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The Child’s
Conception of
Physical Causality
The Child's
Conception of
Ph~sical Causalit~
Jean Piaget
With a new introduction bf:J Joan Valsiner

Originally published in English by Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd.
Published 2001 by Transaction Publishers
Published 2017 by Routledge

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Library of Congress Catalog Number: 99-462314
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Piaget, Jean, 1896-

The child’s conception of physical causality / by Jean Piaget,
p.cm.
Originally published: London : K. Paul, Trench, Trubner & co. ltd., 1930.
Includes index.
ISBN: 0-7658-0641-X (pbk.: alk: paper)
1. Causation. 2. Physics. 3. Child psychology. I. Title.
BF723.C3 P53 2000

155.4'13—dc21
99-462314
ISBN 13: 978-0-7658-0641-3 (pbk)

Students and former students of the Institut f f . Rousseau
who have collaborated in this work.
M. G. B i e l e r (Chaps. I and II).

Mile. A. B odourian (Chap. VIII).
Mile. D a ib e r (Chap. VI.)
Mile. G. Guex (Chaps. II, III and IV).
Mile. L. H a h n l o s e r (Chaps. VI and V II).
Mile. R. H epner (Chaps. I l l and IV).
Mile. H erzog (Chap. VI).
Mile. H. Krafft (Chaps. I ll and IV).
Mile. J. Lebherz (Chaps. X and XI).
Mile. E. M a r g a ir a z (Chaps. I l l and IV).
Mme. V. J. P ia g e t (Chaps. II, III, IV and V).
Mile. H. R ehfous (Chaps. X and XI).
Mile. M. R odrigo (Chaps. I l l and IV).
Mile. M. R oud (Chaps. I l l and IV).
Mile. N. S v e t l o v a (Chap. V III).
Dr V ersteeg (Chaps. I and II).
Mile. Zw ic k h a r d t (Chaps. I and II).
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION ix
SECTION 1
PAGE
EX PLAN ATIO N O F MOVEMENT . I
Chapter I.— E xper im en ts concerning th e N ature

of A i r .............................................................. 3
§ i . Pressure of the hands, p. 5 .—§ 2 . The air of the
punctured ball, of the tube, and of the pump, p. 14.—
§ 3. The making of air and the movement of projectiles,
p. 18 .—§ 4. Centrifugal force, p. 25.
Chapter I I.— T he Orig in of W in d a n d of B reath 32

§ 1 . The formation of wind, p. 33.—§ 2. Breathing, p. 52.
Chapter III.— Movement of the Clouds a n d the

H ea v en ly B o dies . . . . 60
§ 1 . The movement of clouds, p. 61 .—§ 2 . The movement
of the heavenly bodies, p. 73.
Chapter IV .— W ater Currents a n d Movem ents

W eig h t
d u e to . . . . 87
§1. The waves of the lake, p. 87.—§2. The current of
rivers, p. 93.—§ 3. The suspension of the sun and moon,
and the fall of heavy bodies to the ground, p. 103.
Chapter V.— T he Ch il d ’s I d e a of F orce 114

§ 1. How the child explains movement, p. x 14. —
§ 2. Definition of the idea of force, p. 120.—■§3. Origin of
the idea of force, p. 126.
SECTION I I
PREDICTION AND EXPLANATION 133
Chapter VI.— T he F loating of B oats 135
§1. First and second stages: boats float for moral or
dynamic reasons, p. 136.—§2. Third stage: boats float
owing to their own or to acquired movement and because
they are light in relation to the total mass of water,
p. 141.—§ 3. Boats float for static reasons, p. 150.
vii
viii CONTENTS
PAGE
Chapter V II.— T h e L evel of W ater 164

§ i . First stage: the water rises because of the weight
of the submerged body, p. 165.—§2. Second and third
stages: the rdle of volume is understood and made
explicit, p. 170.—§ 3. Conclusions, p. 173.—§ 4. Prediction
and explanation of the phenomenon of communicating
vessels in children from 8 to 12 years old, p. 176.
Chapter VIII. — T he P roblem of S hadow s 180

§ i . First stage: shadow is a substance emanating from
the object and participating with night, p. 181.—Second
stage: shadow is a substance emanating from the object
alone, p. 186.—§ 3. Third stage: shadow is a substance
which flees from light, p. 187.—§ 4. Conclusions, p. 190.
SECTION I I I
EXPLANATION OF MACHINES . 195
Chapter IX.— T he Mechanism of B icycles 197
§ i. First stage: the cause of the movement is synthetic,
p . 1 9 9 -—§ 2. Second stage : the various parts are necessary
but unrelated, p. 205.—H§ 3. Third and fourth stages: the
search for contacts and mechanical explanation, p. 210.
Chapter X.— T he Steam - en g in e . . . . 213

§1. First stage: the wheel turns because of the fire,
p. 215.—§2. Second stage: the wheel turns because of
the water, p. 220.—§3. Third stage: the wheel turns
because of the steam, p. 223.
Chapter XI.— T r a in s , Motor - cars , a n d A eroplanes 226

§ i. Steam-engines and motor-boats, p. 226.—§2. Motor
cars and aeroplanes, p. 230.—§ 3. Conclusions, p. 232.
SECTION IV
THE CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF REALITY
AND C A U S A L I T Y .................................. 237
S ummary a n d Co n c l u s io n .................................................... 237
§1. The child's reality, p. 241.—§2. Causality and the
child, p. 258.—§3. The child’s idea of law, p. 273.—
§ 4. Assimilation and imitation, p. 281.—§ 5. Child logic,
p. 291.—§ 6. Logic and reality, p. 301.
I n d e x of N a m e s ......................................................................... 307
I n d e x of S u b j e c t s ............................................................... 308
INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION
C O N STR U C TIV E C U R IO SITY OF TH E

H U M A N M IND: PARTICIPATING IN PIA G ET
...nowadays to walk down a street

imposes a whole conception o f the world.
(Piaget, p. 235)
R epublication of this book is a very welcome event, as it

allows our contemporary readership a direct access to the
original work of Jean Piaget. The book belongs to the very
beginning of the lifetime work of the Swiss naturalist. In
its original sequence of Piaget’s empirical publications, The
Child’s Conception of Physical Causality (1927) followed
three other books—on language and thought (Piaget 1923),
on judgment (Piaget 1924), and on children’s conception
of the world (Piaget 1926). After the present book, Piaget
moved into the study of children’s moral reasoning (Piaget
1932).
All of these books by Piaget, in his “early” period, were
empirical in their ethos. Piaget was trying hard to make
sense of the complexity of the phenomena that he encoun
tered in his conversations with children. These efforts are
classic works in child psychology of the twentieth century.
However, there is a problem—being considered a clas
sic can be dangerous to knowledge. I would dare to claim
that Piaget’s work is talked about too much to be thoroughly
understood. He has been labeled as a developmental theo
rist who had a youthful habit of collecting mollusks. Yet
he may have actually remained, in spirit, a mollusk collec-
IX
X CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF CAUSALITY
tor who observed children’s forms of thinking—and who
only slowly formulated his developmental theory by the
end of his long life. Surely many people have heard of
Piaget as a “stage theorist,” and stories about “sensori-mo-
tor,” “pre-operational,” “concrete-operational,” and “for
mal-operational” stages may be retold in child psychology
courses all over the world. Yet these features of Piaget’s
contributions are but secondary to his basic curiosity for
how knowledge in its generic forms is created.
This basic curiosity was centered upon Piaget’s own
ego— o f the young boy who w anted to find out how
things— and minds— work. Through a series of coinci
dences, that young boy became known as world’s fore
most child psychologist. Yet he insisted upon remaining
him self—a rare quality among consensus-sensitive psy
chologists.
Piaget’s Revolution in Psychology:
The Right to Be Wrong
Even when the focus on knowledge construction is re
stored to our story by emphasizing Piaget’s self-defined
role as genetic epistemologist, efforts to understand Piaget’s
reasons for his kind of empirical research may come to a
halt. Instead of curiosity about the issues involved, Piaget’s
contributions can easily become dismissed as “too old” or
“lacking statistical rigor.” Such claims are, of course, the
results of well-educated intellectual laziness and the fol
lowing of accepted rules of methodology that dominate
psychology in our times. That laziness often masks itself
as commitment to the newest techniques of psychological
investigation. The energy spent on following the “right”
directions means diminishing interest in phenomena, and
in efforts of researchers of the past.
But being “right” may turn out to end in an intellectual
impasse. It is noteworthy that Piaget’s own development
in child psychology entailed the abandonment of the “right”
methodological stance (of standardizing English IQ tests
INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION xi
for French schoolchildren—see Chapman 1988), and turn
ing his curiosity toward the mental processes through which
children arrived at both the “right” and the “wrong” an
swers. He of course was not the only revolutionary of this
kind (at the time). The study of the psychological pro
cesses as they unfold had been introduced to adult research
in Wurzburg in 1905-1908 (Biihler 1907, 1908), “natural
istic experim ent” had been propagated by A lexander
Lazurskii in 1911 (Lazurskii 1997). Piaget carried on in
the child-study (paedology) area the traditions of Edouard
Claparede, who brought him to the Rousseau Institute in
Geneva in the 1920s. Approximately at the same time,
Lev Vygotsky and his other young colleagues in Russia
were eagerly learning from the work of (similarly young)
Piaget how to investigate processes of children’s reason
ing.
The Norm for Informed Ignorance
The larger historical context for Piaget’s work is largely
forgotten since original sources are rarely considered. The
reliance upon secondary sources for understanding the work
of original thinkers, or even tertiary sources in the form of
textbooks, has a role to play in the loss of previously avail
able knowledge in our time. Glossy textbooks certainly
provide entertaining bits and pieces of information that are
well fitted for filling in multiple-choice questions on tests.
They also communicate hero myths about key scientists.
Piaget (sometimes with his pipe) appears often in that role.
Yet the curiosity inherent in his thinking is not adequately
reflected in textbooks.
The issue at stake is not just that of understanding Piaget.
Textbook presentations of the work of any classic thinker
create a certain mythical image about the hero figure. The
intellectual goals of the classic authors are usually forgot
ten. Instead, mythical stories about the authors proliferate,
and replace careful direct study of the author’s actual—
usually incomplete or cumbersome—thought. Famous sci-
xii CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF CAUSALITY
entists are presented as the ones who were “right” in their
ideas—ignoring those sides of their creativity in which they
clearly were “wrong.” Yet scientific creativity includes “be
ing wrong” as the ordinary and expected state. After all,
any new and bold hypothesis is more likely “wrong” than
“right”— scientists move only slowly toward making sense
of complicated objects of investigation, erring constantly on
their way. Textbooks do not report that cumbersome pro
cess—only the few selected outcomes that have come to the
limelight of normative fixation of knowledge. Students are
supposed to learn that know ledge as the given truth,
and guided against efforts to reconstruct it in new ways.
They are inform ed about the achievem ents, yet igno
rant about the possibilities for further advancement of
knowledge.
Piaget is a good example of such hero-construction ef
forts. He has been considered to be a theoretician—yet
one whose theoretical contributions have been often found
to be difficult to understand or at times incomplete or incon
sistent. His descriptions of stages—and indeed Piaget used
the stage notion to order classes of developing forms of think
ing—are presented often as if these are the center of his “de
velopmental theory.” He is also considered a “precocious
naturalist”, which adds to the story about him as a “hero-
scientist.”
As a result of all these we seem to know about him—yet
our knowledge may be but a schematic skeleton of all the
creative complexity of the original efforts. The reader of
The Child's Conception of Physical Causality can feel that
first hand. Instead of a glorious presentation of clear cases
of “the data” we see here a laborious effort to make sense of
children’s efforts to understand the physical world. Even as
the book title orients the reader to think in terms of causal
ity—the book treats far wider issues. The painstaking efforts
of children to understand the functioning of different phe
nomena are here displayed with the meticulous habits of a
naturalist.
INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION xiii
P ia g e t a s a N a tu ra lis t
Piaget was a naturalist in his methodology. He gave

