Abstract
The purpose of this study is to investigate the development of the understanding of the negative word “not” in a formal task. Regarding “class negation”, the Selection Task, the Construction Task and the Verbalization Task were given. To determine the stages of “negation” and “affirmation”, some instructions (sub-items) were combined. Also the effect of the antecedent experiences (color-form sorting or the selection with picture cards) on the tasks was investigated.
The subjects were 54 children in a day care. They were from 3; 8 to 6; 7, and were divided into three groups according to their ages. The Selection Task was to select the following ones from four figures (a blue circle, a blue triangle, a red circle and a red triangle). 1°blue 2°not a circle 3°ared triangle 4°not a blue circle 3 red and a circle 5°blue and not a circle 6°not a circle and not blue The Construction Task was to construct correspondents to the sub-items in the Selection Task (the words vary), using the apparatus separating the colors and the froms (cf. FIG. 1). The Verbalization Task was to utter the words corresponding to the instructions in the Selection Task, seeing one of the four figures pointed.
The results were as follows.
There was no effect of the antecedent experiences. Regarding “negation” (cf. FIG. 3), the Selection Task and the Construction Task were attained at about the same age. the stage of “one-dimensional negation” was attained at the age of about four years old, that of “two-dimensional negation” at about five and that of “partial complementary class” at about five (as in the Construction Task, at about six years old). On the contrary though, the Verbalization Task was difficult. The stage of “one-dimensional negation” was attained at about five years old and most of the six-year-old children remained at the stage. Regarding “affirmation” (cf. FIG. 4), in the Selection Task and the Construction Task,“twodimensional affirmation” was possible from the age of four. In the Verbalization Task,“one-dimensional affirmation” was possible from four, but the stage of “two-dimensional affirmation” was attained at only about the age of five or six years old. The stages of affirmation preceded those of negation by a year.
In addition to that, two conditions were compared using other subjects: when the apparatus of the Selection Task was four figures, and nine figures. The result was that there was no difference in: when difficulty. Also two conditions were compared the apparatus of the Selection Task was made of figures, and when made of picture cards (a butterfly, a tortoise, a rocket and a car. The dimensions were about “fly” and “living”). The result was that only the affirmation task with the picture cards was more difficult.
