This case study was undertaken to measure the formal operational thought capacity of AA Mooney (Not his real name). This participant is a twelve year old African American male in the seventh grade who attends middle school in Macon Georgia, but he is originally from Los Angles California. This case study is on the A B honor roll and plays football for his school. His parents are both educated and they are both in the home and are part of the middle socioeconomic class. This case study has one male sibling who is one year younger. Throughout his free time, mostly on weekends or after school, the participant enjoys playing a variety of video games on his play station, and shooting hoops in his backyard with his brother. Generally, my case …show more content…
Unfortunately, not every adolescent develops into this stage “The stage of formal operations involves the development of hypothetical-deductive reasoning which is the capacity to think scientifically and apply the accuracy of scientific methods to cognitive task (Inhelder and Piaget, 1958).” Abstract thought, metacognition, meaning, thinking about thinking, and problem solving are the higher order thinking skills that appear in the formal operational stage. In this particular stage, the individual learns to develop assumptions that are not often grounded in actuality, such as hypothetical-deductive reasoning. Adolescents at this point in their development are moving from inductive to deductive reasoning. “Piaget and his colleagues developed an experiment called the “pendulum problem” with which they wanted to assess whether individuals had reached the formal operational stage. Classically, he had children balance a scale using different types of weights (Inhelder and Piaget, 1958).” It is only in early adolescence could children understand the connection between space or distance from the center of the scale and the mass of the weights. This method involves a length of string and a set of weights. AA was asked to take into consideration three factors; the length of the string, the heaviness of the weight, and the power of push. The assignment was to work out which factor was most important in defining the speed of swing of the pendulum. AA was able to change the
The last stage of Piaget’s cognitive development is known as the Formal Operational Stage, which occurs between the ages of eleven and sixteen. Adolescents have now gained the ability to think in an abstract matter, and can now understand things such as science and algebra. The most distinct difference between the
The teacher could place two cups that have the same amount of liquid in the cups but because one of the cups is taller than the other the child is going to think the taller glass has more liquid in it. The third stage is the concrete operational stage which occurs during ages seven to eleven. The term concrete operational means the child can reason only about tangible objects presents. So the child can conserve and think logically but only with practical aids. Thinking becomes less egocentric with increased awareness of external events. The fourth and final stage is the formal operational stage which occurs during ages eleven to fifteen. This stage focuses on hypothetical thinking and scientific reasoning. Piaget believed that only children can learn when they are ‘ready’ to learn. He also believed that development couldn 't be ‘sped up.’ Piaget believed that children learned through the resolution of disequilibrium (self discovery, active participation). He believed that teachers should ‘bend’ to children’s needs, provide an appropriate environment, promote self discovery, exploratory learning, self-motivated learning, and set challenges to existing schemes.
One thing that puts an adolescent in the formal operational stage is the ability to think abstractly about
According to the textbook, Life-Span Human Development, 7th edition, by Carol Sigelman, on page 50, "adolescents who reach the formal operations are able to think more abstractly and hypothetically than school-age children. They can define justice abstractly, in terms of fariness, rather than concretely, in terms of the cop on the corner or the judge in the courtroom. They can formulate hypotheses or predictions in their heads, plan how to systematically test their ideas experimentally, and imagine the consequences of their tests." As of right now, I believe that I am currently in the formal operations stage of Piaget's cognitive development theory. This stage occurs when an individual turns about 12 and continues into adulthood. An example
As the brain is not fully developed until the age of twenty-five, this weakness is used to institute indoctrination among the masses. According to Piaget, this is the Formal operational stage, in which people develop the ability to think abstractly, using logic to consider problems never met before. They are able to divide their attention, discern between different factors, and think hypothetically
During the formal operational stage, a person begins to use deductive reasoning and begin to think critically about certain topics and ideas. The 16- year-
This case study was undertaken to measure the formal operational thought capacity of AA Mooney (Not his real name). This participant is a twelve year old African American male in the seventh grade who attends middle school in Macon Georgia, but he is originally from Los Angles California. This subject is on the A B honor roll and plays football for his school. His parents are both educated and they are both in the home and are part of the middle socioeconomic class. This participant has one male sibling who is one year younger. Throughout his free time, mostly on weekends or after school, the participant enjoys playing a variety of video games on his play station, and shooting hoops in his backyard with his
Finally, the theory touches about formal operational stage which is the most complete stage of development and continued intellectual development depends on the accumulation of knowledge by the individuals. This stage begins at approximately 12 years old to adulthood. They begin to think abstractly and reason about hypothetical and theoretical problems. Adolescents can think systematically and reason about what might be as well as what is which allows them to understand better in different fields such as politics, ethics, science fiction as well as to engage themselves in scientific reasoning.
