Practical - 1

Aakanksha Verma
Group 1
Shaheed Rajguru College of Applied Sciences for Women
Aim
To study the Piagetian conservation and classification tasks in a child in preopeational stage relative to a
child in concrete operational stage.

Basic Concept

Cognition
All processes of thought, conscious and unconscious, fall under the umbrella of cognition. The word
cognition originates from the Latin word Cognito (Cognito comes from a Greek word gnosis) which
means knowledge. Cognition refers to the inner processes and product of the mind that lead to
“knowing”. It includes all mental activity- attending, remembering, symbolizing, categorizing, planning,
reasoning, problem solving, creating, and fantasizing.

Cognitive development refers to the construction of thought processes. The word “cognitive” is derived
from the Latin word cognoscere, which means to know. Hence, all psychological processes and
activities involved in thinking and knowing are cognitive activities. These include how information is
acquired, processed, and organized. Cognitive development is the study of how these processes develop
in children and young people, and how they become more efficient and effective in their understanding
of the world and in their mental processes.

Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

According to Piaget, human infants build and refine psychological structures, i.e. organized ways of
making sense of experience that permit them to adapt more effectively to the environment. He believed
that children develop these structures actively, using current structures to select and interpret
experiences, and modifying those structures to take into account more subtle aspects of reality.

Piaget’s theory of cognitive development is considered to be a constructivist approach to cognitive

development as he believed children discover or construct virtually all knowledge about their world
through their own activity.

There are three key-components of Piaget’s theory:-

Schemes

Key
Elements

Organisation Adaptation

1. schemas
 Piaget defined schemas as the basic building blocks of the way people understand world around
them. Initially these schemes are representative of a physical or sensorimotor action patter, such as
picking up or reaching for an object. However, as children develop, their schemes move to a mental
level, reflecting thoughts. Piaget comments that this transition from sensorimotor approach to
cognitive approach is based on mental representation.
Mental representation is the internal depiction of information that the mind can manipulate. The
most powerful mental representations are images and concepts.
2. Adaptation
In adaptation children develop new schemas by directly interacting with the environment. It contains
two components as follow:-
a. Assimilation – It is defined as process by which children add their new experience into their
already existing mental structures, i.e. schemas. For instance, a child who encounters a laptop in
home and calls it a television is assimilating the laptop into his existing schemas of television. It
is an active process as children do not absorb all the information they encounter, they are
selective in doing so. Assimilation helps them to make sense of the outside world.
b. Accommodation – It is defined as modifying the existing ways of thinking in response to a new
experience. For instance, when a child sees a laptop and calls it a television with alphabets and
numbers, he is beginning to accommodate new knowledge, modifying his schema of television.

The balance between assimilation and accommodation is changes over time, when children
are not changing much, they assimilate more than they accommodate, called cognitive
equilibrium. Whereas, during times of rapid cognitive change, children are in a state of
disequilibrium. This back-and-forth movement between the two is known as equilibration.

3. Organization
The process of organization is an internal process, apart from the direct contact with the
environment. After he children form new schemas, they rearrange them, link them with other
schemas to create a strongly interconnected cognitive system. For instance, gradually the baby can
relate “walking” to “running”.

Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

A stage theory of development was developed by Jean Piaget based on his research. He believed that
when the child develop and goes through the process of assimilation and accommodation, their brain
also develops through the process of maturation. Hence, children’s understanding of the world matures
and their ability to accurately interpret and predict the world develops.

Some researchers reject Piaget’s stages while retaining his view of cognitive development as an active,
constructive process. Other support a less tightly knit stage concept. Still others deny both Piaget’s
stages and his belief in the existence of general reasoning abilities.

Piaget proposed four stages of development. These stages are fixed in sequence, i.e. they cannot be
completed in any other order. The stages are as follows:-
1. Sensorimotor Stage (birth – 2 years old)
It is the first stage of cognitive development of children according to Jean Piaget, which involves
first two years of life. Piaget believed that infants and toddlers “think” with their eyes, ears, hands,
and other sensorimotor equipment. They are unable to perform activities mentally. He suggested that
children develop a circular reaction a sensorimotor response that originally occurred by chance
strengthens into a new scheme as the infant tries to repeat the event again and again.
Piaget divided the sensorimotor stage into six sub stages. The age at which an infant reaches a
particular sub stage varies from one infant to another. Piaget viewed development as a more gradual
process than the notion of different stages might seem to imply. The six sub stages are as follows:-

