Developmental Processes and Stages in the Acquisition of Cardinality

Abstract

This is a study of the level of children's understanding of cardinality, focusing on the difference between a true cardinality response and the application of a mechanically learned rule. The authors also evaluate and discuss the possible relationship between cardinality and counting.The subjects were two groups of 32 preschool children, ranging in age from 4 years 3 months to 6 years 3 months. Experimental methodology included two large sets of tests (elements-cardinal vs cardinal-elements), using both numbers and vowels with forward vs backward counting, and visual vs verbal presentation conditions. Results show that cardinality responses are affected by both the direction and nature of the elements in the counting sequence. Scrutiny of errors committed in the various tests enables us to suggest six stages in the acquisition of cardinality. Although there appears to be a developmental dependency between counting and cardinality, this relationship is not significant in all cases.