Download Introduction to Child Psychology

Cognitive Development
in Adolescence
Lecture 16
C6035 Human Development
Adolescent Cognition
Piaget’s Theory: Adolescent was in formal
operational stage of cognition where thought
is more abstract & adolescents are no longer
limited to actual, concrete experiences as
anchors for thought
 They can now conjure up make-believe
situations & events that are hypothetical
possibilities & then try to reason logically
about them
 In this stage: adolescent has ability to
develop hypotheses, or best guesses to solve
problems as in algebraic equation
 They systematically deduce, or conclude best
path to follow in solving equation

Challenge to Piaget’s formal
Operational Stage
There is much more individual variation
than what he envisioned
 Indeed, it is estimated than only 1 out of
3 young adolescents is a formal
operational thinker, and many American
adults never become such thinkers
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Adolescent Egocentrism
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Heightened self-consciousness of adolescents
which is reflected in their belief that others are
as interested in them as they are & in their
sense of personal uniqueness
David Elkind proposes two types of social
thinking:
 imaginary audience: a belief that they are ‘on
stage’ and that their every act is being viewed
by an imaginary audience
 personal fable: sense of uniqueness making
them feel that no one can understand them
Information Processing in
Adolescents

Ability to process information improves in
areas of memory, decision making critical
thinking & self-regulatory learning
 Robert Sternberg found that solving
problems, such as analogies, requires
individuals to make continued comparisons
between newly encoded information &
previously encoded information
 Adolescents probably have more storage
space in short-term memory
Adolescent Cognitive Capacities
Adolescents have:
 Increased speed, automaticity & capacity of
information processing
 More breadth of content knowledge,
 Increased ability to construct new combinations
of knowledge
 Greater range for applying or obtaining
knowledge
 Capacity to set goals for extending knowledge
 Awareness of their emotional makeup to:
periodically monitor their progress, fine-tune
their strategies, evaluate obstacles & make
adaptations
Values

Adolescents carry with them a set of values
that influences their thoughts, feelings&
actions
 Over past two decades, they have shown an
increased concern for personal well-being &
decreased concern for well-being of others &
demonstrate an increasing need for selffulfillment & self-expression
 Some signs indicate that today’s students are
shifting toward stronger interest in welfare of
society as there has been increase in
percentage of freshmen who said that they
were strongly interested in participating in
community action programs
Moral Education

The Hidden Curriculum
 John Dewey recognized that schools provide
moral education through a ‘hidden curriculum’
which is conveyed by moral atmosphere that
is a part of every school
 Teachers serve as models of ethical or
unethical behavior
 Through its rules & regulations, school
administration infuses school with a value
system
Types of Moral Education

Character Education: direct approach
involves teaching students basic moral
literacy to prevent them from engaging in
immoral behavior
 Values clarification: helping people clarify
what their lives are for & what is worth
working for & where students are encouraged
to define their own values & understand
values of others - It differs from character
education in that it does not tell students what
their values should be
Religion
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Many children & adolescents show an
interest in religion
Religious institutions, created by adults, are
designed to introduce certain beliefs & ensure
that children will carry on religious tradition
Religious issues are important to adolescents
95% of 13-18 year-olds said they believe in
God
Almost three-fourths reported they pray
Developmental Changes
Adolescence may be an especially
important juncture for religious
development because identity
development becomes a central focus
in their lives
 Closely related to Piaget’s theory of
cognition is a developmental theory
providing a theoretical backdrop for
understanding religious development in
children & adolescents

Piaget’s theory of cognition
applied to Religious Belief

In preoperational intuitive religious thought
children’s religious thoughts were
unsystematic & fragmented & they do not
understand material in religious stories
 In concrete operational thought children focus
on particular details of pictures & stories of
religion
 In formal operational thought adolescents
reveal a more abstract, hypothetical religious
understanding
Religiousness and Sexuality
The degree of adolescents’ participation in
religious organizations may be more important
than religious affiliation as a determinant of
premarital sexual attitudes & behavior
 Adolescents who attend religious services
frequently may hear messages about
abstaining from sex
 In one study, adolescents who attended church
frequently & valued religion in their lives were
less experienced sexually & had less
permissive attitudes toward premarital sex

Fowler’s Developmental Theory

James Fowler proposed a theory of religious
development in stages-focuses on motivation to
discover meaning in life:
 Stage 1. Intuitive-projective faith (early
childhood) infants learn to trust their caregiver &
invent own intuitive images of good & evil
 Stage 2. Mythical-literal faith (middle and late
childhood) children begin to reason in more
logical-but not abstract-way
 Stage 3. Synthetic-conventional faith (between
childhood and adolescence) Adolescents develop
formal operational thought & integrate what they
have learned about religion into coherent belief
system
Fowler’s Developmental Theory