careful consideration to the phenomena and created chal
lenging experimental tasks that tested the limits of children’s
understanding. In our time, he would probably fit the cat
egory of an experimental human ethologist— somebody
who studies naturally occurring phenomena through care
ful observation of experimentally set naturalistic problem
solving. He was fortunate in creating his intellectual au
tonomy in the context of Geneva in the 1920s. Free from
the peer-consensus pressures that guide the intellectual
enterprise of child psychologists in our day, Piaget was at
the heart of the phenomenologically original quasi-experi-
mental tradition of cognitive developmental psychology in
Geneva. That tradition has even been labeled after him
(i.e., “the Piagetian approach"). This tradition needed no
statistical mystiques to prove its claims, since the empirical
methods used were kept close to the phenomena they were
investigating, as well as directly linked with the basic theo
retical notions of Piaget’s invention. Statistical inference is
of little relevance in psychology of the kind Piaget and his
contemporaries practiced. It simply would not fit with the
phenomena under study— which would be a sufficient ba
sis for any thinking scientist to decide not to bring that
kind of inference into one’s science. Instead, Piaget relied
upon naturalistic experimentation—interviewing children
about real-life phenomena that they knew, or that could be
produced immediately in the context of the study (e.g.,
shadows).
Indeed, Piaget produced numerous stage accounts. His
and his research group’s observations 1 on children’s un
derstanding of how things work rendered age-related de
scriptions of stages. These are classifications and not much
more. In ways similar to Charles Darwin, Piaget preferred
to collect specimens and classify those into sim ilarity
groups. As those classified phenomena happened to fol-
XIV CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF CAUSALITY
low an ontogenetic order, they became descriptions of stages
in the development of the phenomena.
Piaget’s work was mostly inductive—moving from col
lected specimens of children’s thinking to their classifica
tion into stages, ordering the stages along the lines of onto
genetic progression. The reader of the present book will
find descriptions of stages (and sub-stages) in each of the
content domains in which issues of the nature of things are
covered. The various stages are merely descriptive de
vices—in service of Piaget’s efforts to arrive at the logic
according to which human beings—children and adults—
think.
Logic in Children’s Thought
Logic was the highly-esteemed standard of science in

the beginning of the twentieth century. Piaget’s empirical
work was preceded by similar data-collection efforts by G.
Stanley Hall, and theoretical efforts by James Mark Baldwin
and Lucien Levy-Bruhl. The major question was the exist
ence of logics that were different from the normative Bool
ean logic. Thus, the “otherness” of the thinking by people
from other societies (which was then conveniently labeled
“primitive thinking”) was a central issue in Levy-Bruhl‘s
thinking. Piaget acknowledged his indebtedness to Levy-
Bruhl (Piaget 1959, xxi). Similar “otherness” was the case
with children’s logic.
What Piaget meant by “logic” was not (at least in his
early years) a strictly formalized deductive system, but
rather something far looser. In fact, what he emphasized
under that label might better be viewed as “schemes of
experience” :
Ego-centric thought and intelligence... represent two different forms of
reasoning, and we may even say, without paradox, two different logics. By
logic is meant here the sum ofhabits which the mind adopts in the general
conduct of its operations— in the general conduct of a game of chess
... to the special rules which govern each separate proposition, each
particular move in the game. Egocentric logic and communicable
INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION XV
logic will therefore differ less in their conclusions (except with the child
where ego-centric logic often functions) than in the way they work. (Piaget
1959,46, emphasis added)
The complex “habit of mind“ notion of logic is certainly

close to the collective representations notion (which Levy-
Bruhl used, based on Durkheim). The inductive focus of
such logic follows the efforts of James Mark Baldwin, whose
efforts to introduce “genetic” (developmental) logic were
Piaget’s guidelines in doing his empirical work. It can be
argued that the work of “early Piaget”—by which I mean
Piaget from 1922 to mid-1930s— was a conscious effort
to e la b o ra te and pu t in to e m p iric a l p ra c tic e the
Baldwinian system of “genetic logic” (see Baldwin 1906,
1908, 1911, 1915).
In the present book, Baldwin's major explanatory con
cept of imitation is also used by Piaget in order to general
ize his data. Yet Piaget lacks theoretical precision here.
Using the notion of imitation “in a very wide sense" (285),
Piaget claimed that
Imitation can be by gesture and by movement, as when the child who plays
at being its model who is learning to talk, to walk, etc. Drawing is imitation.
But imitation can also be of thought, thought being a compressed form of
action. In all these imitations there is a motor element, and this is why it is
worth while reducing all these processes to imitation by gesture. (285)
Piaget borrowed LeD antec‘s focus on assim ilation—

which, years later, in conjunction with accommodation, be
comes the cornerstone for his equilibration theory of de
velopment. In paraphrasing LeDantec, Piaget noted:
The organism left to itself tends to assimilate its environment, it tends... to
persist exactly as it was before and to deform the environment so as to
subject it to this assimilation. But the environment resists and influences
the organism. According to the strength of this resistance the organism is
forced to change, and each of these variations consists in a sense, in an
imitation of the object which is exercising its constraining power. (Piaget,
288-89, emphasis added)
So the relationship between organism and environment

is that of a fight between forces of preservation of the or-
XVI CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF CAUSALITY
ganism (assimilating the environment) and those of chang
ing under the influence of the environment (im itation).
Notice that neither of these assumed processes are presented
as constructing any new forms— assimilation is presumed
to “take in” the environment in ways that preserve the or
ganism, and imitation to force the organism to change by
environmental influences. Either one forces the change in
the other, or the other in the one.
Piaget added on his own behalf:
Assimilation and imitation work in the opposite directions, so that each
pulls the mind its own way. Any mental attitude during the primitive stages
will therefore consist in a compromise between these two tendencies and
not in their synthesis. (Piaget, 289, emphasis added)
The present book includes a rich variety of empirical

dem onstrations of such com prom ises, in the form of
Piaget’s original data transcripts. I would claim that the
data amply illustrate different forms of such “compromises.”
The fact that Piaget organized the forms of such compro
mises into ascending categorization system of stages re
mains a technical, not a substantive issue.
Piaget claimed that the processes of assimilation and imi
tation do not remain stable them selves. By becoming
complementary to each other, both of them change. As
similating schemas become increasingly flexible in respond
ing to the demands of the experience. Imitation loses its
servility and becomes “intelligent” adaptation to the exter
nal world (Piaget, 290). The two become synthesized in
the opposition of deduction and experience.
The Law of Participation
Theoretically, Piaget claimed an allegiance to Levy-

Bruhl’s “law of participation.” Participation was a concept
brought into early twentieth century by Levy-Bruhl (1985,
76), in conjunction with explanation of the uses of collec
tive representations in human thinking. In what was then
called “primitive thinking /4 different objects could form
INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION xvii
relations with persons in the context of “collective repre-
sentations“:
I should be inclined to say that in the collective representations of primitive
mentality, objects, beings, phenomena can be, though in a way incompre
hensible to us, both themselves and something other than themselves. (76)
Levy-Bruhl‘s notion of participation was a terminologi

cal solution to the aberration of identity axiom of the Bool
ean logic. In the latter, if something is x, it cannot simulta
neously be something else (non-jc). Yet the evidence from
the thinking of people from other societies indicated that
there were no difficulties for being simultaneously two (or
more) states of existence. Thus, Levy-Bruhl was fascinated
by the report from South America that the members of the
tribe of the Bororo Indians consider themselves simulta
neously persons and red parrots—araras (von den Steinen
1894, chapter 17).
The example of being simultaneously two— myself and
a red parrot—was a fascinating challenge to the canons of
Boolean logic, which require elimination of such anoma
lies, yet the world of human thought is filled with it. Levy-
Bruhl considered that “pre-logical mentality,” which ignores
the contradiction (Levy-Bruhl 1985, 135). The main devel
opment of mental participations entails the respective col
lective representations becoming internalized (or indirect).
The participation becomes a phenomenon of feeling:
The Arunta who feels that he is both himself and the ancestor... knows
nothing of ancestor-worship. The Bororo does not make the parrots,
which are Bororo, the objects of a religious cult. It is only in aggregates of
a more advanced type that we find an ancestor-worship, a cult of heroes,
gods, sacred animals, etc. The ideas which we call really religious are thus
a kind of differentiated product resulting from a prior form of mental
activity. The participation or communion first realized by mystic symbiosis
and by practices which affirmed it is obtained later by union with the object
of the worship and belief called religious, with the ancestor, the god.
(Levy-Bruhl 1985,368)
Piaget‘s study was centered on the notion of participa

tion. It was considered by him to be a result of syncretic
xviii CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF CAUSALITY
fusion of particular observations (33). Piaget considered
participation one of the forms of causality in the child’s
thinking—a type that disappears after age 5-6 years. He
described it as involving
... two things between which there subsist relations either of resemblance
or of general affinity, are conceived as having something in common which
enables them to act upon one another at a distance, or more precisely, to be
regarded one as source of emanations, the other as the emanation of the
first. Thus air or shadows in a room emanate from the air and shadows out
of doors... [the fifth form of causality—magical causality]... is in many
respects simply participation: the subject regards his gestures, his thoughts,
or the objects he handles, as charged with efficacy, thanks to the very same
participations which he establishes between those gestures, etc., and the
things around him. Thus a certain word acts upon a certain thing; a certain
gesture will protect one from certain danger; a certain white pebble will
bring about the growth of water-lilies ... (261)
In his summary of the present book, he explained:
There are, to begin with, during a very early stage, feelings of participation
accompanied sometimes by magical beliefs; the sun and moon follow us,
and if we walk, it is enough to make them move along; things around notice
us and obey us, like the wind, the cloud, the night, etc.; the moon, the street
lamps, etc. send us dreams “to annoy us“, etc. etc. In short, the world is
filled with tendencies and intentions which are in participation with our
own. (245)
While building his book clearly on the general issues

