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The development of conditional reasoning and the structure of semantic memory
H Markovits1, M L Fleury, S Quinn
1Département de psychologie, Université du Québec à Montréal, Québec. MARKOVITS.HENRY@UQAM.CA
Child Development
|July 29, 1998
Summary
Younger children struggle with conditional reasoning when premises are strongly associated or causal. Older children show no difference, suggesting developing knowledge exploration skills are key to reasoning development.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Development
- Developmental Psychology
- Logic and Reasoning
Background:
- Conditional reasoning is crucial for cognitive development.
- Markovits's model provides a framework for understanding conditional reasoning.
- Children's ability to access and utilize their knowledge base impacts reasoning.
Purpose of the Study:
- To test predictions from a revised Markovits's model of conditional reasoning in children.
- To investigate age-related differences in responding to strongly versus weakly associated conditional premises.
- To examine age-related differences in responding to causal versus ad hoc conditional premises.
Main Methods:
- Two studies were conducted with children aged 8 and 11 years.
- Participants were presented with conditional reasoning problems varying in premise association strength and causality.
- Performance was compared between younger and older children on different types of premises.
Main Results:
- Eight-year-olds performed better on weakly associated premises than strongly associated ones.
- Eleven-year-olds showed no significant difference in performance based on premise association.
- Eight-year-olds performed better on ad hoc premises than causal ones, unlike eleven-year-olds.
Conclusions:
- Younger children's reasoning is influenced by premise association strength and causality.
- Older children's reasoning is less affected by these factors.
- The development of children's ability to explore their knowledge base is a significant factor in reasoning development.