Coordination
Primary Secondary Teritiary
Simple of Secondary Mental
Circular Circular Circular
Reflexes Circular Representation
Reaction Reaction Reaction
Reaction

a. Simple Reflexes (1-4 Months)

This is the first sub stage of sensorimotor stage involving the first four months of life. During
this time various inborn reflexes are at the center of a baby’s physical and cognitive life.
These reflexes determine the nature of child’s interaction with the world. Regardless of the
 experience encountered by babies, they suck, grasp, and look in much the same way. For
instance, babies grasp anything placed in front of them.

b. Primary Circular Reaction (4-8 months)

During the period of 4-8 months, infants gain voluntary control over their actions through
primary circular reaction. A primary circular reaction occurs when an infant repeats chance
behavior mostly motivated by basic needs. At this stage infants also begin to vary their
behavior in response to environmental demands. In addition, they also start coordinating
separate responses into single integrated activity. For instance, an infant stare at something
while touching it.

c. Secondary Circular Reaction (4-8 months)

During this stage infants develop schemas for repeated actions that bring desirable
consequence. Also, infants begin to imitate other people’s behavior more effectively as they
gain more control over their behavior.
At this stage, infants begin to notice that if they make noise other people around them will
respond with noise of their own. Hence, their vocalization increases.

d. Coordination of Secondary Circular Reaction (8-12 months)

At this stage, goal-directed behavior is developed in infants. For this, various schemas are
combined and coordinated to generate a single act to solve a problem. For instance, they will
point towards the toy they want, or they will push one toy out of their way to reach for
another.
During 8-12 months of life, infants also develop object permanence. It is the realization that
people and object exists even when they cannot be seen. Although, they somehow still makes
the A-not-B-error, i.e. if they reach several time for an object at one hiding place (A), they
see it moved to another (B), they still search for it in the first hiding place.

e. Tertiary Circular Reaction (12-18 months)

Piaget defined tertiary circular reaction as schemas regarding the deliberate variation of
actions that bring desirable consequences. Infants begin to perform miniature experiments to
observe conseuqnces. For instance, they figure how to unlock the door, or how to open
cabinets in their reach.

f. Mental Representation (18 months- 2 years)

Mental representation is defined is an integral image of a past event or object. According to
Piaget, at this stage infants are capable of imagining the location of an object which is out of
their sight. For instance, if a ball rolls under a piece of furniture, they can figure out where it
is likely to emerge on the other side.
 Mental representation is also helpful in deferred imitation, which is the ability to remember
and copy the behavior of models who are not present. For instance, driving a car, or feeding a
doll.

Piaget believed that an infant gradually develops through all these 6 substages. However, findings have
shown that the cognitive attainments of infancy and toddlerhood do not develop in the neat stepwise
fashion as predicted by Piaget.

2. Preoperational Stage (2-7 Years)

As the infant move forward to preoperational stage from sensorimotor stage they experience
extraordinary increase in representational, or symbolic activity.
Advances in Mental Representation – Piaget believed that language is the most fixable means of
mental representation. It permits for for more efficient thinking if thoughts are detached from
actions. However, Piaget did not consider language as the primary ingredient in childhood cognitive
change, instead according to him senosirmotor activity leads to internal images if exoerience, which
children then label with words.
Make-Believe Play – According to Piaget, children strengthened their newly acquired rsprestational
schemas through pretending. Make-believe-play advances through three-stages, as follows:-

Play Detaches from Real-Life

Conditions Associated with it

Play Becomes Less Self

Centered

Play Includes More Complex

Combinations of Schemas
a. Play Detaches from the Real-Life Conditions Associated with it – Adults’ action
influence children’s earliest acts. These acts by children are not yet flexible. Research by
Rakoczy, Tomasello, and Striano in 2005 shown that children younger than age 2 will
pretend to drink from a cup, but refuse to pretend a cup as a hat. After 2 years, children
 pretend with less realistic toys, and as they reach age 3 they may take on one fictional
identity in one pretend game and another fictional identity in another pretend game.
b. Play Becomes Less Self Centered – Research by McCune in 1993 showed that when
children realize that agents and recipients of pretend actions can be independent of
themselves, their make-believe becomes less self- centered. Their actions are now directed
towards other people or object, such as dressing a doll, or making tea for a parent.
c. Play Includes More Complex Combinations of Schemas – Research by Kavanaugh in
2006 shown that later children combine pretend schemas with those of peers in socio-
dramatic play, the make-believe with others that is under way by the end of the second year
and increases rapidly by complexity during childhood.

