Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development and Individual Differences

Abstract

Dr. Uzgiris has summed up clearly the hierarchical aspect of the organization of the processes of intellectual development as argued by Piaget. She has also underlined the importance of continuous interaction between the organism and the environment, mentioning the complementary role played by the fundamental processes of assimilation and accommodation in this interaction. She has rightly maintained that Piaget is mainly concerned with the development of the intellectual of a normal subject “in an ideal generalized case.” The generalization is evidently made from studies carried out under the normal conditions obtaining in modem Western civilization. She has recognized that Piaget regards the role of experience and of sociocultural factors as indispensable in addition to those of maturation. Moreover, Piaget also introduces a general factor of equilibration, which is at work within each of the specific factors and which also regulates their respective influence. It is this equilibratory factor which explains the fact that development necessarily moves toward more extended and stable stages of reasoning. But in fact, though Piaget’s theory provides a general theoretical framework for the study of individual differences, these fields of psychology have not given rise to any explicit application of his theory.