Cognitive development II - (information processing, core knowledge and sociocultural approaches)

Introduction to Chapter 6

- Three alternative theories to explain children's cognitive development. - The information processing approach begins with an analysis of the particular cognitive processes involved in specific cognitive tasks (ie tasks involving attention, memory, problem solving). - The core-knowledge approach assumes that children may develop understanding of certain aspects of the world from a very young age and that cognitive development in these "core knowledge" domains proceeds more rapidly than in other domains. - Sociocultural approaches which focuses on the ways peers, family, teachers and friends affect cognitive development.

Task analysis

A careful specification of all of the processing steps that are required to complete a particular cognitive task or problem.

Theory of Mind

A coherent understanding of mental states such as thoughts, beliefs, desires and intentions.

Mediational deficiency

A failure to use a mnemonic device caused by an inability to carry out the cognitive operations required to execute the strategy.

Production deficiency

A failure to use a mnemonic strategy even though one has the cognitive capacity to carry it out.

THE SOCIAL CULTURAL APPROACH

- all the approaches so far view cognitive development as something that happens in the children's mind. - The sociocultural approach differs by shifting the way that interactions between children and their parents, teachers and peers drive cognitive development. - The person who in many ways is the father of the socio cultural approach is the Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky. a contemporary of Piaget, he received a law degree from Moscow university and then went on to study literature, linguistics and child development. - As with Piaget his work was largely overlooked by Western scientists until all his works were translated into english in 1960. - Unfortunately Vgotsky died at the age of 37 years of age and therefore never had the time to interact with western scientists who wanted to test his theories. - His theoretical stance was in no doubt inspired by the political doctrines of Soviet Marxism, which stressed the role of collective effort and social conditions in shaping individuals. - Vgotsky general view of child development is that children are inherently social beings who are influenced by the environment and who in turn influence and cause changes in their environment. - According to this view, children are born with certain innate perceptual, memory and attention capacities. These develop during the first two years of life as the child explores and interacts with their physical and social environment. - A MAJOR DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PIAGET AND VGOTSKY is around the role of language in cognitive development. For Piaget, the rapid development of expressive language is just one of the many achievements of the pre operational stage. For Vgotsky, language plays a central role in driving young children's learning and cognition. - For example, Piaget saw the self talk of young children (5-6) as egocentric speech when making a puzzle where Vgotsky saw it as an adaptive tool that helped children learn new tasks and skills. - According to Vgotsky, language is the most powerful tool that societies have developed for transmitting knowledge from one human to another. - THREE KEY ELEMENTS OF VGOTSKY'S THEORY 1) Social scaffolding 2) Zone of proximal development (ZPD) 3) Private speech SOCIAL SCAFFOLDING Children's learning and cognitive development is aided by scaffold - more competent social partners such as parents, teachers, older siblings. The key idea is that social scaffold helps children develop more complex ways of thinking and problem solving that they would normally achieve on their own. Ideally, this means starting with the goals of a task, showing how it might be done and helping children carry out the most difficult parts. When a child attempts a new and challenging task , a significant amount of scaffolding might be needed. But as the child becomes more proficient social guidance can be withdrawn. Considerable support for the theory of social scaffolding. In infancy, high levels of emotional communication with parents and joint attention to objects are associated with more advanced play, language, perspective taking and problem solving. More structured parental or peer guidance through the early stages of learning has also been shown to boost children's understanding of numerical concepts and problem solving and reasoning. The notion of social scaffolding and COOPERATIVE LEARNING is central to a NUMBER OF INNOVATIVE APPROACHES TO CHILDREN'S EDUCATION. The quality of the scaffolding tend to increase with the age and experience of the mentor. One reason is that adult guides are more likely to encourage children to actively problem solve and to encourage the child to become more independent whereas child mentors are more likely to tell a younger child how to do something. Another important facet of scaffolding is that it is ongoing through the learning process. Most children (like adults) benefit from ongoing assistance from mentors even after they have mastered the basics. ZONE OF PROXIMAL DEVELOPMENT - In explaining the process of social scaffolding, Vgotsky used the term of zone of proximal development (ZPD) to refer to the difference in performance that is observed when a child attempts a task independently as compared when the child attempts the task with a more knowledgeable person. - For example, two children may show similar levels of unaided performance on a task but because one child shows greater improvement that the other when assistance is provided, they may have different zones of proximal development. - Vgotsky argued that parental or teacher instruction is most effective when directed at a level within a child's ZPD. - An important implication of ZPD is that it provides a new way for assessing and testing learning difficulties. Again, consider a child who is struggling at school and who preforms relatively poorly on static tests such as the Weschler Intelligence Scale for Children. Vgotsky argued that such poor academic performance may be the result of chronic learning/intellectual disability or may simply reflect poor motivation and previous negative experience in the classroom. To distinguish between these possibilities we need to assess the child's expert guidance to instruction; that is their potential to learn. If they are simply demotivated, then they should show improvement in performance with the right kind of instruction. (ie James at Villa Maria and now at one of the top selective schools). - This approach to educational assessment has called for a "dynamic" assessment of a child's ZPD. Just how well these assessments explain future learning outcomes it is still to be assessed. - It is important to note that Vgotsky's assessment does not replace more static tests where children of a similar age are given the same standardised test without guidance or assistance. In other words, we still need methods for assessing a child's memory, attention and problem solving - the kinds of focus that are the Piagetian frameworks and information-processing approaches. - We can learn about a child;s good or bad performance by assessing their ZPD. PRIVATE SPEECH - Private speech is the key for children's learning. - As children grow and they master a task they move from overt self talk to the use of more covert speech such as lip movements or whispers. This pattern is generally true for children regardless of their academic ability, although children with specific learning disabilities and with attention deficit disorder often show a developmental delay in the shift from overt to covert self talk relative to academically average children. - When children are making errors during problem solving they are more likely to use private speech.

