Abstract
Formal reasoning refers to the ability to reason in the abstract beyond the bounds of specific contexts. Many studies that replicate Piaget's reasoning tasks suggest that most adolescents are incapable of formal thinking and there is a serious mismatch between the cognitive level of school children and the cognitive demand of the science curriculum.The present study challenges the validity of Piagetian reasoning tasks as they may under-estimate the ability of formal reasoning of adolescents. It is argued that performance on problems in a variety of contexts can give a more valid and realistic indication of the formal reasoning ability of children. Using a more valid instrument for assessing cognitive potential, it is found that the process of formal reasoning of a person is affected by various factors such as context of the problems, the sequence of presenting the problems and the format of presenting information.
Based on this finding, activities can be designed to provide appropriate learning experiences for secondary school students that are conducive to the transfer and mastery of formal reasoning skills.
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