introduced by Levy-Bruhl and Baldwin, Piaget had no grand
theoretical aims in this book. Rather, the book is a collec
tion of empirical data, systematically organized by tasks of
understanding of “how things work.” As such, Piaget’s
data are remarkably rich—as they remain close to the phe
nomena of their origin. Piaget’s great contribution to de
velopmental psychology was his “clinical method”— an
empirical investigation tactic that integrated relevant aspects
of naturalistic experiment, interview, and observation.
Piaget’s empirical inquiry is systematic. We can gain a
glimpse into children’s thinking about air, wind and breath,
clouds and heavenly bodies, water currents and levels, and
shadows (on the side of natural understanding). Further-
INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION xix
more, Piaget used themes of artificial objects—boats, bi
cycles, the steam engine, airplanes, and automobiles—to
provide the whole range of phenomena that can evoke
children’s interests. Each task is organized into a frame of
presenting ontogenetic stage sequences in the understand
ing of the specific phenomena.
There is a beautiful autobiographical moment in his in
quiries—the construction of a new form of a vehicle:
At an age which through various coincidences he can place at exactly

between 8 and 9, one of us remembers having played a great deal with
machines. He actually invented a new means of locomotion, which he
christened the “auto-steam” (Fr. autovap), and which consisted in applying
to motor-cars the principle of the steam-engine—boiler, piston, connect
ing-rods. The inventor of the autovap even published his discovery in an
illustrated work, which, incidentally, was written in pencil. (234)
Piaget was an empiricist of the Continental European

kind. This kind is similar to the Bororos who considered
themselves to be red parrots: an empiricist is a researcher
interested in empirical phenomena while using some gen
eral theoretical framework as a starting point. The latter
need not strictly determine the former—although ideally it
should. That ideal was not reached in Piaget’s early work.
Piaget was a keen observer of phenomena that interested
him—and triggered their further forms by introducing spe
cific probes to the children so as to bring out into the open
the complexity of their efforts to understand the ways in
which different phenomena work. At the same time, Piaget
used the relevant theoretical ideas of his time. Of course,
all through his life, Piaget had a meta-theoretical goal—
striving toward harmony (Chapman 1988; Vidal 1993), yet
his own theoretical elaborations were developed slowly. For
example, there is little trace of Piaget’s own theory—that of
equilibration—in the present book. The notion of assimila
tion exists in its mechanical version (as described above).
The notion of accommodation is mixed with imitation.
In contrast, the empirical strength of Piaget’s research
program is visible in this book at its maximum. The world
XX CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF CAUSALITY
of children is filled with different events, many of those are
challenges to the understanding of the child. Thus, chil
dren wonder about why different ordinary events happen.
Researchers of children’s psychological functions can gain
an insight into children's thinking when observing chil
dren making sense of these challenging events.
Why Read Piaget?
There are many ways of answering this question. Per
haps the most important one is that of our own curiosity.
The Child's Conception of Physical Causality is filled with
creative experimental ideas of probing into the most so
phisticated ways of thinking in children. Our encounters
with the physical world are filled with miraculous puzzles—
wind appears from somewhere, some heavy objects (like
oil tankers) float nicely on oceans, but other objects go
down to the bottom of our water-filled buckets. Steam en
gines puffed away in the industries of the past, shadows
are cast on sunny days, and children were eager to turn
from bipedalists into bicyclists— getting the funny two
wheeled transportation device to propel their balancing
bodies toward their destinations.
O f course, nowadays our experiences with steam en
gines may be meager (a tea kettle is not the best equiva
lent), but new technological devices put our understanding
of causality to further tests. After all, can we easily explain
how some image arrives in our computer from thousands
of kilometers away, though the World Wide Web or other
networks? Technologies change—yet the creative curiosity
of children remains, basically unhindered by the consumer
society. We create new myths— about the power of the
Internet, information overflow, and ever-increasing innova
tions of our work through computers. These are our ex
amples of magical causality.
Piaget’s data preserve the reality of the original phenom
ena in them. Our contemporary psychology needs ideas
that relate to reality of phenomena. Careful return to the
INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION XXI
actual work of Piaget, as well as others of his time such as

Lev Vygotsky, Kurt Koffka, Heinz Werner, William Stem,
Kurt Lewin, M uzafer Sherif, allows our contem porary
reader to begin thinking about the unity of psychological
phenomena and their theoretical explanatory constructs.
Collecting new data does not help in a field where the mind
has developed from a constructor to the consumer of knowl
edge. Piaget’s experience of walking through a street—
and by that becoming confronted with a whole world— is
today reduced to driving from one parking garage to an
other. Piaget’s original writings help us to overcome the
handicap of post-modem practices of intellectual laziness
and the acceptance of given truths. As Piaget himself once
said—the road to objectivity in science is not a given, but
can be achieved only by careful, step-by-step investiga
tion. This is the thought behind the stage— of Piaget’s
massive chorus of empirical contributions to the under
standing of how children think. Surely there is a whole
world behind the talk about stages, the world of curiosity,
rather than that of classifications. The hero image surround
ing Jean Piaget can then vanish, and we can enjoy our ac
cess to the curious child-watching mind of the clever natu
ralist from Neuchatel.
Jaan Valsiner
N ote
1. Piaget worked collectively with others on these observations. As is
obvious from the list of his acknowledgments, each chapter in this—
and many other—books is co-authored with a co-researcher.
R eferences
Baldwin, J. M. (1906) Thought and things: A study o f the development and
meaning o f thought, or genetic logic. Vol. 1, Functional logic, or genetic
theory o f knowledge&London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co.
--------- . (1908) Thought and things: A study o f the development and meaning
o f thought, or genetic logic. Vol. 2, Experimental logic, or genetic theory
o f thought. London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co.
XXII CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF CAUSALITY
--------- . (1911) Thought and things: A study o f the development and meaning
o f thought, or genetic logic. Vol 3, Interest and art being real logic.
London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co.
--------- . (1915) Genetic theory o f reality. New York: G. P. Putnam’s sons.
Buhler, K. (1907) “Tatsachen und Probleme zu eine Psychologie der
Denkvorgange. I.” Archiv fu r die gesamte Psychologie 9, 297-365.
----------. (1908) “Tatsachen und Probleme zu eine Psychologie der
Denkvorgange. II, HI “Archiv fu r die gesamte Psychologie 12,1-92.
Chapman, M. (1988) Constructive evolution. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press.
Lazurskii, A. F. (1997) “The natural experiment.” Journal o f Russian and
East European Psychology 35: 2,32-41.
Levy-Bruhl, L. (1985) How natives think. Princeton: Princeton University
Press.
Piaget, J. (1923) Le langage et la pensee chez Venfant. Neuchatel: Delachaux
et Niestle. (English: The language and thought o f the child. London:
Kegan Paul, 1926)
--------- . (1924) Le jugement et le raisonnement chez l'enfant. Neuchatel:
Delachaux et Niestle (in English: Judgment and reasoning in the child.
London: Kegan Paul, 1928)
--------- . (1926) La representation du monde chel Venfant. Paris: F. Alcan.
(in English: A child's conception o f the world. London: Kegan Paul,
1929)
--------- . (1927) La causalite physique chez Tenfant. Paris: F. Alcan (in
English: The child's conception o f physical causality. London: Kegan
Paul, 1930)
--------- . (1932) Lejugement moral chez T enfant. Paris: F. Alcan (in English:
The moral judgment o f the child. London: Kegan Paul, 1932)
--------- . (1959) The language and thought o f the child. 3rd ed. London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Vidal, F. (1993) Piaget before Piaget. Cambridge, M A : Harvard University
Press.
von den Steinen, K. (1894) Unter den Naturvolker Zentral-Brasiliens.
Reiseschilderung und Ergebnisse derZweiten Schingu-Expedition, 1887-
1888. Berlin: Reimer.
SECTION I
EXPLANATION OF MOVEMENT
I n an earlier volum e 1 we have tried to establish what
are the outstanding features of the child’s conception of
the world. Intellectualism, animism, and artificialism
were what we found to be its prevailing notes. We
shall now proceed to make a more detailed analysis, and
to see whether, connected with mental realism, with
animism, and with artificialism, there is not a corresponding
conception of material force and a system of physics
peculiar to the child.
Three methods present themselves for this purpose;
they are of unequal value, but must be used in con
junction if nothing of interest is to be allowed to escape.
The first is the purely verbal method, and consists in
asking the children whether bodies (or a series of bodies
named in a given order) have weight, and if so, why.
In this way we obtain the definition of the verbal idea
of material force. The second method is half verbal,
half practical: a certain number of movements (those of
clouds, of rivers, of the parts of a machine, etc.) are
enumerated to the child who is then questioned as to
why and how these movements are performed. This
method gives a more direct view of child dynamics, but
one th at is still tainted with verbalism, since no mani
pulation is possible. Finally comes the third method
which is, as far as possible, d ire c t: little experiments in
physics are carried out before the child, and he is questioned
as to “ how ” each event takes place. This gives first
hand information about the mental orientation of children.
1 J. Piaget, The Child’s Conception of the World (this Library), 1928.
A 1
2 CHILD’S CONCEPTION OF CAUSALITY
In the present section these three methods will be used
in turn. Our procedure may seem unusual, but it is the
fruit of earlier experimentation rather than of any pre
conceived ideas. We shall begin with the study of
children’s ideas about air, its movement and its origin.
As will appear later, a large number of natural move
ments, such as those of the heavenly bodies, of rivers, of
clouds, etc., are believed by the child to be produced by
wind. Only, this statement is incomprehensible—we failed
ourselves to understand it for many years—so long as no
exact information has been collected about the explana
tions which children give of the wind itse lf; for, strange
to say, the wind is often believed to be produced by the
actual clouds or waves th a t are in movement. One or
more vicious circles would therefore seem to exist within
the mind of the child, and we must beware of letting
adult logic mislead us as to their nature. Above all, care
must be taken to avoid distortion of meaning or, as the
physicists call it, “ systematic erro r” , by which they
mean mistakes th at are the outcome of the very way in
which the experiments are set, for these mistakes vitiate
every result, and always in the same sense. It is in
order to steer clear of this danger th at we have begun
our enquiry with an analysis of children’s ideas about
air. Once this analysis has been completed, we shall be
able to examine the explanations given by the child
concerning natural movements, and then pass on to a
description of the idea of physical force.
CHAPTER I
EXPERIMENTS CONCERNING THE

