Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory of Cognitive Development

Russian psychologist Vygotsky focused on the importance of social interaction, culture and language in a child’s
cognitive development
 Said cognitive development is largely a matter of internalizing the symbols, knowledge, ideas and modes of
reasoning that have evolved over time and constitute the culture into which the child was born.

Vygotsky agreed with Piaget that the main force for development is the child’s active interaction with the
environment, but disagreed with Piaget’s conception of the relevant environment
 Piaget emphasized child’s interaction with physical environment
 Vygotsky emphasized child’s interaction with social environment

Vygotsky saw the child as an “apprentice” rather than “little scientist”

Argued that it is not possible to describe the process by which children acquire knowledge without taking into
account the child’s social environment or culture.
 Culture provides knowledge, teaches children what to think and how to think
 Knowledge is transferred via imitation, instructions, or collaborative learning

Suggests child’s cognitive development is based on interaction with other people, as well as the cultural tools to
understand the world
 Cultural tools include both tools used in the culture (e.g. axes, computer) and the implicit and explicit rules or
norms observed in the culture

Language is the primary form of interaction adults use to transmit knowledge, and as a child grows older, language
comes to serve as the most important tool of learning. As language becomes internalized, it converges with thought
and eventually allows the child to direct and control thinking via language

Vygotsky believed language progressing in three stages
 Pre-intellectual social speech (0-3 years)- thought is not constructed using language and speech is only used to
enact social change (e.g. receiving objects from a parent)
 Egocentic speech (3-7 years)- language helps control the child’s own behavior and is spoken out loud (e.g. when
children play games and verbalize their actions)
 Inner speech (7+ years)- child uses speech silently to develop their thinking and publicly for social
communication

Vygotsky’s fundamental idea→ development occurs first at the social level and then at the individual level

Zone of proximal development→ refers to the difference between what a child can do on his or her own and what
he/she can accomplish with help
 Child can increase competence if he/she receive assistance on a task that is just beyond his or her current ability
(scaffolding)
 Adult must be sensitive to child’s abilities and signals because children can differ

Vygotsky suggested cooperative learning instead of child centered learning

Believed critical thinking derives largely from the social, collaborative activity of dialogue
Evaluation of Vygotsky’s Theory

Concept of scaffolding has been useful from a teaching perspective.
 Connor et al. (1997) argued that the quality of scaffolding provided by a mother and father could predict the
success of the child in the classroom.

Vygotsky’s argument that inner speech was a key part of learning and cognitive development has received support.
 Behrend et al. (1992) quantified inner speech by observing the amount of whispering and lip movement children
engaged in when given a task. Children who used the greatest amount of inner speech tended to perform
better on tasks.

Emphasis on importance of social interaction on cognitive development has been an important contribution to
developmental psychology.

Vygotsky’s approach has been criticized for placing too much emphasis on the social environment

Criticized for being too vague in his outline of social influence.
 May be due to his early death at the age of 38 while his research was still in his infancy.

Lack of empirical support for Vygotsky’s ideas—largely explained by his emphasis on processes (harder to test for)
rather than outcomes