In this stage, adolescents are able to think logically about abstract ideas or events that can potentially occur (“Piaget Stages”, 2015). Adolescents in this stage can also formulate hypotheses and logically use symbols related to math and science. This stage perfectly describes Barry. The teen excels at math and proudly calls it his “favorite subject.” His math homework is always jam-packed with steps that all lead up a (correct) solution. He also enjoys talking abstract ideas such as freedom, happiness, and love. He has literally spoken for hours about the meaning of
The cognitive stage of high schoolers, sophomores through seniors, is typically the formal operational stage. The students have been in the concrete operational stage since they were 7, and should have had many years under their belt to progress into the formal operational stage. The final level of Piaget’s stages of development, formal operational, states that “abstract and purely symbolic thinking is possible” (Slavin, p. 32). Potential and hypothetical situational are very possible and “forms are separate from content” (Slavin, pg. 35). One concern is that in Piagets stages of development, he believed that not all humans made it to the final stage, or they poked in and out of in from time to time. This way of thinking many affect the way
Jean Piaget discovered that our capacity for reasoning is developed in four stages: sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operations, and formal operations stage (Hutchinson, 2015). Sensorimotor (birth to 2 years) is when and infant gradually learns to coordinate sensory and motor activities, and develops a beginning sense of objects existing apart from self. Preoperational stage (2 to 7 years) is when a child starts to discover rules that they can apply to new information, sometimes they can over complicate the rules which leads to them making mistakes. Concrete operations
In the concrete operational stage between the ages of seven and twelve, children become capable of logical thought, they also start to be able to think abstractly. However they are best suited to visible or concrete objects and things they can see (Lee and Gupta). Once the child has reached the formal operations stage from twelve years onwards it becomes more practiced at abstract processing, carrying out problem solving systematically and methodically thus completing the cognitive development process.
Both Berk (2010) and Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford (2012) claim that by this age an adolescent should be thinking in more abstract, systematic and logical ways. Therefore, according to the articles researched for this issue and the behavior exhibited by this adolescent would indicate a delay in cognitive development. This delay not only affects his personal reasoning, but also has delayed his cognitive development to solve hypothetical problems, thus, lower his ability solve situations not yet experienced. Remaining in the concrete operational
According to Piaget's theory, adolescence is referred to as the formal operational stage, which is the final stage of his theory. The formal operational stage describes a time in which one is able to form abstract thought, and solve hypothetical situations. It's during this time that teenagers also gain the ability to analyze their own thought processes (Santrock, 2017, pg. 362).
Adolescence was the fourth and final stage of Piaget’s cognitive development model, formal operational thought. This stage marks the emergence of abstract thought and hypothetical reasoning (Broderick & Blewitt, 2015). This new line of reasoning is extended to relationships, both concrete and hypothetical, and the ability to attend to multiple relationships simultaneously develops (Broderick & Blewitt, 2015). During this stage the individual also begins to establish a sense of focus, blocking out external stimuli to attend to the task at hand. Along with this attentive focus comes the ability to identify the abstract nature of an issue or situation and draw inference about its complexity.