Reference

The Formal Operational Stage of Cognitive Development . The final stage of Piaget's theory involves an increase in logic, the ability to use deductive reasoning, and an understanding of abstract ideas.

The formal operational stage is the fourth and final stage of Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget's theory of child development, which he described in a paper published in 1936. The emergence of logical thinking follows the so-called "concrete operational stage," in which children age 7 to 12 begin to reason logically and mathematically about ...

This allows an individual to think and reason with a wider perspective. This stage of cognitive development, which Piaget called formal operational thought, marks a movement from an ability to think and reason from concrete visible events to an ability to think hypothetically and entertain what-if possibilities about the world. An individual ...