Human cognitive development is a matter of interest for different disciplines among which are philosophical epistemology and cognitive psychology. Shi razi (Mulla Sadra), a Muslim philosopher, deals, among other issues, with the problem of human cognitive development through his 'Irfani -philosophical methodology on the basis of the principles of his philosophy. These principles are the principality and gradation, tashki k, of existence and substantial motion through which Shi razi relates cognitive development to the existential progress of the human being. Piaget from the Western tradition of cognitive psychology focuses his work on the problem of human cognitive development, investigating the issue through a semi-experimental methodology and interpreting his findings on the basis of the principles of genetic epistemology, namely, the analogy between cognitive and physical organisms in terms of assimilation, accommodation and equilibrium. These two perspectives are studied and compared in this thesis with respect to their underlying principles, their scopes and methodologies. Finally, a multi-disciplinary approach is proposed for the study of human cognitive development.

There is no abstract available for this thesis.

The main purpose of this study was to identify the positions taken by Representative Francis H. Case of South Dakota on major foreign policy questions during the years 1937 through 1941 and to determine why those positions were taken.The research focused on several questions: (1) Were there experiences in Case's early life which shaped his adult attitudes? (2) What were Case's stands on major foreign policy questions prior to his election to Congress in 1936? (3) What stands did Case take on major foreign policy questions as a congressman between 1937 and 1941? and (4) What factors contributed to the formation of Case's foreign policy views between World War I and World War II?Research indicated that the experiences of growing up in the rural environment of Iowa and South Dakota in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries did shape Case's adult attitudes. As a congressman Case was conscientious, dedicated, hard-working, and deeply concerned about his state and the nation.The problem that concerned Case the most upon entering Congress in 1937 was keeping the nation out of foreign wars. As a young college student during the First World War he developed strong anti-war views. Eventually, however, he was swept up in the Wilsonian idealism of the day and joined the United States Marine Corps to do his part to help win the "war to end war." Although Case saw no fighting in World War I his military service served to strengthen his anti-war views.During the 1920's, as a newspaperman, Case displayed a cautious internationalism. He supported membership of the United States in the World Court and in some sort of international peacekeeping organization. In the 1930's, however, he became disillusioned by the deterioration of world peace and turned toward isolationism. By the time he was elected to the House of Representatives in 1936 he was a confirmed isolationist.A careful examination of Case's speeches, writings, and letters revealed that the twin pillars of his isolationism were unilateralism and noninterventionism. As a unilateralist Case believed that the nation should follow an independent foreign policy. As a noninterventionist he believed the United States should resist the temptation to intervene in the quarrels of ethers and dedicate its efforts to solving its problems at home. Case united his efforts with other confirmed congressional isolationists between 1937 and 1939 to promote a unilateral and noninterventionist foreign policy for the nation.After the outbreak of World War II, however, Case had to constantly adjust his isolationist views to changing circumstances e the United States moved closer and closer to involvement in theconflict which raged abroad. He fought against the Roosevelt Administration's "steps short of war" to aid the Allies but once policy decisions were made he supported them energetically. He believed this was the only sensible course of action to take.In this regard he differed from the more extreme isolationists in Congress who only reluctantly supported such measures as the destroyers-bases trade, the Selective Service Act, and the LendLease Act. By late 1941, although he hoped war might be averted )y some means, Case was willing to accept it.The isolationism of case in the pre-World War II years was got simple obstructionism based upon ignorance or folly. It was he carefully considered response of a conservative Middlewestern Republican to complex domestic and foreign developments. Although it was an unwise policy to follow it is understandable given the circumstances of the times.

