Conceptual thinking

In the process of cognizing the world, a person relies on the data of his sensations, but his mind has the ability to perceive logical connections in specific things and processes; so we come to the emergence of concepts that act as abstractions of real objects and events. It should be noted the fundamentally conceptual nature of our thinking, for the concept is:

1. The result of the thought process,
2. The beginning of the further process of thinking, when, resorting to operations and the laws of logic, we can draw conclusions without resorting to specific things.

In addition to this, another thing is obvious, namely, that human communication is unthinkable without the use of concepts. This applies to ordinary, and scientific, cultural, etc. forms of communication. It is important to point out the uniqueness of the concepts used, that is, their coherence (consistency) in various social environments; otherwise, human communication will become impossible or ineffective. ²⁰

It is known that in political, economic, legal, etc. types of practice, in texts of official documents it is often specially stipulated that it is the contracting parties or governing bodies that are understood by key concepts of the text; otherwise, after its approval, various interpretations of it are inevitable, which would jeopardize the implementation of agreements or official orders.

Even in everyday communication, we cannot avoid the need for an unambiguous interpretation of concepts, otherwise our practice will acquire an indefinite, disorganized character. So, if the word “vacation” is understood to mean any absence of an employee at the workplace, and not legalized by the regulations, then the phrase: “Ivanov is on vacation now” can mislead anyone. Or, discussing a sports topic, we use such concepts as “champion”, “prize winner”, “participant of competitions”, etc., giving each of them a very definite meaning. ²¹

No less obvious is the need for conceptual rigor in the field of science, where the initial concepts ("field", "substance", "integral", "biocenosis", "synthesis", etc.) rigidly determine the result of scientific work. However, from our own practice we know that the same word sometimes acquires a special content depending on the scope of its application. For example, we say “market”, but we understand what is at stake from the context of the conversation; this term has one meaning when we report that we are going shopping, and another when we discuss the economic situation in a city, region, country, etc.

Analysis - the division of the general into its component parts and individual features.

Synthesis is a generalization of individual parts into a common whole.

Comparison - a comparison of several objects or events among themselves.

Abstraction - the allocation of certain signs and distraction from non-essential concepts.

Generalization is a combination of different concepts in one category.

Systematization - combining categories into one system. ^[2]

Preconceptual thinking is the initial stage in the development of thinking in a child, when his thinking has a different organization than that of adults; children's judgments are sporadic about this particular subject. When explaining something, everything comes down to a particular, familiar one. Most judgments are judgments by similarity, or judgments by analogy , since memory plays a major role in thinking during this period. ^[3]

The central feature of preconceptual thinking is egocentrism . Due to the weak development of his "I.", the child can not look at himself from the outside, because he is not able to independently make transformations of the frame of reference. As a result, the child does not fall into the sphere of its own reflection. In other words, there is no objective perception of both himself and the world around him. Therefore, children under five cannot correctly and objectively understand this or that situation. They are not able to renounce their own point of view and take someone else's position. Piaget and Inelder conducted an experiment with a model of three mountains. It consisted of the following: the child was shown a model containing three mountains of different heights, and each of them had some distinguishing feature: a house, a river flowing along the slope, a snowy peak. The experimenter gave the child several photos of the layout, in which all three mountains were depicted from different sides. In all the pictures, the house, the river and the snowy peak were clearly visible. The child was asked to choose a photograph where the mountains are depicted exactly as he sees them on a given layout. Meant from the same angle. Often the child chose the right picture. After that, the child was shown a doll with a head smooth and spherical, without a face, so that the child could not catch the direction of her gaze. The doll was placed on the other side of the layout. Now the child was asked how the doll sees this model, but the child could not give the right answer, choosing those photos where the model was depicted exactly as he sees it. When the child and the doll were interchanged, the child again chose a picture where the mountains looked as he perceived them from his angle. This result was obtained with most subjects of preschool age. ^[four]

Preconceptual thinking also manifests itself in such a trait as a lack of understanding of the conservation of quantity. Jean-Jacques experimentally showed that children perceive and measure the amount of substance according to only one parameter - the height of the liquid in the vessel. Other parameters such as the length or diameter of the vessel are not taken into account.

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• R. M. Granovskaya . Elements of practical psychology. - Moscow: Speech, 2007. - C. 19. - 396 ° C.
• L.M. Wecker. MENTALITY AND REALITY. - M: meaning. 1998 .-- 684 p.