NATURE OF AIR
The problem of air is highly interesting to children and
a large number of spontaneous questions bear witness to
their natural curiosity about wind and air in general.
Sully 1 mentions children, some of whom believed th at
wind was caused by a large fan waved by an unseen
being, and others th a t it was produced by the movement
of trees. Stanley H a ll 2 quotes the following questions of
a boy of six : “ What makes the wind blow ? Is someone
pushing it? I thought it would have to stop when it went
against a house or a big tree. Does it know that it is making
our pages blow over ? ” Miss Morse N ice 3 took down
these questions of a child of four : “ What is air ? How
do people make air ? What makes air ? ” These questions
show th at there exists in very young children a spontaneous
interest in air and wind, together with a spontaneous
tendency to think of wind as both alive and produced
by human beings (animism and artificialism combined).
How can one get a t children’s real ideas about these
m atters ? The enquiry has been carried out here in a
very concrete and direct manner, and is one in which no
effort must be spared in the attem pt to avoid verbalism
and to capture the child’s immediate reactions. This,
after much tentative groping, is the method we adopted.
First experim ent: we show the child the lid of a box
attached to a piece of string. We then put a penny in
1 Studies of Childhood, pp. 98 and 99.
2 Pedag. Semin., 1903 (Yol. X), “ Curiosity and Interest/'
3 Ibid., 1921, p. 23.
3
the lid, swing the string round on a vertical plane, and ask
the child why the penny does not fall out of the box.
This preliminary experiment does not seem to have any
connection with air. But, as will be seen later, it is by
referring to the movement of the air th at (at least in the
succeeding stage) the child explains why the penny does
not drop. Second experim ent: we clasp our two hands
together, and, by repeated pressure of the palms, produce
a small current of air which the child generally becomes
aware of with extreme surprise. We then ask the child
where this air comes from, etc. Third experim ent: we
give the child an india-rubber ball punctured a t a point
which is clearly visible. We deflate the ball, taking care
to direct the jet of air against the child’s hand or cheek.
The ball is thus completely deflated, and the child is
made to observe th a t it is flat and contains no more air.
We then let it fill itself with air and begin the experiment
over again. We ask the child where the air comes from
th a t is in the ball, where the air comes from th at has
gone into the ball, and so on. Later on, the same game
is played with a small tube, or with a bicycle pump, etc.
Fourth experim ent: the lid is again swung round, but
without the penny, and horizontally. The child is asked
where the air comes from which this movement produces.
A fan may also be used, b ut this is not necessary. Fifth
experim ent: the child is told to blow on his hand and is
asked where this air comes from, where the air comes
from th a t is in his mouth, etc. This leads to a series of
questions on breathing. Finally, the sixth point which
is purely v e rb a l: the child is asked where the wind
comes from, how it began, etc. It is naturally a good
thing to add to these six questions other complementary
enquiries as to the consciousness or life of the air .1
The order of succession given to these six groups of
questions is intended to avoid as far as possible any
suggestion “ by perseveration ” . The questions about the
1 We also asked some of the children two sets of additional questions
of which the results will be given in § 3 and § 4.
EXPERIM ENTS ON TH E NATURE OF AIR 5
wind should only come at the end, otherwise the child
will bring in the wind a t every point. Finally, it goes
without saying th at as an indispensable precaution the
room in which the experiments are carried out should be
entirely shut in, even in summer. The windows should
even be closed before the child arrives on the scene,
otherwise he will not fail to say (at least if he is under 7- 8)
th a t the air of the hands or of the ball, etc., has just
come in through the window, the room being ordinarily
thought of as empty of air.
In the following exposition we shall pay no attention
to the order in which the experiments have been carried
out. The questions about wind and breathing, moreover,
will be kept for the next chapter.
§ 1. P r e s s u r e o f t h e h a n d s .— The answers given by

the children to the questions we asked in the second of
our experiments, th a t of the pressure of hands, may
roughly be divided into four stages. During the first
stage, which extends on the average up to the age of six
(average age of this sta g e : 5 years and 4 months), the
child admits th at the air issuing from the hands is due
to the actual pressure, the room being considered as
empty of a i r ; but in addition, and this is what characterises
this particular stage, the hands, in producing air, attract,
so to speak, a supplementary quantity of air which comes
in from outside (air passing through the closed windows).
Thus what characterises this first stage is an immediate
participation between the air produced by the hands and
a reservoir of wind out of doors. During a second stage,
in which the average age is 7 , the air is conceived as being
produced by the pressure of the hands (the room being
thought of as empty) but this pressure causes air to come
out of the skin and the interior of the body. During
a third stage (average age 8), the air is simply produced
by the hands without any additional factor. Finally,
when at about the age of 9 the fourth stage is reached,
the mechanism is understood : the room is full of air and
the hands simply collect and then send out again the air
th a t surrounds them.
Here are some examples from the first stage, which is
very interesting from the point of view of the child’s
conception of physical causality: the air from outside
comes in obedience, as it were, to a call, and comes through
the closed window.
B at (4) tells us th a t the sound he hears is due to the
air: “ Where does it come from? . . .” 1 “ Where does
the air come from ?—Through the window.—Is it open ?—
No, shut.—And yet the air could get through ?—Yes.—
Where ?— . . . Look a t my hands [they are open before
him]. Is there any air in them ?—No.—And now [pressing
them one against the other] ?—Yes.—Where does it come
from ?—From the window.—Is there any in the room ?
—No.”
Zel (41) : “ Look, do you hear ? W hat is it ?—Wind.
—Where does it come from ?—From the window.—Is
there any wind in my hands ?—No.—And in the room ?
—No.—And now [hand pressing] ?— Yes.—Where does it
come from ?—From the hands.—And where does the wind
in the hands come from ?—From the window.—And the
wind in the window ?—From the sky.—How did it get
in ?—By the window, and then it went into the hands.—
When did it come ?—When you did that [when the hands
are pressed together].—How did it come ?—I don’t know.
—How ?—In between the window. [The window is, of
course, closed. Zel is supposing th at the wind comes
through the chink between the two sides of the French-
window.] ”
T a q (7 ; 4 . G.) 2 : " W hat am I doing ?-—You are
shutting your fingers and then clapping.” “ It is blowing.—
W hat is it ?—Like the wind.—Where does it come from ?
—From your hands.—W hat is it th a t blows ?— Wind.—
W hat is it called ? Air ?— Yes.” “ Where does it come
from ?—I t’s the wind that comes from your hands.—And
where does the wind in my hands come from ?—From
outside. (Taq points to the closed window.)—The air
comes from outside, does it ? How ?—Through the
window.—Is it open ?—No. Through your open hand.—
[The experiment is repeated.] Is the wind coming now ?—
No . . . yes.—How does it get in ?—It comes into the
1 Throughout, only the children's words are in italics .
2 7 ; 4 = 7 years and 4 months completed. G = g ir l.
room, then it goes into your hand.—Is the window open ?—
It was open just a minute ago.—And the wind came in ?—
No. It is outside.—Is there any wind in here ?—No.”
“ Is there any air on this table ?—No.—Here [pointing
up] 7—No.—Here ?—No.—On the floor 7—No.” “ How
does the wind manage to get in when I do this with my
hands ?— . . . —Could a butterfly get in ?—No.—And
could the wind ?— Yes.—W hat way 7—By the window.”
“ Does the air get in through the window even when it is
shut 7— Yes.”
Mont (7 ; 2) The experiment is done and Mont ex
claims : “ There is air l—Where does it come from ?—
From outside. [He points to the street].—Is there any
outside ?— Yes.—And in the room ?—No.—Here [in the
hands] ?— Yes.—How is th at ? Where does it come
from ?—From outside.— . . . —W hat makes the air ?—
The hand makes the air.—How ?— . . We then try to
help Mont by showing him the displacement of air due
to the rotation of the box. “ Where does this air come
from ?—From inside there.—And the air inside there ?—
From outside.” “ Where does it come from ?—From
inside there.—How is th a t ?—When you turn it round, it
makes air.—W hy ?—Because it is cold [the rotating lid
does produce a cold current].—Where does this air come
from ?—From inside there.—Then it doesn’t come from
outside ? Or does it come from outside ?—From outside.
—Show me where outside is [he points towards the street].
— [We return to the experiment of the hands.] Where
does this air come from ?—From outside.” The con
versation is continued, but the answer is always the
same. The case, then, is quite clear. The rotation of
the box and the pressing together of the hands produce
air which immediately attracts the air from outside.
R e (8) : ‘‘ W hat’s happening ?—I t’s blowing.—Why ?—
Because you!re clapping your hands.—W hat is blowing ?—
The air.—Where does it come from ?—From outside.—
Where from ?—From the street.—Is there any air in the
room ?—There is in our room.—Where ?—Not here, at
home.—W hy is there a t home ?—’Cos it’s cold. [It is
winter, and poor little Re does not look very well off].—
Is there air in here ?—No.—Why is there not any in this
room ?—Because everything is shut.—Is there some in my
hand ?—No.—And now [hands half closed] ?—No.—And
now ?— Yes. When you clap your hands it makes air.—
Where does the air come from ?—From outside.—Where ?
—From the street.—Did it come from the street into my
hands ? — No . . . yes . . . because you clapped your
hands.” Here again it is definitely asserted th a t the air
is produced both by the pressure of the hands and by an
irruption of external air which has been attracted precisely
by the current of air made by the hands.
We need not multiply these examples of the first stage,

