Cognitivism Theorists

Jean Piaget

Piaget dedicated his professional life to studying childhood development and how children learn at different life stages.

He devised four stages of development:

The Sensorimotor stage (birth to 2 years old)

The Preoperational stage (2 to 7 years old)

The Concrete Operations stage (7 to 11 years old)

The Formal Operations stage (11 to up)

Lev Vygotsky

Vygotsky believed in "scaffolding" and rejected all of Piaget's beliefs by stating that all children (people) learn through social interactions, a mentor (more knowledgeable person), and the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). ZPD refers to what the child is ready to learn with the help of a mentor or a more knowledgeable person who can guide or facilitate learning.

Jerome Bruner

Bruner believed in active learning engagement, which constructs meaning by doing and applying learned concepts. For this, he created a "spiral curriculum," in which you learn and then revisit (or practice) the same topics in a cyclical format. This curriculum promotes a more profound way of learning that helps cement knowledge in long-term memory. He also expanded on Vygotsky's work on "scaffolding" strategies and a learner-centered approach.

Albert Bandura

Bandura studied the social cognitive theory. This theory highlights that learning occurs through observation, imitation or modeling, and social experiences.

He implemented the Four Stages of Social Learning Theory:

Attention: Focuses on observing and internalizing external behaviors.
Retention: Recalling the observed behavior and storing it in the long-term memory.
Reproduction: Attempting and perfecting the learned (observed) behavior by doing or performing it.
Motivation: Finally, a reason to perform the behavior (motivation), which could be any social incentives like social approval or disapproval, punishments, or positive reinforcements.

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Sources and Citations

Simply Psychology. (2024, January 24). Piaget’s Stages: 4 Stages of Cognitive Development & Theory. https://www.simplypsychology.org/piaget.html

Sprouts. (2020a, January 31). Bruner’s 3 Steps of learning in a Spiral curriculum [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZfAsbhfL_Y

Sprouts. (2022, April 28). Social Learning Theory: Bandura’s Bobo Beatdown Experiments [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHIhkM1cAv4

Simply Psychology. (2024b, February 1). Albert Bandura's Social Learning Theory In Psychology. https://www.simplypsychology.org/bandura.html