Play and Cognition in Infants

The stages of Jean Piaget – although too strictly, and some would say erroneously, associated with specific timetables in infant development – is still perhaps the most comprehensive look at the cognitive development of infant children available to the world of developmental psychology. Piaget’s first two stages (i.e. sensorimotor, preoperational) provide a valid outline and analysis of steps a child makes from outer discovery to internal development.

Summary

Piaget’s sensorimotor stage gives us great insight into the sensory and perceptual development of an infant. The six substages of the sensorimotor stage bring the infant through a series of developments that ultimately lead to an understanding of object permanence (Tuch, 2009). What begins as merely the ability to integration information from a singular sense evolves into the usage of multiple senses as the infant explores the world around them. Through trial-and-error and subtle play, an infant begins to understand some aspects of cause-and-effect before developing an “object” concept (Boyd & Bee, 2009, p. 122). Towards the end of the sensorimotor stage, the child is able to form mental representations of objects and understands the aforementioned object permanence.

Throughout the sensorimotor stage and well into the preoperational stage, play becomes an important part of a child’s life. Play not only teaches the child about the environment around them (opening them up to the outside world), but also begins to shape their imagination and their ability to think symbolically.

Play begins with the child manipulating objects. These manipulations build a solid foundation on which the child can understand the rules of the physical world. From exploring the world around them, children then begin to pretend play. This is the marker that pinpoints the move between Piaget’s sensorimotor and preoperational stages, signified by a more symbolic cognition (Boyd & Bee, 2009). Once the preoperational stage is entered, the child becomes capable of dealing with more complex problems using this symbolic understanding. The child begins to develop an ability to think in abstract terms, role-play and understand rules-based games (Boyd & Bee, 2009).

Discussion

Understanding the development of cognition is paramount in understanding how and why the mind develops in certain ways. It’s important not only to understanding the learning process, but also in social development, as well as uncovering the root of mental disorders that may plague a client later in their life.

The development of cognition lies at the heart of the continuous versus discontinuous debate (Berk, 2008). How do infants and older children respond to the world around them? Do they see things in a fundamentally different way than their adult counterparts? Do children have “unique ways of thinking, feeling and behavior” that differ from adults (Berk, 2008, p. 5)? Piaget’s research exemplifies the sort of staged development of which proponents of discontinuous development adhere. Understanding this staged cognitive process better helps researchers understand the rationale behind a child’s actions and thought process – important information when attempting to examine the best parenting style or teaching utility to better position a child for positive growth.

Even though most are critical of the exactness that Piaget portrays in his age-divided stages, Piaget pioneered the modern developmental psychologist obsession with determining the essence of thought at each year of a child’s life. Understanding what goes through a child’s mind helps us understand the best way to approach proper teaching, as well as enhance mental stimulation.

Comparison

Krull (2010) quotes Jean Piaget’s famous saying “play is the work of childhood” in her blog post about the importance of play in adulthood, as well as childhood. Although her blog post is primarily an opinion piece concluding that adults need to play more, there is important information in there about childhood play as a problem solving utility.

Krull (2010) uses examples from her own children to emphasize the problem solving capabilities in childhood. She finds a fascination in seeing how each one of her children uses play differently in their day-to-day lives (Krull, 2010). Her oldest child often reads and keeps to herself, often wandering and acting fidgety (Krull, 2010). Krull (2010) equates that with a certain need that the fidgety movement fulfills. Her middle child is mostly social, playing consistently with others, while her youngest child prefers to be alone playing “Little People” for hours on end (Krull, 2010).

Krull (2010) brings up the importance of such play in the development of problem solving abilities. This is evident in children during their very first stages of life. Something as simple as playing with blocks helps children solve the problems of exploring the outside world and understanding the laws of physics and reality (Boyd & Bee, 2009). In terms of Piaget, it helps them to develop their schemes (Boyd & Bee, 2009). Krull (2010) makes note that play gets children’s imaginations out in front of them (i.e. gets them using their eyes and hands in pretend scenarios) so that they can experiment in life, but within the safety of play.

Krull (2010) pointed out the importance of play in cognitive development, but it was Jean Piaget that pioneered the understanding of cognitive development in children. Whereas Krull (2010) focused on the external presentment of play as observed by the family, Ellis and Siegler (1996) turn their powers of observation to the history of developmental psychology in order to show us the importance of Piaget even in today’s modern era.

In their article, Ellis and Siegler (1996) examine the importance of Jean Piaget in the realm of developmental psychology, specifically in regards to childhood development. It is their belief that it would be impossible to understand developmental psychology without a keen understanding of the ideas and findings of Jean Piaget (Ellis & Siegler, 1996). They argue that unlike other developmentalists, Piaget’s work was so groundbreaking that entire chapters are devoted to him in textbooks (Ellis & Siegler, 1996).

Piaget transformed thinking about childhood and development to the point where many current developmental psychologists see it as difficult to fathom how such childhood development could ever have been conceived differently (Ellis & Siegler, 1996). It was Piaget who switched the focus of what questions are asked when contemplating childhood development. This resulted in many important aspects of developmental psychology, including constructivism, essentialism and dynamism (Ellis & Siegler, 1996).

