Intellectual Development of Child During Childhood

Read this article to learn about the Intellectual Development of Child During Childhood. After reading this article you will learn about: 1. Meaning of Intelligence 2. Symbolic Schemas 3. Intellectual Development and Play.

Contents:

1. Meaning of Intelligence
2. Symbolic Schemas
3. Intellectual Development and Play

1. Meaning of Intelligence:

The foregoing pages deal mainly with the cognitive development of the child since birth. This is based on what the famous developmental psychologist Jean Piaget has traced in his book Origins of Intelligence. How a normal child develops intellectually up to two years of age, has been described above.

Piaget has called this the period of sensorimotor development. Input (stimulus) is received from the external world, and also from the soma or the body or mind of the child. The child reacts to it according to the state of his sensorimotor development; and, his reactions also help him in the process of physical and intellectual development.

While reacting to the stimulus, body and mind has to perform certain functions which again provide an occasion for having more experiences.

Thus, the process of intellectual development continues. Guilford writes “……… input into his structure of intellect (SI) comes both from the environment and the soma or body, the latter being of both motivational and emotional types, and from the brain as well as the internal receptors. Filtering or screening occurs, shutting off some sorts of input, facilitating other types”.

To meet the demands of the situation, to be able to solve the problem that one faces, successfully, are the indicators of intellect. Thus, it is through one’s behaviour, that it can be assessed, how much developed one is intellectually? Behaviour has two aspects-external and internal; and—of course, the two are interdependent.

It is only through the external behaviour, that a clue to the nature of internal behaviour, which is purely mental or emotional, can be found. While, conversely, it is the internal nature of behaviour which guides and controls the external behaviour.

Henry Garrett writes:

“Efficiency in meeting everyday situations or solving everyday problems is, perhaps, as useful a working definition of general intelligence as any. Intelligence, in the solution of problems, demands power as well as speed. To do a thing well, we must know how to do it; and we must not dawdle and blunder, in the doing”.

The two words used by Garrett in his definition of Intelligence—”power” and “speed”, are very significant. In English, there is a famous saying— “knowledge is power”. It means, it is the knowledge which breeds power or ability to behave in such a way, that one can do what is required to be done or one intends to do.

This ability or power is the same what J Piaget calls “SCHEMA”. “Schema” is ability in reference to a certain type of behaviour. It means, for different types of behaviours, there is the need for the development of corresponding types of schemas or mental abilities. The other word “speed” indicates the time taken in doing a certain thing. “Power” increases “speed”.

With the increase of power, for doing a certain thing or for behaving in a needful way, speed also increases. The more the power, the less will be the time required for doing a thing or for behaving for the performance of something. This is why Garrett declares “power” and “speed” to be the sure indicators of intelligence.

Intelligence has been described by James B Stroud in terms as under:

“….Ability to learn, to make a good response, to think abstractly, to remember, to perceive relationships, and to display insight and good judgement in situations requiring thought”.

How much a person is intellectually developed, we can know through his behaviour in situations demanding power or ability to learn, that is, how swiftly and properly one learns something new—a new action or a new information.

How promptly and befittingly one responds to some stimulus that the environment presents; how far and how correctly one can think abstractly. Besides this, a good memory is also one of the indicators of the level of intelligence. Piaget has traced minutely how the power to perceive relationships, develops along with age.

Nevertheless, this power differs from man to man according to the level of intelligence. There may be problems, the solution of which depends upon the power of insight— this power is also a form of intelligence. Intelligence is also assessed according to the nature and ability of how one judges things.

Proper judgment involves proper thinking; it means the ability to think over an incident or about an object, so that a just judgment about it may be made.

Guilford in his same book, on page 25, writes: “Awareness that a problem exists, and identification of structuring of the problems are cognitive operations … during which … there is evaluation of cognized information. In the effort to cognize the problem, there may be a seeking for new input information”.

