Studying cognitive development in sociocultural context: The development of a practice‐based approach

This paper sketches the development of a research framework for analyzing the interplay between culture and cognitive development in cultural practices and the methodological tensions that gave rise to the framework. The framework consists of three components geared for analyzing intrinsic relations between culture and cognitive development. The first focuses on the analysis of individuals' goals as they take form in everyday practices. The second is concerned with the shifting relations between cognitive forms and cognitive functions in individuals' efforts to accomplish those goals. The third focuses on the appropriationandspecialization of forms structured in one practice to accomplish emergent goals in another. Applications and progressive refinements of the framework are discussed in analyses of practices of economic exchange in a remote group in Papua New Guinea, number play in middle and working class children in Brooklyn, New York, and candy selling in Northeastern Brazil.