Development Of Conditional Reasoning Research Articles

The development of conditional probability reasoning

Although errors in reasoning about conditional probability have been the focus of interest of psychologists for a long time, the development of conditional reasoning in school students has received little attention. This paper considers the responses of 69 students across grades 3 to 13 in an attempt to model the development of appropriate reasoning skills. Although acknowledging the misconceptions observed by earlier researchers, this study seeks a positivist approach to describe developing understanding by combining mathematical appropriateness with structural complexity. The results of the study are intended to inform other researchers, teachers, and curriculum developers.

Age, schooling and conditional reasoning

This study estimated the independent effects of age and schooling in grades 7–9 on scores obtained on invalid conditional and class syllogisms. The results, which point to a negative, albeit small, effect of out-of-school experience and to a sizeable positive effect of schooling, replicate previous findings in a different age range and support the counterintuitive hypothesis that accumulated daily experience with conditionals has a negative effect on the development of conditional reasoning, and that improved performance on invalid problems with age is entirely attributable to schooling. Contrary to most cognitive tasks, therefore, in which schooling operates in the same direction as out-of-school experience, in this case, schooling breaks daily-life interpretational habits, and therefore, is critical for development.

The Development of Conditional Reasoning: A Mental Model Account

Conditional (if-then) reasoning is one of the key components of logical reasoning. Studies examining the way that children and adults make conditional inferences have shown that while there are some clear developmental patterns, there is also a great deal of variation in performance due to factors such as problem content. Such variation is difficult to model without an explicit process model. In the following we propose a variant of mental model theory (Johnson-Laird, 1983) that can explain much of the empirical data. This model suggests that the development of conditional reasoning can be explained, at least partly, by such factors as the capacity of working memory, the range of knowledge available to a reasoner and his/her ability to access this knowledge on-line.

Development of Conditional Reasoning: A Longitudinal Study

This study examines the development of conditional reasoning within a longitudinal design. Two age cohorts were assessed each year for 3 years. One cohort began the investigation as 6th-grade students (M = 11 years, 6 months of age); the other cohort began as 8th-grade students (M =13 years, 8 months of age). At each measurement point, each participant completed 5 reasoning problems consisting of modified versions of the Wason Selection Task (Overton, 1990). Results demonstrated a significant improvement in reasoning performance for each cohort. Furthermore, participants performed better when "if-then" propositions were formulated with the antecedent phrase specifying an action and the consequent specifying a condition, than they did when the antecedent specified a condition and the consequent an action. The results are consistent with the position that the development of logical thinking moves toward the integration of inferential schemes into a systematic network, and that this network is not consistently available before adolescence.

A mental model analysis of young children's conditional reasoning with meaningful premises

Mental model theory has been used to explain many differing phenomena in adult reasoning, including the extensively studied case of conditional reasoning. However, the current theory makes predictions about the development of conditional reasoning that are not consistent with data. In this article, young children's performance on conditional reasoning problems and the justifications given are analysed. A mental model account of conditional reasoning is proposed that assumes that (1) young children can reason with two models and (2) the fleshing out of conditionals involves activation of information in semantic memory that uses the minor premise as a retrieval cue.

Conditional reasoning by mental models: chronometric and developmental evidence

The aim of this article is to verify two predictions resulting from the mental models theory of conditional reasoning. First, the denial of antecedent (DA) and modus tollens (MT) inferences should take longer to verify than modus ponens (MP) and affirmation of consequent (AC) because the former require subjects to flesh out the initial model whereas the latter do not. This prediction was confirmed in two reaction time experiments in adults. In line with Evans' proposal (Evans, J. St. B. T. (1993). The mental model theory of conditional reasoning: critical appraisal and revision. Cognition, 48, 1–20), there was a strong directionality effect: inferences from antecedent to consequent (MP and DA) took less time to verify than the inferences in the opposite direction (AC and MT). Second, the development of conditional reasoning should result from the increasing capacity to construct and coordinate more and more models. As a consequence, the pattern of conditional inference production should evolve with age from a one-model conjunctive pattern (production of MP and AC more frequent than DA and MT) to a three-model conditional production pattern (higher production rate for MP and MT than for DA and AC). This prediction was confirmed using an inference production task in children, adolescents, and adults.

