Cognitive Development

2024/2025

Academic Year

ENG

Instruction in English

6

ECTS credits

Delivered at:

Department of Educational Programmes

Course type:

Elective course

When:

2 year, 1, 2 module

Instructor

Kotov, Alexey A.

Course Syllabus

Abstract

Cognitive development is one of the most elaborated and intensively evolving areas of cognitive psychology. The course will consider the specifics of the development of cognitive functions in children from birth to 10 years of age, the relationship of the development of cognitive functions with the development of the brain. Much attention will be paid to innovative behavioral and neurophysiological methods for studying cognitive functions in children at different ages. Course topics include characteristics of the development of basic cognitive functions: perception and attention, language and categorization, memory, and thinking. The course will also address the development of children's social cognition and learning abilities (joint attention, theory of mind), cognitive control and metacognition. Within the framework of the course mechanisms of cognitive development will be considered from different theoretical perspectives - associative approach, cultural-historical approach, neuroconstructivism.

Learning Objectives

• The purpose of the course "Cognitive Development" is to acquaint students with the modern theories, research and methods of cognitive development psychology. Cognitive development is one of the most developed and intensively developing areas of cognitive psychology. The course will deal with the characteristics of the formation of cognitive functions in children from birth to 12 years of age, and the connection between the development of cognitive functions and the development of the brain. Much attention will be paid to innovative methods of research, the peculiarities of the study of cognitive abilities in children at different ages. The value of the discipline for the student will be the integration of facts about the cognitive functions of children into theoretical models of general and cognitive development.

Expected Learning Outcomes

• Is able to distinguish between the main theories and is aware of the limitations of methods for studying cognitive development
• The student can critically evaluate basic methods of studying cognitive function in infancy. The student can design research on the basic effects of cognitive development of attention, memory, and learning functions in children under two years of age.
• The student can plan research on the basic effects of cognitive development: social learning and perception in children under the age of two
• The student can plan research on the basic effects of cognitive development: different types of representations in children under the age of seven
• The student can plan research on the basic effects of cognitive development: types of categories and characteristics of learning new concepts at different ages
• The student can plan research on the basic effects of language learning
• The student can plan research on the basic effects of causal learning in children under 12 years of age
• The student can plan research on the basic effects of working, semantic, and implicit memory in children of different ages

Course Contents

• Introduction: the psychology of cognitive development
• Infancy: learning and perception
• Infancy: social cognition
• Theory of mind and mental representation
• Conceptual development
• Language development
• Causal reasoning and active learning
• Memory development

Assessment Elements

• Interim test 2
  промежуточный тест по эффектам и экспериментальным результатам
• Interim test 1
  промежуточный тест по эффектам и экспериментальным результатам
• Final project
• Interim open-ended test
  open-ended test
• Interim open-ended test

Interim Assessment

• 2024/2025 2nd module
  0.3 * Final project + 0.2 * Interim open-ended test + 0.2 * Interim open-ended test + 0.15 * Interim test 1 + 0.15 * Interim test 2

Bibliography

Recommended Core Bibliography

• Mareschal D. et al. (ed.). The making of human concepts. – Oxford University Press, USA, 2010.
• Murphy, G. L. (2002). The Big Book of Concepts. Cambridge, Mass: A Bradford Book. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=78121
• Origins of the social mind : evolutionary and developmental views, , 2008
• Tomasello, M. (2014). A Natural History of Human Thinking. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=660118
• Принципы психологии развития, Баттерворт, Дж., 2000

Recommended Additional Bibliography

• Carpenter, M., Nagell, K., & Tomasello, M. (1998). Social cognition, joint attention, and communicative competence from 9 to 15 months of age. Monographs Of The Society For Research In Child Development, 63(4), i. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=mdc&AN=9835078
• Handbook of categorization in cognitive science, , 2005

Authors

• KOTOV ALEKSEY ALEKSANDROVICH
• KOTOVA TATYANA NIKOLAEVNA