Jean Piaget : Author, Psychologist, Teacher, and Father

On August 9, 1896, Jean Piaget was born in Switzerland. His father was a writer and taught young Piaget about organization and how it related to work. His mother was intelligent yet the extreme changes in temperament made Piaget interested in psychological studies. By age ten Piaget had published his first scientific paper and at the age of twenty two he graduated from the University of Neuchantel with his Ph. D. in science. In 1919, Piaget embarked on a two year period of studies in Paris where he took classes in pathological psychology. It was during this time in Paris, Piaget started working in a laboratory and investigating how and why children reason. He studied children by analyzing their verbal reasoning. This was accomplished by Piaget providing the children with questions that required the children to participate in tasks which related to cause and effect. It was during this two year period of research that Piaget discovered he wanted to work in the field of experimental psychology.

Later in 1921, Piaget became the Research Director at the Jean-Jacques Rousseau Institute in Geneva, Switzerland. At the institute, Piaget planned to study the emergence of intelligence in children. It was during this time he published five books and married. As Piaget advanced through the faculty ranks, he became the Chair of Philosophy in 1925. He also became a father that year to his first daughter. Two years later another daughter was born and four years afterwards, he had a son. Piaget's children inspired him to observe and record their behavior. He observed the genesis of intelligent behavior, ideas of objective consistency, and causality. Symbolistic behaviors such as imitation and play were also observed and studied. Through his research, Piget learned how intellectual operations are prepared by sensory-motor action, before the appearance of language.

As a result of these studies, Piaget focused less on conversation with the child and more on objects that the child could use by himself. He wanted to see if there were successive stages in development that could be observed in concrete situations rather than language. In 1929, Piaget discovered the operative structure and throughout the next few years worked at a rapid pace, as the uncertainty of the war worried Piaget that he would not be able to complete his project in five years. In reality, Piaget's work spanned a thirty year period.

In addition to performing psychological research, Piaget was also a biologist and philosopher. He considered himself a "genetic epistemologist". His biological training made Piaget interested in the relationship between humans and animals. He noted that the difference between humans and animals was that "humans were able to reason through abstract symbolism". As a result of Piaget's studies, educators wishing to teach in the Piagetian Philosophy encourage children to learn through self discovery.

One of Piaget's most famous studies resulted in the Process of Cognitive Development. Piaget found that the most influential factor in a child's development is the interaction of a child among other children. He concluded that children develop better when they interact with peers as opposed to interaction with adults. The down side to this is that sometimes children interact with other children of their same level, which does not challenge them to make the same kind of gains as if they were presented with conflict.

While watching these children, Piaget realized there are four main stages of cognitive development, with each child possibly experiencing all four at a different pace, based on that child's advancement or regression. The first stage of development is from birth to about two years of age and is called the Sensorimotor Period. Children in this stage of development have a cognitive system that is limited to motor reflexes. Infants develop these reflexes in greater strength in order to accomplish more advanced interactions. At the age of seven months, the child learns how objects still can exist while they are not in plain view. This is known as object permanency. It is also during this stage that basic tasks and activities are developed into more complex interactions. By having better control of their movements, Piaget discovered children's intellectual abilities increased as well. He noted that children begin to experiment with the muscles of the face and mouth to imitate simple words spoken to them by parents or caretakers.

Next, Piaget used the term, Pre-Operational Period to describe children from age two to about age six or seven. It is during this stage that children begin to use language and develop mental imagery. Many of the child's thoughts during this period are non-logical and involve thought that is very egocentric in nature. After the Per-Operational Period comes the concrete Operational Stage. This stage occurs from the ages of six or seven until the ages of eleven or twelve. Children at this stage are able to consider someone else's point of view and see it from more than one perspective. Children have the ability to reason but are fully unable to understand all possible outcomes in a given situation. Facts, rather than the abstract, are preferred by children during this stage. They also have developed a logical thought pattern and can use logic and reason to solve simple problems.

Finally, the last stage of development is the Formal Operational Stage. This stage starts at age eleven or twelve and continues throughout adulthood. People in this stage can think logically, abstractly, as well as theoretically. Piaget believed this was the highest stage of development yet not everyone is able to obtain it. Even for those that were able to reach this stage, Piaget believed that people needed to revise their knowledge bases, as learning is a lifelong process.

Throughout his studies, Piaget was intrigued by intelligence. He discovered that intelligence was a form of adaptation by a child using assimilation and accommodation. Piaget believed adaptation "is the process of adjusting schemata to cope with the child's environment, which involves assimilation and accommodation". Assimilation is the fitting of new information into existing cognitive structures, while accommodation involves adjusting mental structures to deal with new information and assimilation does not work. As a result, a new concept is developed.

As part of his studies dealing with intelligence, Piaget developed the Theory of Intelligence which states, "Intellectual abilities that a child possesses at a given age permit certain types of emotional behaviors". Another of Piaget's studies in Genetic Epistemology stated that intellectual processes of complexity are built on the primitive foundations achieved in earlier stages of development. Piaget also noted that genetics contributes in the development of intelligence, mainly contributing to help or hinder the ability for children to move from one stage of development to another. This is especially important for people who think they can teach a child to move from one stage of development to another. Piaget noted that a person can challenge a child to new experiences and ideas; however, it is not possible to be able to teach them out of one stage to the next.

While Piaget's early works did not gain acceptance; it was only after they were translated from French to English that American researchers and psychologists first noted these Piaget's findings. He was met with criticism for not using the traditional experimental method, rather his clinical method instead. Also, his findings were doubted due to the small sample size he used in his research. Piaget defended his actions stating that his small sample size was appropriate to the type of research he was conducting with the children. Later after much discussion, Piaget's work was finally deemed experimental and Piaget received the recognition he deserved.