The aim of this study was to determine whether the underachievement of pupils in science is due to the fact that the pupils have not reached the phase of formal thinking. The question is whether the difference in achievement in science of pupils with the same I.Q. can be attributed to the fact that the underachiever is on a lower cognitive level than the better achiever. The child in the junior secondary school phase is in or somewhere between the phase of concrete operational thinking or phase of formal operational thinking. An analysis of the syllabi in the junior secondary school phase showed that formal operational thinking is required of pupils especially in standard 7. In this research the population was defined as the Afrikaans-speaking pupils in the junior secondary school phase of the schools in a big town. The experimental group consisted of pupils with I.Q. ≥ 108 with low marks in science while the control group consisted of pupils with I.Q. ≥ 108 who did well in science. In this study 58 pupils were tested individually with 4 tests of formal thinking namely the switches-test (an adaption of the combinations of coloured and colourless chemical bodies-test), equilibrium in the balance, flexibility of rods and the oscillation of a pendulum. A significant difference was found between the experimental and control groups. (F = 28,84, p < 0,001). This study proved the following: (i) Gifted pupils in the junior secondary school phase with poor marks in science haven't reached the level of formal thinking to the same degree as gifted pupils with good marks in science. (ii) Gifted children in standard 6 who did well in science had already reached a plateau with regard to the development of formal thinking. (iii) Pupils differ with regard to the level of cognitive development regardless of having the same I.Q. and age. The above conclusions have the following implications for didactics: - The curricula and syllabi must be combined in such a way that formal thinking is not expected of the child before he is capable of it. Every teacher must try to individualize his teaching methods in order to make provision for differences in the cognitive levels of the pupils in his class. / Thesis (MEd)--PU vir CHO

In this study, an experimental group of college honors students were given instruction via researcher-developed Piagetian concrete operational learning strategies for the purpose of assessing: (1) the effectiveness of the strategies on concept acquisition in human genetics, and (2) growth in intellectual development as a result of the students' being instructed by concrete operational learning strategies rather than lecture.Evaluation of the effectiveness of the learning strategies on human genetics concept acquisition required the construction of comprehensive and unit pre/post-tests and administration of these tests to both experimental and control group populations. A Piagetian Task Instrument was administered as a pre/post-test to selected experimental group members to assess their growth, if any, in intellectual development. In addition, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) was used as a diagnostic instrument in an attempt to identify students preferring to learn via a concrete operational mode of instruction regardless of their Piagetian level of intellectual development.The comprehensive and unit pre/post-tests and the MBTI were administered for the purpose of testing the following null hypotheses: Null Hypothesis 1. There are no significant differences between themeans of the comprehensive pretest results and the comprehensive post-test results for either the experimental or control groups.NullHypothesis2.There is no significant difference between the experimental and the control groups with respect to the means of the comprehensive pre/post-test results.Null Hyothesis 3. There are no significant differences between the means of the results on the unit pretests and the unit posttests for either the experimental group or the control group.Null Hypothesis, 4. There are no significant differences between the means of the unit pre/post-test results when comparing the experimental and control groups.Null Hypothesis 5. There is no significant correlation between students preference, as indicated by a Likert scale item, for instructional method with any one or more of the indices on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.Results of the study led to the rejection of null hypotheses 1 and 3 at less than the .001 level. These data indicate that both concrete operational learning strategies and lecture were effective instructional methods in facilitating long-term and short-term human genetics concept acquisition.

A thematic and formal analysis of Jean-Aubert Loranger's poetic tale "Le Passeur" [1920], and of Gabrielle Roy's novel La Montagne secrete [1962], shows that the construction of the two heroes' respective identity is directly related to the representation of small and large rivers in the two stories. Considering the generic difference between the two texts, these similarities---which are shaped up in a four steps "organizing scheme"---suggest the existence of a real structure in the construction of the modern identity (quebecoise). La Grande traversee, an historical novel about the massive Irish emigration of 1847, narrates the quest of identity of Seamus Doyle, while following the same four steps of this particular movement.

This East-West comparative study can be looked upon as my attempt to better understand people living in two different worlds and societies---the former Communist Russia and Western countries. It is a chance for me to take the best from the two mentalities and concentrate on what unites Eastern and Western scholars in their interpretation of Vygotskian psychology, his theory on education and his ideas on teaching a second language. Ironically, this became possible far away from Russia, the country where I first heard the name of Vygotsky. / I owe my "meeting" Vygotsky in Montreal to my ESL Curriculum Development, Ethnography classes professor and my thesis supervisor Mary Maguire who has helped me to rediscover Vygotsky on Canadian soil. / My thesis is one more attempt to contribute to the existing research on theoretical interpretations of Vygotsky's theory of psychological development. It is one more voice of a teacher and native speaker of Russian, captivated by Vygotsky's ideas and his lifelong search for the universal concepts essential for building the future. That is, raising and teaching children. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

No description available.

