preview

Piaget's Theory Of Cognitive Brain Development

Decent Essays
Open Document

Piaget’s Critics
In the world of cognitive brain development, especially when it comes to children and infants, no one has pioneered the field quite like Jean Piaget has. While Piaget might have been one of the first to create a comprehensive theory on brain development, this means over time researchers have found flaws and criticisms with Piaget’s methods and theories.
Piaget’s theory of cognitive development is based on four key concepts: Assimilation, Accommodation, Adaptation, and Equilibrium. Assimilation is the concept of a child adding new information to an already existing classification, such as learning that a cat and dog can both be four-legged animals, but are not the same thing in my case as a child. Accomodation is when a child changes …show more content…

Using these concepts, Piaget concluded that children are born with very basic but expandable brain structure that allows for the child to learn and create multiplying connections based on their environment and activities.
With these theories however, researchers have come to scrutinized certain aspects of Piaget’s theories and methods that were developed in the 1960’s and 70’s. One criticism from psychologists Neil R. Carlson and William Buskist bring into question is Piaget’s terminology used in his key concepts as he did not include his process and methods of observing and testing his theories, so his observations could not be replicated for confirmation.
Many psychologists such as Wayne Weiten bring up the possibility that Piaget has grossly underestimated the speed of children’s development, such as the ability for a child to comprehend object permanence much earlier than Piaget’s theories had predicted. When children are able to show different rates of growth for abilities such as these, what is the point of having separate stages when there is no set age where these abilities

Get Access