Make-believe plays contribute to and reflect children’s cognitive and social skills. Creasey et al
in 1998 found that during sociodramatic play preschooler’s interaction last longer, show more
involvement, draw more children into the activity, and are more cooperative. A number of
studies have also shown that make-believe strengthens a wide variety of mental abilities,
including sustained attention, memory, logica reasoning, language and literacy, and the ability to
reflect on one’s own thinking and take another’s perspective.

Drawings – Golomb in 2004 suggested that development of children’s artful representation is

influenced by a number of factors. However, a drawing process develops in the following
sequence:-

First
More Realistic
Scribbles Representational
Drawings
Forms

a. Scribbles – Children’s initial intended representation is in the form of gestures, instead of

resulting marks on a page. Research by Wimmer in 1986 showed that one 18-month-old
 made her crayon hop around the page, and as it produced a series of dots, explained,
“Rabbit goes hop-hop”.
b. First Representational Forms – As children reach age 3, their scribbles start to become
pictures. An important change occurs when they start using lines in their drawing to
represent the boundaries of the object. Fine motor and cognitive limitations make the
preschooler reduce the figure to the simplest form that looks human. As children reach 4-
years of age, they add features like eyes and nose to their drawing.
c. More Realistic Drawing – Research by Toomela in 2002 showed that greater realism in
drawings develop gradually, as perceptions, language, memory, and fine-motor capacities
improve.

Research has also fond cultural variations in development of drawing. Children who belong
from a rich artistic tradition make rich elaborate drawings that reflect the convention of their
culture. On the other hand, children from cultures that have little interest in art, produce
comparatively simple drawings. For instance, when children from Papua New Guinea, a
remote region with no indeginous practical art, were asked to draw a human figure for the first
time, most nonschooled Jime 10-15 years old produced non-representational scribbles and
shapes or simple “stick” or “contour” images (Martlew and Connolly, 1996).

Limitations of Preoperational Thought

Preoperational stage has the following limitations:-

a. Egocentric and Animistic Thinking – Egocentric refers to failure to distinguish others’

symbolic viewpoints from one’s own. Piaget argued that children’s egocentric bias
prevents them from accommodating. On the other hand, animistic thinking refers to the
belief that inanimate objects have lifelike qualities.
b. Inability to Conserve – conservation refers to the idea that certain physical characteristics
of objects remain the same, even when their outward changes. There are various types of
conservation, i.e. mass, length, area, weight, and volume. The inability to conserve reflects
centration and irreversibility.
c. Lack of Hierarchial Classification – Children at this stage face difficulty with
hierarchial classification- the organization of objects into classes and subscales on the
basis of similarities and differences.

Follow-up researches on this stage present evidence in favour as well in against to what
Piaget believed about children’s cognitive development. When given simplified tasks based
on familiar experiences, preschoolers show the beginning of logical thinking. That
preeschollers have some logical understanding that strengthen with age indicates thatthey
acquire operational reasoning gradually.
3. Concrete Operational Stage (7-11 Years)
At this stage, children’s thought become more logical, flexible, and organized, more closely
resembling the reasoning of adults than that of younger children. During the concrete operational
stage children’s ability to conserve develops and provide clear evidence of operations. For instance,
in conservation of liquid children state that the amount of liquid has not changed. The child is also
now capable of decentration.
At this stage, since children pass Piaget’s class on inclusion problem, they become aware of
classification hierarchies and can focus on relations between a general and two specific categories at
the same time. Children also start collecting stuff, such as collection of stamps, coins, rocks etc
become common in middle childhood.
Children also develop the ability of seriation, i.e. the ability to order items along a quantitative
dimension, such as length or weight. The concrete operational stage children can seriate mentally,
i.e. transitive inference.
Piaget found that school-age children’s understanding of space is more accurate than that of
preschoolers. Preschoolers and young school-age children include landmarks on the maps they draw,
but their arrangement is not always accurate. But if the map is rotated, they have difficulty. Around
age 8 to 10, children’s maps become better organized, showing landmarks along an organized route
of travel. By the end of the middle childhood children combine landmarks and routes into an overall
view of a large scale space. Cultural frameworks influence children’s map making. Research by
Parameswaran in 2003 compared 12-year-old in small cities in India and in the United States.
Children were asked to draw maps of their neighborhoods, the Indian children represented many
landmarks and aspects of social life. The researchers found that children from the United States drew
a more formal, extended space, highlighting main streets and key directions but few landmarks.

