Where a child learns to deal with their environment on the
basis of what they experience through the senses e.g. touch,
taste, smell, seeing, hearing.
According to Piaget
Children are unable to understand that things out of sight,
still exist. But by the end of this stagem the child has learnt
object permanence (being aware that objects exist even
when they are no longer in view)
Baillargeon and Devos
Method (A01)
A screen was designed with a
'notched' at the top. 4 months of age pts
1) Stage 1 - The short carrot was moved
behind the screen from the left and
reappears on the right
2) Stage 2 - The tall carrot is moved similarly, but
because its tall, it appears through the 'notch' in the
screen as it passed from left to right
3) Stage 3 - The tall carrot began to move from left to
right but did not appear, as expected, through the
notch in the screen
Findings (A01)
Infants in the expt looked for much longer in the 3rd
impossible stage than another of the other stages once the
carrot reappeared from behind the screen.
Conclusion (A02)
Infants did not understand that the carrot (even though out
of sight) was still there - the infants' response showed that
they were puzzled when the tall carrot did not appear
through the notch
This is evidence that Piaget's earlier claim that object
permanence was not possible until 8months was incorrect.
Baillargeon & DeVos (1991) -
Evidence against Piaget
Method (A01)
Investigated the abilities of 3.5 and 4.5
month-old infants
Findings (A01)
Even very young children
had object permanence
Implications (A02)
Suggests that how a study is carried out is crucial to
whether or not a child understands object permanence.
2) Pre-operational stage (2-7yrs)
According to Piaget
During this stage, the child is egocentric (they tend to see the world only from their own
viewpoint) e.g. they have difficulty understanding why they have to share their toy or refrain
from hitting another child.
Children tend to lack the ability to conserve (conservation is the
understanding that even thought the appearance of something can
change, the amount of substance there remains the same e.g.
modelling clay from a ball to a sausage shape) during this stage.
Piaget - Conservation of numbers
Method (A01)
1) 2 identical rows of 7 counters are laid out, closely
spaced together
2) Pointing at the rows, the child is asked "Which row has more
counters, or are they both the same?"
3) One row is then rearranged, spreading the counters out so that the row
appears longer. Then the question is repeated to the children.
Findings (A01)
Children answered that the bottom row
has more counters
Children tend to fail at conservation tasks because they don't yet
understand that quantity can stay the same, despite changes in
appearance e.g. coin task. This is because they can only focus on one
aspect of a situation at a time (cent ration - such as height or length, but
not both)
Methodological +/-
- Investigator bias: researchers may have
affect the results due to hand gestures
(pointing) or how they asked the questions
+ Provides evidence that pre-operational stage children struggle
with conservation tasks
Piaget and Inhelder (1952) -
3 mountains task
Method (A01)
1) Child must say what
the doll is able to see,
from different positions
2) The child must 'put
themselves 'in the dolls shoes'
(in order to do this correctly)
3) Experimenter asks the child "What does the
doll when seated at position A, or B, or C?" (In
each case, the perspective of the doll changes)
4) To complete the task successfully, the
child must be able to imagine what the
mountains look like from the doll's position.
Findings (A01)
Children in the pre-operational
stage were not able to complete
this task with satisfactorily
Concluded that this meant that the child
was exhibiting 'egocentrism', an inability to
see things from others' viewpoint
Methodological +/-
+ Each child may have been positioned differently to one
another (meaning that each child doesn't have a fair chance &
may of had a different interpretation)
+ Provides evidence that egocentrism does have an
influence on ones perception
- Biased results?: Children that took part were
only his own and those from a similar
bringing up.
3) Concrete operational
stage (7-12yrs)
1) Most children can successfully achieve conservation
tasks e.g. liquid test, because they're able to mentally
manipulate objects or situations
2) For the liquid task, children need to be able
to reverse the situation to deduce the answer
3) At this stage, children need to
be able to engage in transitivity.
Transitivity = Understanding the relation
between elements. This helps them to
solve mental thinking tasks.
Formal operational
stage (12yrs onwards)
1) A child's thinking becomes more
complex, whereas the concrete O.S,
they think in terms of rules.
2) Abstract & hypothetical thinking is now
possible to test and solve problems and think
about concepts with no concrete reality e.g. they
can debate such as "is there a god?"
3) This kind of realistic thinking sometimes lacks a
sense of realism, so that adolescents, especially,
have difficulty seeing or accepting the practical
limitations inherent in their views.