Piaget's Theory Of Equilibration Research Articles

What Does Galileo's Discovery of Jupiter's Moons Tell Us About the Process of Scientific Discovery?

In 1610, Galileo Galilei discovered Jupiter'smoons with the aid of a new morepowerful telescope of his invention. Analysisof his report reveals that his discoveryinvolved the use of at least three cycles ofhypothetico-deductive reasoning. Galileofirst used hypothetico-deductive reasoning to generateand reject a fixed star hypothesis.He then generated and rejected an ad hocastronomers-made-a-mistake hypothesis.Finally, he generated, tested, and accepted a moonhypothesis. Galileo's reasoningis modeled in terms of Piaget's equilibration theory,Grossberg's theory of neurologicalactivity, a neural network model proposed by Levine &Prueitt, and another proposedby Kosslyn & Koenig. Given that hypothetico-deductivereasoning has played a rolein other important scientific discoveries, thequestion is asked whether it plays a rolein all important scientific discoveries. In otherwords, is hypothetico-deductive reasoningthe essence of the scientific method? Possiblealternative scientific methods, such asBaconian induction and combinatorial analysis,are explored and rejected as viablealternatives. Educational implications of thishypothetico-deductive view of scienceare discussed.

Piaget's equilibration theory and the young gifted child: A balancing act

This article describes the value of Piaget's equilibration theory for understanding characteristics of the young gifted child. Key elements of equilibration theory are discussed. Differences in the equilibration patterns in gifted children are described and application of equilibration to other than cognitive systems is considered. The article concludes with some ideas for teachers and parents to help gifted young children search for equilibrium.

Inferencias causales y clasificación: su relación en niños de 4–7 años

The present work analyzed the relationship between the acquisiton of classification and the ability to establish causal inferences. Also, to find out to what extent the content of causal stories (in terms of animate/inanimate, antecedents and consequences) elicit differences in performance. Seventy children from 8 primary state schools paticipated in the study, their age ranged between 4;7 and 10 years. The results showed that as children master classification their ability to perform causal inferences increases. However, children's level of performance did not vary when the content of the story was altered, i.e., an animate or inanimate main character. Finally, a causal model on the developrnent of causal inferences is proposed based on Piaget's equilibration theory.

The Association between Early Adolescent Boys' Cognitive Development, Father Attitudes and Nonverbal Behavior

Based on Piaget's equilibration theory, father dogmatism and empathy was hypothesized to influence sons' cognitive development through non-verbal behavior in father-son interactions. Subjects were 52 pairs of fathers and their sons drawn from first-year high school students of bi-parental families. Fathers' dogmatism and empathy was assessed by questionnaire, sons' cognitive development with Piaget's permutation task using the clinical procedure, and fathers' nonverbal behavior by videotaping father-son interactions while they worked on a computer terminal. A factor analysis of fathers' nonverbal behavior revealed two factors accounting for 59.3% of the variance. One factor is mainly loaded with fathers' visual behavior and body orientation toward their sons while keeping at a distance from them. The other factor is mainly loaded with fathers' smiling behavior. No relationship was found between fathers' dogmatism, empathy and sons' cognitive development, but the nonverbal factor "father smiles" was associated with both sons' cognitive development and fathers' dogmatism. A multiple regressions analysis revealed that together these traits account for 24% of the variance in the nonverbal factor "father smiles." This result is interpreted as not only showing once more children's effects on parents' behavior, but also as evidence that by using both some of the child's and some of the parents characteristics we can account for more of the variance in the parent's behavior with his child than if either are considered independently.

Development of seriation and its relation to the achievement of inferential transitivity

AbstractSixty kindergarten and first grade children took part in an intervention program during which they were confronted with problems requiring concrete operational thought. The study was designed to ascertain the influence of an intervention in the development of operational seriation and transitivity in kindergarten and first grade children who initially failed to demonstrate the ability to do seriation and transitivity problems. Seriation of size, presumably a prerequisite operation for transitive size relations, was also studied. The subjects showed significant advancement toward concrete operation on the seriation problems but failed to show significant improvement on the transitivity problems. In addition, subjects who showed understanding of transitive inference also demonstrated success on seriation, but subjects who showed clear understanding of seriation did not demonstrate success on making transitive inference. Results were interpreted in the context of Piaget's equilibration theory (Genetic epistemology. New York: Columbia University Press, 1970).

Identity, Compensation, and Conservation

ACREDOLO, CURT, and ACREDOLO, LINDA P. Identity, Compensation, and Conservation. CHmLD DEVELOPMENT, 1979, 50, 524-535. This study tested Piaget's assertion that true stage 3 conservation awaits the emergence of an understanding of compensation, that a recognition of identity is not sufficient, and that the anticipation of liquid conservation among otherwise nonconserving children is not an indication of conservation by identity, but is instead due to an erroneous anticipation of unchanging water levels. These assertions were tested using a modified replication of Piaget and Taponier's classic study of liquid conservation. 96 K-grade 1 children were presented a sequence of anticipation-of-liquid-conservation, anticipation-of-water-levels, and standard liquid-conservation tasks. The results, which failed to replicate Piaget and Taponier, disconfirmed Piaget's theory of pseudoconservation, but supported his assertion that an understanding of compensation is necessary for consistent conservation judgments plus explanations. The results suggest a modification of Piaget's equilibration theory of conservation development, one which elevates the role of identity.

An Experimental Study of the Development of Formal Operational Thought

KUHN, DEANNA, and ANGELEV, JOHN. An Experimental Study of the Development of Formal Operational Thought. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1976, 47, 697-706. Fourth and fifth graders took part in a 15-week intervention program during which they confronted problems requiring formal operational thought. Subjects showed advancement toward formal operations on the pendulum and chemicals problems (Inhelder & Piaget 1958) and on a third problem designed by the authors on both immediate and 4-month posttests. Density of exposure to the problems (once per 2 weeks, once per week, twice per week) was monotonically related to amount of advancement. An additional group of subjects who were also given explicit demonstrations of formal operational solutions to the problems showed no more advancement than subjects given exposure alone. Results were interpreted in the context of Piaget's equilibration theory (1971). Implications for Inhelder and Piaget's (1958) theory of formal operations are discussed.

Constructing Cognitive Operations Linguistically

Publisher Summary The training study is one of the means to explore the mechanisms of conservation. The first efforts to train conservation interestingly enough were initiated by the Genevans themselves, in an effort to show that Piaget's equilibration theory better accounts for cognitive change than other explanations, particularly empiricist-behaviorist theories. Non-Genevan attempts to account for conservation acquisition are not confined to behaviorist or neobehaviorist theories, however. Among the alternatives are explanations based on a significant place given to the role of language. This chapter describes research, including that of the present author, designed to show how conservation can be acquired by linguistic means, despite assertions of Piaget and H. Sinclair (the principal Genevan investigator of language development) that conservation is not acquired in this fashion. There is a theoretical basis for expecting such achievements to occur, based in fact on Piaget's more recent views on the relation between language and thought.