At what developmental stage might a child believe that their parent's divorce is their fault due to egocentrism?

The correct choice is the preoperational stage, during which children typically exhibit egocentrism, a key characteristic of their thinking. This stage, as identified by developmental psychologist Jean Piaget, generally occurs between the ages of 2 and 7. Children in this stage have difficulty seeing perspectives other than their own, which can lead them to wrongly assume personal responsibility for events they do not control, such as their parents' divorce.

In this context, a preoperational child might conclude that they are to blame for their parents' separation, reflecting their limited ability to process complex relationships and their inclination to center the world around their experiences and emotions. Their thinking is often intuitive rather than logical, which further contributes to this misunderstanding.

As children progress to the concrete operational stage, their thinking becomes more logical and less egocentric, allowing them to understand that events can have multiple causes and do not solely revolve around their actions. The sensory motor stage, which occurs before the preoperational stage, involves learning about the world through direct experience and lacks the capacity for abstract thought. The formal operational stage, developing from around age 12 onward, brings advanced reasoning abilities and the understanding of abstract concepts, further diminishing egocentric thinking.