Abstract Ideas & Thinking in Adolescent Development Stages

Concrete Operational

• According to Piaget, the concrete operational stage lasts approximately from ages 7 to 11. During this phase, children learn to think logically about items that they can physically manipulate. A major lesson of this phase focuses on the principles of conservation and reversibility, in which kids discover that quantities and amounts do not change if the items are moved around. For example, by the end of this phase, children recognize that when a stack of blocks is spread out across the floor, the number of blocks does not change.

Formal Operational

• The formal operational stage begins near the age of 12 and lasts through late adolescence. In this phase, children move from manipulating literal objects to manipulating their own thoughts. By the time this phase is complete, they are able to imagine possibilities, speculate on future outcomes, and utilize symbols and representations that do not directly correspond to real-world objects. The two major goals of this stage are hypothetic-deductive reasoning, in which the teen learns to form a hypothesis and test it logically, and propositional thought, in which the adolescent learns to evaluate the logic of verbal statements without connecting them to real-life circumstances.

Brain Development

• According to a 2010 Psychology Today article on the teenage brain, research shows that human brains undergo dramatic changes during the teen years. Some neural pathways shut down, new ones are created, and heavily used pathways become more efficient. According to developmental theorist Erik Erikson, adolescence is the time when teenagers are consumed by the search for an independent identity. This process ultimately shapes the ways in which the brain develops, as exposure and repetition determine which neural pathways become most efficient. As the brain develops, more efficient processing allows higher levels of abstract thought.

Levels of Abstraction

• In an article for the George Lucas Educational Foundation̵7;s Edutopia website, Educator Shawn Cornally points out that abstract thought exists on a bell curve rather than on a single point. Teens in the formal operational stage of development do not just wake up one morning able to think abstractly about all topics. Instead, they develop this ability at their own individual rates. He points out the importance of assessing where a specific teen falls in his ability to use abstract thought and using teaching methods that match the child̵7;s current level of cognitive development.