Later conducted researches on concrete operational stage suggested that the forms of logic required
by Piagetian tasks do not emerge spontaneously, instead they are influenced by training, context, and
cultural conditions.
Limitations of Concrete Operational Stage
Concrete operational stage also has a number of limitations. One of the major limitation is that
children’s mental operations work poorly with abstract ideas. They think in an organized, logical
fashion only when dealing with concrete information that they can perceive directly. The continuum
of acquisition of logical concepts is another limitation of concrete operational stage, i.e. children are
able to master concrete operational only step by step.

4. Formal Operational Stage (11 Years and Older)

This is the last stage of Piaget’s stages of Cognitive Development. It includes age group of 11 years
and older. St this stage, children develop the capacity for abstract, systematic, and scientific
thinking.
 According to Piaget, as children reach adolescence they develop hypothetic-deductive reasoning, i.e.
when faced with a problem they start with a hypothesis, or prediction about variables that might
affect an outcome, from which they deduce logical and testable inferences. Along with this, children
also develop propositional thought, i.e. adolescent’s ability to evaluate the logic of propositions
without referring to real-world circumstances.
Osherson and Markman in 1975 conducted a study with children and adolescents in which they
showed them a pile of poker chips and asked whether statements about the chips were true, false, or
uncertain. They found that children focused on the concrete properties of poker chips, and on the
other hand adolescents analyzed the logic of statements.
The cognitive changes that adolescents went through had several consequences for them. Piaget said
that a new form of geocentricism develops in adolescence in which adolescence face problems in
distinguishing their own and others’ perspectives. According to his followers, at this stage children
develop two distorted images if the relationship between self and others:-
a. Imaginary Audience – It is defined as adolescents’ belief that they are the focus of everyone
else’s attention and concern.
b. Personal Fable – It is defined as being certain that others are observing and thinking about
them, i.e. teenagers develop an inflated opinion about their own importance.

Adolescents also develop idealism and criticism at this stage of life as they are now able to imagine
alternative family, religions, political, and moral systems, and they want to explore them. A temsion
between the parent and the child is created because of the disparity created between teenagers’ idealism
and adults’ more realistic view.

Decision making at this stage is highly dependent on “feel-good” behavior and the appeal of immediate
rewards, the brain’s emotional or social network tends to prevail, and adolescents are far more likely
than adults to emphasize short-term over long-term goals.

Follow-up researches on formal operational stage found that that individuals in tribal and village
societies rarely do well on tasks typically used to assess formal operational reasoning (Cole, 1999).

Concept of Conservation Task and Classification

Conservation means that certain physical characteristics of objects remain the same, even when their
outward appearance changes. Piagetian conservation tasks help in understanding how children
understand things at different ages and how this understanding changes as children gain life experience
in the world that surrounds them.

There are seven Piagetian tasks as follows:-

1. Number
2. Length
 3. Liquid
4. Mass
5. Area
6. Weight
7. Volume

Piaget believed that children at preoperational stage are not able to conserve and gradually master them
over the concrete operational stage. The inability to conserve at preoperational stage indicates that the
child’s understanding is cenetered, i.e. their focus they focus on only one aspect of the situation and
neglect other important features. It also reflects that the child is easily distracted by the perceptual
appearance of objects. The inability to perform any conservation task also shows that the child is
incapable of reversibility, i.e. the ability to go through a series of steps in a problem and then mentally
reverse direction, returning to the starting point.

Piaget also gave classification tasks to test cognitive development of children. Hierarchial classification
is the ability to simultaneously sort things into general and more specific groups, using different types of
comparisons. According to Piaget preoperational children are not able to perform classification tasks,
and it gradually develops as the child grows through concrete operte operational stage.

Criticism of Piaget’s Theory

In spite of the fact that Piaget's work was incredibly huge and changed the manner by which youngsters'
reasoning was seen, there have been criticisms of his work. Piaget’s theory’s main critisim is that Piaget
underestimated the capacity of children in his theory. Many researchers argued that children possess
many of the abilities at an earlier age than Piaget suggested. According to Donaldson, children are
capable of solving problems associated with operational thought if they were given help. Another
criticism of Piaget’s theory is in regard to his research method. Most of his theory is highly influenced
by his observation of his own three children, and the others were from well-educated professionals of
high socio-economic strata. Because of this unrepresentative sample, his findings cannot be generalized
on to a larger population. Yet another criticism is regarding lack of clear operationally defined variables.
Researchers are unable to replicate Piaget’s theory because Piaget did not provide specific definitions
for each variable, and to replicate his observations and objectively measure how one variable leads to
changes in another, researchers need to have very specific definitions of each variable. Researchers have
also commented against Piaget’s argument that all children will automatically move to the next stage of
development as they mature. Research has suggested that environmental factors may play a role in the
development of formal operations.

