Fonctions exécutives,vieillissement cognitif et variations stratégiques

Aging is characterized by a decrease of cognitive performance in most of cognitive domains. One of the most fundamental issues is then to know what are the underlying mechanisms of these age-related changes in human cognition. Recent research suggests that in addition to speed of processing and working memory capacities, age-related impairment in executive functioning plays an important role in the cognitive decline associated to aging. Above and beyond performance, current research shows that the mediating role of executive function in age-related changes in cognitive performance occurs via changes in strategies variations (i.e., repertoire, distribution, execution, and selection of the strategies used to accomplish a cognitive task). In this article, we illustrate both strategic variations and underlying executive control mechanisms in two important cognitive domains : episodic memory and problem solving.     

Étude des stratégies d’adultes présentant un retard mental dans la résolution de la Twenty Questions Task

A Twenty Questions problem solving Task was given to 30 mentally retarded adults, 30 mentally nonretarded adults matched on chronological age, and 12 mentally nonretarded children matched on cognitive efficiency. Four strategies were identified on the basis of a subject-by-subject analysis. Results showed group differences of frequency in the use of the strategies. Moreover, results indicated that the more frequent strategy used by the mentally retarded adults is the one which consists in identifying the categories without using them to efficiently reduce the problem space. The interpretation of the results as reflecting a conceptual deficit or a chronicle cognitive sub-functioning of the mentally retarded adults depicted in the literature is discussed.     

L'impact des schémas non analogiques conceptuels dans la compréhension de textes expositifs : stratégies visuelles selon l'expertise

The main objectives of this study are: 1) to determine the contribution of a conceptual not-analogical schema in an expositive text's comprehension and memorizing according to the reader's previous knowledge level in the field approached in the text; 2) to identify the differentiated reading strategies according to the reader's previous knowledge level in the field when it is about understanding expositive schematized texts via ocular movements recording on one hand and the score given on the comprehension questions on the other hand. The results highlight a reading strategy with more Text/Schema transitions accompanied by longer fixations on the textual zone for the items for which the subjects are novice in the field than for those whose contents relate to their expertise field.     

L'intervention des explications causales internes en termes d'effort dans les stratégies d'autoprésentation et le jugement social : perspectives sociocognitives

This article pursues two aims. The first one is to propose an extension of the theory of the social norm of internality by studying the value of various types of internal and external causal explanations of reinforcements. A first study shows that students (n = 155) choose more effort-based explanations to explain spontaneously a success or a failure to an exam. A second study, realized with students placed in judge's position (n = 80), reveals that effort-based explanations are more appreciated than others explanations, regardless of the event desirability. The second aim of this article is to show that attributional approach and the theory of the social norm of internality are based on different definitions of social judgment and concern different psychological phenomena. A third study realized with students (n = 63) placed in judge's position shows that the effect of the type of explanations for explaining a success or a failure varies according to the nature of the judgment (approval/punishment, probability of success, competence and motivation).     

Pragmatique et langage non littéral : la compréhension des demandes sarcastiques par les enfants

This study was aimed at examining the role of context and intonation in sarcastic-request understanding by French-speaking children 3- to 7-year-olds. An individual completion of stories task is given to the children. Stories vary according to two factors: intonation (sarcastic or neutral) and context (sarcastic or neutral). The results showed that the children were able to understand sarcastic requests before the age of 6 or 7. Intonation seems to be an earlier cue than context in sarcastic-request understanding. At the ages of 3 and 5, children appear to primarily base their interpretation on intonation; it is not until they are 7 that they are also able to take context into account.     

Connaissance du nom et du son des lettres, habiletés métaphonémiques et capacités de décodage en grande section de maternelle

This study examined the specific implication of letter-name knowledge in reading acquisition on 5-year-old kindergarten children. Several studies underlined the importance of both phonological and orthographic skills (letters and grapho-phonological associations’ knowledge developed during reading acquisition). So, we focused on the link between those different early abilities and on their links with reading acquisition during school year. Thus, at the beginning and at the end of the year, we proposed to 40 children metaphonemic tasks (phoneme identification in initial and final position in the words), letter-sound and letter-name knowledge tasks (naming and identification) and a pseudo-words decoding task. In addition, to access letter-name knowledge, two types of measurements were proposed: an accuracy measure and a speed one. Mean number of correct responses and reaction times were collected by children and analysed too. Results show that letter-name knowledge could play a part in metaphonemic abilities development and in letter-sound associations’ discovery and acquisition, at the beginning of the year. Thanks to those skills improvement, letter-name knowledge could have an indirect impact on later children's decoding skills. Furthermore, the direct link, already observed at the beginning of the year, between letter-name knowledge and decoding skills still exists in April. At last, analyses on letter-name knowledge access time show that the more children name an important number of letters, the more they do it quickly. These results could mean that a certain level of letter-name knowledge have to be reach before children could use this knowledge automatically. All together, results confirm the importance of good letter-name knowledge in the first stages of reading acquisition. We also suggest taking into account some clues of letter-name knowledge's automatic use to better understand reading acquisition processes.     

Conceptions différenciées et non différenciées de la compétence et de l'effort en fonction de l'âge: conséquences sur les affects et sur les stratégies d'auto-handicap

Quatre-vingt seize sujets de 7 à 9 ans et de 13 à 15 ans ont travaillé sur un texte dans deux conditions d'implication (ego versus tâche). Après avoir été crédités de feedback de compétence ou d'incompétence, ils furent requis d'inférer leur niveau d'effort, d'évaluer leurs affects (fierté, embarras et culpabilité) et de donner leurs raisons de l'effort mis en jeu (stratégies d'auto-handicap). Les résultats confirment que les adolescents se réfèrent à une conception différenciée de la compétence et de l'effort en situation d'implication de l'Ego, et utilisent une conception moins différenciée dans des conditions d'implication dans la tâche. Les affects résultent eux-mêmes de ces conceptions. Mais les buts d'implication de l'Ego, qui accentuent les menaces pour l'estime de soi, suscitent en retour des stratégies de protection de soi que les individus appliquent effectivement à eux-mêmes.     

Le traitement des voyelles nasalisées et des groupes consonantiques par l'apprenti‐lecteur francophone

This study was designed to evaluate the influence of phonological structure on the performance of French beginning readers. Because the French phonological system has a clear syllabic structure novice readers use phonological units such as syllables when silently reading words. Therefore, the phonological structure of items was expected to be a significant determinant of performance. The results demonstrate the young readers' tendency to simplify polysyllabic words by reducing them to open‐ended syllables. The first experiment showed that nasal vowels involve a delay in phonological processing and the second experiment focused on the difficulties in processing consonant clusters.