Overview

Cognitive development refers to changes in mental abilities such as thinking, reasoning, problem solving, memory, and learning. From infancy to old age, individuals progress through various stages and exhibit changes in attention, executive function, and cognitive flexibility influenced by biology and experience.

Key Themes and Concepts

• Attention and Executive Function: Develop rapidly during early childhood. Include working memory, cognitive flexibility, and inhibitory control essential for learning and problem-solving.
• Information Processing: Focuses on how people encode, store, and retrieve information. Emphasizes gradual and continuous improvements in cognitive skills over time.
• Memory: Includes sensory, working, and long-term memory. Memory capacity increases with age; older adults may show declines in working memory but retain semantic memory longer.
• Jean Piaget’s Theory: Describes four stages—sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational. Emphasizes active learning and constructivist principles.
• Lev Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory: Highlights the role of social interaction, culture, and language in cognitive development. Key concepts: zone of proximal development and scaffolding.
• Problem Solving and Planning: Improve with experience, language, and executive function. Children become more strategic; adults rely more on prior knowledge.
• Play and Cognitive Growth: Play promotes exploration, symbolic thinking, and social understanding. Especially important in early childhood.
• Expertise and Wisdom: Expertise emerges from practice and knowledge in specific domains. Wisdom involves emotional regulation, perspective-taking, and moral reasoning—often associated with aging.
• Environmental Influences: Socioeconomic status, parental involvement, and education shape cognitive outcomes across the lifespan.

Quick Tip

Review Piaget’s and Vygotsky’s key ideas. CLEP questions often test recognition of cognitive stages, the role of play, and how cognitive abilities shift with age and context.