Varieties of Strategy Training in Piagetian Concept Learning

Abstract

Occasionally, the proscriptions of a theory have more influence on the behavior of scientists than do its positive predictions (see Chapter 2 for additional comments about this phenomenon). A situation of this sort occurred some two decades ago in connection with what Piagetian theory anticipates about the laboratory learning of its stage-related concepts. At that time it was widely supposed that the theory predicts no learning effects. Although this interpretation was not entirely accurate, it was correct in spirit, and it spawned a large number of learning experiments on Piagetian concepts, especially the concrete-operational concepts of middle childhood. What began as some modest attempts to assess the trainability of conservation ultimately blossomed into a substantial literature containing multiple experiments on concepts such as perspective taking (e.g., Cox, 1977; Iannotti, 1978), sedation (e.g., Bingham-Newman & Hooper, 1974; Coxford, 1964), identity (e.g., Hamel & Riksen, 1973; Litrownik, Franzini, Livingston, & Harvey, 1978), proportionality (e.g., Brainerd, 1971; Brainerd & Allen, 1971b), isolation of variables (e.g., Case, 1974; Siegler, Liebert, & Liebert, 1973), ordinal and cardinal number (e.g., Brainerd, 1973, 1974b), subjective moral reasoning (e.g., Arbuthnot, 1975; Jensen & Larm, 1970; also Chapter 3 in this volume) and many others. In fact, I would venture to say that there is no concept that figures prominently in Piaget’s summary writings on his stages (e.g., Piaget, 1970; Piaget & Inhelder, 1969) that has not been subjected to training in several experiments.