However, despite the theory’s criticism, Piaget’s theory of cognitive development is highly influential
even today. The theory is been further developed and its major identified criticisms are examined to
improve it.
Vygotsky’s Theory
Lev Vygotsky was a Russian and a student of literature, law and cultural studies. He developed the
Socicultural Theory. According to Vygotsky, infants are endowed with basic perceptual, attention, and
memory capacities that they share with other animals. He viewed human cognition as inherently social
and saw language as the foundation for all higher cognitive processes. According to Vygotsky, private
speech, or language used for self- guidance, emerges out of social communication as adults and more
skilled peers help children master challenging tasks within their zone of proximal development, i.e. a
range of tasks too difficult for the child to do alone but possible with the help of adults and more skilled
peers. Eventually, private speech is internalized as inner, verbal thought.

Intersubjectivity and scaffolding are two features of social interaction that promote transfer of cognitive
processes to children. Guided participation recognizes cultural and situational variations in adult support
of children’s efforts.

Vygotsk’s theory helps in understanding a wide cultural variation in cognitive skills. However, his
theory did not pay much attention to biological contributions to cognition and abut how children
internalize social experiences to advance their learning.

Literature Review
Marwaha, Goswami, and Vashisht conducted a study to assess Piaget’s principles of the intuitive stage
of preoperational period among 4-7-year-old children relative to their Intelligence quotient (IQ). They
found that the mean IQ score of children who possessed perceptual egocentrism, cognitive egocentrism
and egocentrism in dental setting was significantly higher than those who lacked these characteristics.

Eggen and Kauchak in 2000 found that Piaget’s theory does not offer a complete description of
cognitive development.

Asokan et al in 2014 conducted a study to assess the characteristics of egocentricism, lack of

conservation, centration, and reversibility. They found out that all the three features assessed were
observed in most of the children in the preoperational stage as claimed by Piaget and many of his
principles are valid till ate.

James McGarrigle replicated one of Piaget’s experiments and tested his explanation that young children
cannot compare class and sub-class dye to the characteristics of centration. He found out that young
children were capable of class inclusion at an age younger that what Paiget claimed, and that it was the
way Piaet worded the question that confused the children.
Rose and Blank in 1974 replicated Piaget’s study and found out that many children could conserve at an
age younger than what Piaget claimed.

Method

Design of the Study

For the purpose of the study 2 children from 2 different age groups were selected. One child was from
preoperational stage, i.e. 2-7 years, and another child was from concrete operational stage, i.e. 7-11
years.

The aim of the study was to study the Piagetian conservation and classification tasks in a child in
preopeational stage relative to a child in concrete operational stage.

For the study total seven tasks were designed – 5 conservation tasks (conservation of number, length,
mass, volume, and area), 1 classification task, and 1 egocentric task. For conservation of number coins
were used, for conservation of length 2 pencils of equal length were used, for conservation of area two
biscuits were used, for conservation of volume 2 identical glasses filled with colored water and 1 non
identical glass were used, for conservation of mass two identical balls of clay were used, for
classification task 5 red colored squares and 5 yellow colored triangle were used, and for egocentric task
a toy and a pencil was used.

Material Required
1. Coins
2. Pencils
3. Biscuits
4. Clay
5. Water
6. Glass
7. Shapes
8. Toy

Participants
1. Preoperational Child
Age - 4 and a half Years Old
Gender- Female
Place of Conduction- Participant’s home
2. Concrete Operational Child
Age – 8 Years Old
Gender – Female
Place of Conduction – Participant’s Home
Method
Observation and Interview methods were used for the study. In observational research method behavior
is systematically observed and recorded. It is a non-experimental method as no variable is manipulated
by the researcher. Data collected through this method can be qualitative as well as quantitative in nature.
On the other hand, the interview method of research is a conversation with purpose and is non-
experimental in nature. It involves an interviewer and an interviewee. The interview can be structured,
semi-structured, or unstructured, and the data collected can be qualitative or quantitative.

Procedure

Rapport Formation
For the purpose of the study a positive rapport was formed with the subject to make subject at ease. The
subject was made comfortable with some casual talks before beginning with the study. For the same,
questions such as “what do you do like to do in the day?”, “which is your favourite cartoon?”, “what is
your favourite color?”, etc. were asked from the subject.