of which we shall find the equivalent in connection with
the experiments of the ball, the little tube, the box, etc.
I t will now be clear wherein the phenomenon consists.
The child maintains th a t it is sufficient to squeeze one’s
hands together to make air, even though there is none in
the room. B ut he adds th at as soon as the hands are
pressed together, the air comes rushing in from the street.
In all the cases quoted this duality of origin is unmistak
able : it is the hand th a t “ makes air ” (Taq, Mont, Re),
but a t the same time, the air comes " from outside ”
(same cases). This fact is of the utmost significance, and
is no isolated feature. We shall meet with a large number
of explanations by “ agglomeration of causes ” ; in
particular, we shall come across children who maintain
th a t the shadow cast by an object on a table comes both
from the object, from the night, and from under the
trees. Are we dealing in the question of air with a case
of action at a distance ? There is no need in the child’s
mind for such a concept as this. Air may easily be
thought of as a fluid sufficiently subtle to pass through a
closed window. Is it a case, then, of “ attraction ” ?
But this is a grown-up way of speaking. The child does
not go into details as to the “ how ” of things. The
only adequate way of putting it is to say th at there is
“ participation ” between the outside air and th at pro
duced by the hands : there is wind out of doors, and the
hands make wind, and these two kinds of wind are
directly and concretely assimilated one to the other,
regardless of “ how ” the relation effected. Such is the
process which we designate under the name of participation.
In a sense, this participation is rational, since it is an
attem pt to get at the origin of the wind produced by the
hands. In another sense, it is not rational, since on the
one hand, no concern is felt as to the “ how ” of such an
explanation, and on the other, the origin of the wind in
the hands is conceived as dual, without this duality in
any way worrying the child. The hands make wind, but
this wind is a t the same time air from outside.
This childish conception would seem to admit of the
following explanation. For lack of having subsumed
particular cases under a general law, the child identifies
one case with the other, not only logically but materially.
He creates participations owing to his failure to establish
comparisons. For, after all, why is it th a t when we
identify the current of air made by the hands with the
air out of doors, our identification applies, not to reality,
but only to logic ? It is, in the first place, because we
compare these two kinds of air currents so as to find
what is common to both, and secondly, because we look
upon this quid, commune, not as the direct action of one
current upon another, but as a general abstract law of
the fo rm : “ All movement produces a current of air,
etc.” Like the child, we s a y : “ The current of air pro
duced by the movements of the hands is identical with
the wind outside” , but “ identical” here means “ com
parable with ” , or “ forming part of the same genus ” , or
“ actuated by the same law ” . The child, on the contrary,
through deficient power of abstraction and synthesis,
does not look for a law common to both kinds of air
currents, and if by comparison we mean the search for
the abstract common element, he does not compare.
He actually identifies the two, which is the first stage of
comparison. Analogy is felt as identity of being, and
identity of being implies real participation.
I t may be objected th at the whole m atter is much
simpler, and th at the child is merely looking for the
origin of the air th at has been displaced by the hands,
just because he has failed to see th at the movements
made by the hands are sufficient to create the air. In
this case, the child would be admitting, like ourselves,
th a t the hands merely displace air without actually
forming any, but as he is ignorant of the fact th at the
room is full of air, he has recourse to the air from outside
in order to explain the phenomenon. Unfortunately,
this interpretation is contradicted by the following facts.
It is only in the later stages th a t the child discovers
th a t air is a substance th at can exist in an immobile
state. Before that, the child knows only of “ wind ” , or
air in movement. Moreover, even in the third stage the
child still believes th a t the hands create air by moving,
and would do so in an empty room. In the first stage,
therefore, the child really does think th a t the hands
create wind (air in movement) and th at this wind, or the
action of the hands, draws in the air from the street.
There is genuine participation. The authenticity of the
fact itself, however, will perhaps be called in question,
and doubt thrown upon its claim to being based on
observation. B ut we shall meet with this same fact in
many forms in connection with other experiments, and
above all, we shall find unmistakable traces of it in
children capable of reaching the second, the third, and
even the fourth stage.
In the meantime, let us turn to the answers of the
second stage. They show a marked advance upon those
of the first stage, in th a t the child tries to imagine an
immobile supply of air, and places it in the body. The
current of air made by pressing the hands together now
becomes intelligible. When we squeeze our hands, air
comes out of the skin, because we are “ full of air ” .
G a v a (6£) : “ W hat am I doing ?— You are clapping.—
W hat do you hear ?—A slap.—W hat is it ?—The hands.—
W hat are the hands doing ?—They are clapping and that
makes it blow.—W hat is blowing ?—Wind.—Where does
the wind come from ?—From the hands.—And the wind
of the hands ?—From inside the skin.—Where from ?—
From the meat inside.—Where is this wind ?—All through
the body."
G e h (7 ) : “ It makes a breath.—Where does it come
EXPERIM ENTS ON TH E NATURE OF AIR n
from ?—From the hand.—How ?—Because you are doing
that [gesture].—Is there any air in the room ?—No.—
Any breath ?—No.—Then where does it come from ?—
From the hand.—And the air in the hand ?—From inside
there [the skin].—And the air inside there ?— When you
do this (he breathes), it goes from there [points to his
mouth] and goes to there (points to his arm).” Naturally,
for Geh, to breathe is to produce air, and not to take it
in, the room being considered empty of air.
L ug (8) : “ I t’s the breath going away [going out of the
hands],—Where does this breath come from ?—From the
hands.” “ Does it come from the hands or from the
room ?—From the hands.—How ?—’Cos there are little
holes in your hands, only you can’t see them.”
Com (io ; 4 ): “ Because you are leaning on your hand.—
W hat is it doing ?—It’s whistling and blowing.—Where
does the blowing come from ?—It’s the blood blowing.—
W hy ?—Because you pressed much too hard.—And then ?
—Because you are hitting on it. That makes it scream if
you press too hard.—How does the blood blow ?—Because
it stops.—W hat does this do ?—It blows.—Why ?—Because
the blood is more squeezed.” In other words, the pressure
of the hands stops the blood flowing; it is then confined
and blows when it is set free !
It is, of course, not on their own merits th at these

answers constitute a more advanced stage than the
preceding. I t is because the average age of the children
of this type is 7 years and 3 months, whereas th at of the
first type was 5 years and 4 months. The explanation of
the second stage will be seen to be rational in spite of its
puerility. I t is very much superior to the conception of
wind th a t comes rushing in through closed windows,
Nevertheless, we shall still find some of the children
making the hypothesis th a t is characteristic of the first
stage, while giving, in addition, the explanation of the
second. Here is an example of those mixed cases which
are, however, rare.
Roc (6|. G.) : “ W hat is it ?—Wind.—Where does it
come from ?—From outside.—Where from ?—Through the
window (First stage).” “ Where does it come from ?—
From our hands. . . . —Where from ?—From our bodies
(Second stage).” The rest of the interrogatory shows a
continuous oscillation between the two hypotheses.
The third stage is a t the first glance more difficult to
define than the two earlier ones, b u t it can easily be
distinguished from them. By this time, most of the
children have discovered th at there is already some air
in the room, so th a t the current produced by the hands
is due in part to the fact th at the hands are moving air
th a t is already there. Others, however, have not yet
made this discovery, and even those who have made it
are of opinion that if there were no air in the room, some
would be produced by the movements of the hands.
W hat characterises this third stage is therefore the idea
th a t the air made by the hands is produced only by the
movements of the hands, or could have this as its sole
origin. The idea th at the hands created air was already
present in the earlier stages, but always with an additional
appeal to some reservoir of “ winds ” either outside the
room or inside the body. This appeal is the only thing
th at disappears during the third stage, but the idea
remains th a t the hands create wind. Again we must
remind our readers th a t it is not “ on its merits ” th a t
we designate this stage as superior to those preceding i t ;
it is simply because the average age of the children at
this stage is 8 instead of being 7 or 5.
Here are some examples of this third stag e:
K enn (8) : “ W hat is it ?—Wind.—Where does it come
from ?—From the hands.—Where does this wind in the
hands come from ?—From the hands.—Is there any air in
the room ?—Yes . . . no.” The experiment is renewed :
“ Where does this wind come from ?—From the hands.—
Is there any there [hands opened] ?—No.—And there
[hands shut] ?—No.—Does it come from the hands, or
from the room ?—From the hands.”
R oy (7) : “ W hat am I doing ?—Clapping your hands.—
W hat is happening ?—It makes air.—Why ?—Because you
are clapping your hands.—Where does the air come from ?
—From here.—From where ?—From where we are.—
Where ?—From here.—Show me where ?—From the room.
EXPERIM ENTS ON TH E NATURE OF A IR 13
—L ook; when my hands are open is there any air round
them ?—No.—Why ?—'Cos you are not doing like what
you was doing before.”
D uss (10): “ W hat am I doing ?—Making air.—Where
does it come from ?—From the room.—How is th at ?—
Because the air goes in [to the hands] and it goes out.
There is air all round [the hands].—Would it make any
in a room without air ?— Yes.—How ?—Because when
you move there’s always a little air and then when you
move, it stirs up the air.—But if there were no air in the
room at all, would it make some ?— Yes.”
Bus (xo ; 7) : The air of the hands comes into the
room, “ because there is always air about.—Would it make
any in a room without air ?— Yes.—Why ?—Because it
would be as if you pumped.—Would the pump make air
in a room without any air ?— Yes, it would make air.—
Why ?—It would come from the pump.”
The general tenor of these answers will now be clear.

Some of the children (Kenn) still deny th at there is any
air in the room, others (Duss and Bus) admit th at there
is, while others again (Roy) hesitate between the two
hypotheses. It may be objected th at there is an am
biguity of vocabulary here, and th at by “ air ” the child
simply means air in movement. Thus Roy maintains
a t one time th at there is air in the room, at another th at
there is none around the hands a t rest. Is this not
because in the one case he is thinking of air at rest and
in the other of “ wind ” or air in movement ? This may
be, but the important point is th at for these children
" making air ” means “ creating air ” . Thus air at rest is
not clearly distinguished from air in movement, or rather
it is conceived as the residue or the product of air in
movement, which is the more fundamental conception of
the two.
This third stage is therefore the genuine outcome of
the preceding stages, and throws light upon their true
significance. In the first stage, the child knows only of
air in movement, wind. But all winds participate with
each other, and th a t issuing from the hands calls to th a t
out of doors. During the second stage, wind is still the
only thing th a t exists, but the body is full of it, and the
air produced by the hands may come from the body’s
breath. Finally, in the third stage, the discovery is
made of air as a substance at rest, but it is conceived as
the result of “ wind ” or of air in action, so th a t the
hands are still thought of as capable by their sheer move
ment of creating air in an airless room.
We now give the answers of the fourth stage, i.e. the
correct answers. It is on an average from the age of 9
onwards th at these explanations make their appearance :
D elesd (8) : “ W hat is happening ?—There is air.—
Where does it come from ?—From the hands.—Where
does the air in the hands come from ?—[Delesd tries the
movement.] It doesn’t blow when I do it.—Have you got
an idea ?—No Sir, it comes from the room.—Are you
sure ?—Not quite sure.—Is there air in the room ?— Yes.—
Where does it come from ?—From outside.—Is there any
air in my hands [open hands] ?— Yes.—Where does it
come from ?—From the room.—Did you know th a t ?—
Now, I ’ve got i t ! I f there wasn’t any, you couldn’t blow !—
Why were you not sure before ?—’Cos I didn’t know.—If
I were in a room where there wasn’t any air would this
make some ?—No, it would make nothing.—Why ?—
Because there isn’t [ = there would not be] any air.”
Arb (9) : “ I t’s air.—How is it done ?—Because you
take it [the air].—Where ?—Here.—Is there any air in the
room ?—Of course l—Where does it come from ?—From
outside.—In a room without any air would it make any
to do this with my hands ?—No, it wouldn’t make any.”
Such replies are excellent, and show sufficiently by
contrast what those of the earlier stages amounted to.
§ 2. T he air of the punctured ball , of the tube ,
and of the pump .— The results th at follow are put
forward only as counter evidence of what has already
been suggested. The hypothesis of air issuing from the
body by the skin being unable to explain the presence
of air in the ball as it did the current of air produced by
the hands, it may be of interest to see what are the stages
of explanation in relation to this new phenomenon.
Actually, the stages are exactly analogous to those we
have just been observing in connection with the pressure
of hands. During a first stage, of which the average
age is 5, the child declares th a t the air th a t is produced
comes both from the ball and from outside (through the
closed window). During a second stage (average age 6),
the child answers th a t the ball is full of air because it
was filled a t the shop where it was bought, and th a t the
air goes out of it and then in again when it is squeezed
and then allowed to fill itself again. During a third
stage, the child realises th at the air of the ball comes
from the room, but still claims th a t in an airless room
squeezing out the ball would produce air. During a
fourth and final stage (average age 9), the correct
explanation is found. I t will be seen th a t the stages
follow the same sequence as they did in the case of the
current of air produced by the hands.
Here are examples of the first stage :
Schnei (4J) : “ Look what I ’m doing [the ball is
squeezed out, the current of air being directed on to
Zel’s cheek]. W hat is it ?—The wind that comes when the
ball is broken.—Where does it come from ?—From outside.
—Is there any now [the ball is completely deflated and
flat] ?—No.—Where has it gone ?—It has gone away.—
Where ?—Out at the window.—How ?— When it is open.—
Is it open now ?—No.” The ball is allowed to fill up
again before Schnei’s eyes. “ Where does this air come
from ?—From outside . . .” etc.
Z el (4) : “ It is a current of air.—Where does it come
from ?—From the sky.—How did it come ?—Through the
window [which is shut] and through the little hole [in the
ball].—When did it come in a t the window ?—When you
did that [when the ball is squeezed] it comes at once.”
Like Schnei, Zel naturally maintains th at there is no air
in the room.
Sut (6) : “ I t’s because it [the ball] swells itself up with
air.—Where does this air come from ?—From outside.—
Is there any air in the room ?—No.”
A nt (8): “ It comes in by the window [which is shut],
then it goes into the ball by the little hole. I f you squeeze,
it comes out, then it goes in again.”
D e (8): " It makes air.” This air comes from the ball
being squeezed, and from outside.
I t is easy enough to see how similar these answers axe
to those th a t we examined in connection with the pressure
of hands. In the case of the ball, analysis can be carried
even a step further. The older children of this stage
dispense with the incessant stream of air coming through
the closed window, and say th a t when the flattened out
ball is allowed to fill again it is the same air th at goes
back into it after having wandered about the room.
Thus the air comes in from outside a t the beginning of
the experiment, goes into the ball, comes out into the
room, and then goes back into the ball according as the
latter is squeezed or not. The younger children of this
group, on the contrary, claim th a t a t each squeeze the
air comes into the ball from outside, or issues from the
ball and goes out again through the closed window !
During the second stage, the child gives up the idea
th a t the air passes through closed windows. He then
appeals to an air forming part of the ball itself, and
imagines th a t this air, which has been put in on purpose
by the man in the shop, can go in and out at will. The
air is like an animal which returns intelligently to its lair
after venturing abroad.
R o y (6) : “ It makes air !—Where does it come from ?

