And you thought babies ain't that smart

According to a new study, babies have logical reasoning before age one.

Human infants are capable of deductive problem solving as early as 10 months of age, a new study by psychologists at Emory University and Bucknell finds. The research shows that babies can make transitive inferences about a social hierarchy of dominance.

Study leader Stella Lourenco said that they found that within the first year of life, children can engage in this type of logical reasoning, which was previously thought to be beyond their reach until the age of about four or five years.

The researchers hypothesize that transitive inference for social dominance is evolutionarily important, so the mechanisms to support this type of logical reasoning are in place early.

In addition to exploring important science questions about how the mind develops, the findings could aid in determining whether infants are on track in the learning process.

The study appears in Developmental Science.