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The meaning and measurement of Conceptual Development in Adulthood
Abstract
Until recently, there was one basic approach to the study of conceptual development in adulthood. This approach, exemplified in the work of scholars like Kohlberg and his colleagues (Colby, Kohlberg, Gibbs, & Lieberman, 1983), Kitchener & King (1990), Armon (Armon & Dawson, 2002), and Perry (1970), involves collecting data from a more or less representative sample of individuals at more or less frequent intervals over the course of several years. Guided by cognitive developmental theory, their longitudinal results, and sometimes, philosophical categories, researchers construct stage definitions. Although these definitions are cast as descriptions of reasoning structures, they include descriptions of the conceptual content associated with each developmental level. Stage definitions, along with exemplars from the construction samples targeted in these studies, become the basis for scoring manuals, reifying the conceptual content associated with each stage.
... In Piaget (1983), attaining a stage corresponded to a moment of equilibrium which was to be characterized by logical-mathematical structures. Equilibrium has been translated by Commons & Richards (2002), Sara Ross (2008) and Theo Dawson-Tunik, (2006) as the last step in stage transition. ...
... Rasch analyses (1980) have been used to validate orders of hierarchical complexity (e.g., Adams, 2006;Commons, 2006;Commons, Goodheart, et al., 2007;Miller, 2008;Richardson & Commons, 2008;Robinett, 2006). Through seven studies to date, Dawson-Tunik's (2006) work has validated the consistency with which hierarchical complexity accounts for stages of development across multiple other instruments that were designed to score development in specific domains. Along with other studies she performed, these support the claim that "the hierarchical complexity scoring system assesses a unidimensional developmental trait" and thus "satisfies the first requirement for good measurement, the identification of a unidimensional, context-independent trait" (pp. ...
... As a quantitative behavioral developmental theory, the Model includes a validated scoring system (see Dawson-Tunik, 2006, for hierarchical complexity validation studies). Through seven studies to date, Dawson-Tunik's (2006) work has validated the consistency with which hierarchical complexity theory accounts for stages of development across multiple other instruments that were designed to score development in specific domains. ...
... As a quantitative behavioral developmental theory, the Model includes a validated scoring system (see Dawson-Tunik, 2006, for hierarchical complexity validation studies). Through seven studies to date, Dawson-Tunik's (2006) work has validated the consistency with which hierarchical complexity theory accounts for stages of development across multiple other instruments that were designed to score development in specific domains. Along with other studies she performed, these support the claim that "the hierarchical complexity scoring system assesses a unidimensional developmental trait" and thus "satisfies the first requirement for good measurement, the identification of a unidimensional, context-independent trait" (p. ...
The Model of Hierarchical Complexity is introduced in terms of its main concepts, background, and applications. As a general, quantitative behavioral developmental theory, the Model enables examination of universal patterns of evolution and development. Behavioral tasks are definable and their organization of information in increasingly greater hierarchical, or vertical, complexity is measurable. Fifteen orders of hierarchical complexity account for task performances across domains, ranging from those of machines to creative geniuses. The four most complex orders are demonstrated by postformal stages of thought, which measure beyond formal operations, the highest stage found by Piaget for adults.
... In preparation towards developing such a questionnaire a review of existing models was undertaken, merging evidence of student and teacher thinking with that regarding adult development models (e.g. Baxter Magolda, 1992, 2001Belenky, Clinchy, Goldberger & Terule, 1986;Dawson, 2006;Kegan, 1994;King & Kitchener, 1994;Kuhn, 1991;Perry, 1970;West, 2004). From this review, the six stage developmental model of learning-teaching conceptions developed by Van Rossum and Hamer (2010) and expanded upon in a number of follow up studies (Van Rossum & Hamer, 2012Hamer & Van Rossum, 2016) was selected as the primary source for constructing items and scales designed to access a broader range of epistemological development and through this psychological maturity within a teaching and learning environment (see Table 1). ...
Qualitative research supports a developmental dimension in views on teaching and learning, but there are currently no quantitative tools to measure the full range of this development. To address this, we developed the Epistemological Development in Teaching and Learning Questionnaire (EDTLQ). In the current study the psychometric properties of the EDTLQ were examined using a sample (N= 232) of teachers from a Swedish University. A confirmatory factor and Rasch analysis showed that the items of the EDTLQ form a unidimensional scale, implying a single latent variable (eg epistemological development). Item and person separation reliability showed satisfactory levels of fit indicating that the response alternatives differentiate appropriately. Endorsement of the statements reflected the preferred constructivist learning-teaching environment of the response group. The EDTLQ is innovative since is the first quantitative survey to measure unidimensional epistemological development and it has a potential to be used as an apt tool for teachers to monitor the development of students as well as to offer professional development opportunities to the teachers.
... Part of this theory's appeal is that designing and applying a Skill Theory coding system is inexpensive and relatively easy. Indeed, its user friendliness has already been evidenced in the field of education, where a percentage of agreement of over 75% was observed between researchers and untrained teachers (see Dawson-Tunik, 2006). ...
