Psychology is one of the newest sciences. Because it is the science of the mind and behavior, it is also less concrete than some of the other sciences. Over the years, social scientists have developed theories or perspectives based off of their observations, research, and the perspectives of other scientists. Although there is some overlap, each of the major perspectives of psychology is unique. As a result, they each have strengths and weaknesses and explain psychology in a different way. One theory, the sociocultural perspective, is exactly what its name suggests. It’s the idea that the society and groups that an individual belongs to are what influences development, thoughts, and behavior. The sociocultural perspective was pioneered by a Russian psychologist, Lev Vygotsky, in the 1920’s (John-Steiner, 1998). Vygotsky stressed the idea that children learn through what he called guided participation (Sigelman, 2009). His theory was that children develop through interactions with parents, teachers, and other knowledgeable members of the culture and are given tools to adopt the group’s way of thinking.
One of the strengths of this perspective is that it recognizes the relationship between cognitive development and the social, cultural, and historical context that an individual is a part of (Sigelman, 2009). This explains the differences between cultures throughout history. This is an important concept because we all notice the differences between each person’s ways of thinking. Although we can attribute this to other factors, we can recognize more similarities in people of similar social and cultural backgrounds and more differences in those with drastically different backgrounds. Vygotsky points out that one of the...
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...the perspectives are going to have strengths and weaknesses. Until we gain more knowledge about the mind and behavior, we won’t be able to draw accurate conclusions that everyone can agree upon. For now, psychologists continue doing research, come up with new perspectives, and use the relevant information from the current perspectives. In the field of psychology opinions will always differ.
Works Cited
John-Steiner, V., & Mahn, H. (1998). Sociocultural approaches to learning and development: a vygotskian framework. University of New Mexico. http://webpages.charter.net/schmolze1/vygotsky/johnsteiner.html
Mcleod, S. (2010). Zone of proximal development.
http://www.simplypsychology.org/Zone-of-Proximal-Development.html
Sigelman, C.K., & Rider, E.A. (6th Edition). (2009). Life-span human development (pp. 210- 214). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth cengage learning.
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Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky spent their lives constructing theories to explain human growth and development. Both theorists are, today, considered leading contributors to the field of developmental psychology. The purpose of this paper is to explain how a better understanding of Piaget’s and Vygotsky’s theories will provide you with a better understanding of how we ourselves learn and grow as students in today. This will be accomplished by summarizing, comparing,
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Psychology is the scientific study of the mind, brain, and behavior. In psychology, and all of the other sciences, relying on opinions is abandoned in order to find out which explanations best fit the evidence or data given. Science continually forces us to question our findings and conclusions. Over time, psychology has advanced greatly and a main reason for such progressiveness is because of the change in the research model used.
Lev Vygotsky(1896-1934) was a Russian psychologist who created the Social Development Theory/ Sociocultural Theory. Vygotsky believed that children's mental, language, and social development is supported and enhanced through social interaction. Vygotsky also believed that beginning at birth, children seek out adults for social interactions and that development occurs through these interactions. The belief that social development sets a precedent for development(appeals to the nurture side of development). The general idea from this theory is that being aware, consciousness, and cognition are the end results of socialization and social interaction. It stated that, "Sociocultural approaches to learning and development were first systematized and applied by Vygotsky and his collaborators in Russia in the 1920s and 1930s. They are based on the concept that human activities take in cultural contexts, are mediated by language and other symbol systems, and can be best understood when investigated in their historical development(John-Steiner & Mahn, 1996)." At the core of this theory, " Vygotsky focused on the way that a child co-constructs meaning through social interaction, and the role word meaning plays in the development of thinking(Mahn, 1999)."
For Vygotsky, children are seen as active beings on their development through social interactions with parents, teachers, and other adults, as well as by participating in their cultural activities. The interactions they have with other individuals and their culture opens their minds to new information and helps develop skills not previously attained. To further understand cognitive development in Piaget and Vygotsky’s theory, we must first look at the processes involved.
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Growing up, everyone has different upbringings and everyone develops in different ways or at different rates. Their social class, social background, and or gender identities play a large role in the way which they perceive the world and in the way that the world perceives them. According to Vgotsky social interactions play a crucial role in the development of cognition. This term refers to the mental processes that are involved in gaining knowledge and comprehension. These processes include thinking, knowing, remembering, judging
Socio-Cultural Theory. The socio-cultural theory is a concept by experts that looks at the essential influences that humanity makes to individual development. It stresses the collaboration between developing individuals and the ethnicity in which they exists. It indicates that human learning is largely a societal process.