Piaget’s Theory: Cognitive Development and Learning
Genetic-Cognitive Conception of Learning (Piaget)
Genetic Epistemology
Genetic epistemology is the discipline that studies the mechanisms and processes by which states of less knowledge transition to more advanced states of knowledge (Piaget, 1979).
Learning and Cognitive Development
The level of intellectual competence of a person at a particular moment in their development depends on the nature of their schemes, the number of them, and how they combine and coordinate with one another (Coll, 1985).
Piaget sees cognitive development as a succession of stages and substages characterized by the special way in which patterns are arranged and combined to form structures.
The stages must meet three conditions:
- The sequence of stages must be constant for all subjects.
- A stage must be able to be characterized by a form of organization (structure group).
- The structures that correspond to a stage are integrated into the next stage’s structures as a particular case.
Experience is not sufficient to explain knowledge and development. Maturation is not sufficient either: it determines areas of possibilities and impossibilities but requires the input of experience.
Piaget emphasizes the study of learning rather than its content, in the process as a chairman rather than the result.
Development Factors
Piaget sees development as a succession of stages characterized by specific structures, each of which arises from the one before, integrates it, and prepares for the next.
The traditional factors that explain development are:
- Maturation
- Experience with objects
- Experience with people
Piaget adds a fourth factor: equilibration, an internal factor, but not genetically programmed. This is a self-regulatory process, based on active compensation of the subject in response to external shocks. This factor coordinates the three classic factors.
Intellectual development involves the construction of regulatory mechanisms to ensure ways to balance that are increasingly mobile, stable, and able to make up an increasing number of disturbances.
Equilibration acts as a true engine of development.
Simple Equilibration
The cognitive system of humans shares the tendency of all living organisms to restore lost balance.
Majorant Equilibration
The human cognitive system has a tendency to react to external shocks by making changes in its organization to ensure a better balance, i.e., to enable it to anticipate and compensate for a growing number of possible disturbances.
Equilibration, Development, and Learning
Piaget’s interactionist position is that the necessary intervention of subjects and objects in any learning is modulated by internal equilibration factors. Individuals acquire, after training sessions, skills at a level corresponding to their cognitive development.
Learning will be based on the level of cognitive development of the subject. Only subjects who are operating at a level close to that of the acquisition of the notion will learn it.
Cognitive conflicts play a positive role in the acquisition of new knowledge. The learning process involves interaction between the subject, the learning content, their cognitive schemas, and the learning method, often mediated by others.
Educational Implications
The educational applications of genetic psychology are characterized by their volume and diversity:
- Diversity of educational contexts
- Diversity of levels of education
- Diversity of content
- Diversity of problems
- Several aspects of the educational process
Genetic psychology states that development involves the construction of an ordered series of intellectual structures that regulate the functional or behavioral exchanges of people with their environment.
The order of construction of the structures has a universal character and responds to the majorant equilibration principle: each frame ensures a balance that is more mobile, more stable, and able to handle more trouble than the last.
Each structure allows a greater wealth of trade and greater learning ability than the last.
The ultimate goal of education should be to strengthen and promote the construction of these structures.
Whatever the level of education in which we place ourselves, school education will aim to help students progress through successive stages or levels that shape development.
The learning capacity depends on the level of cognitive development of the subject. The possibility that a student can perform a particular learning task is limited by their level of cognitive competence.
Educationally, it is advisable to analyze the contents of school education to determine the cognitive skills necessary to assimilate them successfully.
Piaget believed that knowledge is the result of a construction process. Knowledge represents a progressive appropriation of the object by the subject. School learning is an active process of development by the student.
The teacher plays a mediating role between the content of the school curriculum and the student who builds knowledge regarding such content.