{"id":2250,"date":"2013-04-05T15:46:24","date_gmt":"2013-04-05T15:46:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/infed.org\/mobi\/?p=2250"},"modified":"2025-08-18T14:55:02","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T13:55:02","slug":"the-cognitive-orientation-to-learning","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/infed.org\/dir\/welcome\/the-cognitive-orientation-to-learning\/","title":{"rendered":"The cognitive orientation to learning"},"content":{"rendered":"

The cognitive orientation to learning. Where behaviourists looked to the environment, those drawing on Gestalt turned to the individual’s mental processes. In other words, they were concerned with cognition – the act or process of knowing.<\/h2>\n

Many psychologists were not happy with behaviourism. There was a belief among some that there was too much of a focus on single events, stimuli and overt behaviour. Such criticism was especially strong from those who saw themselves as Gestalt psychologists (Gestalt meaning configuration or pattern in German). For them, perceptions or images should be approached as a pattern or a whole rather than as a sum of the component parts. Such thinking found its way into psychoanalysis and into the development of thinking about group functioning (perhaps most famously in the work of Kurt Lewin<\/a>). It also had a profound effect on the way that many psychologists thought of learning. Where behaviourists looked to the environment, those drawing on Gestalt turned to the individual’s mental processes. In other words, they were concerned with cognition – the act or process of knowing.<\/p>\n

Researchers like Jean Piaget, while recognizing the contribution of environment, explored changes in internal cognitive structure. He identified four stages of mental growth (sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational). Jerome Bruner<\/a> explored how mental processes could be linked to teaching (emphasizing, among other things, learning through discovery). Robert M. Gagn\u00e9 developed a model that highlighted eight different forms of learning – behaviourists identifying only a fragment of human capabilities.<\/p>\n

James Hartley (1998) has usefully drawn out some of the key principles of learning associated with cognitive psychology. As he puts it: ‘Learning results from inferences, expectations and making connections. Instead of acquiring habits, learners acquire plans and strategies, and prior knowledge is important’ (1998: 18). The principles he identifies are:<\/p>\n