Stage 4. Individuating-reflexive faith (between
adolescence and adulthood) where individuals
are capable of taking full responsibility for their
religious beliefs
 Stage 5. Conjunctive faith (middle adulthood).
Fowler says that only a few adults move on to
this stage, which involves being more open to
paradox & opposing viewpoints
 Stage 6. Universalizing faith (middle or late
adulthood) involves transcending specific belief
systems to achieve a sense of oneness with all
being
Schools for Adolescents
Controversy Surrounding Secondary Schools
 This century has seen schools playing
prominent role in lives of adolescents
 Laws excluding teens from work & mandating
attendance at school were passed by virtually
every state
 Some experts believe that junior & senior high
schools actually contribute to alienation &
delinquency & interfere with transition to
adulthood
 A push for back-to-basics where students are
being taught fundamental skills & knowledge
needed for workplace
Transition to Middle & Junior
High School

Junior high schools emerged in 20s & 30s on
predication that physical, cognitive & social
changes characterizing early adolescence
needed a separate institutional approach
 Junior high school served as transition to high
school which was grades 10–12
 Later - middle schools were adopted which
restored 9th grade to high school & brought 6th
grade into transitional stage of junior or middle
school
Transition to Middle & Junior
High School

When students make transition from
elementary to middle or junior high school they experience top-dog phenomenon:
 Circumstance of moving from top position in
elementary school to lowest position in
middle/junior high school
 These positions are characterized by being
oldest, biggest & most powerful versus
youngest, smallest & least powerful
Effective Middle Schools for
Young Adolescents - Joan Lipsitz
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School’s ability to adapt all school practices to
fit physical, cognitive & social development of
its students
Emphasize importance of creating
environment positive for adolescents’ social &
emotional development
Smaller ‘communities’ or ‘houses’ to lessen
impersonal nature of large middle schools
Lower student-to-counselor ratios
Parental & community involvement in school
Curriculum structure flexible in time & content
Program for health and fitness
High School Dropouts

Over past 40 years proportion of adolescents
who have not finished high school has steadily
declined from 60% in 1940 to 5.2% in 1986
 Statistic is skewed by high number of Latino
youths who drop out each year - High school
graduation rates for Latinos is 63% & for AfricanAmericans it is 76%
 Observed differences in dropout rates among
ethnic groups were related to family background,
especially socioeconomic status, lack of parental
support & supervision & low parental
expectations
Theories of Career Development

Three main theories describe manner in which
adolescents make choices about career
development:
Ginzberg’s Developmental Theory
 Children and adolescents go through three
career-choice stages: fantasy, tentative, and
realistic
 Until about age 11, children are in fantasy
stage with unrealistic visions of their career
 Tentative stage is a transitional and occurs in
the early to mid-adolescent years
 Realistic stage explores, focuses & then
selects a career
Theories of Career Development
Super’s Self-Concept Theory
 Individuals’ self-concepts play central roles in
their career choices
 During adolescence individuals first construct
a career self-concept
 Develop ideas about work
 Crystallize or narrow their choices
 Begin to initiate behavior for some type of
career
 Begin specific training for a career
 In later life - after 35 years of age - begin to
consolidate & engage in career enhancement
Theories of Career Development
Holland’s Personality-Type Theory
 An effort should be made to match an
individual’s career choice with his or her
personality
 Theory built upon assumption that everyone is a
specific type & will not change nor develop into
other types
Holland’s six personality types:
 Realistic
conventional
 enterprising
intellectual
 artistic
social
Influences on Career
Development
Increasing Educational Training
 ability to partake in advanced academic
and vocational training
Immediate Environment
 urban, rural or suburban
 ethnicity and race
 living conditions
 quality of schooling
Influences on Career
Development
Gender
 some career choices are predominantly
controlled by males
 wide disparity in income levels between
male and female in many careers
Sociohistorical Context of
Adolescent Work
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At the turn of 19th century-fewer than 1 out of 20
high-school-age children was in school
Today - more than 9 out of every 10 adolescents
receives a high school diploma
National survey of 17,000 high school students3 out of 4 reported some job income during
average school week with income exceeding $50
per week for 41% males & 30% females
1940 only 1of 25 10th graders had part-time job
Jobs for Teens: 17% fast-food restaurants, 20%
cashiers in retail stores, 10% unskilled laborers
10% clerical assistants
Work for Adolescents
Benefits to work for Adolescents:
 Money management
 Time budgets
 Pride in accomplishments
 Important skills about how to get & keep a job
Drawbacks to work:
 Give up sports, social affairs with peers &
sometimes sleep
 Lower grade point averages
 Poor school attendance
 Less satisfaction with school
 Less time with their families
 Alcohol and marijuana