What Is the Sensorimotor Stage?
The sensorimotor stage refers to the period before the operation when the individual is still developing their skills. The person may have some basic motor skills but they are not yet proficient enough to perform complex tasks such as driving or operating machinery. They need more training and experience in order to learn new things.
In general, it takes around 4 years from birth until one reaches adulthood (18) . From then on, it takes another 2 years before the person starts working at their own level.
A typical life span for a human being is 40 – 50 years. So, the average age of a person during this time is between 20 and 30 years old.
A child’s first year of life consists mainly of learning how to walk and crawl. During these early days, they will often play with toys or other children.
At this point, they are called “preoperational”. They do not yet understand the concept of responsibility and must follow rules. They might even start doing things without thinking about consequences.
During the next few years, they gradually develop their abilities to move around and interact with others. They can be taught basic skills like how to read, write, and count.
Most children learn these things with ease during this period. At this point, they are called “concrete operational”. During this stage of development, they do not yet understand the concept of abstract thought.
The final years of a person’s life consist mainly of teaching them how to become an adult. During these years, they begin to interact with the adult world more than before.
They are taught how to do things like go to school, get a job, and raise a family. If they follow rules and listen carefully, then they will be able to reach their potential during the formal operational period.
What Is Formal Operational Stage?
The formal operational period is the last stage before adulthood. It begins at around age 12 – 15 and lasts until about age 21 – 25. During this time, people learn how to do things on their own. They begin to think more independently and have a wide range of emotions. If they were taught the right skills during the previous stage, then they will be able to think in a complex way. An example of formal operational thought is somebody driving from one place to another by themselves for the first time.
During the stage, teenagers and adults will often move away from their parents and go live on their own. They will be able to live independently and support themselves for the rest of their lives.
If they do live with their parents, then they are still expected to contribute in some way (i.e. paying rent, doing chores, etc).
During the formal operational period, people are also able to deal with abstract concepts. They can think about things that don’t physically exist or situations they haven’t personally experienced.
For example, they can consider the concept of immortality or imagine a world where cars fly. They can also think about things like justice and morality even though these things are very complex and differ from person to person.
What Is Formal Operations?
The final stage is called the formal operations stage. This stage typically begins around the age of 15 to 20 and lasts until around the age of 30 to 35. During this period, people learn to deal with abstract concepts. They can consider hypothetical situations and think logically about them even if they haven’t experienced them personally. As people move from the formal operations stage into early adulthood, they become more open to new experiences and can easily think about things from different points of view.
At this point, people are also able to understand long-term goals. They can set realistic life plans and achieve them.
During this stage, people are also less likely to engage in risky behavior. They weigh the pros and cons of things more carefully and therefore are less likely to get themselves into trouble.
After the age of about 25 or so, a person can be considered an adult in today’s society. During these years, people are able to live independently and can take care of themselves.
They think rationally and have a wide range of real-life experience, which allows them to make good decisions.
However, as people move beyond the age of 30, they typically experience a decline in cognition. They may not think as critically or learn things as easily.
They may also experience memory problems and have a harder time remembering things that happened recently. This is known as senescence.
After the age of about 60, people typically experience more rapid cognitive decline. This is known as premature senescence.
It is worth noting that today, life expectancy in first world countries is around 80 years. As such, many people never experience cognitive decline during old age because they die before then.
The formal operations stage is also sometimes referred to as the Weber-Fechner position. This is a reference to German scientists Ernst Heinrich Weber and Gustav Fechner who are responsible for the experiment that is used to test for this stage.
Formally, the Weber-Fechner position refers to the fact that people can determine a change in stimulus on a proportionate basis. For example, if a person knows that lifting a weight of 1 kilogram from the ground to overhead requires a certain amount of effort, they can also correctly predict how much effort would be required to lift a weight of 2 kilograms from the ground to overhead.
However, this concept is more commonly known as the just noticeable difference (jnd). This refers to the fact that people can determine when there is an increase or decrease in stimulus.
