Good Morning! Please take a seat and direct your attention to the board.

Developmental Psychology

The psychology specialty that studies how organisms change over time as the result of biological and environmental influences.

Overview

Piaget Continuity vs. discontinuity

Piaget’s stages of cognitive development

KohlbergSix stages of moral reasoning

Jean Piaget Pioneer in developmental psychology.

For nearly 50 years studied the cognitive behavior of children.

Piaget’s Discontinuity Stage Model

Sensorimotor Stage

PreoperationalStage

Concrete OperationalStage

Formal Operational Stage

SensorimotorBirth – 2 years

Child relies heavily on innate motor responses to stimuli.

Object Permanence

Wynn’s number study. (Argument)

Preoperational

2 years – 6 or 7 years

Well-developed mental representation and the use of language.

Two major concepts children begin to understand.

Sense of self

Theory of Mind

Preoperational

Two “flaws” with the development.Egocentrism – “World revolves around me”

Animistic Thinking – “Bad table!”

Concrete Operational

6 years – 12 years

Child thinks logically but is unable to understand abstract thought.

IrreversibilitySally’s box of raisins.

Formal Operational

12 years - adult

Think logically about abstract thoughts.

If this, then that.

Reflection

Human cognition unfolds basically in the sequence he proposed.

While specific ages are less accurate.

Research shows that cognition development is more a continuous line than Piaget’s Stages.

Lawrence KohlbergLooked to describe the development of moral reasoning, by using Piaget’s view of cognitive development.

Moral Development

Kohlberg created a series of moral dilemmas and administered them to children, teens, and adults. With his findings he created the moral ladder.

Preconventional Conventional

Postconventional

Six stages broken into three levels

Preconventional

Stage 1Reward and punishment.

No concern for others.

Stage 2Seek personal gain by appealing to another person’s self interest. “You scratch my back I’ll scratch yours.”

Conventional

Stage 3Seek social approval and keeping everyone happy.

Based on personal relationships rather than principle.

Stage 4Emphasis on laws, rules, policies, etc…

Maintaining social order is paramount.

Postconventional

Stage 5(Social contract stage) rules and laws are flexible and can be changed by social consensus.

Emphasis on fairness, rather than blind obedience.

Stage 6Universal principles of conscience that he or she would apply to all people in all situations.

Abstract principles that often refer to dignity and worth of a person.

Activity

Closing Thoughts

You can see that Kohlberg’s stages parallel Piaget’s theory.

Early stages are mostly based on self interest (Egocentrism)

While later stages focus on other peoples expectations.

Unfortunately not all people move on to the later stages. Kohlberg found that many adults never even reach stage 4.

At home look up Carol Gillagan, she strongly disagreed with Kohlberg.