Psychology: Carl Rogers and Jean Piaget Theories

Psychology

• Psychology is the scientific study of the mind and behavior.

Carl Rogers

• Acceptance of one's self is the first step to change.
• Rogers created the Person-Centered Theory.
• Helping people was a primary concern.
• Rogers postulated ideal self and real self subsystems in 1959.
• The ideal self is one's view of self as one wishes to be.
• The real self is a person's total internal view of self in relation to the experiences of being and functioning within the environment.
• When the ideal self and real self are aligned, they are congruent.
• When the ideal self and real self are not aligned, they are incongruent.

Jean Piaget

• The Theory of Cognitive Development was created by Jean Piaget.
• Cognitive development comes from a progressive reorganization of mental processes.
• Biological maturation and environmental experience is the foundation of mental processes.
• The three basic components of Piaget's cognitive development are:
  • Schema / Schemes are the building blocks of knowledge.
  • Adaptation involves a child's learning to meet situational demands.
    • Assimilation is the cognitive process of altering new information to fit an existing scheme.
    • Accommodation is the cognitive process of changing a scheme to adapt to new information.
• Stages of Cognitive Development reflect the expanding sophistication of a child's thought process.

Stages of Cognitive Development

• Sensorimotor stage:
  • Age: 0-2
  • Characteristics of Stage: learns by doing, looking, touching, and sucking; primitive understanding of cause-and-effect and object permanence appears around 9 months.
• Preoperational stage:
  • Age: 2-7
  • Characteristics of Stage: child begins using language and symbols, including letters and numbers. Egocentrism is also evident. Conservation marks the end of the preoperational stage and the beginning of concrete operations.
• Concrete Operations stage:
  • Age: 7-11
  • Characteristics of Stage: child demonstrates conversation, reversibility, serial ordering, and a mature understanding of cause-and-effect relationship. Thinking is still concrete.
• Formal Operations stage:
  • Age: 12+
  • Characteristics of Stage: individual demonstrates abstract thinking, but thinking at this stage is still concrete.

Dr. Susan Harter

• Dr. Susan Harter broadened childhood and adolescent development.
• In early childhood, "self" is described with concrete, observable characteristics, such as physical attributes, material possessions, behaviors and preferences.
• In middle or later childhood, "self" is described in terms of trait-like constructs, requiring hierarchical organizational skills characteristic of logical thought development.
• In early adolescence, emergence of more abstract self-definitions, such as inner thoughts, emotions, attitudes, and motives.
• In emerging adults, vision of possible self, the age of possibilities, and time of grand dreams.