Editing Jean Piaget (section)

==Career history==
[[File:Jean Piaget.jpg|thumb|Bust of Piaget in the [[Parc des Bastions]], [[Geneva]]]]
[[File:Professor Piaget en koningin Juliana tijdens de bijeenkomst, Bestanddeelnr 925-6521.jpg|thumb|Piaget at Award ceremony of the Erasmus Prize, 1972, Amsterdam]]
Harry Beilin described Piaget's theoretical [[research program]]<ref>{{Cite journal | doi = 10.1037/0012-1649.28.2.191 | last1 = Beilin | first1 = H. | year = 1992 | title = Piaget's enduring contribution to developmental psychology | journal = Developmental Psychology | volume = 28 | issue = 2| pages = 191–204 | s2cid = 14459165 }}</ref> as consisting of four phases:
# the sociological model of development,
# the biological model of intellectual development,
# the elaboration of the logical model of intellectual development,
# the study of figurative thought.
The resulting theoretical frameworks are sufficiently different from each other that they have been characterized as representing different "Piagets". More recently, Jeremy Burman responded to Beilin and called for the addition of a phase before his turn to psychology: "the zeroth Piaget".<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Burman | first1 = J. T. | year = 2011 | title = The zeroeth Piaget| journal = [[Theory & Psychology]] | volume = 21 | issue = 1| pages = 130–135 | doi = 10.1177/0959354310361407 | s2cid = 220119333 }}</ref>

===Before becoming a psychologist===
Before Piaget became a psychologist, he trained in [[natural history]] and [[philosophy]]. He received a doctorate in 1918 from the [[University of Neuchâtel]]. He then undertook post-doctoral training in Zürich (1918–1919), and Paris (1919–1921). He was hired by [[Théodore Simon]] to standardize [[psychometrics|psychometric measures]] for use with French children in 1919.<ref>{{Cite journal |title = The Early Evolution of Jean Piaget's Clinical Method|last = Mayer|first = Susan|date = 2005|journal = History of Psychology|volume = 8|issue = 4|pages = 362–82|doi = 10.1037/1093-4510.8.4.362|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/6646116|pmid = 17152748}}</ref> The theorist we recognize today only emerged when he moved to Geneva, to work for [[Édouard Claparède]] as director of research at the [[Rousseau Institute]], in 1922.

===Sociological model of development===
Piaget first developed as a psychologist in the 1920s. He investigated the hidden side of children's minds. Piaget proposed that children moved from a position of [[egocentrism]] to [[sociocentrism]]. For this explanation he combined the use of psychological and [[clinical method]]s to create what he called a semiclinical [[interview]]. He began the interview by asking children standardized questions and depending on how they answered, he would ask them a series of standard questions. Piaget was looking for what he called "spontaneous conviction" so he often asked questions the children neither expected nor anticipated. In his studies, he noticed there was a gradual progression from intuitive to scientific and socially acceptable responses. Piaget theorized children did this because of the social interaction and the challenge to younger children's ideas by the ideas of those children who were more advanced.

This work was used by [[Elton Mayo]] as the basis for the famous [[Hawthorne effect|Hawthorne Experiments]].<ref>{{cite journal|author=Hsueh, Y. |year=2001|title=Basing much of the reasoning upon the work of Jean Piaget, 1927–1936|journal= Archives de Psychologie|volume= 69|issue=268–269|pages=39–62|url=http://psycnet.apa.org/record/2002-15215-002}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|author=Hsueh, Y. |year=2002|title=The Hawthorne Experiments and the introduction of Jean Piaget in American Industrial Psychology, 1929–1932|journal= History of Psychology|volume= 5|issue=2|pages=163–189|doi=10.1037/1093-4510.5.2.163|pmid=12096759}}</ref> For Piaget, it also led to an honorary doctorate from [[Harvard University|Harvard]] in 1936.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Hsueh | first1 = Y | year = 2004 | title = He sees the development of children's concepts upon a background of sociology": Jean Piaget's honorary degree at Harvard University in 1936 |journal = History of Psychology | volume = 7 | issue = 1| pages = 20–44 | doi = 10.1037/1093-4510.7.1.20 | pmid = 15022668 }}</ref>