In relation to the formal operations period, this means that people can determine a small increase or decrease in the amount of effort it takes to lift the weight from the ground to overhead.
In both cases, this is an important concept because it means that younger children might not be able to understand it. Younger children might not be able to determine a small change in stimulus.
As a result, they might struggle to learn and may need help with this task.
As explained by the University of Oregon, some of these concepts were first discovered by the German scientists Ernst Heinrich Weber and Gustav Fechner. They carried out experiments and found that there was a relationship between the physical energy of stimuli and the psychological sensations that people experience.
The formal operations period can be defined in terms of our ability to make a careful analysis of things. It is during this time that people are able to entertain the idea that our thoughts can differ from reality.
This means that people can come up with thoughts or ideas, and then determine whether they are accurate representations of reality or not.
As people continue to grow intellectually, they eventually develop the ability to think about their own thought process. This means that they are able to think about the fact that they are thinking about something.
This may then lead them to think about whether their thoughts about their own thoughts are accurate or not.
The formal operations stage is also sometimes known as the deductive reasoning stage. This is because people begin making more advanced logical deductions during this time.
They might be able to make a series of logical deductions that allow them to predict what will happen in the future, for example.
Around the world, people generally go through these three stages in the same order and at more or less the same time. However, there is a lot of variation between different people.
Also, people may revisit a stage and experience it a second time if they encounter situations that are conceptually difficult to understand.
The formal operational stage typically lasts from ages 12 to around age 15 or 16, but it may last longer for some people.
Intelligence Quotient
Intelligence is a concept that has been debated by scientists for many years. Psychologists have developed tests to measure a person’s intelligence, and several tests have been developed over the years.
The most well-known test is called the “intelligence quotient” or IQ test. These tests are designed to provide a score that indicates a person’s overall intelligence.
These tests are designed to be free of cultural and social bias, so they can be given to people from all over the world in the hope of getting a fair assessment of their intelligence.
IQ tests typically include a range of questions that assess a person’s verbal skills, nonverbal skills and logical reasoning skills. The questions used are designed to be suitable for people across a wide age range.
There are a number of different theories about intelligence and how it works. Some researchers have suggested that there is no such thing as general intelligence, and rather we all have a set of different skills that we are good at.
Other researchers have suggested that there is a general intelligence, but that it is more commonly referred to as “g.”
Recent research has also suggested that our intelligence may be heavily influenced by our genes.
Intelligence is an important concept for educators to understand, especially because they may encounter students with widely varying levels of intelligence. It is important for teachers to provide students with learning environments that cater to their individual needs.
Did You Know?
The first IQ test was developed in France in the year 1905 by a man named Alfred Binet. He developed the test to identify students who may need help in certain areas so they could be given special attention.
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Sources & references used in this article:
Development of operational thought without a normal sensorimotor stage by VW Berninger – Intelligence, 1988 – Elsevier
Sensorimotor functioning and communication in mute autistic children by F Curcio – Journal of autism and childhood schizophrenia, 1978 – Springer
Transition from sensorimotor Stage 5 to Stage 6 by Down syndrome children: a response to Gibson. by CB Mervis, C Cardoso-Martins – American journal of mental …, 1984 – psycnet.apa.org
Communicative and sensorimotor development of Down’s syndrome children. by CA Greenwald, LB Leonard – American Journal of Mental …, 1979 – psycnet.apa.org
Stage transitioning in the sensorimotor development of Down’s syndrome infants by CJ Dunst – Journal of Intellectual Disability Research, 1988 – Wiley Online Library
Sensorimotor and action development in autistic children from infancy to early childhood by G Lösche – Journal of Child psychology and Psychiatry, 1990 – Wiley Online Library
Language development as related to stage 6 object permanence development by R Corrigan – Journal of Child Language, 1978 – cambridge.org
Cognitive and social constructivism: Developing tools for an effective classroom by C Kalina, KC Powell – Education, 2009 – pdfs.semanticscholar.org
Evaluation and educational programming of students with deafblindness and severe disabilities: Sensorimotor stage by CJ Jones – 2001 – books.google.com
