Effect on development of proportional reasoning skill of physical experience and cognitive abilities associated with prefrontal lobe activity

The present study tested the hypothesis that maturing prefrontal lobes play a role in the development of proportional reasoning skill because the pref rontal lobes are involved in the inhibition of task-irrelevant information and the representation of task-relevant information. The hypothesis that re asoning development is in part dependent upon physical experience was also tested. Students tall males) who failed to solve a diagnostic proportions t ask were administered several tests of prefrontal lobe functions. The stude nts were then randomly assigned to manipulative or verbal tutoring groups. Both groups received a series of individual testing, tutoring and testing s essions on proportional reasoning. As predicted, performance on the prefron tal lobe tasks (measures of inhibiting ability, planning ability, dissembed ding ability, and working memory capacity) significantly predicted performa nce on proportional reasoning tasks following tutoring. Students' computati onal skills were not a significant predictor. Also, the manipulative group' s proportional reasoning performance was significantly higher than that of the verbal tutoring group. Therefore, the present results provide support f or the hypothesis that maturing prefrontal lobes and physical experience pl ay roles in the development of proportional reasoning skill. (C) 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.