ISSN : 1229-0718
Young children's intuitive understanding of the relationship between volume, weight, and density was examined. Especially when "density" was defined as "heaviness of substance", 4-to 7-year-olds were asked to reason on weight given volume and substance information on the objects used. The results of the study 1 showed that 5-year-olds successfully predicted the relative weight of the objects considering both volume of objects and heaviness of substance. In study 2, based on weight and volume information, 4- and 5-year-olds successfully identified substance kinds given objects were made of. The results indicate that, contrary to previous studies, young children have an intuitive understanding of density.