Now, it would be useful to explain what is implied in these words of Guilford:

i. Awareness of the existence of the problem is the first condition for an intelligent behaviour.

ii. Then the organism needs to identify the problem with its relations to other phenomena; and to structure the problem in its entirety.

iii. For the identification and structuring of problem in its entirety, past references are must. This fact leads the author to conclude that “there is dependence on memory storage”.

iv. For intelligent behaviour, the subject must be able to evaluate what part of the whole gamut of cognized information is relevant and of importance now. The subject must also know how much important that cognized information is.

v. The subject may feel the need of some new/additional information in order to be able to better identify and for a better structuring of the problem.

The mention of new/additional information as additional needful input, verifies Nancy Bayley’s definition:

“Intelligence appears to me, rather, to be a dynamic succession of developing functions, with the more advanced or complex functions in the hierarchy depending on the prior maturing of earlier simpler ones…..”

First the simpler functions are mastered, then with the help of new information coming in as new input, the subject becomes able to perform new functions, more complicated and more advanced. Nancy Bayley at the end of the definition, as quoted above, adds a few words more within brackets—(given, of course, normal conditions of care).

These words refer to the importance of social environment in the process of the development of intelligence. If two children intellectually are too much different, one of the factors leading to this difference is the difference in their social environment.

The one having got a more congenial environment will impress as more intelligent. He has been exposed to an environment of greater variety, more encouraging, more stimulating for activities. The environment, providing more varied desirable experiences, will more enrich the repertoire of the subject’s information, with the result the subject will be able to behave more intelligently.

By ‘normal conditions of care’, Nancy Bayley means that there should be no hindrance in the development of intelligence along with the maturity that age brings about.

The importance that is being accorded to environment in the development of intelligence is quite justified, as it is the environment, social or physical, which provides inputs in the form of experiences through the thresholds of senses, the end-result of which is intelligence.

The environment for the child becomes varied where a lot of objects—toys, are available for the child to play with, to handle.

These objects enable him to enrich his repertoire of information with the conceptions of hardness and softness; with the conceptions of size and shape; with the conceptions of different sounds that are produced while moving or throwing objects/toys about; with conceptions related to taste, smells and others, as the child matures with age, and, passes from the stage of sensorimotor to that of Formal Operations through that of Concrete Operational—as Piaget puts it.

Piaget in his book Origins of Intelligence has traced this development in great details graphically and mathematically.

Before coming to that, it would be proper to see what environment should be considered stimulatory and leading to intellectual development. An environment which stimulates the child to react, to respond fully to the stimulus, is called to be stimulant. The more stimulating the environment is, stronger and better will be the response.

The chain of S-R provides more and more input in the form of experiences leading to better, clearer perceptions and conceptions, and the intellect is the end product of all these developments. Conversely, if the environment is dull, the child will not be moved to react, to respond and, if there is no reaction, no response, no development will be there.

This is why, especially, the parents and the teachers are advised to provide for their wards such an environment which is rich.

Rich, in the sense that therein the child has a variety of experiences, where there are an umpteen number of objects to handle; and stimulating, in the sense, that it readily prompts the child to react or respond to it, and, do the same with its utmost ability—as this is the only way of further developing its abilities.

The affectionate treatment of parents, teachers and elders also make the environment stimulating for the children. Though we shall describe this in greater details when we shall deal with the emotional development of the child, yet to make a mention of this factor here is also essential, as proper emotional development too has its salutary effect on intellectual development.

All the three aspects of personality—physical, intellectual and emotional—are interdependent. If one’s nervous system is innately impaired or weak, he or she cannot be intellectually strong. When in old age or in the presenile period, one suffers from Alzheimer, a disease caused because of physical reasons his or her intellectual ability would also seriously be damaged.

Thus, an environment which the child does not feel secure; where the genuine affection is not felt for the child, and, he is not encouraged (and supported, if need be) for his reactionary attempts, not only the child’s emotional development suffers but the child also fails to achieve intellectual development to the full level of his capacity.