—From something where there is air.—W hat is it ?—I t’s
something like when you pump up a bicycle [in other words,
the ball has been filled with a bicycle pump].—Is there
any more air [the ball is flattened out] ?—No.—Is there
some again now ?— Yes.—Where did it come from ?—
It’s the air that went away and that’s come back [the same].”
“ Is it the same air come back again ?— Yes.—How did it
come back ?—Because the air pushes itself along.—W hat
does th at mean ?—Because it moves along.—Why does it
move along ?—Because there is air, and behind there is a
lot more air that pushes ; because there is some air that has
pushed the other air along.—How far did the air go th a t
came out of the ball ?—So far ” [Roy points to a place
a few millimetres from the hole on the actual surface
of the ball].
R e (8£): “ W hat is happening ?—There is air. Because
there is a hole, then it comes out.—Where does the air come
from ?—They put it in.—Who ?—The m an ” “ The man
who took the ball and put air into it.” The ball is deflated
and allowed to fill itself a g ain : “ It is coming back.—
How ?—By the hole.—But where from ?—It is going in.—
Is it the air of the room th a t is going in, or the air th a t
I took away ?—The air that you took away."
G eh (6): “ It (the ball) makes a breath. . . .” “ Because
inside there it is full of breath.—Where does it come from ?
—From the ball. They put a little thing, and they pvt
breath in [blow it out], and then they stick on the same
colour where the hole was." The ball is deflated : " I see !
You've flatted it out. The breath is flat too.—And now
where does the breath come from ?—From the ball.—
B ut there was none le f t!—The breath flats itself out, and
then when you put it [the ball] back, it [the breath] goes
back where it was before.”
I t will be seen th at according to these children, air is
capable of remaining fixed to the place where it has been
put. The air has been put into the ball by the shop
man, and will therefore return thither as soon as it has
the chance. Note too th at for all these children the air
is conscious and alive. It “ know s” th a t it has come
out of the ball and it “ knows ” th at it must go back
again, etc. The air is “ alive ”, as Com tells u s ; it “ knows”
th a t it is moving forward, says Geh, “ because it runs”.
Interesting also is Roy’s explanation of how the air
moves : the air pushes itself along, th a t is to say it moves
spontaneously and pushes the air ahead of it. We shall
return to these facts later on.
We shall now give examples of the third stage, during
which the children generally admit th a t there is air in
the room. This is the air which goes into the punctured
ball and comes out again when the ball is being deflated.
B ut at the same time, the mere action of squeezing the
ball produces air, and even if there were no air in the
room the ball would create some in this way.
K enn (8) : “ Is there any wind in there [deflated
ball] ?—No.—And now ?—It has gone in by the hole.—
Where does it come from ?—From the room.—Is it the
same or another ?—It has come back ; the same that went
B
out.—Is there any wind in the room ?— Yes.—Where ?—
Everywhere." “ Could the ball make any wind if there
were none ?— Yes.—Where would it come from ?—From
inside there [inside the ball].”
Buss (io) : “ Would it make any air in a room without
any ?—It would make a little.”
Children of the fourth stage, finally, reason like adults :
B u r d (9): “ W hat has happened ?—There is air.—
Where does it come from ?—From the ball.—And where
does the air in the ball come from ?—From the room.—
How ?—Because there is air in the room.— [The ball is
deflated.] Is there still any air in it ?—No.—And now ?
— Yes.—Where does it come from ?—From the room.”
“ In a room without air would the ball make any air ?—
No.—And would the little tube ?—No.—Why not ?—
Because there wouldn’t be any air.”
The reader will see how closely the evolution of these
answers follows th a t of those obtained by means of the
experiment with the hands. Not only this, but the
experiments of the pump and the tube produced exactly
the same results, so much so, th a t there is no need to
put them on record here.
§ 3. T he making of air and the movement of
projectiles .—One definite result seems to emerge from
the foregoing paragraphs, namely, th a t one has only to
make a movement to produce air, and even to draw in
the wind from outside by means, as it were, of an im
mediate participation. We must now give final con
firmation to this fact by means of a more elementary
movement than those which we have made use of up till
now, and we must try to follow to their conclusion the
conceptions of the child with regard to the explanation
of movement.
Let us simply show the child the box tied with string
which we have already spoken o f ; let us swing the box
round and ask the child where the air comes from which
he sees to be produced in this way. The answers reveal
three stages of development.
During the first stage (average age 5J), the child states
th a t the box makes wind, and th at in so doing, it attracts
air from the outside.
R e c (6) : “ W hat is happening ?—The box is making
air.—Where does it come from ?—From outside.—How ?—
Through the window [which is shut].”
Taq (7 ; 5) : “ W hat is happening ?—The wind is
blowing.—Where does it come from ?—From the box.—
Where does the wind in the box come from ?—It’s from
outside. I t’s the box. . . .”
During the second stage (average age 7), the box makes
wind in a room thought of as airless, or could do so if
there were no air in the room.
G e h (6) : “ W hat is happening ?—I t’s making wind,
it’s blowing.—Where does it come from ?— When you
swing it, it makes wind, just a little wind.” Geh assures
us th at there is no air in the room.
D e l e s (8|) : “ It makes air when you make it go round.
—Why ?—Because it goes round.—In a room without air
[Deles has just assured us th at there is air in the room]
would it make any, or would it not ?—It would make air.—
Why ?—Because it goes round,” etc.
At a third stage, finally (average 9 years), the box
displaces the air in the room but does not produce
any air.
Ch a r (11; 8): " I f you swing it round quickly, it
makes a lot of air.—Where does this air come from ?—
Round the box. You take all the air of the room.—If you
were to do the same thing in a room without air would
it make any ?—No.”
Thus we are faced with the usual schema of stages,
minus the complications arising from the hands and the
ball in the second stage of the previous series. It is very
interesting to note th at this succession of stages remains
the same in the special case of an object in movement.
This circumstance has led us to raise the question whether
the same thing would not hold good for movements of
translation such as th a t of a ball thrown across a room.
Now, the remarkable thing is this : not only did we find
the process of evolution to be the same, but we discovered
quite unexpectedly th a t children give of the movement
of projectiles an explanation which very closely recalls
the uvtl irepl(TTa(Ti ? of the Greeks.
Let us take two entirely spontaneous facts as our
starting point. A child of 6, of whom we have asked
whether the wind is strong, answers immediately : “ Yes,
because if I am walking it makes me run, it pushes me
along.” To which we o b je ct: “ But where does the wind
come from when we run ? ” , and the child answers th a t
we make it ourselves by running. Another child gives
the same explanation of his top.
Ca r (4I), taking a top from his pocket during the
interrogatory: “ When it makes wind it makes it go
round.—Does it make wind ?— Yes.—Where does it come
from ?—From that [the top].”
Facts like these have led us to put to the children the
very question which Aristotle asked him self: why does
a projectile left to itself continue to move, instead of
immediately falling to the ground ? In other words, why
does this ball which we have thrown across the room
move along instead of dropping ? I t may be objected
th a t this is a very artificial question to put to a child.
We quite agree, but we shall meet, in the course of
this work, with so many spontaneous explanations by
avmrepl<TTa<n$ th a t we have thought it worth while to
submit this phenomenon to experimental control by
questioning the children on the problem of projectiles.
And since this problem is naturally allied to th at of the
production of air by moving objects, we shall give an
account of our results now, a t the risk of leaving a certain
impression of doubt in the reader’s mind.
The question as to why the ball moves gives rise to
five types of answers, which, in view of the age average,
m ay be regarded as characteristic of five successive
stages.
During the first stage, the child fails to understand the
problem, and simply declares th at the ball moves because
“ it has been thrown During the second stage (average
7 years), the child says th at the ball moves “ because it
makes a ir ” , and that, in addition to this, the air from
outside comes in and sustains it. We naturally chose
children for this experiment who had not already been
questioned on the punctured ball, the hands, the tube,
etc. In these conditions there could be no danger of
perseveration. Here is an example of the second stage :
Vel (7) is of opinion th a t there is no air in the room.
“ Why does the ball go on, when I have thrown it and
let go of it ?—When it goes, it goes fast, and it can’t
fall.—W hy does it not fall down when it goes fast ?—
The air holds it up.—W hat air ?—The air of the sky.”
Vel, on the other hand, says th at “ there is always some
air ” when it goes fast, because the projectile “ makes
air In other words the ball, as it advances, attracts
the air of heaven which prevents it from falling down.
During the third stage (average 9 years), the child says
th a t the ball makes air and th a t this air pushes it.
Children a t this stage think th a t there is no air in the
room, or th at if there were none, the ball would create
some. I t should be noted th a t the average age of this
stage is 9 and not 8, as was the case in the corresponding
stages examined in § 1 and § 2. This is because the
illusion th a t movement creates air of itself is stronger in
the case of a projectile than it was in th at of the hands
or of the punctured ball. Here are examples of this
stag e:
G a l (10 ; 2) : “ Why does the ball go on . . ., etc. ?—
I t’s been given a push [Fr. dlan].—But how does it go so
far ?—By the air.—Where does the air come from ?—
From us, because we are moving.—Why is there air right
down to the floor ?—Because it makes air.—Was there
some air in the room already ?— Yes.—And in a room
without air, would the ball fall down if I were to let it
go ?—It wouldn’t fall down because it’s a movement. . . .
The ball makes a movement and that makes air.”
T ac (9) : “ You throw hard, it goes a long way.—How ?
—It’s the wind.—W hat wind ?—I t’s the air.—How ? W hat
air ?—Because you throw hard . . . because it (the wind)
pushes it.—How does the wind push it ?—It’s the force.—
W hat force ?—Of the wind.” Tac says th at there is no
air in the room, so the wind he speaks of is th at of
the ball.
During the fourth stage (average io years), the child
says that the ball displaces the air of the room, which,
blowing behind it, pushes it along. In an airless room
the ball would not move, and could not of itself produce
any air. Here is a good example :
Mart (io ). We place a match on the table and send it
across the room by flicking it with the nail of our fore
finger. We ask why it goes so f a r : “ Because it’s been
given a start [Fr. elan], it’s gone off ever so quick.—
W hat happens when it has been given a start ?—It
pushes it.—How ?—It went hard. That helped it.—W hat
helped it ?—The wind.—W hat wind ?—The air.—How
does it help the match ?—The match went off, and the air
went [after it] all the time and that pushed it along.—
W hat would happen in a room without any air ?—It
would fall down at once [ = the match could not be thrown].
—Why ?—Because the air pushes it."
When, finally, the fifth stage is reached, the child
declares th at the impetus (l elan) is sufficient to explain
the advance of the match, and th a t the air hinders rather
than helps the movement. In an airless room the pheno
menon would occur all the more easily. Here is an
exam ple:
D esp (12 ; i) : “ I t’s the force, the impetus (Fr. elan).—
How does the force make it stay in the air ?—I f there is
any wind it stops it.—How ?—When you throw [the ball]
the wind can’t make it come back if there is too much force
in the throw.” “ But my hand does not touch it when it
is in the a i r !—I t’s what is left of the force.—How is it
th at there is any force left ?—Because there is still some
of the impetus left.—In a room without any air could I do
this with the ball ?—fu st the same.”
We see, therefore, th at the conception of an impetus
sufficient to itself is later, genetically speaking, than the
hypothesis of a reflux of air which comes and pushes the
object before it. It is true th a t all the younger children
began by appealing to an impetus, but when pressed,
they very soon introduced the idea of a i r ; whereas the
children of the fifth stage refused to make this hypothesis.
This is probably due to the industrial setting of modern
life in which the presence of machines accustoms the mind
to the principle of inertia, and enables the children of
n - 1 2 to rise above the level of commonsense which
formed the basis of Greek physics.
In conclusion, without touching upon the very subtle
problems which would have to be solved before any
comparison could be made between the physics of the
child and th at of the ancient Greeks, it will suffice to say
th at the explanations given by our children of the third
and fourth stages bear a close (or distant) resemblance to
the two famous explanations of projectiles which Aristotle
has discussed in his Physics. The first of these explanations
is that of avrnrepla-Taais, which Aristotle seems to accept
in some passages while he rejects it in others. “ . . . It is
the air th a t plays the part of motor. Shaken by the
projectile issuing from the sling of the catapult it flows
after it and drives it along.” 1 But, says M. Carteron,
Aristotle regards this phenomenon " a s an effect rather
than a cause. . . . We have therefore to believe th a t the
projectile confers not only movement but motive force
to a surrounding medium, which has the power both to
move and to be moved.” 8 In other words, “ the con
tinued movement of the projectile after it has lost contact
with the motor is to be explained by a transference . . .
of the original impulse to the medium traversed by the
projectile.” By means of a phenomenon comparable to
magnetism the intervening medium acquires the power
to move objects. If, then, this faculty decreases a t a
distance it m ust be because of the resistance in the actual
mass of the projectile, th at is, in its natural weight.12*
1 Arnold Reymond, Histoire des Sciences exactes et naturelles dans