Instructions
We are going to play a game. I will show you some things and ask simple questions. You have to answer
whatever you understand of them. You will have to first listen very carefully before you answer. After
we’re done with this game, you will get a chocolate. If you do not understand anything you can just ask
me.

Conduction
After the establishment of a positive rapport with the subject and providing the subject with
instructions, the actual conduction of the study began. Te conduction started with conservation of
number task. For this two rows of coins of similar sizes, five in each row were lined up about two
inches apart in the center in front of the child. The child was to acknowledge that they are equal in
number. The child was asked “which row has more coins, or do both rows have the same number of
coins.” They were then asked why they gave such an answer. Then coins from the first row were
more spread out in front of the child and again the child was asked which row has more coins, or
whether both the rows have same number of coins.

Conservation of number was followed by conservation of length. For this task two pencils of equal
length were placed parallel to each other. The child was supposed to acknowledge that both of them
are equal in length. For this, the child was asked “which pencil is longer and which one is shorter, or
are both of them of equal length”. This was followed by asking them the reason for their particular
 answer. After this, one of the pencils was shifted upwards. The child was then again asked which
pencil is longer and which is shorter, or both of them are of equal length.

This was followed by conservation of mass. To test conservation of mass two balls of clay of equal
size were used. The subject was asked whether both of the balls are of equal size or one of them is
larger than the other and one is smaller. The child is asked for a reason for their answer. Then one of
the balls was flattened and the child is then again asked whether both of the balls are of equal size or
one of them is larger than the other and one is smaller. This is followed by questioning the child why
they think so.

After this, conservation of volume was conducted. For this task 2 glasses of same shape and length
filled with colored water and one empty glass of different shape and length were used. The subject
was supposed to acknowledge that even after pouring the water in the different shaped glass, the
volume of water is still same in boh of the glasses. For this task, firstly the subject was shown two
glasses of same shape length filled with colored water. The child is then asked whether both of the
glasses have equal volume of water one has more than the other. The child is then asked for a reason
for the given answer. The water is then poured into another glass of a different shape length. The
child is then again asked the same question, followed by asking the reason for the same.

Conservation of volume was followed by conservation of area. To test conservation of area one
whole biscuit was given to the subject and one biscuit was broken in 2 equal pieces and kept with the
researcher. The subject was then asked whether the researcher and the subject have equal biscuits or
one of them have more than the other. After this, subject’s biscuit was broken into two equal pieces
and then the subject was again asked whether both of them have equal amount of biscuits or one
have them have more than the other.

After conducting all conservation tasks, classification task was conducted. For the classification task
the subject was presented with 5 red colored squares and 5 green colored triangles. First, the subject
was supposed to classify squares and triangles. After this, the subject was asked to classify red
colored shapes from yellow colored shapes.

And at last egocentricism task was conducted. For this task a toy and a pen was used. The researcher
hid the pen in front of the teddy. The subject is then asked whether the teddy saw it or not. The
subject is then asked for a reason to their answer.

The interview was recorded and behavior of the subject was noted down. After the completion of
conduction of all tasks the subject was given a chocolate and thanked for participating in the study.

Precautions
 1. An informed consent should be taken from the subject. The informed consent ensures that the
subject is aware of all the potential risks and costs involved in a treatment procedure.
2. Adequate rapport should be formed with the subject to make sure that the subject is at ease.
3. The research should be conducted in a distraction-free environment.
4. Transformations for conservation tasks should be done in front of the subject.
5. All activities in the research should be carried out in a playful manner.
6. The care must be taken that no physical or psychological harm is caused to the subject.

Result

Task Pre Operational Stage Concrete Operational

Stage
Conservation of Number Could Not Conserve Could Conserve
Conservation of Length Could Not Conserve Could Conserve
Conservation of Mass Could Not Conserve Could Conserve After
Prompting
Conservation of Volume Could Not Conserve Could Conserve
Conservation of Area Could Not Conserve Could Conserve
Classification Task Could Not Conserve Could Conserve
Egocentricism Could Not Conserve Could Conserve

Interpretation
All processes of thought, conscious and unconscious, fall under the umbrella of cognition. The word
cognition originates from the Latin word Cognito (Cognito comes from a Greek word gnosis) which
means knowledge. Cognition refers to the inner processes and product of the mind that lead to
“knowing”. It includes all mental activity- attending, remembering, symbolizing, categorizing, planning,
reasoning, problem solving, creating, and fantasizing.

