Three-year-old May Lin loves to play with her doll. She gives her doll a bottle, burps her, and changes her diaper just like her mother does for her baby brother. According to Piaget, May Lin's ability to use a doll as a representation of a real baby illustrates that she is capable of:

According to Piaget, May Lin's ability to use a doll as a representation of a real baby illustrates that she is capable of: SYMBOLIC FUNCTION.

Explanation: Symbolic function in Piagetian theory illustrates the ability of an individual to mentally use an object (the doll) to represent something that is not physically present (her baby brother).

This question lacks options, the options are:

a. Operation.

b. Scheme.

c. Symbolic function.

d. Concept

The correct answer is c. Symbolic function.

Explanation:

Symbolic function is the ability to represent objects without them being physically present. For Piaget (1973) intellectual development between the ages of two and seven is determined by progress in the symbolic function. It is what he calls the preoperative stage and its fundamental characteristic is to be able to use symbols, that is, to think about things, objects or events that are not present. In the thought process there is a signifier, that is, concrete manifestations of this symbolic function, among them Piaget highlighted symbolic imitation, symbolic play, language, among others; and a meaning (the ideas represented by the symbolic object, the imitation made by the child or the words). The human mind at birth uses the senses directly to learn the things that happen in the environment that surrounds it. We understand deferred imitation as imitation in the absence of the model, which reveals the existence of internal models of what is being imitated. Mary Lin represents this symbolic function, imitating with her doll something she has previously observed and performing it when she no longer has the object observed in front of her (her baby brother).