La presente investigación presenta un estudio descriptivo hecho desde una perspectiva constructivista piagetiana, cuyo objetivo es narrar la psicogénesis de conceptos económicos en escolares chilenos portadores de ceguera congénita.Nos ha interesado describir como construyen los niños y adolescentes ciegos algunos conceptos sociales, específicamente aquellos relacionados con la acuñación, emisión y circulación del dinero, el papel que juegan los bancos en el ciclo económico de un país, las nociones de ganancia, el concepto de interés bancario, la falsificación del mismo, la determinación de los precios y la inflación, entre otros. En resumen, cómo construyen estos niños y adolescentes algunos conceptos económicos. Denegri y sus colaboradores (1998, 2000) demostraron que los niños y adolescentes videntes construyen las nociones económicas en un proceso evolutivo que se da en tres niveles: pensamiento extraeconómico, pensamiento económico subordinado y pensamiento económico inferencial, que implican menor a mayor conocimiento de estos conceptos sucesivamente, pero hasta la fecha de inicio del presente estudio no se habían encontrado en la literatura especializada, investigaciones sobre la misma temática con niños ciegos. La pregunta que ha guiado esta investigación es: ¿Cómo construirán los niños y adolescentes con ceguera congénita sus conceptos sobre economía, debido a su imposibilidad de acceder a las "experiencias visibles" descritas por Delval, Enesco y Navarro (1994) y que son tan importantes para construir la noción de mundo?Para responder a esta pregunta de investigación, el estudio se dividió en dos partes: un estudio de validación de la entrevista piagetiana denominada "Origen y circulación del dinero" diseñada por Denegri, Delval, Ripoll, Palavecinos y Keller (1998) para investigar el desarrollo de conceptos económicos en niños videntes y verificar si ésta podía aplicarse a niños ciegos. Verificada su aplicabilidad y después de hacerle algunos pequeños cambios se procedió a la segunda parte que consistió en la aplicación de la entrevista clínica piagetiana denominada "Origen y circulación del dinero para niños y adolescentes ciegos" (Keller, 2000) con lo que se dio paso a la investigación principal de esta tesis.Ésta se efectuó entrevistando a una muestra de 60 escolares invidentes, balanceada por sexo y tres tramos de edad, que asistían a escuelas especiales para niños con ceguera congénita ubicadas de norte a sur del país. Las entrevistas fueron audio grabadas, luego transcritas a un formato mecanografiado. El contenido de las entrevistas fue sometido a un análisis de contenido simple para establecer categorías. Las categorías establecidas fueron analizadas mediante el uso de tablas de frecuencia para describir las secuencias evolutivas encontradas y el estadístico Gamma para estimar diferencias significativas entre los distintos grupos de edad y de género. Una vez realizado el análisis de categorías se efectuó un segundo tipo de análisis tendiente a determinar la existencia de niveles diferentes y progresivos de cómo niños y adolescentes construyen los conceptos de economía y que agruparan diversas categorías y dieran cuenta de la forma global de comprensión del mundo económico. Se respetaron los cuatro criterios de rigor descritos por Lincoln y Guba (1985). La codificación de las respuestas, su inclusión en categorías y la inclusión de éstas en los niveles de pensamiento económico fueron sometidas a triangulación y pruebas de fiabilidad. Los resultados de la investigación principal indicaron una clara secuencia evolutiva en la conceptualización de conceptos económicos, pese a que los participantes sólo se ubicaron en los primeros dos niveles de pensamiento económico descritos por Denegri, et al. (1998,2000) Los hallazgos e implicaciones se discuten a la luz de investigaciones vinculadas y se entregan algunas orientaciones pedagógicas para enseñar estos conceptos a niños y adolescentes con ceguera congénita. / The present study provides a descriptive account of the psychogenesis of economical concepts in blind born Chilean school children. Denegri et al. (1998, 2000) demonstrated that sighted children constructed their economical notions through a developmental process that comprised the following three levels: extra economic thinking,, subordinate economical thinking, and inferential economical thinking, which imply successive inclusive knowledge from one level to the next. At the initial stages of this research, no studies were found on the development of economical concepts by blind children.Accordingly, the research question posted was: ¿How would congenitally blind children construe their notions about economy, especially considering their impossibility to gain access to "visible experiences", described by Delval, Enesco and Navarro (1994) as so much important for constructing our notions of the world?In order to answer this question, the Interview on the Origin and Circulation of Money for Blind Children (Keller, 2000) was administered to a sample of 60 blind schoolchildren, balanced by gender and age, sampling all the schools for the blind located in Chile, from very North to the far South. The interviews' contents were subjected to a content analysis in order to establish categories. A frequency analysis and Gamma test were also performed. The results indicate a clear evolution in the conceptualization of economic concepts, despite the participants being at only the first two levels of economic thought (Denegri, 1995b). The findings and implications are discussed in light of other research, and some new recommendations for the teaching of economical concepts are offered.