THE CORE KNOWLEDGE APPROACH THEORY OF THE MIND

An approach to cognitive development which assumes that children have developed specialised mechanisms for learning about certain important domains. - According to this approach, acquiring knowledge about certain key areas, in their environment is important for the child's survival and adaptive functioning. Three key domains have been identified: a) physics (knowledge about innate objects in space); (b) biology (knowledge about living things); (c) psychology (knowledge about the motives, intentions, beliefs and emotions of human beings). These domains are seen as special in that children have specific knowledge about them from an early age, and they acquire knowledge about each domain very quickly. # Many core-knowledge theorists argue that this reflects the evolutionary significance of these domains. # From an evolutionary point of view, it is very important for children to have an early understanding of physical objects so they can perceive and move about the environment without being hurt. # Knowledge about animals and plants is useful for their nourishment, and avoiding poison and predators. # Finally, understanding other people's psychology is a key part for developing social relationships and communicating basic needs. # These core concepts helps us further understand how these domains should be taught to children. # A number of core-knowledge theorists have implied that children come up with informal or "folk" theories. # This approach is sometimes referred to as the "theory-theory". # Children's naive theories are of course not formal deductive theories. # Nevertheless, according to these theorists children's naive theories sometimes share important information with adult scientific theories. # Children's understanding of biology is an area that illusrates core knowledge domains well. Chdilren as young as two years old can discriminate between living and non-living objects and behave differnty towards each other. # By the age of four, children understand the need to reproduce for food and water apply across a different range of animals but that such mechanisms do not apply to non living things. # Preschool children believe that animal activities such as movement are caused by something inside the animal, rather than by external forces that determine the behaviour of inanimate objects. # With parental exposure and formal schooling, children will gradually learn that not all their theories about the world are correct. Gradually, early theories are replaced by more complex ones. For example, before the age of 7 most children believe that biology is applicable to animals and not plants. Gradually, though, children learn that plants share many of the same properties as animals, including reproduction, growth and adaptive movement. THEORY OF MIND - children's understanding of human psychology - Wellman As children interact with other people and reflect on these interactions, they begin to build a theory of mind - a coherent understanding of mental states such as thoughts, beliefs, desires and intentions. - the development of a theory of the mind begins in infancy - one of the first clues that children start to understand others come from JOINT ATTENTION - a task where an infant and a partner such as a parent attend to a task or an object. Between the age of 8 and 12 months an infant will monitor changes in the partner's gaze and jointly attend to the same object or event. They will also actively direct adults' attention towards things that interest them. - Another sign is SOCIAL REFERENCING - using other people's reaction to threatening events to guide their own behaviour. They begin to use emotional cues such as the caregivers facial expressions (happy, sad, distressed) as a way for exploring new environments or be wary of strangers. - Two key components of Theory of the mind are DESIRE AND BELIEF - FIGURE 6.7 p.204 A summary of Wellman's model of belief-desire reasoning (1990)

Connectionist theories

Cognitive theories that emphasise parallel processing and conceive of memories and concepts as representations that are distributed across a large number of learning nodes.

