I argue that Demetriou and Raftopoulos have presented a complex and thought
-provoking model of cognitive developmental change, but one that is based o
n a false and misleading assumption about the nature of representation. Thi
s assumption-roughly, that representation is encoding-cannot work and has i
nduced serious problems in the model. An alternative model of representatio
n is outlined, in part for contrast and in I,art to demonstrate that the ap
oria of encodingist assumptions can be avoided. The encodingist assumption
about representation, however, is one that Demetriou and Raftopoulos share
with the majority of psychologists, developmentalists included, so the stak
es here are not limited to this model alone. (C) 1999 Academic Press.