Dissertação (mestrado)—Universidade de Brasília, Faculdade de Educação, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Educação, 2016. / Submitted by Camila Duarte (camiladias@bce.unb.br) on 2016-05-04T18:53:16Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2016_KeilaRossanaChavesCostaToledo.pdf: 2801601 bytes, checksum: 90abb01f31360ffc8364950021329e1c (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Raquel Viana(raquelviana@bce.unb.br) on 2017-02-15T20:23:22Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 2016_KeilaRossanaChavesCostaToledo.pdf: 2801601 bytes, checksum: 90abb01f31360ffc8364950021329e1c (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-02-15T20:23:22Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2016_KeilaRossanaChavesCostaToledo.pdf: 2801601 bytes, checksum: 90abb01f31360ffc8364950021329e1c (MD5) / Este estudo trata de uma pesquisa que teve como objetivo analisar as narrativas audiovisuais (gênero paródia) da série “Cocoricó Conta Clássicos” (TV Cultura) a partir do olhar de crianças. No sentido de compreender como as crianças interagem com essas histórias por meio de suas expressões infantis e como elas relacionam essas narrativas ao seu contexto social. A investigação fundamentou-se nos aportes teóricos do estudioso Propp (1983) no seu método de análise de contos por meio das funções categorizadas. Em Vygotski (1992), em seus estudos que enfocam e analisam a imaginação como uma formação especificamente humana, relacionada à atividade criadora do sujeito. No viés psicanalítico de Bettelheim (1980) que traz considerações sobre os gêneros contos de fadas e como esses se relacionam com as crianças. Nas teorias de Bruner (1987) quanto às várias possibilidades de significados e experiências por meio da narração de crianças. E na escritora e ensaísta Held (1980) que coloca a narrativa como uma boa proposta lúdica, desde que para isso a criança seja motivada. Nesse contexto, o estudo se desenvolveu tendo por objetivo pesquisar, como se dá a interação de crianças de 5 anos de uma instituição pública de educação infantil localizada no Gama/DF em relação aos contos clássicos infantis do programa “Cocoricó”. Para a obtenção dos dados da pesquisa foi utilizado o método de observação participante conjugado a roda de conversa e oficinas de desenhos. Alguns dos resultados obtidos por meio da observação participante foram a relações que as crianças fizeram entre o conteúdo das narrativas e suas experiências de vida e com isso deram os seus significados e sentidos ora por meio da imaginação, ora por meio da sua realidade. / This study results from a study that aimed to analyze the audiovisual narratives (genre parody) of “Cocoricó Conta Clássicos” series (TV Cultura) from the eyes of children. In order to understand how children interact with these stories through their children's expressions and how they relate these stories to their social context. The research was based on the theoretical contributions of the scholar Propp (1983) in its method of analysis of short stories through the categorized functions. In Vygotsky (1992), in their studies that focus on and analyze the imagination as a specifically human, related to the creative activity of the subject. In psychoanalytic bias Bettelheim (1980) that brings considerations about fairy tales genres and how these relate to children. The theories of Bruner (1987) and the various possibilities of meanings and experiences through the narration of children. And the writer and essayist Held (1980) that places the narrative as a good playful proposal, since for this child to be motivated. In this context, the study was developed with the purpose of research, how is the interaction of children 5 years of a public early childhood institution located in Gama / DF in relation to the classic children's tales program "Cocoricó". To obtain the survey data was used the participant observation method combined the conversation wheel and drawing workshops. Some of the results obtained through participant observation were the relationships that children made between the content of the narratives and experiences of life and it gave their meanings and senses now through imagination, sometimes through its reality.