A stage theory of development was developed by Jean Piaget based on his research. He believed that
when the child develop and goes through the process of assimilation and accommodation, their brain
also develops through the process of maturation. Hence, children’s understanding of the world matures
and their ability to accurately interpret and predict the world develops.
the aim of the study is to study the Piagetian conservation and classification tasks in a child in
preopeational stage relative to a child in concrete operational stage.

 Task 1- Conservation of Number

Two rows of coins of similar sizes, five in each row were lined up about two inches apart in the
center in front of the child. The child was to acknowledge that they are equal in number. The child
was asked “which row has more coins, or do both rows have the same number of coins.” They were
then asked why they gave such an answer. Then coins from the first row were more spread out in
front of the child and again the child was asked which row has more coins, or whether both the rows
have same number of coins.

Preoperational Child- The preoperational stage child was not able to conserve numbers. When both
the rows were equally spread out the child pointed out at the first row from his side saying that line
has more coins than the other. When the child was asked for answer, he replied “kyuki ye badha
hai”. The child did not have a concrete reason for his answer. For the second time, when one of the
rows was more spread out than the other, the child again pointed out towards the same row and gave
the same reason for his answer. The child was not able to conserve maybe because of lack of
cognitive development. Research by Goswami, 1998 support these findings that children aged less
that 6 years are unable to understand Piaget’s tasks.

Concrete-Operational Child- The concrete-oprational stage child was able to conserve. First time,
when both the rows were equally spread out, the child first counted the coins in both the rows and
then answered that both the rows have equal number of coins. Second time, when one of the rows
was more spread out than the other, the child again first counted the number of coins and then
answered that both of them have equal number of coins. When asked for a reason the child replied,
“mene count kia hai, dono rows equal hai”. Through this it could be interpreted that the child is able
to conserve numbers and also that cognitive development is not delayed.

 Task 2 – Conservation of Length

For conservation of length task two pencils of equal length were placed parallel to each other. The
child was supposed to acknowledge that both of them are equal in length. For this, the child was
asked “which pencil is longer and which one is shorter, or are both of them of equal length”. This
was followed by asking them the reason for their particular answer. After this, one of the pencils was
shifted upwards. The child was then again asked which pencil is longer and which is shorter, or both
of them are of equal length.

Preoperational Child – The pre operational child was not able to conserve. When both the pencils
were aligned the child perceived one pencil to be longer than the other. The reason given by the
child was “kyuki ye lambi hai”. Then, after shifting one of the pencils upwards, the child again
pointed out towards the same pencil stating that it is longer than the other. The child was not able to
 conserve due to the weakness in the way children think during preoperational stage. Research by
Asokan et al (2014) had similar findings.

Concrete Operational Child – The concrete operational stage child was able to conserve. The subject
was able to understand that when one of the pencils is shifted upwards, still both of them have equal
length. The subject was able to acknowledge that the pencil has been only shifted and not increased
in length. This suggests that concrete operational children has developed the ability to obey logical
rules. Research by Samuel and Bryant (1984) found that older children do significantly better than
younger children on the conservation task.

 Task 3 – Conservation of Area

To test conservation of area one whole biscuit was given to the subject and one biscuit was broken in
2 equal pieces and kept with the researcher. The subject was then asked whether the researcher and
the subject have equal biscuits or one of them have more than the other. After this, subject’s biscuit
was broken into two equal pieces and then the subject was again asked whether both of them have
equal amount of biscuits or one have them have more than the other.

Preoperational Child – The preoperational could not conserve. When the subject was asked why the
researcher have more biscuit, the subject replied “kyuki aap k paas 2 hai”. This could be due to lack
of decentration, i.e. the subject focused on only the number of biscuits one has and not the area of
biscuits.

Concrete Operational Child – The concrete operational child was able to conserve. The subject
acknowledged that even if the researcher have 2 biscuits, the area for both of their biscuits is same.
This suggests that the concrete operational child has developed decentration and is able to focus on
other important features too.

 Task 4 – Conservation of Mass

To test conservation of mass two balls of clay of equal size were used. The subject was asked
whether both of the balls are of equal size or one of them is larger than the other and one is smaller.
The child is asked for a reason for their answer. Then one of the balls was flattened and the child is
then again asked whether both of the balls are of equal size or one of them is larger than the other
and one is smaller. This is followed by questioning the child why they think so.

