Sosial learning theory
Subsequent to skinners work, some
theorists concerned with human learning, notably Julian Rotter and Albert
Bandura, were willing to talk about cognition (thinking, a behavior not
directly observable). They elaborated description of cognitiveprocesses
involved in learning or changing the frequency of behavior (Bandura, 1973,
1977; Rotter et al., 1961). Their ideas are fundamental to contemporary social
learning theory (Cairus, 1998).
TABLE 1.5
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Common statements based on learning views of
child development
|
|
·
“ you may watch television after your finish
your homework”
·
“ in our math program, children learn just one
small step at a time. Success is guaranteed, and children want to keep
working with the materials”
·
“ when you finish your reading and math
assignment you may paint, play with blocks, or choose a learning games”.
·
“ ignore children when they are behaving
badly; praise them when they are behaving welt”.
·
“ you will spoil the baby if you pick him up
when he cries”.
·
“ children who answer correctly will receive a
gold star on their papers”.
·
“ it is important that children have good
models of behavior”.
|
Bandura intially emphasized that
many behavior are learned quickly through observation and imitation of other
rather then gradually through the shaping process that Skinner described. It is
unlikely, for exemple, that many of as could learn to drive a car through
shaping, which depends so heavily on trial and error. We might not live through
the first lesson! Instead, we learn through cognitive processes related to
modeling (imitating to the general form of behaviors observed in others) and
verbal instructions. A psychologist who warns, “ if children see you hitting,
they learn to hit,” is using social learning theory to explain and predict
behavior.
As social learning theory has
progressed, it has placed more emphasis on the cognitive processes involve to
learning. Walter Mischel (1976) suggested that an individual’s behavior in
particular situation is determined not by the situation alone but by a complex
of cognitive qualities that the individual bring tothe situation. This includes
abilities, values, expectations, interpretation and plans. Mischel noted an
observation first made long ago by plato : the same stimulus or situation-for exemple,
in the modern times, a classroom test- elicits different response from
different individual, depending, on the abilities and interpretation they apply
to it. Whereas the radical behaviorist would assert that the stimulus controls
the respons in a strict way, the social learning theorist allows room for the
individual variation due to different interpretation of the stimulus.
Bandura extended his theory into
the realm of cognitive theory, even labeling it “ social cognitive theory, even
labeling it “social cognitive theory” (1986,1994). Rather than describing
individuals are determined strictly by the learning histories their
environments have dealt them, Bandura
described individuals who in large measure determind their own destiny by
choosing their future enviroment, including the goals they wish to pursue. They
reflect on and regulate their own throughts, feelings and actions to achieve
those goals. To degree to which individuals are effective in thingking,
motivating themselves and feeling positively whatever the enviroment provides
(Bandura, 1995). Social learning theory accepts a number of the principle of
behavioral psychology such as the effect of reinforcement and other aspects of
the environment on behavior, but it supplements these principles with ideas
about cognition, which enables human being tiactively their environment.
Chapter 1 theories of child
development and methods of studying children.
Cognitive-developmental theory :
jean piaget
When confronted with picky eating
like Nicole’s, a cognitive-development theorist is likely to ask if she
understands what is expected of her and why. The cognitive developmental
theoistmay weel probe the child’s knowledge of the health advantages of eating
a variety of food and ask nicole if she interested in changing her behavior as
aresult of what she knows. If necole does not have these undesatandings, the
cognitivw-developmental theorist may
take the position that rewarding her behavior would be of little use. However,
if nicole did undestand the usefulness of eating a variety of food, then her
mother could remind her at appropriate times in order to encourage her to try a
range of food.
Interest in how cognition affects
behavior grew rapidly in the late 1950s. Researches from a number of traditions
noted that exploration and learning often occurred best in situations unrelated
to the satisfaction of commonly recognized reinforcers or primary rewards
(those having to do with the satisfaction of physiological needs). For example,
one researcher found that monkeys would learn a task when it was followed by an
opportunity to look at something outside their cages (Butler, 1953). Similar
behavior had been noted earlier in rats. They would cross an electrified grid
to get to a maze filled with new objects (Nissen, 1930). Some theorists
suggested that there might be a drive to play, explore, effectively manipulate,
and become competent in mastering the environment (White, 1959). But other
theorists looked for a different explanation.
Cognition seemed to be a fruitful area to investigate in search of an
explanation for the organisms’ exploration in these situations.
At about the same time,
information-processing theorists (Miller et al., 1960; Newell et al., 1958)
began using a computer analogy to describe cognitive phenomena, such as
selective attention, information gathering, and problem solving. We discuss
information-processing theory later in this chapter as well as in later
chapters on cognitive development.
Since the 1930s, however, Swiss
philosopher and biologist-turned-psychologist Jean Piaget (1896-1980) had been
studying the development of cognition. He was particularly interested in what
knowledged is and how peoplr acquire it. He approached the question of adult
knowledge by investigating children’s knowledge. He asked two basic questions:
(1) Why do children and adults think differently in similar situations? And (2)
What causes human knowledge to change with time?
