Information-Processing Theories

• View children as undergoing continuous cognitive change.

• Describe how cognitive change occurs.

• Mostly concerned with the development of learning, memory, and problem-solving skills.

Information Processing Theories:Child as Problem Solver

• difficulties solving some problems because of lack of planning/use of strategy

3 factors that lead to a lack of planning in young children1. Sometimes plans fail (high failure rate leads them to

believe planning is “not worth the effort”)2. Young children are overoptimistic (e.g they think

they can remember more, get more done, and communicate more effectively than they can)

3. Inhibition is difficult

Information Processing Theories

Cognitive growth is the result of three processes working together and improving with age:

1. Basic Processes (e.g. encoding, generalizing, recognizing objects)

2. Use of Strategies (e.g. rehearsal, selective attention)

3. Content Knowledge (e.g. scripts)

• - greater knowledge of the world increases ability to encode and recall info because it makes it easier to relate new material to old. (e.g. playing first vs. 10th card game)

Speed of Processing Increases with Age

Myelination (the covering of neurons with myelin, a fatty substance that insulates the axon) helps speed processing and increases the child’s ability to rule out distractions.

Both experience AND brain maturation (Innate--pre-programmed development) and experience play a role in changes in information processing (e.g. paving roads + beating pathways analogy)

Core-Knowledge Theories:Child as Theorist

Principles of core-knowledge theories:– Children have innate cognitive capabilities– Children form informal theories to help them

organize related information (naïve physics, psychology, and biology)

– Focus on areas (such as understanding people) that have been important throughout human history

Modularity and Domain Specificity

objects

numbers

people

Principles of Modularity

1. Results in Domain Specificity--a special system dedicated to a particular domain (people, number, objects, faces, etc.)--system answers questions specific to that area.

e.g 2 balls need contact to move, but people don’t

Principles of Modularity

2. Fast and Mandatory

3. Restriction on Information Flow- Information Encapsulation and Lack of Access to Interlevels

e.g. Hollow Mask/Face illusion

Principles of Modularity

4. Characteristic Breakdown

Autism--Lack Naïve Psychology?

Prosopagnosia -- Unable to Process FacesWernicke’s aphasia--lack of meaning in language

but grammar is intact (e.g. She swam everywhere he could go but when it flooped his way over my brother....)

Broca’s Aphasia--lacks grammar but meaning is intact (e.g. chair fall over broke)

* Not all skills (e.g. memory) or domains (e.g. language) have 1 specific location/system

Sociocultural Theories of Cognitive Development

• Cognitive development occurs in interpersonal contact—(interaction with parents, siblings, teachers, and playmates).

• Children are products of their cultures– Emphasize aspects of cognitive development that involves use

of cultural tools, like symbol systems, artifacts, skills, and values.

• E.g. Vygotsky vs. Piaget: Whereas Piaget depicted children as trying to understand the world on their own, Vygotsky portrayed them as social beings intertwined with other people who were eager to help them learn and gain skills.

Sociocultural Theories: How Cognitive Change Occurs

• Guided participation: knowledgeable individuals guide learning

• Social scaffolding: More competent people provide temporary frameworks that lead children to higher-order thinking.

• Zone of proximal development: The range between what children can do unsupported and what they can do with optimal social support.

• Intersubjectivity: Shared communication– Joint attention: Infants and social partners focus on common referent.

– Social referencing: Children look to social partners for guidance about how to respond to unfamiliar events.

The Visual Cliff and Social Referencing

If Mom looks fearful,child won’t cross.

If Mom looks happy,child will cross.

Child uses emotional cues from social partner to interpret new things!

Conclusion

• Why so many different theories?• The cognitive theories have contradictory features--It

is not possible to create a unified grand theory – (though they don’t disagree on all aspects so in many ways are

complementary).

• Each theory emphasizes different aspects and each has its strengths and weaknesses

• We incorporate insights from all four theories to help us understand children in different ways and in different settings.