Development Of Propositional Reasoning

We investigated the propositional reasoning of children 8-10 year of age, adolescents and adults. 128 participants took part in our test. We used the proposition-figure match task and tested all of the 5 kinds of propositional reasoning. Our results support three main conclusions: (A) Young children are capable of propositional reasoning which is contrary to the claims of Piaget. The youngest subjects were able to draw valid conclusions well above chance to one model propositional reasoning; (B) Our findings corroborate the model theory of propositional reasoning which suggests that reasoning depends on a mastery of referential language and on the ability to search for counterexamples. Most of the subjects performed better with one-model reasoning than with multiple-model propositional reasoning. (C) There is a significant development of ability from childhood to adulthood, especially in the multiple-models reasoning. And it is possible to identify some of the major components of the improvement.