Piaget thought knowledge was
constructed or created gradually, as maturing individuals interact with the
environment. He considered children to be active in their own development. This
view constrated with other major theories. According to traditional
maturational theory, the child is at the mercy of the genes that determine the
rate of maturation. Only when neural ripening has occured can the child acquire
knowledge quite easily from the environment.
Learning theorists consider
knowledge to be externeal—acquired through experience and reinforcement.
Piaget, on the other hand, did not consider knowledge to be independent of the
child, to be lurking “out there” in the external world. He believed instead in
constructivism, the creation of knowledge through interactions between the
developing child’s current understanding and the environment.
Processes by Which
Knowledge Is Acquired Piaget
explained that knowledge is created by the child through two processes,
assimilation and accommodation. Assimilation is the process of taking in
information about the environment and incorporating it into an existing
knowledge structure, which Piaget called a scheme or schema. A 1-year-old who
is familiar with dogs, for example, can be said to have a dog scheme, which may
cover medium-sized, four-legged animals often found in people’s houses. Then,
the first time the child sees a cat, she may call it a dog, assimilating it to
her “dog” scheme. Gradually, as he sees more cats and notices how they differ
from dogs, she develops two different schemes, one for cats and another for
dogs. Piaget called the process by which children change their knowledge
structures accommodation.
Because our schemes or cognitive
structures are always inadequate to handle all our experiences (Piaget, 1963),
assimilation tends to distort information from the environment to make it fit
available schemes. Eventually, these distortions are corrected as we change the
schemes to accommodate the new information. The 2-year-old changes her dog
scheme to exclude animals that meow and climb trees, and she develops a cat
scheme that includes these characteristics. Eventually, her schemes will
accurately reflect all the noticeable characteristics of each type of animal.
In this way, our schemes come to conform more closely to the world around us.
Piaget used the term
equilibration to refer to the process by which assimilation and accommodation
constantly balance each other. Experiences that promote cognitive development
are those in which the child is in conflict or disequilibrium—current knowledge
structures do not quite match the child’s experience. This cognitive conflict
leads the child to invent new structures or schemas, and equilibrium between
experience (input) and knowledge (internal structure) is thus restored.
Piaget’s Stages of
Development In Piaget’s theory, assimilation
and accommodation lead not only to more knowledge, but also to major
reorganizations of knowledge—to different ways of thinking. Piaget considered
the points at which major reorganizations in thinking take place to be the
beginnings of different stages. Table 1.6 summarizes the four major stages
Piaget proposed. (each stage is discussed in detail in later chapters)
Chapter 1 theorist of child
development and methods of studying children
Pieget’s stages of cognitive
development
|
Stage
|
Descriotion of stage
|
|
Sensorimotor (brith-2years)
|
Knowledge is acquired and structured through
sensory percetion and motor activity. Schemes involve action rather than
simbols
|
|
Preoperational (2-6 years)
|
Knowledge is acquired and strustured through
symbols, such as words but, scemes are intuitive rather than logical.
|
|
Concreteoperational (7-12 years)
|
Knowledge is acquired and structure symbolically
and logically, but schemes are limited to concrete and present objects and
events.
|
|
Formal operational (12 years and older)
|
Knowledge is acquired and structured symbolically
and logically and hypothetical/deductive (“if then”) thinking can be used to
generate all the possibilities for a particular situation.
|
Piaget and Motivation
for Knowledge Acquisition Piaget’s
theories were enormously influential in many areas of child development. One
implication of his ideas is that completely familiar events may be
uninteresting to the child because they require no change in schemes.
Completely unfamiliar events, on the other hand, may be incomprehensible
because the child has no scheme into which to assimilate them. Piaget’s theory
predicts that children will prefer moderately novel events because these are
the ones most likely to prompt accommodation (Hunt,1965)
Piaget’s ideas provide a
theoretical basis for the notion of intrinsic motivation, or motivation that
comes from information processing itself, rather than from external rewards
(Hunt, 1965). In other words, a child might initiate actions without being
motivated by hunger, thirst, sex, or pain and without being rewarded or
punished for the actions. According to piaget’s theory, children will act
simply to understand. When children express interest in something, Piaget’s
theory suggests that they are indicating both that they understand it in some
sense and that they are trying to understand it in a better way.
Cognitive-developmental theory is
evident in many child-rearing and educational practices and beliefs. Exampes of
its common applications are listed in Table 1.7.
TABLE 1.7
|
Common statements based on cognitive-development
view of child development
|
|
·
“children learn best when they are interested
in what they are doing”.
·
“children are activities learners”.
·
“when children answer questions incorrectly,
ask them whyvthey answered as they did before deciding how to help them
arrive at a more accurate answer.”
