Cognitive Development

Question:

Discuss About The Social And Cognitive Development Psychology Press?

The aim of the essay is to explore the human development stages. These stages include “prenatal development, infancy, childhood (early and middle), adolescent, adult (early, middle, and late) and old age (death and dying)”. Understanding this stages is important as it accompanies age related changes. Every stage is associated with unique capability that enables a person to thrive, survive and grow matured. These changes occur beyond the psychology realm and are necessary to develop cognitive and social competence (Feldman, 2016).  The essay discusses the cognitive and social development of children and factors influencing this development.

Various brain related aspects mark cognitive development which includes information processing, perceptual skills, information processing, language learning. These are important for maximising the child’s wellbeing since early childhood. It will help attain full metal capacities (Bjorklund & Causey, 2017). Jean Piaget theory explains four stages of cognitive development. According to his theory, the first stage called sensorimotor stage is for 0-2 years old children. In this stage a child responds to the sensory data (hearing, smell, touch) and learns the body movements. In the second stage called pre-operational stage is for children of 2-5 years. In this stage a child’s thinking remain egocentric but, gains capability to think about objects symbolically. They demonstrate intelligence by constructing simple sentences. The third stage is called the concrete operational stage for 7-11 years old children, is marked by logical thinking. They demonstrate reversible mental actions and of systematic manipulation of symbols. The last stage from 11 years onwards is marked by increase in the capability of children to grab abstract concepts such as joy, love or grief (Modgil et al., 2013). In the given case study, Jack belongs to pre-operational stage as he is 3 years old.

Social development in early life occurs by developing the emotional and skills and continues across the lifespan. This development pays attention to child and adolescent stages. This development is essential for a human being to establish a positive relationship with society.  Erikson’s theory of social development involves eight stages that starts at birth and continues till 18 years (Serafica, 2015).  Each of the stage is associated with a psychological crisis faced by the child that ultimately helps to become socially competent. A child may struggle with trust vs. mistrust during infancy until 18 months and autonomy vs. Shame during 18 months to 3 years age. At the age of 3-5 years a child may experience “initiative vs. Guilt”, at 5-13 years, “industry vs. Inferiority” and between 13-21 years children may deal with “identity vs. role confusion”. Other sages indentified by Erikson are 21-39 years refers to “intimacy vs. isolation”, 40-65 years “generativity vs stagnation” and lastly 65, and older, which refers to crisis of “Ego integrity vs. despair” (McAdams & Zapata-Gietl, 2015). In the case study given, Jack belongs to the second stage of social development and may experience the psychological crisis of “autonomy vs. Shame”. This stage is marked by learning new concepts and acting independently. They may tend to eat or dress themselves without external assistance. Relying on others for this activities may create feeling of shame in children as they need to apply these skills in real life (Overton, 2013).

Social Development

Jack is 3 years old and the normative cognitive developments, expected at this age are rapid learning and expression of their interests in certain activities. For instance, a child can pick up new words like “mom” and “papa” and form new simple sentence upto 500 words. This is the first sign of thinking development. Children can recognise themselves in mirror at this age (Bjorklund & Causey, 2017). Jack shows non-normative development as his speech is delayed. He can only babble at this age.  The normative social development expected at this age includes performing daily activities of dressing, toilet training and eating independently. They may express interest in games and understand emotions like sharing of toys. Poor toilet training in Jack is the sign of non-normative development (Overton, 2013).

Several factors determine the social and cognitive development. Delay in this development can be due to biological (intelligence, heriditary) and environmental factors (maternal support and family support, play). Children can learn new concepts if they have strong sense organs to collect adequate stimuli from environment. Intelligence help achieve cognitive development to its fullest. Children with low intelligence show delayed cognitive development (Brown & Lan, 2013). Speech delay could be due to the biological factors in Jack. According to dual language could be other reason for his speech delay. If the language spoken in day care and the mother tongue of child is different, it may  lead to delayed speech (Barac et al., 2014). Social and cognitive developments are also controlled by the maternal support and the learning opportunities in the child’s management. A child can acquire better cognition, by spending more with parents and family relatives. They become more expressive of their feelings and acquire social skills and emotional skills faster then child without parental support. Poor maternal support lead to poor mother-infant attachment as well as worry elaboration in children (Grist & Field, 2012). This poor attachment can lead to alteration in temperament due to poor response from parents. Lack of contingent parenting practice fails to help a child develop secure relation. Therefore, they show less curiosity, independence and self-reliance (Hong & Park, 2012). 