Preoperational Child – The preoperational child could not conserve. The subject replied that “ye gol
zada hai kyuki qo dusra wala patla hai”. The subject was not able to conserve because children of
this age tend on focus on static characteristics of objects, i.e. they lack the concept of reversibility.
The subject could not imagine the flattened clay being molded back in the shape of a ball.
 Concrete Operational Child – The concrete operational child was able to conserve. However, after
one of the balls was flattened the initial response of the subject was that the other ball is bigger than
the flattened one, but after giving a prompt the subject was able to conserve. The subject gave the
reason that “wo ball ko hi toh patla kia aapne”. For this task, the subject might be able to conserve
because of the prompt provided. This suggests that the subject is still developing the concept of
reversibility.

 Task 5 – Conservation of Volume

For this task 2 glasses of same shape and length filled with colored water and one empty glass of
different shape and length were used. The subject was supposed to acknowledge that even after
pouring the water in the different shaped glass, the volume of water is still same in boh of the
glasses. For this task, firstly the subject was shown two glasses of same shape length filled with
colored water. The child is then asked whether both of the glasses have equal volume of water one
has more than the other. The child is then asked for a reason for the given answer. The water is then
poured into another glass of a different shape length. The child is then again asked the same
question, followed by asking the reason for the same.

Preoperational Child – The preoperational child could not conserve. After the water was poured into
another glass, the subject could not perceive that the volume of water in both the glasses is still the
same. The subject reasoned the answer by stating “kyuki ismelambe glass m paani upar tak hai”. The
subject was not able to conserve because subject’s understanding is centered on one aspect only, i.e.
the subject centers on the height of the water and fails to realize that changes in width compensate
for the changes in height.

Concrete Operational Child – The concrete Operational child could conserve. The subject was able
to acknowledge that the amount of liquid has not changed after being poured in a different glass. The
explanation provided by the subject was “pehle wale glass ka pani hi toh dala. Jab usme paani equal
tha to isme bhi hoga hi”. This suggests that the subject has developed decentration and hence is able
to focus on several aspects of problem and relating, instead of focusing on only one aspect.

 Task 6 – Classification
For the classification task the subject was presented with 5 red colored squares and 5 green colored
triangles. First, the subject was supposed to classify squares and triangles. After this, the subject was
asked to classify red colored shapes from yellow colored shapes.
Preoperational Child – The preoperational child was not able to classify. When the subject was asked
to differentiate squares from triangle, the subject was not able to do so. The subject also was not able
to classify red colored shapes from yellow colored shapes. The subject could not classify even after
giving prompts. This could be because the subject is not taught about different types of shapes and
colors. However, Piaget argues that preoperational children do not think reversibly.
 Concrete Operational Child – the concrete operational child was able to conserve. The subject could
easily classify between different shapes as well as between different colors. This suggests that at this
stage children are able to focus on relations between a general and two specific categories at the
same time.

 Task 7 – Egocentrisism
For this task a toy and a pen was used. The researcher hid the pen in front of the teddy. The subject
is then asked whether the teddy saw it or not. The subject is then asked for a reason to their answer.

Preoperational Child – The preoperational child showed egocentricism, i.e. failure to distinguish
others’ symbolic viewpoints from one’s own. The subject could not acknowledge that the toy is a
non-living thing and hence cannot see. The reason given by the subject was “mujhe dikha toh use bhi
toh dikha hoga na”. This could be due to centration in preoperational children. This subject only
focused on the fact that she was able to see it, hence the toy also saw it.

Concrete Operational Child – The concrete operational child showed decrease in egocentricism. The
subject could acknowledge that the toy is a non-living being and hence cannot see. The child gave
the reason “use kaise dikhega wo living nahi hai”. This suggests that the child at this stage have
developed decentration and is able to consider others’ perspective.

Conclusion
From table no.1 it can be concluded that out of 5 conservation tasks the preoperational child was not
able to perform any conservation task the concrete operational child was able to perform all
conservation tasks. It can also be determined through the table the preoperational child was also not able
to perform classification or egocentricism task, and on the other hand the concrete operational child was
able to perform both of these tasks. Therefore, the study confirms with Piaget’s theory.
 References
 Berk. Laura E., (2017). Child Development. India: Pearson
 Mitchell, P. and Ziegler, F. (2007).Fundamentals of development: The Psychology of Childhood.
New York: Psychology Press.
 Santrock, J. W. (2011). Child Development (13th Ed.). New Delhi: McGraw Hill.
 Feldman, R.S.&Babu.N. (2011).Discovering the Lifespan.Pearson .