Constructivism is the key when it comes to contemplating the ideas of staged cognitive development in children and the role that play has in it. What Piaget showed was that children were able to assimilate information into previously acquired information rather than just replacing it (Ellis & Siegler, 1996). He showed that children have the cognitive capability of evaluating two separate pieces of information and finding a common ground between them (i.e. the ability to reason). Furthermore, Piaget’s idea of constructivism showed that even when their abilities are not scrutinized as erroneous, children continue to evaluate and refine their cognitive process and problem solving abilities (Ellis & Siegler). It is through play that most of this evaluation and problem solving is accomplished. Critical thinking is a direct result of play whether from playing with blocks, pretend play or advanced role-playing.
Through the comparison of the blog post of Krull (2010) and the article of Ellis and Siegler (1996) we find an importance emphasize on a child’s problem solving ability. Although Ellis and Siegler (1996) don’t mention play explicitly, reviewing the works of Piaget (as cited in Boyd & Bee, 2009) shows the importance that play has not only in childhood development, but in the overall work that Piaget has left the developmental psychology community. Although Krull’s blog post is little more than an opinion column based on an understanding of childhood play, it still emphasizes the important role of play in solving problems – something that leads directly to increased cognitive ability. It would be easy to value the merit of Ellis and Siegler’s scholarly article over a simple blog post, but the blog post shows us a real world application of evaluating children at play, which is valuable in itself.

Application

The application of any understanding of infant and childhood cognitive development should begin and end with the enhancement of positive life experiences for the child in question. Most importantly is the proper emphasis on life situations and learning environments that maximize the stimulation of a child’s developing cognition.

The emphasis of play in the blog post by Krull (2010) and the works of Jean Piaget show that play is an important tool used by the developing child in order to learn about the world around them, develop critical thinking and reasoning, and solve problems that become increasingly complex. By the time a child exits the preoperational stage presented by Piaget they have successfully developed an internal world of symbols and the ability to understand and participate within complex rules systems. Play and imagination have presented them with a world of ideas.

The fault in today’s culture lies within an overemphasis on getting children started early to prove their intelligence. As indicated in the Boyd and Bee (2009) text, parents are often willing to believe or do anything that increases their child’s chances of success, including falsely believing that listening to Mozart will create a child genius. One needs only to look at today’s offerings of the Mozart craze to see that many parents are still focusing in the wrong direction. Things like Baby Einstein and Baby Can Read are nothing more than the new Mozart fad taking valuable resources away from what really matters to a child’s development: play.

Baby Einstein is a popular set of children’s DVDs that bombards an infant with lights, colors and sounds in an attempt to visually teach them abstract concepts that they are incapable of assimilating into their schemes because of no real world experience with such ideas. In fact, most psychologists recommend that a child not be exposed to such things as television before the age of two. Time is better spent forming an attachment to their parents and exploring the world around them.

Baby Can Read is another detrimental tool focusing on teaching an infant to read well ahead of their peers (and the traditional age of reading). Why does a child need to learn to read at such a young age when the most important thing that they could be doing is playing? Infants should be busy examining the world around them, developing their ideas on objects and object permanence, and enhancing their imagination and problem solving abilities.

Reading is a limited discipline. Once you learn to read, that’s it. Maybe you can learn to read faster, but for the most part reading is reading – the understanding of the representation of written symbols. Unlike reading, imagination, critical thinking and problem solving are things that continue to grow, expand and be refined throughout life. These are unlimited disciplines that first begin to take shape when a child plays and examines the outside world. Why teach them to read so young?

German philosopher Rudolf Steiner (the creator of the Waldorf education system) was also a believer in a staged development. Steiner emphasized the importance of play in children before the cutting of their second teeth (i.e. Steiner’s stages were divided into seven year increments with the first stage from birth to age seven – usually when a child’s new teeth start to come in) (McDermott, 2007). Steiner thought that it was unnecessary to teach a child to read before the age of seven. Instead, he emphasized art and writing. To Steiner, writing was a way of understanding symbols, and his most common example looked at how an image of a fish could be morphed into the letter “F” (McDermott, 2007). The importance of symbolism and creativity far outweighed the necessity of simply reading when it came to Steiner’s idea of education.

What can ultimately be gained from all of this is a better understanding of the important aspects of an infant’s developmental years. Cognition and play are very much co-dependent and the activities that a child is placed in ought to stimulate the creativity necessary for effective play. This, in turn, will allow the child greater success at problem solving and critical thinking – tools that will greatly enhance their future development. Policies that influences day care, education and other things aimed at further developing a child’s abilities can then be adjusted to make sure that the proper emphasize is being placed where needed. Instead of investing in speculative and fad devices such as Baby Can Read, parents can focus on the more appropriate activities that really do enhance a child’s creativity and intelligence. In turn, federal and state funded education systems can make sure that children get ample time at recess, and that creative projects rather than just “work” are used to further stimulate a child’s own creative and intellectual refinement.

References

Ellis, S., & Siegler, R. (1996). Piaget on childhood. Psychological Science. 7(4), 211-215.

Berk, L. (2008). Exploring lifespan development (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Boyd, D. & Bee, H. (2009). Lifespan development (5th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Krull, E. (2010). Piaget – Play is the work of Childhood. PsychCentral. Retrieved from http://blogs.psychcentral.com/family/2010/09/piaget-play-is-the-work-of-childhood/

McDermott, R. (2007). The essential steiner. Herndon, VA: Lindisfarne Books.

Tuch, C. (2009). Developmental psychology. Cheektowaga, NY: Permacharts.