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The goal of this paper is to illustrate how the psychology of cognition which has grown out of psychoanalytically oriented research within ego psychology is a viable alternative to Piaget's model which has examined cognition separate from personality. The limitations of Piaget's model are delineated. Psychoanalysis needs a model which systematically takes into account the following issues: (1) individual differences, regression, progression, and fixation in cognitive functioning; (2) multiple cognitive functions which operate simultaneously at all stages; (3) cognitive functions which gather information from the external environment and from fantasies and memories; (4) cognitive functions which participate in balancing and regulating affects; and (5) language as one cognitive ego activity which is located developmentally among others. The author's model approaches this goal by integrating two concepts: cognitive controls and the concept of action, fantasy, and language as developmentally ordered ego modes. The usefulness of the model is demonstrated in the analyses of two children and an adult.