The processes involved in human performance seem inherently complex and dynamic. For example, in order to “read the game”, a soccer player must integrate all the information from the ongoing movements and positions of team members, the opponents, the relative positions between them, where the ball is located, etc. Furthermore, an individual’s motor performance, which is particularly crucial in sports, depends on various simultaneous processes at different levels of the motor system: Cells, muscles, limbs, the brain, etc. In addition, individuals and teams do not perform in a void, but in achievement contexts, in which they strive for their goals, and their psychological states and performance may fluctuate as a function of many personal and environmental factors. For example, an athlete may enter a positive or negative spiral when perceiving that he or she is progressing or regressing in relation to the preferred goal or outcome (e.g., the victory). This perception of progress and regress, and the positive and negative psychological and behavioral (performance) changes accompanying this perception, are called positive and negative psychological momentum (PM; e.g., Gernigon, Briki, & Eykens, 2010). Positive and negative PM can emerge from one’s (or the opponent’s) mistakes, referee decisions, crowd behaviors, one’s psychological and physical state at a certain moment, and the interactions between these factors (Taylor & Demick, 1994). In addition, switching from performance on a relatively short time frame to a long-term process, individuals develop their abilities over multiple years, and hence over many practice or competition occasions. Ultimately, very few individuals develop world-class performance (e.g., winning Olympic medals), and their excellent abilities develop out of a combination of a variety of personal and environmental factors in interaction (e.g., motivation, coaching, family support, practice; Simonton, 1999). The current dissertation aims to capture complex dynamic performance-related processes, including the topics illustrated above. This means that we examine complexity at different levels (psychological, behavioral), time scales (from one training or competition session up to a career), as well as the interrelation between the processes across different levels and time scales.
... Each task's difficulty has an order of hierarchical complexity required to complete it correctly" (Commons, 2008 "This objective, quantal feature of tasks and stages means that discrete ordinal scores can be assigned to them" (Commons, 2008). Hence, as a quantitative behavioral developmental theory, the Model of Hierarchical Complexity includes a validated scoring system (see Dawson-Tunik, 2006, for hierarchical complexity validation studies). ...
The paper focuses on corruption and attitudes towards corruption in organizations. It proposes an interdisciplinary framework for reassessing them. It is argued that an integrative theoretical and analytical framework based on the Model of Hierarchical Complexity (mhc) can provide new insights on corruption. Furthermore the proposed framework offers new theoretical horizons for understanding and evaluating public and scientific discourses on corruption. This approach compensates for frequent shortcomings and disciplinary reductionisms in large parts of the social science literature on corruption. It can thus offer a substantially new outlook on the field of behavioral ethics in organizations based on a meta-systematic theory integration.
... Part of this theory's appeal is that designing and applying a Skill Theory coding system is inexpensive and relatively easy. Indeed, its "user friendliness" has already been evidenced in the field of education, where a percentage of agreement of over 75% was observed between researchers and untrained teachers (see Dawson-Tunik, 2006). Furthermore, it can be applied using recordings of natural situations, without placing any burden on the recorded participants . ...
In various domains, experts are found to possess elaborate domain-specific representations they
developed over years. In this study, we provide the first systematic attempt to characterise the short-term representations among individuals with different expertise levels. We showed videos of soccer game
plays to expert, near-expert and non-expert soccer players and asked them to describe the actions taking
place. Verbalisations were coded based on Fischer’s Skill Theory. Monte Carlo permutation tests
revealed that players with higher expertise constructed representations of higher complexity (regardless
of their specific content). Taking the content of the representations into account, we found that higher
expertise soccer players relatively more often included high complexity levels of actions not including the
ball and (moving) players on the field. These findings improve our understanding of perceptual-cognitive
expertise by demonstrating how actors with different levels of expertise integrate the information they
perceive to construct their representations in real time.
... For example, the order of hierarchical complexity predicts the Rasch scaled stage score performances on the same items with r's ranging from .85 to .99. By contrast, other stage theories have no such independent variable much less one that works as well as order of hierarchical complexity (see Dawson, 2006). ...
This study addresses the current debate about the beneficial effects of text processing software on students with different working memory (WM) during the process of academic writing, especially with regard to the ability to display higher-level conceptual thinking. A total of 54 graduate students (15 male, 39 female) wrote one essay by hand and one by keyboard. Our results show a beneficial effect of text processing software, in terms of both the qualitative and quantitative writing output. A hierarchical cluster analysis was used to detect distinct performance groups in the sample. These performance groups mapped onto three differing working memory profiles. The groups with higher mean WM scores manifested superior writing complexity using a keyboard, in contrast to the cluster with the lowest mean WM. The results also point out that more revision during the writing process itself does not inevitably reduce the quality of the final output.
The aim of the present study was to describe, test and validate a method for disclosing significant response patterns from questionnaire data, and for classifying individual response profiles into a sequence of significant patterns. The method is based on pattern recognition statistics and probability calculations. The results from the population tested show that the method can disclose characteristic profiles of different value systems, and that these systems can be arranged in a hierarchical order similar to the conventional levels of ego development. It is suggested that this method is applicable to any multiple choice-questionnaire containing a number of items where the response alternatives represent a sequential order, for example, of different levels of development within a psychological domain. The method might be a valuable tool for acquiring information on the distribution of different levels of adult development in large populations, such as in communities and large organizations.
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