Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development • Topic 3 of 6

Preoperational Stage (2–7 years)

From about 2 to 7 years the child can use symbols — words, images, pretend play — but cannot yet perform logical mental 'operations'. CTET loves the limitations of this stage. Egocentrism is the inability to see a situation from another person's point of view (the child assumes everyone sees, knows and feels what they do). Centration is focusing on one feature of a situation and ignoring others. Because of centration the child fails conservation — the understanding that quantity stays the same despite a change in appearance: poured into a tall thin glass, the 'taller' water now looks like 'more'. The child's thinking is also irreversible (cannot mentally reverse the pouring) and shows animism (treating objects as alive — 'the naughty chair hurt me'). Pretend/symbolic play flourishes here.

✅ Solved examples

1. Water from a short wide glass is poured into a tall thin glass and a 5-year-old says the tall glass has 'more'. The child cannot yet perform:
Conservation (of liquid). The child centrates on height and ignores width, and cannot mentally reverse the pouring — typical of the preoperational stage.
2. A 4-year-old covers her own eyes and says 'now you can't see me'. This illustrates:
Egocentrism — she assumes others share her own viewpoint and cannot take another perspective.
3. A child scolds a table for 'hurting' him after he bumps into it. This preoperational feature is:
Animism — attributing life and intentions to inanimate objects.
4. Focusing on only one aspect of a problem (e.g. only the height of the water) while ignoring others is called:
Centration — it is the reason preoperational children fail conservation tasks.

✏️ Practice — try these, take hints as needed

1. The inability to take the perspective of another person is called:
Key limitation of 2–7 yrs.
The world revolves around me.
Egocentrism
2. A child believes the amount of clay changes when a ball is rolled into a sausage. The missing concept is:
Amount stays the same.
Same as the water-glass task.
Conservation
3. Pretend play and the use of words and images to stand for things flourish in which stage?
Symbols appear but logic does not.
2–7 years.
Preoperational stage
4. Treating a doll as if it can think and feel is an example of:
Inanimate treated as alive.
Animism
5. Concentrating on one feature and ignoring the rest is termed:
Why conservation fails.
Centration

📝 Topic test — 8 questions

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