6 - Piaget on Equilibration

Summary

EQUILIBRATION AS A CENTRAL CONCEPT IN PIAGET’S THEORY

According to Piaget, models of equilibration are involved in all questions about cognitive development. Cognitive development, for him, is a succession of constructions with constant elaborations of novel structures. Moreover, for Piaget, this implies a process that improves existing structures and replaces temporally achieved equilibria through re-equilibrations. This process is designated by Piaget as equilibration, and coming to grips with it is the central issue for many of his works.

Piaget's account of equilibration is not only crucial for understanding his approach, it also sets his theory apart from most other theories concerning cognitive development. Moreover, Piaget, in his long career, has developed his own terminology that suits his own intentions better, but this terminology makes the challenge for new uninitiated readers even more daunting. It might be in order, therefore, to characterize the equilibration idea avoiding Piagetian jargon. So, I will first give a brief expository definition and elaborate upon it by expanding on all terms used in - and left out of - this brief definition.

Subsequently, I will go deeper into matters now based on Piaget's own formulations and review some of the central issues and perspectives involved. This review is roughly structured along these perspectives with a focus, first, on biological systems, next on the psychological subject, and third on the epistemological subject. Finally, conclusions and evaluation will follow.