1 ARE INTUITIVE RULES UNIVERSAL?

In our work in science and mathematics education, we have observed that students intuitively react in similar ways to a wide variety of scientific tasks. These tasks differ with regard to their content area and/or to the reasoning required for their solution, but share some common, external features. We have identified three types of intuitive responses: "More A- more B " and "Same A-same B " which relate to comparison tasks, and "Everything can be divided endlessly " which relate to repeated division tasks. For example, in respect to the first intuitive rule: "More A- more B", when students are told that Tom saves 15 % of his salary, and Mary saves 20 % of her salary, they tend to incorrectly claim that Mary saves more money than Tom, because 20 is larger than 15. This response is in line with the intuitive rule "More A (percentage)- more B (money)". Similarly, when presented with the task: Is the size of a muscle cell of a mouse larger than/equal to / smaller than / a muscle cell of an elephant, students tend to incorrectly argue that the cells of the larger animal are large