We have already seen how the child develops cognitively during the sensorimotor period. Now again, we shall be referring to Piaget when we describe the last two periods of cognitive development; that is Pre-operational and the period of Formal Operations.

Pre-Operational Period:

The former part of pre-operational period extends from 2 to 7 years of age. The main development of the pre-operational period is the development of mental imagery. It is during the last stage of sensorimotor period that mental representation of events starts.

Its full impact on the ability to cognize can be felt only during this period. Piaget calls this ability as conceptual schema to differentiate it from sensorimotor schemas of the first period of cognitive development. The child can have proper conceptions of things perceived because of mental representation of the same.

This is the ability to conceive or ponder things which are invisible. This is also the ability which makes possible “deferred imitation”, that is, the child can imitate the model when it is no more present there.

Mental image is an internal phenomenon, and is the result of internal activity—during the development of which the child seems inactive or non­functional externally. Nevertheless, the fact remains that the first reaction was initiated in response to some stimulus from the external world.

Mental image is different from perception because the latter occurs only in relation to a thing which is present, and, is perceivable by any of the five senses; the former is the reconstruction of the same previously perceived object/event in the mind not necessarily causing any external action.

The mental image does not necessarily contain all the details of what it represents. It is really the representation of a class of actions rather than the imitation of some specific event. Giving his explanation of what Piaget has written about Symbolic Schema; AL Baldwin clarifies “It (image) is not an after effect of perception or an attenuated perception of some kind; it is an independent schema…..”

2. Symbolic Schemas:

When one action represents another, not in its exactness but just to represent the characteristics of the genre, the ability involved is Symbolic Schemas. The child’s fondling a doll is a pretense which represents the genuine action of the mother, but the child sometimes losses distinction between the two.

The child shifts from the pretense to the genuine and vice versa. Doing this requires some degree of symbolic thought which is one of the important cognitive developments of the period.

Distinction between play and pretending should also be clearly understood. Play is a fun. “It emphasises assimilation rather than accommodation. The child can stop the game whenever it so likes. In imitation, the process of accommodation is important; imitation is an attempt to behave as the model does or did.

A game may involve imitation too. Especially, the complex games are not possible without the role of mental imagery being therein.

“In the process of play, Piaget sees the first appearance of symbolic schemas, internal schemas that permit symbolic behaviour. Behaviour is symbolic when something in it is used to represent something else”. Symbolic schemas are of two kinds—Idiosyncratic and Communicable.

Idiosyncratic schemas are something private with the person. They are quite different from the schemas which initiate, direct and control behaviours and which are the reactions to the stimuli that are there in the external environment.

Idiosyncratic schemas colour the likings and disliking of a person; and affect the behaviour which the stimuli of the external world evokes, only indirectly. These schemas are incommunicable, non-verbal. Contrary to it, the other types of schemas are communicable and verbal.

They are directly expressed through the reaction that the external stimuli evoke. These are only the latter kind of schemas that adapt themselves to other people of the situation. These schemas conform to social rules and customs (whereas the first kind of schemas, that is Idiosyncratic Schemas have nothing to do with the norms and customs of the society; nor do they need to adapt themselves to other people).

Idiosyncratic schemas are non-verbal; they cannot be communicated directly, even then they influence the thoughts of the person, which he expresses verbally. Idiosyncratic schemas directly control our dreams and fantasies, and the plays, especially, those of the younger children. Schemas’ effect may either facilitate or hinder the solution of the problem.

Our feelings or emotional life is very much affected by these schemas. These non-verbal schemas have very strong elements of concrete imagery which can explicitly be expressed only symbolically as an artist would do; an artist attempts to communicate his private, feeling-laden, symbolic schemas to other people.

The level of intelligence much depends upon the level and nature of these non-verbal and verbal schemas. The more and the better exposure a child gets, the better developed will be the schemas of the child.