The Development of Conditional Reasoning and the Structure of Semantic Memory

The Development of Conditional Reasoning and the Structure of Semantic Memory

The Development of Conditional Reasoning and the Structure of Semantic Memory

The present article examines 2 predictions concerning conditional reasoning in children derived from a revised version of Markovits's model of conditional reasoning. The first study examined the prediction that younger children (8 years of age) would have greater difficulty in responding correctly to premises where the antecedent was strongly associated with the consequent than to premises where the association was weaker; for example, "If something is a car, then it has a motor" should be more difficult than "If something is a refrigerator, then it has a motor." A total of 55 children in grades 2 and 3 (average age: 8 years) and 49 children in grades 5 and 6 (average age: 11 years) were given either 2 strongly associated problems or weakly associated counterparts. Results indicated that 8-year-olds did better on the weakly associated problems than on the strongly associated problems, but there was no difference among the 11-year-olds. The second study examined the prediction that younger children (8 years of age) would have greater difficulty in responding correctly to causal premises ("If a rock is thrown at a window, the window will break") than to corresponding ad hoc premises ("A rock is something that can be used to break a window"). A total of 53 children in grades 2 and 3 (average age: 8 years) and 49 children in grades 5 and 6 (average age: 11 years) were given either 2 causal problems or ad hoc counterparts. Results indicated that 8-year-old did better on the ad hoc problems than on the causal problems, but there was no difference among the 11-year-olds. These studies are interpreted as consistent with the idea that 1 major factor in the development of reasoning in this age level is the development of children's ability to explore their own knowledge base.

The Development of Conditional Reasoning and the Structure of Semantic Memory

The present article examines 2 predictions concerning conditional reasoning in children derived from a revised version of Markovits's model of conditional reasoning. The first study examined the prediction that younger children (8 years of age) would have greater difficulty in responding correctly to premises where the antecedent was strongly associated with the consequent than to premises where the association was weaker; for example, “If something is a car, then it has a motor” should be more difficult than “If something is a refrigerator, then it has a motor.” A total of 55 children in grades 2 and 3 (average age: 8 years) and 49 children in grades 5 and 6 (average age: 11 years) were given either 2 strongly associated problems or weakly associated counterparts. Results indicated that 8-year-olds did better on the weakly associated problems than on the strongly associated problems, but there was no difference among the 11-year-olds. The second study examined the prediction that younger children (8 years of age) would have greater difficulty in responding correctly to causal premises (“If a rock is thrown at a window, the window will break”) than to corresponding ad hoc premises (“A rock is something that can be used to break a window”). A total of 53 children in grades 2 and 3 (average age: 8 years) and 49 children in grades 5 and 6 (average age: 11 years) were given either 2 causal problems or ad hoc counterparts. Results indicated that 8-year-olds did better on the ad hoc problems than on the causal problems, but there was no difference among the 11-year-olds. These studies are interpreted as consistent with the idea that 1 major factor in the development of reasoning in this age level is the development of children's ability to explore their own knowledge base.

The Development of Conditional Reasoning: An Iffy Proposition

Publisher Summary This chapter attempts to make some sense of the competing claims concerning conditional-reasoning competence. The competence model is based on the natural deduction approach to standard logic; modus ponens and the schema for conditional proof provide inference rules for simple conditionals and, together with the recognition of the constraints imposed by universal quantification, they provide a model for reasoning with universally quantified conditionals. Piaget's account of conditional reasoning is inadequate on logical grounds, that is, it confuses simple and quantified conditionals, but it is possible to make fairly clear empirical predictions when quantifiers are assumed. Ennis and Brainerd have argued that Piaget's account of formal operational thought is wrong because children have some ability to evaluate conditional syllogisms correctly. However, Piaget argued that successful performances on many conditional reasoning tasks can be obtained without a formal operational appreciation of the conditional. Given that the class-inclusion logic structure of concrete operational thought should be sufficient for reasoning with simple conditionals; this does not appear to be a warranted dismissal of the theoretical expectations. Rather, the appropriate assessment of formal operational competency with conditionals appears to concern performances in judging universally quantified conditionals.