Which stage of Piaget's cognitive development is characterized by egocentrism (ages 2-5)?

• A. Sensorimotor
• B. Preoperational
• C. Concrete Operational
• D. Formal Operational

Answer: (B)

Egocentrism is a hallmark of the preoperational stage, where young children think from their own viewpoint and have difficulty seeing things from another’s perspective. In this period (roughly ages 2 to 5, though the stage extends to about age 7 in some models), children develop symbolic thought and language but lack the ability to perform logical operations that would allow them to consider other viewpoints. A classic example is the three-mountain task: a child describes what they see from their own position and can't reliably describe how the scene looks from someone else’s point of view, illustrating the perspective-taking limitation of this stage. As children move into the concrete operational stage, they begin to decenter and understand that others can hold different thoughts and that certain properties remain the same despite changes in appearance, signaling a move away from egocentric thinking.