The intelligence of a child can only be assessed on the basis of his non-verbal and verbal behaviour which themselves are initiated, conducted and controlled by the schemas—non-verbal and verbal. This is why so much stress is laid on providing good environment to the child at home, at school and outside in the society.

Play, on the one hand, expresses the level of child’s cognitive development, on the other it helps in improving his cognitive development further. So, a lot of games should be provided for the child, keeping in mind, his age and level of development—both physical and cognitive.

If we consider play in reference to the development of non-verbal schemas, some very important facts may come to our notice. Symbolic schemas can very clearly “be seen and studied” through children’s play.

Play is often a non-verbal activity; and if words are used, they are not used so freely. Another reason that play is a good window on the child’s symbolic schemas, is that it is less accommodated to reality than to routine or problem-solving behaviour.

Language is a verbal activity. What Piaget describes, has the implied inference that the development of language depends upon the development of symbolic schemas. It is the social environment which leads to the development of these schemas where each sound or word stands for a concrete object or for an abstract idea. Intelligence tests have two forms— verbal and non-verbal.

Verbal form of intelligence tests, also assess the level of the development of the child’s language; indirectly a good knowledge of language, and good verbal expression of the child-are indicators of higher level of intelligence.

Of course, intelligence is considered to be an innate faculty. It is innate to the extent that it depends upon the natural sharpness of the senses which are the thresholds of receiving experiences, the end-product of which is intelligence. So, in the long run, the sharper the senses, the higher will be the level of intelligence.

Nevertheless, nurture has an important role to play. Through play-way method and other devices of providing activities to the child, the development of the senses of the young child at the nursery level, may substantially be influenced.

The home of the child may also make important contribution towards it. So, it would be wrong to dismiss Thomas Alva Edison’s assertion that genius is ninety-nine per cent perspiration, as altogether un-psychological.

So, coming to the nurture; the better the environment, better in the sense of providing varied and richer experiences, still higher will be the level of intelligence. The parents, first of all, will have to see to it that the infant gets to play with the maximum possible number of objects, and reacts to the events, such as are helpful in the development of senses.

At school, the environment should be rich with objects and activities which make it motivating and delightful, and where the child has full occasions for reactions and receiving experiences such as may help in further sharpening his senses.

Individuals close to the child, other beings and objects of his environment, the pictures, excursions and a lot of other things that have their influence on the development of perceptions and conceptions of the child, are all parts of the factors which affect the intelligence of the growing child. Though the fact remains that a child can be benefited by nurture only to the extent that his brain or senses by nature are capable of.

3. Intellectual Development and Play:

Piaget in his observation, found his subject, a child of 1;6 (30), saying “cry.cry” to her dog. Then she herself made the sound of crying. On the following day, she made her bear/duck, cry. Then she attempted to make her hat cry.

This illustrates Projection of Symbolic Schemas onto New Objects:

i. The child at 1;7 (12), pretended to be reading a newspaper; she also pointed with her finger at certain parts of it; she muttered to herself On the following day, she pretended to be telephoning. Not only this, she made her doll also telephone. On the days that followed, she made all sorts of things telephone.

This is Projection of Imitative Schemas onto New Objects:

i. At 1 ;8 (30), Piaget’s subject stroked her mother’s hair, saying “pussy, pussy”. The next day she saw a shell, picked it up saying it “a cup”, and pretended to drink with it—the identification of cup and shell evoked the pretense.

This is Simple Identification of one Object with Another:

i. At 1; 10 (30), the child pretended to be playing with her cousin who had been away for a period over two months. She herself became her cousin, Clive. Clive is running; Clive is jumping;” and she imitated him strutting up and down.

This is the example of Identification of Child’s body with that of other People of things:

i. The child at 2; 1 (9), put her doll’s head out through the balcony railings with a turn towards the street, and, said, “you see the lake and trees. You see a carriage, a horse”, etc. The same day, she seated the doll on a sofa, and, told it what she herself had seen in the garden.