Retrieval

Of memory, the process by which information stored in the memory system is accessed.

Storage

Of memory, the process of holding information in the memory system over time.

Encoding

Of memory, the process of taking information into the memory system.

Connectionist approaches

- Early information processing relied sequential processing: each step in the information-processing sequence is completed before proceeding to the next step. In contrast, connectionist theories emphasise parallel processing, whereas many of the activities involved in completing a task are processed simultaneously. - One of the key features of the connectionist models is that children learn through experience. - Connectionist models have been used to explain a large number of important aspects of children's functioning including object permanence, conservation, face recognition, problem solving, and the way that grammar and word are acquired. - One of the important contributions of these models is that they offer ways of explaining how children learn complex concepts, skills and strategies without having to assume that children have innate knowledge of these domains.

EVALUATION OF THE SOCIAL CULTURAL APPROACH

- In Vgotsky's world the child is seen as part of a larger system involving parents, peers, mentors, and the surrounding culture. In many ways these views are shared by the "dynamic-systems" approach discussed earlier. - When we are trying to understand at child's knowledge and information processing abilities we cannot look at just their knowledge but must also look at their learning environments, including the strategies employed by teachers and mentors when teaching. - Vgotsky and dynamic-system theorists see learning outcomes as joint product of a child's ability and their learning environment. - The approach has yet to explain the mechanisms that produce individual differences in the ZPD. - Also, many of the theories still need to be empirically evaluated.

EVALUATION OF THE CORE KNOWLEDGE APPROACH

- Some aspects of this approach are still in need for clarification. One issue that remains to be resolved is how exactly we identify a "core" area of knowledge. When infants demonstrate an early ability on a task, how can we be sure that it is innate knowledge or specialised learning system, as opposed to a high level of experience and familiarity with the task???? - Second issue is how do naive biology for example interact with changes in more domain general aspects of children's concept learning such as memory, learning and attention. - These approach has many contributions to understanding children's thinking for example understanding how some types of knowledge are acquired more rapidly than others. - This approach also highlights the importance of realising about our evolutionary system when trying to determine how children learn about and adapt to their environment.