VAntiquitS grtco-romaine. Paris, 1924, p. 183.
2 H. Carteron, La notion de force dans le systime d’Aristote. Paris,
1924, p. 23.
Thus Aristotle is still a long way off from the principle
of inertia.” 1
We may regard these two explanations—th at of the
reflux of air behind the projectile, and th a t of movement
transferred to the air by the projector—either as closely
allied (M. Reymond’s view) or as completely distinct
(M. Carteron’s view). The fact remains, however, th a t
stripped of their elaborate setting and taken apart from
their relations with the sum of physical ideas propounded
by the Peripatetics, they are both to be found among
the spontaneous conceptions of children thus showing
themselves to form part of the commonsense belonging
to a definite mental level or to a definite degree of in
formation. In the examples quoted above, Mart tells us
th a t when the projectile is launched, “ the air . . .
went all the time and pushed it along.” He adds th a t
without air the projectile would fall to the ground, and
th a t “ the air pushes it.” This is a typical case of
avTnrepl<rTa<ri$. On the other hand, Gal tells us th at the
air pushes the projectile, but th a t this air " comes from
us because we are moving.” This is the idea th a t the
projector transfers its movement to the surrounding
medium. In both cases, there is a striking analogy with
the physics of the Peripatetic school. Of course, the
child generally conceives projectile and projector as
producing (and not merely as displacing) the air (third
stage) ; but the schema of interpretation remains the
same in passing from the third to the fourth stage, and
this is the im portant point to bear in mind.
It is true th a t the problem of projectiles is a very
artificial one for children. But we repeat th at the sequel
will show the schema of explanation of movement by
reflux of air to be a very general one ; the movements
of clouds, of rivers, of waves, and sometimes even of
the heavenly bodies are explained in this way. We
shall have occasion, moreover, from the next paragraph
onwards to see a new application of the same principles.
1 L6on Robin, Greek Thought, p. 279.
§ 4. C e n t r if u g a l f o r c e .—We axe now going to show
th a t the effects of centrifugal force itself are explained
by the child through the idea of a reflux of air. This is
why we are introducing a t this point of our exposition
the account of an experiment which at first sight seems
to bear no relation to the problem of air.
Two experiments may be carried out on centrifugal force.
The first consists in putting a penny in the box already
described, in swinging the box round on a vertical plane,
and in asking the child why the penny does not drop out.
The second consists in swinging the empty box round on
an horizontal plane, very slowly a t first, then faster and
faster, and in asking the child why the box rises higher
and higher the faster one goes (though the child must be
left to find out this relation for himself).
The first of these experiments has yielded four types of
explanation, characteristic of four stages of development
in the child. During the first stage (average age 6), the
child answers th at the penny does not drop because the
box has sides ; the child takes no account of the position
of the box during rotation. During a second stage, the
child answers th a t the penny does not drop because the
box is swinging round very fast and the penny has no
time to drop. During a third stage, the child declares
th a t in swinging round the box produces air (whether or
not there is any air in the room), and th at this air flowing
back into the box is what keeps the penny in position.
Finally, during a fourth stage (average 9-10 years), the
child says th at in moving round, the box displaces the
air of the room and thus produces a current of air which
holds up the penny.
The children we questioned were naturally not the
same as those who were discussed in § 3, so th a t the
hypothesis of perseveration is ruled out.
Here are some examples of the first stage :
G e h (6) foresees before the experiment begins th a t the
penny will not drop : “ I ’ve tried doing that at home with
water.—[The experiment is carried out.] Why did it not
fall down ?—Because it is in the box.—Why does it stay?
—Because there are sides so the penny doesn’t fall.—Why
do the sides hold it back ?—Because the penny was there
(he points to the sides). Of course it doesn’t fall out!—
Yes, but why does it not fall out ? When the box is up
there it is upside down. The penny is underneath, do
you see, and it ought to drop out. Why doesn’t it drop
out ?—Because there is that [the side].—But how is it th a t
the penny does not drop out ?—Because there is that
(the side) to hold in the penny.”
G a v (6) also foresees th at the penny will rem ain :
“ I often put onions in the basket and swing it round.—
[The experiment is made.] Why does it stay ?—Because
it wasn’t swinging [ = because the box has remained in
the same position!]—W hat do you mean by th at ?—
(Gav makes the experiment himself, but too slowly and
the penny falls out).—Why did it drop ?—The sides were
holding it back.—Will it fall if I swing it slowly ?—No.—
[Gav has not noticed the part played by speed].— (A
demonstration is made). It fell because you were going
slowly.—Why does it not fall out when I go fast ?—
Because of the sides.—Why do the sides not stop the
penny from fading out when I go slowly ?— . . . —Do
you think so ?— . . . — [Fresh dem onstration: the
penny drops out].—I t’s the sides that hold it back.”
The answers at this stage are remarkable, but more
from a geometrical than from a physical point of view.
Either the child does not realise th at the box is upside
down when it is passing through the highest point of the
trajectory, or else he bases his argument on the sides,
without taking the position of the box into account.
Thus in both cases the child fails to understand th at the
sides cannot hold in the penny when the box is upside
down, and this failure is due to an absence of spatial
representation of the successive positions of the box.
Here are two examples intermediate between the first
and the second stage : the sides still hold back the penny,
but only when the box is going fast enough.
D e l e s (8) foresees th at the penny will “ stay.—Why ?—
Because it is going round.— [The experiment is made].—
W hy does the penny stay when I swing it round ?—
Because the sides are there.—[The box is swung round
slowly]. I t has fallen out. W hy?—Because you weren’t
swinging it round fast enough." “ Why does it stay when
it is swinging round fast ?—Because the sides are there.—
And when it goes slowly ?—It drops out because you are
not going fast enough.”
B u r d (9) : “ W hat will happen ?—It won’t fall out.—
Why not ?—Because it goes fast.—Then why ?—Because
it has not time to drop out.—Why ?—Because the sides of
the box stop it.”
The idea here seems quite c le a r: when the box travels
quickly, the penny is thrown against the side and held
in by it. It has not the time to drop out. This leads us
to the second stage, when the child gives up the notion
th at the sides play any part, and attributes only to the
speed of the rotation the fact th at the penny does not
fall out of the box. Here is an example of this second
sta g e :
L u g (8) : “ It won’t fall out.—Why not ?—Because it
is going round fast.” “ If I go slowly will it fall out ?—
Yes.—W hy does it fall out when I don’t make it go
round fast ?—Because it [the penny] doesn’t have time to
drop out.—Why not ?—Because you are going too fast.—
Does something hold it back ?—No, no one.—No, but
does something ?—No.”
Pat (10): “ The penny won’t fall out.—Have you already
seen this ?—Yes, with milk.—Why does it not fall out ?—
Because it hasn’t time to fall out.—How does it do it ?—
Because it is turning round fast.—Why does it stay when
you turn it round quickly and not stay when you do it
slowly ?—The penny hasn’t time to fall out, and then when
you go slowly it has time.”
This stage looks more advanced than those th at come
after it. But the children’s ages show th at this is not
the case. W ith the exception of Pat, no child of this
second stage is more than 8, and the average age is 7.
The average age of the third stage, on the contrary, is 8,
which means th at a large proportion of the children
are 9 or 10 years old. During this third stage, the child
says th at the penny remains in place because the box, in
swinging round, produces air which flows back towards
the inside of the box and keeps the penny there. Here
are exam ples:
R o y (7) : “ W hat will the penny do when we swing it
round ?—It’ll fall out.—[The experiment is made.]—Why
has it stayed ?—Because it has gone round fast.—Why does
it not fail out when you swing it round fast ?—Because
it stops it falling out.—Why does it stop it ?—Because of
the air.—Where does the air come from ?—Because it's
going round.—Is there air in the room ?— Yes.—Is there
any now ?—No.—When I swing the box round, where
does the air come from ?—Because when you swing it
round it makes air.—Is there any air here [near the box] ?
—No.—Is there any in the room ?—No.”
A ck (8 1) : “ W hat will happen ?—I t’ll fall out.—Look
[experiment done]. Has it fallen ?— You’re making it go
round too fast [for it to fall out].—How is th a t ?— The air
does it.—How ?—The air pushes [the penny]. The air
makes a push.—Why does the air not make the penny
fall out ?—You’re making it go round too fast.—And then ?
—I t’s the current.—Where is the current ?—In the box.—
W hat is the current ?—A ir.” “ Where does this air
come from ?—When you swing it round it makes air.”
“ Is there air in the room ?—. . . . Yes . . . no! Because
everything is shut.”
B or (9!) : “ W hat will happen ?—It [the penny] will
not fall out.—Why not ?—Because it stays in the middle.
The air pushes it in the box.—Where does this air come
from ?—It’s the draught made by the box when it goes
round.—Is there any air in the room ?—No.—Is there any
air in the box ?—No.—And now [making the box swing
round] ?— Yes, because the box is going round.”
These are very definite cases, and closely recall the
schema of explanation given for the movement of pro
jectiles (third stage).
Here are some examples of the fourth stage. The air
is still supposed to keep the penny in place, but this
time the air is thought of as coming from the room, and
not as produced by the box itself. Between the third
stage and the fourth there are naturally many inter
mediate cases.
Cam (10 ; 4 ): " Will the penny fall out or not ?—
It’ll fall.—[Experiment].—Why did it not fall out ?—
Because you swung round too hard.—Why does it not fall
out when you swing it hard ?—The box keeps in the air.—
W hy does it not keep in the penny when we go slowly ?—
I f you go fast the penny stays, if you go slowly it falls out.
—Why does it stay ?—The air keeps in the air.—W hat
air ?—The air that is here.” “ Where does this air come
from ?—From the room . . .”
Ch a i ( i i ; 8 ) : " W hat will happen ?—It [the penny]
will fall out.— [Experiment], — Why has it not fallen
out ?—It can’t fall out going round.”—“ Why not ?—
Because the air goes against the penny.—And when I go
slowly why does it fall out ?—Because you don’t go fast
enough ; and then when you make it go round quickly it
gives a lot of air.—Where does this air come from ?—
Round the box. It takes [swinging the box round] all the
air of the room.—If we were to swing this box round
in a room without any air, would it make some air ?
—No.”
I t may be of interest to examine the relations existing

