A D OLESCEN CE 12E L A U R E N C E S T EIN B E R G CHAPTER 2 COGNITIVE TRANSITIONS Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education CHAPTER 2 OVERVIEW 1 Changes in Cognition Thinking About Possibilities Thinking About Abstract Concepts Thinking About Thinking Thinking in Multiple Dimensions Adolescent Relativism Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education CHAPTER 2 OVERVIEW 2 Theoretical Perspectives on Adolescent Thinking The Piagetian View of Adolescent Thinking The Information Processing View of Adolescent Thinking The Adolescent Brain How Your Brain Works The Age of Opportunity What Changes in Adolescence Implications for Adolescent Behavior Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education CHAPTER 2 OVERVIEW 3 Individual Differences in Intelligence in Adolescence The Measurement of IQ Culture and Intelligence Adolescent Thinking in Context Social Cognition in Adolescence Adolescent Risk Taking Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education CHANGES IN COGNITION The term cognition refers to thinking Compared to children adolescents are more sophisticated in their ability to do the following Think about possibilities Think about abstract concepts Think about thinking metacognition Think in multiple dimensions See things as relative not as absolute relativism Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education THINKING ABOUT POSSIBILITIES 1 Unlike adolescents children don t wonder about how their personalities might change in the future or how they might have been different had they grown up under different circumstances Adolescents are able to move easily between the specific and the abstract to generate alternative possibilities Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education THINKING ABOUT POSSIBILITIES 2 The adolescent s ability to reason systematically in terms of what is possible is handy for learning math and science This type of thinking is also noticeable in the types of arguments adolescents employ Deductive reasoning A type of reasoning in which one draws logically necessary conclusions from a general set of premises or givens Hypothetical thinking is if then thinking People need to be able to see beyond what is directly observable and apply logical reasoning to anticipate what might be possible Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education THINKING ABOUT ABSTRACT CONCEPTS A second aspect of cognitive development is the appearance of more systemic abstract thinking Able to think about interpersonal relationships politics philosophy religion and morality Able to think about abstract concepts such as friendship faith democracy fairness and honesty Improvements in social thinking during adolescence are directly related to improvements in the ability to think abstractly Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education THINKING ABOUT THINKING 1 Thinking about Thinking Metacognition The process of thinking about thinking itself Involves monitoring one s own cognitive activity during thinking Being able to assess how well one is learning new material Increased introspection thinking about our own emotions Increased self consciousness thinking about how others think about us Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education THINKING ABOUT THINKING 2 Adolescent Egocentrism Extreme self absorption as described by David Elkind Sometimes results in two types of problems for adolescents Imaginary audience The belief often brought on by the heightened self consciousness of early adolescence that everyone is watching and evaluating one s behavior Personal fable An adolescent s belief that he or she is unique and therefore not subject to the rules that govern other people s behavior Can cause the dangerous belief that nothing bad can happen to them because they are special Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education THINKING IN MULTIPLE DIMENSIONS Adolescents develop the ability to view things from more than one aspect at a time They develop a more sophisticated understanding of probability Adolescents develop far more complicated self conceptions and relationships They describe themselves and others in more complex ways The ability to look at things in multiple dimensions enables their ability to understand and enjoy sarcasm Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education ADOLESCENT RELATIVISM Adolescents shift from seeing things as absolute to seeing things as relative Compared to children adolescents are more likely to question others assertions and less likely to accept facts as absolute truths Difficulties can arise when adolescents begin to see parents values as relative Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ADOLESCENT THINKING Experts disagree on the processes underlying improvements in adolescents thought processes Different researchers measure adolescent thinking in different ways Two especially important viewpoints on this topic Piagetian Information processing Copyright 2020 McGraw Hill Education All rights reserved No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill Education THE PIAGETIAN VIEW OF ADOLESCENT THINKING 1 Cognitive developmental view A perspective based on the work of Piaget that takes a qualitative stage theory approach It includes four stages Sensorimotor period The first stage of cognitive development spanning