===Biological model of intellectual development===
In this stage, Piaget believed that the process of thinking and intellectual development could be regarded as an extension of the biological process of the (adaptation) of the species, which has also two ongoing processes: assimilation and accommodation. There is ''assimilation'' when a child responds to a new event in a way that is consistent with an existing [[schema (psychology)|schema]]. There is ''accommodation'' when a child either modifies an existing schema or forms an entirely new schema to deal with a new object or event.<ref name="Ormrod">Ormrod, J.E. (2012). ''Essentials of Educational Psychology: Big Ideas to Guide Effective Teaching''. Boston, MA: Pearson Education Inc.</ref>

He argued infants were engaging in the act of assimilation when they sucked on everything in their reach. He claimed infants transform all objects into an object to be sucked. The children were assimilating the objects to conform to their own mental structures. Piaget then made the assumption that whenever one transforms the world to meet individual needs or conceptions, one is, in a way, assimilating it. Piaget also observed his children not only assimilating objects to fit their needs, but also modifying some of their mental structures to meet the demands of the environment. This is the second division of adaptation known as accommodation. To start, the infants only engaged in primarily reflex actions such as sucking, but not long after, they would pick up objects and put them in their mouths. When they do this, they modify their reflex response to accommodate the external objects into reflex actions. Because the two are often in conflict, they provide the impetus for intellectual development{{mdash}}the constant need to balance the two triggers intellectual growth.

To test his theory, Piaget observed the [[habit]]s in his own children.

===Elaboration of the logical model of intellectual development===
In the model Piaget developed in stage three, he argued that intelligence develops in a series of stages that are related to age and are progressive because one stage must be accomplished before the next can occur. For each stage of development the child forms a view of reality for that age period. At the next stage, the child must keep up with earlier level of mental abilities to reconstruct concepts. Piaget conceived intellectual development as an upward expanding spiral in which children must constantly reconstruct the ideas formed at earlier levels with new, higher order concepts acquired at the next level.

It is primarily the "Third Piaget" (the logical model of intellectual development) that was debated by American psychologists when Piaget's ideas were "rediscovered" in the 1960s.<ref>Hsueh, Y. (2005). The lost and found experience: Piaget rediscovered. The Constructivist, 16(1).</ref>

===Study of figurative thought===
Piaget studied areas of intelligence like [[perception]] and [[memory]] that are not entirely logical. Logical concepts are described as being completely reversible because they can always get back to the starting point, meaning that if one starts with a given premise and follows logical steps to reach a conclusion, the same steps may be done in the opposite order, starting from the conclusion to arrive at the premise. The perceptual concepts Piaget studied could not be manipulated. To describe the figurative process, Piaget uses pictures as examples. Pictures cannot be separated because contours cannot be separated from the forms they outline. Memory is the same way: it is never completely reversible; people cannot necessarily recall all the intervening events between two points. During this last period of work, Piaget and his colleague Inhelder also published books on perception, memory, and other figurative processes such as learning.<ref>Guthrie, James W. (2003) "Piaget, Jean (1896–1980)" in ''Encyclopedia of Education''. 2nd ed. Vol. 5. New York, NY: Macmillan Reference USA. pp. 1894–898.</ref><ref>{{Cite journal | doi = 10.1007/BF02687400 | last1 = Valsiner | first1 = J. | year = 2005 | title = Participating in Piaget | journal = Society | volume = 42 | issue = 2| pages = 57–61 | s2cid = 145294976 }}</ref>

Because Piaget's theory is based upon biological maturation and stages, the notion of readiness is important. Readiness concerns when certain information or concepts should be taught. According to Piaget's theory, children should not be taught certain concepts until they reached the appropriate stage of cognitive development.<ref>{{Britannica|459096|Jean Piaget}}</ref> For example, young children in the [[preoperational stage]] engage in "irreversible" thought and cannot comprehend that an item that has been transformed in some way may be returned to its original state.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.simplypsychology.org/preoperational.html |title=Preoperational Stage – Egocentrism |last=McLeod |first=Saul |website=Simply Psychology |access-date=2018-08-07}}</ref>