Developmental steps in the comparison and integration of information by grade-school children

The developmental sequence in 5- to 11-year-old children's attempts to combine two discrete stimuli was investigated by microanalysis of answers in an equivalence task. Eleven response types were identified and shown to form both a developmental and a hierarchical sequence of comparison and integration operations. An age-related progression in response abstractness was also found and a significant interrelation with response type was demonstrated. The evidence supported a construct of verbally mediated executive control over the interactions of short- and long-term memory.