Cognitive Learning: A Tutorial Study Guide

Nicoladie Tam

• Publisher: Nicoladie Tam, Ph.D.
• eBook ISBN: 9781301966455
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Neuropsychology
• Index: Psychology

“Cognitive Learning” is a part of the college-level Neuropsychopharmacology course series textbooks. It is a tutorial written in questions and answers format to describe the process of cognitive learning psychologically.

It is a study guide with in-depth explanations. Each section is a modular unit that is self-contained for easy reading. The principles and concepts are introduced systematically so students can learn and retain the materials intuitively.

1.1.Stages of High-Level Learning

Objectives

• Understand the different stages of learning

Concepts to Learn

• Stage 1: unconscious incompetent
• Stage 2: conscious incompetent
• Stage 3: conscious competent
• Stage 4: unconscious competent.

Conscious competence theory of learning identified the four stages of learning, progressing from unconscious incompetent to conscious incompetent to conscious competent to unconscious competent. At each stage, the level of awareness increases. It started at the level of unaware of our lack of knowledge to the awareness to what we don’t know. From then, acquisition of knowledge is actively sought. Once the knowledge is acquired, it arrives at the conscious awareness of the fact that we have gained that knowledge. With practice, we become an expert in the subject area, and become so fluent in it that it becomes intuitive to us, and become part of us so naturally. That is the final stage that we become an expert in it.

Summary

The four stages of high-level learning is the progression from:

• unconscious incompetent
• conscious incompetent
• conscious competent
• unconscious competent.

Q&A

What are the stages of cognitive learning?

In conscious competence theory, there are four stages:

• Stage 1: unconscious incompetent
• Stage 2: conscious incompetent
• Stage 3: conscious competent
• Stage 4: unconscious competent.

The conscious competence theory of learning was proposed by Abraham Maslow in the 1940’s. It represents the progression of cognition in the learning process.

Unconscious incompetent stage represents the ignorant stage – we don’t even know what we don’t know at all.

Conscious incompetent stage represents the beginning of awareness – we begin to know what we don’t know.

Conscious competent stage represents the active learning process to acquire knowledge – now we know what we are talking about.

Unconscious competent stage represents the fluency stage in which we become an expert – we are so good at it that it becomes second nature without having to think about it.

What is unconscious incompetent?

It is the stage in which we don’t even know that we don’t have the knowledge.

This is the first stage – the ignorant stage that we have no knowledge of what we don’t know. We are not aware of our lack of knowledge. This is the naive stage that we don’t know our deficiency.

This is also the stage that we don’t even know our blind spots. We are totally blind from it.

What is conscious incompetent?

It is the stage in which we are aware of the lack of knowledge.

Conscious incompetent represents the beginning of awareness that we don’t have the knowledge yet. We are aware of our incompetency (or deficiency) at a particular subject matter.

It is the beginning of the process to seek knowledge. This is one of the reasons why we go to school to learn something that we don’t know. At this stage, we often feel incompetent and insecure about the fact that we don’t have the needed knowledge.

At this stage, we are aware of our blind spots, and recognize what is missing in us.

Learning a foreign language is a good example. Before we learn the language, we feel so incompetent about our ability to understand or speak the language at this stage.

Going to med school is another example. At this stage, you realize there are so many different diseases and symptoms that are too overwhelming. You go through the clinical round, and visit the patients, but realize that there are so many different cases each with their own peculiarity that you don’t know how long it will take you to master all that to make the diagnosis and provide treatment options.

What is conscious competent?

It is the stage in which we have acquired the knowledge and skills in it.

Conscious competent represents the active learning process to acquire knowledge. When we have acquired the knowledge, we often feel competent and more secure about what we know, but we still have to work on it.

For instance, when you aced a course, you feel conscious competent about the subject, but you still have to rely on the book to reference the materials, even th...

Table of contents

• 1.1.Stages of High-Level Learning
• 1.2.Category of Learning
• 1.3.Stages of Learning
• 1.4.Windows of Knowledge
• 1.5.Cognitive Learning: Review