The Inclined Bottle Experiment -- A Classic Piagetian Experiment
A child is shown a bottle containing a visible liquid, and asked to mark on a
sketch of the bottle the liquid level. This the child does as in the top of the figure (dashed line).
The bottle is now tilted, and another sheet is supplied to the child, indicating an inclined bottle.
Once more the child is aked to mark on the new sheet the liquid level in the bottle.The child draws a line perpendicular to the axis of the bottle, as before.
What the child saw What the child drew
REFERENCES
Harvey A. Cohen, The Art of Snaring Dragons, M.I.T. Artificial Intelligence
Laboratory Memo 338, No 338, May 1975.
Downloadable
Andrea di Sessa and Bruce L. Sherin, What Changes in Cognitive Growth,
International Journal of Science Education,
20(10), 1155-1191 (1998)
J. Piaget, The Child's Concept of Number, Norton, New York (1965); J.Piaget and B.Inhelder, The Child's Concept of Space, Norton, New York (1967).
