The Second Decade: What Develops (and How)

Abstract

The lion's share of cognitive development research addresses cognitive processes of individuals in the first decade of life. The assumption has been that mechanisms of learning and development identified in such research will apply as well to later periods. This chapter questions that assumption and examines aspects of cognitive development that may be unique to the second decade – a time when the nature and directions of development become less universal and more variable. Topics covered include brain and processing growth, learning and knowledge acquisition, deductive and inductive inference, inquiry and scientific thinking, epistemological understanding, argument, and decision-making. Aspects of cognitive development in the second decade that warrant particular attention, it is claimed, are increasing meta-level regulation and management of mental processes and the growing importance of disposition, as well as competence. Keywords: adolescence; argument and decision making; brain development; deductive and inductive inference; epistemological understanding; information processing; inquiry and scientific thinking; knowledge acquisition; learning; metacognition; regulation; variability