Applying the theories of Piaget and Erikson, it can be concluded that Jack’s cognitive and social development is not occurring, as it should at the given age. It may be attributed to the biological factors and environmental factors discussed above. Low intelligence or defect in sense organs may be one of the reasons for speech delay. Vanessa can refer to speech therapist to identify the root cause.  Vanessa being working mother, Jack is attending the day care centre. It is evident that she is not able to spend adequate time with her son. Therefore, there is poor mother-infant attachment in this case. Therefore, Jack is having poor toilet training.  She may not be able to provide enough learning opportunities at home. Similar, the caregiver at care centre may have failed to establish strong relationship with Jack. Child’s social development is determined by the carer-child relationship at day care and teacher-child relationship at prekindergarten (Serpell & Mashburn, 2012). Therefore, these factors may have hampered Jack’s temperament and his will power. These factors predicts the adaptive and social development in children even when there is no developmental delays (Green et al., 2014).  In case of Jack both the carers, nurses and Vanessa must together modify the learning environment for Jack to improve his psychosocial development. Jack needs more play and learning opportunities to increase curiosity and self-reliance. Vanessa needs to increase attachment and emotional security with Jack to improve his toilet training (Beebe & Steele, 2013).

Factors Affecting Development

Thus, social and cognitive developmental theories are important and nursing professionals. In order to design appropriate interventions for children like Jack, it s necessary for the nurses and midwifes to understand the developmental milestones of child. In case of Jack the nurse can apply these theories and concepts to improve Jack’s speech and toilet training. Further, the nurse can explain Vanessa about various factors that can delay cognition and social development in children. These theories are useful to detect developmental defects at earl stage and take immediate precaution (Bierman et al., 2014).

In conclusion, understanding human developmental stages is essential for nursing professionals to take better care of child and maximise the well-being. The essay was useful in developing meaningful insights of cognitive and social development and factors that influence this development. Strong maternal support is essential for effective transition from childhood stage to old age growing competence in each stages involved.

References

Barac, R., Bialystok, E., Castro, D. C., & Sanchez, M. (2014). The cognitive development of young dual language learners: A critical review. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 29(4), 699-714.

Beebe, B., & Steele, M. (2013). How does microanalysis of mother–infant communication inform maternal sensitivity and infant attachment?. Attachment & human development, 15(5-6), 583-602.

Bierman, K. L., Domitrovich, C. E., Nix, R. L., Welsh, J. A., & Gest, S. D. (2014). Integrating evidence-based preschool programs to support social-emotional and cognitive development. Promoting school readiness and early learning: Implications of developmental research for practice, 231-252.

Bjorklund, D. F., & Causey, K. B. (2017). Children’s thinking: Cognitive business development and individual differences. SAGE Publications.

Brown, C. P., & Lan, Y. C. (2013). The influence of developmentally appropriate practice on children’s cognitive development: A qualitative metasynthesis. Teachers College Record, 115(12), 1-36.

Feldman, R. S. (2016). Development across the life span. Pearson.

Green, S., Caplan, B., & Baker, B. (2014). Maternal supportive and interfering control as predictors of adaptive and social development in children with and without developmental delays. Journal of Intellectual Disability Research, 58(8), 691-703.

Grist, R. M., & Field, A. P. (2012). The mediating effect of cognitive development on children’s worry elaboration. Journal of behavior therapy and experimental psychiatry, 43(2), 801-807.

Hong, Y. R., & Park, J. S. (2012). Impact of attachment, temperament and parenting on human resource development. Korean journal of pediatrics, 55(12), 449-454.

McAdams, D. P., & Zapata-Gietl, C. (2015). Three strands of identity development across the human life course: Reading Erik Erikson in full. The Oxford handbook of identity development, 81-94.

Modgil, S., Modgil, C., & Brown, G. (Eds.). (2013). Jean Piaget. Routledge.

Overton, W. F. (Ed.). (2013). The relationship between social and cognitive development. Psychology Press.