Development of 6 - to 17-year-old students’ inductive reasoning: What is the most sensitive period?

• IR development is slow and encompasses K12 education. • IR development can be described with the superposition of two logistic curves. • The most sensitive period for enhancing IR can be found in Grades 1 and 7. • There are no gender-level differences in the developmental trend of IR. • Parent's level of education determines the level of students’ IR. This paper focuses on inductive reasoning (IR), which strongly influences the effectiveness of learning and is an important predictor of academic achievement. The aims of the study are twofold: first, to develop an easy-to-use, computer-based item bank for everyday educational practice, which can make development of students’ IR skills visible from the beginning of schooling up to adulthood; and, second, to describe IR development, especially focusing on the course of development and the sensitive period. The sample was drawn from 1 st - to 11 th -grade students (aged 6–17) in 230 Hungarian primary and secondary schools (N = 29,453). The reliability of the computer-based item bank proved to be high: EAP/PV reliability was 0.916. Across all grades, IR development was remarkable; however, the pace of development varied. The developmental trend was identified with the superposition of two logistic curves. The most intensive and sensitive periods were found first in Grade 1 and then in Grade 7. Explicit training in these fast-growing phases may be more effective. There were no gender-level differences in the developmental level of students’ IR in Grades 1 to 8, but parental educational background proved to be important in student developmental level as well as in the developmental path of IR. This study provides evidence that extra training during the early years of schooling may be crucial to boost the effectiveness of learning for later success.