between the prediction of the phenomenon and its ex
planation, between, th at is, the fact th at the child does
or does not foresee th a t the penny will remain in the
box in spite of its rotation, and the nature of the ex
planation which the child gives of the phenomenon after
the experiment, whether or not he has foreseen what
would be its result. Now the result of our enquiry is
very definite in this respect. In this particular case,
there is no connection between the accuracy of the
prediction and the nature of the explanation.
On the one hand, indeed, the explanation of centrifugal
force goes through very definite stages in relation to the
children’s ages. Thus there is hardly a child under 8
who will attem pt to introduce air as an explanation of
the phenomenon. On the other hand, prediction of
phenomena has appeared to us, at any rate among the
children we examined, to be almost entirely independent
of age. We found th a t one half of the children could
predict the phenomenon, and th a t the other half could
not. Now, these two groups occur in th e same numerical
proportion from the ages of 4 to 14, and the average age
of each group is 8£. There is therefore no relation between
prediction and a g e ; a t every age a certain number of
children have made the experiment of swinging round
vertically a full basket, a pail of water, etc. Cases of
right and wrong prediction are to be found, moreover, at
every one of our different stages. Prediction and ex
planation are, in this particular case, entirely independent
of each other.
This is rather exceptional, and as a rule we shall find
a very close relation between the degree of accurate
prediction and the validity of the explanation. If in this
particular case the relation does not exist, it is because
the physical phenomenon which forms the subject of our
experiment cannot have been observed spontaneously by
the child. It is only a t the instigation of their playmates
th a t children try to swing round baskets and pails of
water by themselves. B ut the correct prediction of the
laws of inertia and movement, etc., arises from spon
taneous observations th at are in direct relation with the
child’s age, th a t is, with his own level of intellectual
development. The particular case under discussion must
therefore in no way be taken as representative.
I t is none the less interesting to draw from it the con
clusion which it implies. For it shows us—and this is
extremely im portant as a justification of the method we
have chosen to use—that an explanation improvised by
the child during the interrogatory is, in the main, identical
with an explanation based on the child’s own previous
observations. W hether he has thought about the m atter
or not, a child of a given level will, in the course of the
interrogatory, arrive at the same result. There is there
fore something spontaneous in “ liberated conviction ” ,
taking these two words in the special sense defined
elsewhere {C.W., Introduction, § 2).1
Let us now turn our attention to another effect of
centrifugal force. The empty box is made to swing
round horizontally by the string, and the child is asked
1 C.W. = The Child's Conception of the World. Kegan Paul.
why it goes higher (as the speed of the rotation increases).
The answers obtained fall into three stages which corre
spond point for point with the last three stages noticed in
connection with the rotation of the penny. During a
first stage (average 6 years), the child answers th at the
box rises because it is going fast, which is a statem ent
of the law rather than a discovery of the cause. During
a second stage (average 8 years), the child answers th a t
the box rises because of the air it creates by going round.
During a third stage (average 9J years), the child answers
th a t the box rises because of the current of air which it
produces by displacing the air of the room.
Here is an example of the first stag e:
L e o (7 ; 3) : “ Why does the box go up ?—Because
you make it go round harder and harder. . . . You make it
go harder and then it goes up.—Why does it go higher ?—
The harder you go the higher it goes ” , etc.
An example of the second stage:
B or (9) Spontaneously: " The air makes it go up.—
How ?—Because the box makes air when it goes round.—
Is there air in this room ?— Yes.—In a room without any
air would the box do anything by going round ?—It
would make air."
Here, finally, are some examples of the third stage :
S t o e ( i i ) : “ Why does it go up ?—Because you make
it go round with your hand.—B ut why does it go up when
I go fast and go down when I go slow ?—Because there is
air in the box. It makes it fly when you swing it round
with the string.—Is there any air in the room ?— Yes ” , etc.
J e l (10) : “ W hy does it go up ?—It goes fast, then the
air makes it go up. When it goes up the air comes and
pushes it along still more."
D e l e s d (8|) : “ The air makes it go up.—How ?—I t’s
the start (Fr. Vdlan). The air helps the start to go up.”
Thus the same schema reappears very clearly—explana
tion of movement by reflux of the air th at has been
displaced.

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The Child’s

With a new introduction bf:J Joan Valsiner

Published 2001 by Transaction Publishers

Published 2017 by Routledge

Routledge is an imprint o f the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa

New material this edition copyright © 2001 by Taylor & Francis

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced

Library of Congress Catalog Number: 99-462314

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Piaget, Jean, 1896-

BF723.C3 P53 2000

ISBN 13: 978-0-7658-0641-3 (pbk)

M. G. B i e l e r (Chaps. I and II).

INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION ix

Chapter I.— E xper im en ts concerning th e N ature

Chapter I I.— T he Orig in of W in d a n d of B reath 32

Chapter III.— Movement of the Clouds a n d the

Chapter IV .— W ater Currents a n d Movem ents

Chapter V.— T he Ch il d ’s I d e a of F orce 114

Chapter V II.— T h e L evel of W ater 164

Chapter VIII. — T he P roblem of S hadow s 180

Chapter X.— T he Steam - en g in e . . . . 213

Chapter XI.— T r a in s , Motor - cars , a n d A eroplanes 226

C O N STR U C TIV E C U R IO SITY OF TH E

...nowadays to walk down a street

R epublication of this book is a very welcome event, as it

Piaget was a naturalist in his methodology. He gave

Logic in Children’s Thought

Logic was the highly-esteemed standard of science in

The complex “habit of mind“ notion of logic is certainly

Piaget borrowed LeD antec‘s focus on assim ilation—

So the relationship between organism and environment

The present book includes a rich variety of empirical

The Law of Participation

Theoretically, Piaget claimed an allegiance to Levy-

Levy-Bruhl‘s notion of participation was a terminologi­

Piaget‘s study was centered on the notion of participa­

In his summary of the present book, he explained:

While building his book clearly on the general issues

At an age which through various coincidences he can place at exactly

Piaget was an empiricist of the Continental European

actual work of Piaget, as well as others of his time such as

EXPERIMENTS CONCERNING THE

§ 1. P r e s s u r e o f t h e h a n d s .— The answers given by

We need not multiply these examples of the first stage,

It is, of course, not on their own merits th at these

The general tenor of these answers will now be clear.

R o y (6) : “ It makes air !—Where does it come from ?

1 Arnold Reymond, Histoire des Sciences exactes et naturelles dans

I t may be of interest to examine the relations existing

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Levy-Bruhl‘s notion of participation was a terminologi

Piaget‘s study was centered on the notion of participa