Question

Briefly outline the characteristics of formal operational thinking during adolescence according to Piaget's theory of cognitive development.

Answer 1

According to Piaget’s theory of cognitive development helps in explaining the mental and cognitive development in the world. As per the theory, how a child the mental development through 4 stages. It states that formal operations are something which starts from age 12 and above. During this phase, the development starts during the adolescent and it helps them think and develop things through reasoning and understanding the hypothetical problems. In this as the cognition develops, they tend to start to develop things more philosophically, ethically, morally and better understanding of social cognition. The major characteristics is about understanding logic and understand broader issues. The characteristics of the formal processing are able logical understanding, abstract thinking and idealistic thinking. When logical thinking comes with better rational thinking and able to draw better conclusion. The idealistic way is to vision a better world and social understanding of things. The abstract thinking is about logical take on various concepts like emotions, virtues, feelings etc.