PIAGET, KOHLBERG AND VYGOTSKY

 Salient features of the Theory of JEAN PIAGET, a French-speaking Swiss psychologist

a) He was a pioneer of the Cognitive Development Theory, focused on the cognitive aspect of human development

b) He gave a detailed picture of how thinking is processed among individuals, concluding that the difference between adults' and children's thinking is qualitative and not quantitative

c) He asserted that development occurs in distinct, measurable, and observable stages

d) He made an assumption that developmental growth is independent of experience and based on a universal characteristic

e) His theory assumes that development is unidirectional with all children reaching each stage at approximately at the same age

f) He briefly propagated the theory of Morality, which was later expanded by American psychologist Kohlberg

g) He stated that development necessarily precedes learning

Salient features of the Developmental Theory of Lawrence KOHLBERG, a post-graduate student of Chicago University

a) He tried to expand the theory of morality that Piaget gave briefly

b) He assumes that there are 3 levels of morality that each individual faces — Preconventional, Conventional, Post Conventional— that are then subdivided in stages

c) He relied for his studies on stories such as the Heinz dilemma, and was interested in how individuals would justify their actions if placed in similar moral dilemmas

d) According to him, children in primary childhood, do actions with one thing in mind – If something goes wrong I would be punished. He therefore accomplishes task in such a way that he escapes punishment

e) According to him, children in middle childhood, begin to perceive themselves as responsible to others because of the importance of getting along and of being a good citizen. They seek to act appropriately because people matter to them, not just to avoid punishment

f) He stated that children’s developing psychological understanding heightens their sensitivity to human needs and contributes to empathy for others. Whereas a preschooler may sympathize with another but not know what to do, older children are more likely to assist a classmate who is attacked by a bully or to raise money to help children in a developing country.

Salient features of the Social Development Theory of Lev VYGOTSKY, a Russian Psychologist

a) He proposed the Social Theory of Development

b) According to him social interaction plays a fundamental role in the process of cognitive development

c) Contrary to Piaget, who said - development necessarily precedes learning, he said - social learning precedes development. He states: “Every function in the child’s cultural development appears twice: first, on the social level, and later, on the individual level; first, between people (inter-psychological) and then inside the child (intra-psychological).”

d) He investigated child development and how this was guided by the role of culture and interpersonal communication. Vygotsky observed how higher mental functions developed historically within particular cultural groups, as well as individually through social interactions with significant people in a child's life, particularly parents, but also other adults

e) He introduced the notion of zone of proximal development (ZPD)

f) ZPD is name given to an innovative metaphor capable of describing not the actual, but the potential of human cognitive development