In such a behaviour of a child, there is Simple Symbolic Combinations Involving Whole Schemas Instead of Simple Objects.

At 2; 4(8), not being allowed to play with the water being used for washing, she took up an empty cup, and went, and stood by the forbidden tub, and went through the actions saying, “I’m pouring out the water”. At 2;6 (28), she wanted to carry Nonette (the new baby).

Her mother did not allow her to do so, saying that she could do so later on. She folded her arms and told, “Nonette is there. There are two Nonettes”. She repeated the game many times on the same day, but quite secretly. When Piaget went up to her, she stopped talking, and whispered to Nonette.

Another variety of this game is catharsis, at 2;9 (14) the child, the another subject of Piaget’s observation, was afraid of a tractor in a field near a garden. The child then told her doll. “Dolly told me she would like to ride on a machine like that”. At 3;0 (0) the same thing happened with aero planes.

Such a game of a child shows Compensatory Combinations:

i. At 2; 1(7), the child was afraid while sitting on a new chair at the table. Later in the day, she put her dolls in the uncomfortable positions, and said to them:” It doesn’t matter. It will be alright”. (—repeating what had been said to her).

ii. At 2; 7(2) she had fallen down, and cut her lip. After the usual scheme, she consoled herself by projecting all on to her cousin Andre who took the form of a doll.

iii. At 4; 6 the child’s hand was hit with a rake which made her cry. The psychologist expressed himself to be sorry for the same. At first, she did not believe him to be sorry for the same. At first she did not believe him to be sincere. Sometime later, she repeated the exact words spoken to her, of course, changing the order of words.

These are the examples how a child of this period, by dint of imagery would behave in the way which otherwise was not possible, and such plays, imitations and dreams or imagination are a great help in intellectual development also—though it’s a fact, not directly perceivable.

Piaget has given these examples to illustrate Liquidating Combinations:

i. Continuing with his observations, Piaget found that at the age of 4;6(23), Jacqueline was walking on a steep mountain road when Piaget warned her—”Mind that loose stone”. And, she started saying—”Marecage once strode on a stone, you know, and didn’t take care, and she slipped and hurt herself badly”.

On another occasion, when Jacqueline was 4;6(26), and was on a precipitous path, she was warned to be careful of the rushing stream at the foot of the mountain.

She immediately started: “Do you know what my little negress friend did? She rolled right to the bottom of the mountain into the lake. She rolled for four nights. She scraped her knee and her leg terribly. She did not even cry. They picked her up afterwards. She was in the lake, she couldn’t swim and was nearly drowned.

At first, they could not find her and then they did.”—”Now do you know all that?” she was asked. To this she replied: “She told me on the boat”. It was the incidence of Jacqueline’s seeing a negress that gave rise to this cycle.

These are the examples of Symbolic Representations. The first thing that stands out through such examples, or through our own observations, is that the symbolic representation has its relationships with things of the real world. In making such representations of objects and events, imagination, of course, plays its important role.

Characters may not even be imaginary; nor are events just opposed to those of the real world. Symbolic representation may be much similar to objects and events of reality, or it may be a representation of things in contrast—the implied motive there always being to pre-practice in reference to what is the present need, or to lighten the strain which the impending situation is likely to cause.

The child, of course, resorts to symbolic representation, during the time of difficulty as well as that of great pleasure and excitement—then the behaviour serves for catharsis.

To sum up this part, the following points may be noted:

i. Symbolic representation is to compensate what the child cannot have or possess; it is to protect the tender child from the strain, which his inability to do something, may cause.

ii. Symbolic representation is a natural device for out-letting excitement both bitter and caused by something pleasant, again to save the child from the strain of excessive excitement. Thus, it provides for catharsis.

iii. Thus, symbolic representation is in the interest of the child’s mental health and development.

iv. Symbolic representation creates a situation for the child where he can have pre-practice for the behaviour which the situation demands. It is during pre-practice that the child gets new experiences, which lead to further intellectual development.