摘要：Piaget's theory of cognitive development has evoked strong, multivocal responses within the English-speaking community around the world, and over the last 40 years, it has helped to produce a massive reconstruction of approaches to development and mind. In reviewing this literature, we could not possibly provide an exhaustive history or review of these responses, just as we could not possibly review all of Piaget's diverse work. There is one theme, however, that has dominated the Anglophone debate: Piaget's claims that cognitive development occurs in stages. Although Piaget (1983) did not view the stage claims as the most important part of his framework, they became the focus of the large majority of English-language research based on his work. As a result of this sometimes rancorous debate, developmental researchers now find ourselves in a fortunate situation: The decades of empirical challenge and defense of stage theory have provided masses of findings about developmental variability as well as new methods for studying variation and