INFORMATION PROCESSING APPROACH

- The information-processing approach first emerged in the second half of the 20th century and now represents the dominant field of cognitive development. - The term information processing is borrowed from computer science and the approach often draws parallels between the way computers work and the way human beings process information. - A computer's ability to process information is determined by both its hardware and software. Hardware includes the capacity of the computer's memory systems, its ability to process information in parallel and the sped in which it executes basic functions. - Software components include the specific routines and programs that have been installed to process information for example word processing, creating graphs, drawing pictures and playing games. - Human information processing is influenced by "hardware" factors such as memory capacity and the speed in which new information enters the cognitive system. It is also determined by "software" such as knowledge and strategies that are available for particular tasks. - The computational analogy seeks to build a step by step model of how children take in new information and transform it and use it. - Often such models are described in flowcharts which describes how the information enters and is modified by the cognitive system. - These models have evolved in processing, making them easier to test experimentally. - FIGURE 6.1 page 183 Flowchart of a hypothetical information-processing sequence for visual recognition of a cat Basic processes 1: Attentional Development - Our perceptual system provides us with an enormous amount of information from the outside world, much more than what what we can interpret at any given moment. - Ou attentional system helps us cope and make sense of all this information. - When a mother tells a child to pay attention she is re directing her child to selective attention - whereas the task is to focus only on one stimuli and to stop focussing on competing stimuli (such as the TV). - Development of selective attention has been studied extensively using tests of incidental learning. In a typical study, children are given pairs of pictures and are told that they need to memorise only one type of picture (eg memorise only the ones with animals) and they can ignore the other pictures. Children are then asked to repeat the target pictures ant he pictures they were asked to ignore. - Children farewell on incidental memory - that is they remember well pictures they were told to ignore. At around 11 years of age, the amount of incidental information recalled decreases. This means that older children are usually better at redirecting their attention to a particular target and filtering out incidental information or irrelevant distractions. - These means that we want young children to focus attention on a particular task at school it would be good to remove distractions. On a computer screen, for example, relevant and irrelevant information can be separated spatially or presented in different colours. Repeated prompts to focus only on task-relevant details may also be helpful. - another important aspect of attention is SUSTAINED ATTENTION. That is the ability to stay on task over a sustained period of time and its particularly important when the child is learning a new task or is trying to solve a difficult problem. Sustained attention in play activities increases with age. Longitudinal studies have shown that measures of children's sustained attention in 1-2 is predictive of attention in early childhood. Such research suggests that it may be possible to identify children who are at risk of attentional developmental disorders at a very early point in their development. BASIC PROCESSESES II: MEMORY DEVELOPMENT - Memory is one of the most important information-processing abilities and its involved in every aspect of our child's life. - The development of memory is important in teh acquisition of academic skills such as learning geography, history or mathematics. - It is also critical to our emotional and social development. - Before child can start bonding with a parent they have to remember the parents face, body shape or voice, and to recognize these features every time the parent appears. Our relationships with family and friends are governed by memories of past experiences with those people. - Three processes of memory: 1) Information needs to be taken into the memory system, a processes referred to as encoding. 2) That information needs to be held in storage over time. 3) Finally, retrieval is the process by which we access information stored in memory. When we look at memory development we need to examine each of these processes. Study memory by looking at RECOGNITION and RECALL. - Infant memory starts at birth an even before (auditory memory). - Memories of newborns are fragile. - Operant conditioning techniques used to test memory. - As children grow they can recall more and more numbers in a sequence. - Memory strategies become very important - people use them to help them remember something. MNEMONIC STRATEGIES Three of the most common ones are: - rehearsal: repetition of events - organisation strategy: eg grouping an unfamiliar group in alphabetical order - elaboration: the use of salient mental images - many young children do not use these memory strategies due to mediational deficiency (inability to carry out the cognitive operations required to execute the strategy) and production deficiency ( failure to use a mnemonic strategy even though one has the cognitive functions to do so). - with age, children become more likely to spontaneously employ memory strategies to assist future retrieval. - the complexity of children's strategies also increases with age. - research has shown that children rather than relying on on e strategy often use many strategies. Children will try as many as 4 strategies in a simple memory test. Strategy variability in creases with age and is associated with better memory performance. - adults often use simple strategies like rehearsal when trying to remember a telephone number. ROLE of GENERAL KNOWLEDGE * A second important information-processing mechanism that is linked to memory development is the growth of general knowledge about the world. Knowledge and memory are closely related. What we know about a topic influences how well we learn and remember information about that topic. * This principle starts as soon as 14 years of age. There is evidence that acquired knowledge can affect memory in 14 month olds. * With age, children's knowledge of everything increases. * This affects two components of memory that general knowledge affects : CONSTRUCTIVE MEMORY and the EFFECTS OF MEMORY OF EXPERTISE AND CULTURE. * basic notion that memory does not play like a tape recorder which can capture and replay event that takes place. During encoding and retrieval, people seek to understand and interpret information, often deleting trivial information and incorporating details inferred from general knowledge. This concept has some similarities to Piaget's concept of assimilation of new information into familiar schemes. * As children get older, memory becomes even more constructive as they become increasingly active information processors. * If a child has a very strong interest in a particular area of expertise (chess, soccer) he can perform as well or better in memory tests in that subject are against adults who know less about the area. * Children are more likely to use effective memory strategies in areas they have some expertise. Finally, expertise increases the speed of memory processing . So that the child encodes new information relevant to the expertise domain than non expertise, freeing up cognitive resources to use effective mnemonic strategies. ROLE OF METAMEMORY # means knowledge about memory. # it means knowing general facts about memory (eg that shorter lists are easier to remember than longer lists) but also knowledge about our won memory ( eg whether asking a person's name once you will be able to remember next time). # studies have shown that memory knowledge may be linked to performance. THE DEVELOPMENT OF IMPLICIT MEMORY # We have two components to memory: explicit memory (direct) and implicit (indirect) memory. One popular way to study implicit memory is through repetition priming - a procedure in which previous exposure to a stimulus causes an improvement in subsequent performance, even when there is no conscious awareness of the initial learning episode.

Dynamic-systems theories

- The information-processing approach has proved very successful in understanding how specific cognitive processes involved in memory, attention, problem solving and concept formation work. However the approach has not linked how these cognitive areas might be related. Part of the reason is because of the complexity of the problem. - recent developments in mathematics and engineering have risen lass to theoretical models that can cope with this problem. these dynamic-systems aim to explain interactions between developments in different domains such as perception,motor activity, attention, language, memory and emotion.

CONCLUSION OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT II

- There is little doubt that children's parents, peers and culture play a very important role in many aspects of cognitive growth.