·
“chilren seek simulation”
·
Do not put all of the new toys out in the
classroom at once; add new ones gradually to renew interest”.
|
Sociocultural Theory: Lev
Vygotsky
Piaget tended to focus on the
child’s own construction of knowledge. He overlooked the social context in
which knowledge is constructed (Valsiner, 1998), even in the acquisition of the
most important cognitive structures. Other theorists have not shared Piaget’s
view that knowledge is acquired autonomously through interactions with the
physical environment. For example, Lev Vygotsky, a contemporary of Piaget, had
read the early writings of Gesell and Piaget, but felt that they minimized the
importance of social interaction in cognitive development.
Vygotsky received a degree in law
from the University of Moscow in 1917, at the beginning of the Communist
Revolution. He received his doctorate in the psychology of art in 1925.
Vygotsky began writing in his native Russia just after the socialist revolution
and led a young group of Marxists in the task of creating a psychology that
would contribute to the development of a new socialist society. Despite this,
his writings were suppressed because they were considered to be insufficiently
Marxist. Secifically, Vygotsky had used intelligence tests in some of his
research, a practice that was condemened by the Communist Party. Because of
this political situation, and because Vygotsky died in 1934 at the age of 37,
his influence worldwide was delayed. Only relatively recently has his work
become widely known.
Like works by other Russians of
his time, Vygotsky’s first writings were marked by Marxist zeal, bent on
pointing out how knowledge and even thought itself are socially mediated and
constructed for each child throughout history. According to Vygotsky and
Marxist philosophy, knowledge is acquired in a dialectic process—it is the
product of interaction between two opposing tendencies existing within a
problem-solving situation. The dialectic by which the knowledge in a culture is
acquired is the interaction between the child and a more advanced member of the
culture who usually uses language or a commonlly understood sign to impart it.
This dialogue is eventually internalize by the child as thought.
For Vygotsky, all knowledge, from
the most important to the most mundane, is socially constructed. For example,
suppose an adult reads a particular story to a child or describes how to do
some aspect of homework. The child internalizes the essential features of these
dialogues. Gradually, the child is able to work independently on these
previously tutored activities.
An example of such
internalization in the infant’s nonverbal pointing to objects, which occurs
near the end of the child’s first year of life (Wertsch, 1985). Pointing begins
with the baby’s unsuccessful attempt to grasp an object, which a mother
comprehends as an indication of the child’s interest. The parent responds with
her own attention to it, names it, gives it to the child, and so on. In other
words, the mother, an individual more mature that the child, introduces meaning
into the child’s initial gesture. Subsequently, the child also sees the gesture
as a sign (Leont’ev,1981).
Internalization is the means by
which culture (a social group’s values and skills) is transferred from one
generation to the next. The particular knowledge and even the ways of thinking
transmitted from adult to child are thought to vary a great deal from culture
to culture. Because knowledge is socially constructed by the child and others
within the culture. Because knowledge is socially constructed by the child and
others within the culture, Vygotsky’s theory is usually described as
sociocultural.
Vygotsky’s theory is also
cultural-historical. In addition to being a sociocultural theory of ontogenetic
development (development of an individual child), his general theory
encompasses a view of human evolution, plus a short human cultural history.
Like Marx, Vygotsky indicated that tool use and labor in our history demarcated
the beginning of human culture. But Vygotsky went on to say that the
acquisition of language was the most important event in the development of the
culture, just as it is in the development of individual children. The breadth
of Vygotsky’s thinking allowed him to speculate not only about the relationship
between linguistic signs and the development of thinking, but also about the
nature of human consciousness itself.
Vygotsky believed that human
consciousness did not exist prior to the development of the ability to use some
sign (or mental “tool”), such as language, to form concepts, to generalizr, or
to describe events (Ratner, 1991). Without concept formation and linguistic
description of events, Vygotsky thought mature human consciousness impossible.
For Vygotsky, human consciousness was more than experience. The first
development of human consciousness in the course of evolution and its
subsequent manifestation in any given individual require the use of language,
or at least some meaningful sign, which can be used to describe and operate
a=on that experience. Human consciousness consists of thought about experience.
In his typical literary style, Vygotsky (1926, p. 33) stated that a human’s
consciousness of his or her experiences means only that those experiences have
been “changed into an object (a stimulus) for other experiences.” In this way,
he continued, “conciousness is the experience of experience in precisely the
sama way as experience is simply the experience of objects.”
Hurlock,
Elisabet. 1994. Psikologi Perkembangan: Suatu Pendekatan Sepanjang rentang
Kehidupan. Jakarta: Penerbit Erlangga.
DAFTAR KEPUSTAKAAN
Allen,L.R(1980). Leisure and its relationship ti work and career guidance
vokasional guidance Quarterly,28(3) 257-262.
Brammer,L.M,&Shorrom,E,L(1960).Therapeutik psychology,engle wood
cliffs,N.j:prentice-Hall.
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