A Developmental Study of Conservation Concepts with Five- to Ten-Year-Old Children

The concept of conservation and its development form one of the most interesting aspects of Piaget's theories. According to Inhelder, the foundation of reasoning, including logical, mathematical, geometrical, and physical reasoning, is built upon the concept of conservation of quantity. In a way, children's discovery of conservation is comparable to discoveries in science. Many studies have been conducted of the sequence of development of the concept of conservation in children. However, the results of these studies are not always consistent. The inconsistencies are usually in the age at which a certain type of conservation first appears and in the sequential order of appearance of different types of conservation.