Learning objectives

6.1 Describe the basic assumptions of the information-processing approach to cognitive development, including the concept of task analysis. 6.2 Describe the major cognitive and behavioural changes in attention that take place during infancy and childhood. 6.3 Describe the major changes that take place in infant's and children's memories. 6.4 Explain two new, emerging theoretical approaches to cognitive development (connectionist and dynamic systems). 6.5 describe the basic assumption of the core-knowledge approach to cognitive development. 6.6 Describe the major developmental changes that take place in children's theory of mind. 6.7 Explain the importance of culture, schooling, peer relationships and mentoring in cognitive development. 6.8 Conduct a practical research exercise on the development of children's memory.

Private speech

A form of cognition in which children talk to themselves often as a way of guiding them through new tasks.

Reactivation

A procedure developed by Rovee-Collier in which infants recover a memory from a past event following an appropriate reminder cue.

Repetition priming

A procedure used to demonstrate implicit memory in which previous exposure to a stimulus causes an improvement in subsequent performance., even when there is no conscious awareness of the initial learning episode.

Joint attention

A process whereby the infant and social partner jointly attend to some object or event.

Information processing approach

An approach to cognitive development that begins with an analysis of the particular cognitive processes involved in cognitive tasks and then examines how these processes change and develop with age.

Sociocultural approach

An approach to cognitive development that emphasises the influence of interactions between children and their parents, teachers and peers.

Core knowledge approach

An approach to cognitive development which assumes that children have developed specialised mechanisms for learning about certain important domains.

Cultural tools

Artifacts that are used as models or references to guide children's cognitive activities. These include maps, models and reference books.

Organisation

In memory strategies, a mnemonic strategy in which to be remembered material is grouped according to some familiar framework.

Rehearsal

In memory strategies, a mnemonic strategy involving the repetition of to-be-remembered items.

Elaboration

In memory strategies, a mnemonic strategy which involves processing to be remembered information in a more meaningful way.

Metamemory

Knowledge about memory, including knowledge about the general facts of memory as well as knowledge about one's own memory.

Incidental learning

Learning that takes place without deliberate intention.

Implicit (indirect) memory

Memories of previous experiences that affect our behavior even though we are not consciously aware of the memories.

Explicit (direct) memory

Memory of a previously experienced object or event that is consciously searched for.

Guided participation

Occurs when an older or more experienced person assists a child in the learning of a new skill.

Computer simulation

One way of testing an information-processing model of cognitive development. It involves constructing a computer program based on the model, and providing it with "input" that resembles the experience of a child. If the program simulates an actual child's behavior, the model is supported.

Mnemonic strategies

Techniques that people deliberately employ with the goal of helping them to remember something.

Sustained attention

The ability to stay on task during a sustained period of time.

Childhood amnesia

The gap in people's reports of their experiences before the ages of around three to four years.

Social scaffold

The guidance of more competent social partners (parents and older siblings) that helps the chidlren develop more complex ways of thinking and problem solving.

EVALUATION OF INFORMATION PROCESSING APPROACHES

The information-processing approach has made positive contributions to the study of cognition by showing how performance on complex problems can be broken down into component processes, and by providing explicit explanations how these processes change with age and experience. The specificity of this approach has also been cited as one of the limitations of the approach; as we develop highly specific theories in areas such as memory and attention, arithmetic computation, it becomes more difficult to see how development in each of these areas might be related. This is a major challenge for future information-processing theories. The connectionist and dynamic systems approach may be effective ways of addressing this problem. Indeed these two approaches may also help explaining how developments in cognitive approach interact with social and emotional development.

Encoding specificity

The principle that retrieval of a memory will be better if the contextual conditions present at retrieval are similar to those that were in placed when the memory was formed.

Selective attention

The process by which we focus only on certain target stimuli at a given time and filter out irrelevant stimuli.

Recognition

The realisation that some physically present object of event has been encountered before.

Recall

The retrieval of some past object or event when no memory cues for those objects or events are present.

False belief

The understanding that another person may have a belief about the world which you know to be untrue.

Constructive memory

The way that people use their background and past experiences to retrieve past events.

NEW DIRECTIONS IN THE INFORMATION PROCESSING APPROACH

Two new emerging theories of information processing approach: (1) Connectionist approach (2) Dynamic-systems theories

Social referencing

Using other people's reactions to unfamiliar or threatening events as a guide to our own responding.

Flowcharts

Visual representations of how information enters and is modified by the cognitive system.

Parallel processing

When many of the activities involved in completing a cognitive task are processed simultaneously.