the naughty teddy study

• aim


  wanted to see whether the childs reaction would be different if there was no deliberate change in the row of counters
• method


  There were 80 children in the study from scotland-40 were in nursery and 40 in primary.

  The children were introduced to a naughty teddy who was liable to escape from his box and mess up the game. The children were then shown 2 rows of counters -4 red in one row and 4 white in the other.

  The teddy jumped out of his box and pushed the counters in 1 row- he transformed the display by making 1 row seem smaller.

  The child were asked before and after the transformation-is there more here or here or are they the same number?
• Results

  41 percent of children gave the right answer if the display was changed deliberately

  68 percent of children gave the right answer if the change was accidental
• conclusion


  in this study many children did conserve quantity, this goes against what piaget suggests as he said children of this age couldnt do this

  But the primary children did better overall than the nursery children, which supports piagets idea that the way children thinks changes when they grow older
• weakness


  the primary age children all come from one school so they have different educational backrounds to the nursery children. They also coped better with the task because their language was more developed.
• strength


  challenges some of piagets assumptions as the way piaget designed his research appears to have confused the children