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1.6 Cognitive Development: Overview

Cognitive Development

A Brief Overview1

In the Typical Cognitive Development section of this course, we described how cognitive development involves the development of thinking or evaluation and coping, or ‘adaptation’ skills. Thinking or evaluation skills, such as “thinking outside the box2 (see full Glossary),” are related to the development of intelligence (see full Glossary). Coping skills involve the ability to adapt to changes in one’s environment.  Cognitive skills also look at creativity, the ability to learn new things, retain (see full Glossary) what one has learned, and how one applies information to new situations. Cognitive development also includes pre-academic and academic skills that children need in order to succeed at school. Examples might include the ability to sit quietly for certain periods of time, the ability to listen and follow instructions and the ability to perform paper and pencil tasks.

Some children do not develop these skills at par with their peers. They may develop some of these skills much later than others —or not develop them at all. In other words, atypical cognitive development involves difficulties with both the quality and quantity of certain skills (see full Glossary):

Severe cognitive delays often effect all other areas of development. Below are some signs of cognitive delays that can be observed in all areas of development between the preschool and school age years, around ages 3 – 5 years old.

In the domain of cognitive development:

  1. Children may experience serious difficulties in learning basic concepts (e.g. colors and shapes);
  2. Children may experience serious difficulties in learning advanced concepts (e.g. counting, reading and writing);
  3. Children may experience serious difficulties in generalizing what they learn from one situation to the next;
  4. Children may experience serious difficulties in adapting to changes in their environment and to new situations.

In the domain of social/emotional development:

  1. Children may trust others too easily and readily enabling others to take advantage of them;
  2. Children may not read visual or language cues as they their attempt to socialize with others.

In the domain of motor development:

  1. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their fine motor skills;
  2. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their gross motor skills

In the domain of communication development:

  1. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their receptive language skills;
  2. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their expressive language skills;
  3. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their pragmatic skills;
  4. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their articulation skills.

In the domain of adaptive skills:

During the preschool years:

  1. Children may be delayed in becoming toilet trained, and in extreme cases, may never be toilet trained.

During the elementary school years:

  1. Children may experience difficulties bathing and cleaning themselves properly;
  2. Children may experience difficulties with dressing and undressing.

During the high school years:

  1. Male adolescents may experience difficulties with knowing how and when to shave;
  2. Female adolescents may experience difficulties knowing how to handle their menstrual cycle.

Severe cognitive delays have been linked to developmental disabilities (also known as mental retardation and developmental challenges). Developmental disabilities involve global delays and affect all areas of development, including motor, language, social and emotional, and self-help skills.

1. see References
2. Source: University of Wahington, available at: http://faculty.washington.edu/ezent/imdt.htm
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1.6 Cognitive Development: Thinking Skills

Thinking or Evaluation Skills

Children who show delays in the development of their cognitive skills1 need an evaluation. This evaluation helps caregivers and teachers understand what a child’s specific needs are, and to provide intervention as early as possible. Delays in cognitive development may result in delays in other developmental areas and are likely to affect the child’s work at school and his daily life activities as he/she grows older.

Some signs of significant cognitive delays in babies, toddlers and children are below.

Between Birth and Age 12 Months:

  • Babies may not develop object permanence; (see full Glossary)
  • Babies may not produce speech sounds and may not babble (see full Glossary);
  • Babies may not show interest in looking around their own environments;
  • Babies may not reach for objects.

At 12 Months and Older:

  • Babies and young children may not look at others;
  • Babies and toddlers may not engage in games and activities that need joint attention and joint action (see full Glossary);
  • Toddlers and young children may not explore their environments;
  • Toddlers and young children may not play appropriately with toys;
  • Toddlers and young children may not imitate others;
  • Toddlers and young children may not pretend that something is something else (for example: pretending that a spoon is a comb);

During preschool ages (2-3 year olds – 5 Year Olds)

  • Young children may no tuse imaginary play; that is, they will not pretend that they are someone else (for example, a superhero or a cat);
  • Young children may not show they understand basic language, or “qualitative” concepts (for example: tall/short, big/small);
  • Young children may not show they understand basic math, or “quantitative” concepts (for example: all, none, a little, a lot);
  • Young children may not showthey understand basic where or “spatial” concepts (for example: far/near, over/under);
  • Young children may not group or separate toys, or put them into or other objects into categories (for example: ‘only the red blocks go in a container’) (see full Glossary); (Fig. 1)

categories

Fig. 1: Organizing items into categories
  • Young children may not match (see full Glossary) pegs, toys or other objects with same colour (for young preschool children); same colour and shape (for older preschool children); same colour, shape and size (for children in kindergarten and older);
  • Young children may not put together simple puzzles (for example: large 4-8 pieces); (Fig. 2)

assemble

Fig. 2: A 9-piece puzzle that has been assembled

Young children may not recognize a pattern (see full Glossary) and continue it (for example: red blue, red blue);

  • Young children may not tell others how old they are when asked;
  • Young children may not tell others if they are a boy or a girl when asked;
  • Young children may not answer “why” questions (for example: Why do we eat? Why do we sleep?) when asked;
  • Young children may not retell basic parts of a short story when asked;
  • Young children may not count (first to five, then to 10, then to 20 by age 6);
  • Young children may not match objects using one to one correspondence (see full Glossary) (Fig. 3);

one to one correspondence

Fig. 3: Counting little bears and matching by the corresponding number
  • Young children may not imagine or talk about future events (for example: having a birthday party).

Signs of cognitive delay are not always easy to recognize in babies and even toddlers, because they are more subtle than motor delays.  It is of great importance that caregivers and others working with babies, toddlers and young children are aware—and provided with information—of their cognitive milestones.

1. see References

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