Orthographic facilitation and phonological inhibition in spoken word recognition: A developmental study

We investigated the extent to which learning to read and write affects spoken word recognition. Previous studies have reported orthographic effects on spoken language in skilled readers. However, very few studies have addressed the development of these effects as a function of reading expertise. We therefore studied orthographic neighborhood (ON) and phonological neighborhood (PN) effects in spoken word recognition in beginning and advanced readers and in children with developmental dyslexia. We predicted that whereas both beginning and advanced readers would show normal PN effects, only advanced readers would show ON effects. The results confirmed these predictions. The size of the ON effect on spoken word recognition was strongly predicted by written language experience and proficiency. In contrast, the size of the PN effect was not affected by reading level. Moreover, dyslexic readers showed no orthographic effects on spoken word recognition. In sum, these data suggest that orthographic effects on spoken word recognition are not artifacts of some uncontrolled spoken language property but reflect a genuine influence of orthographic information on spoken word recognition.     

A review of error correction procedures during instruction for children with developmental disabilities

Error correction procedures are remedial strategies presented following an incorrect response that increases the probability that a correct response will occur in the future. Error correction is commonly used during skill acquisition programs for children with developmental disabilities; however, the specific strategy used may differ considerably. Recent comparative studies have examined the effect of numerous error correction procedures on the efficiency of acquisition for children with developmental disabilities. Despite considerable merit, minor procedural differences and unique terms for similar procedures likely affect comparisons across studies. Here, we clarify the procedures and findings of these studies and suggest areas of future research.     

Life skills instruction for children with developmental disabilities

The Preschool Life Skills program is an intervention package designed to teach functional skills to prevent problem behavior in typically developing children. The purpose of the current study was to evaluate the effects of the instructional package (renamed “Life Skills”) with children with developmental disabilities. The program involved teaching 12 life skills to nine participants across four instructional units. The units were instruction following, functional communication, tolerance of denial and delay, and friendship skills. Teachers provided instruction through a three-tiered instructional approach, starting with class-wide instruction followed by small group and one-to-one instruction as necessary. We extended previous research by using visual prompts during all three tiers and progressively increasing intertrial intervals during one-to-one instruction. Results indicated that the intervention led to skill acquisition with all nine participants. The skills maintained 4 weeks after instruction ended.     

A developmental study of proverb comprehension

Growth in proverb comprehension was hypothesized to result from the gradual emergence of cognitive abilities reflected in a sequence of increasingly complex abilities: story matching, transfer of relations, desymbolization, proverb matching, and paraphrase. Items for these abilities for each of 10 proverbs of two structural types were administered in three test sessions to 438 students in grades three to seven. An analogy subtest was used to measure general intelligence. ANOVA yielded significant main effects for grade, tasks, and proverbs (all p's less than .01). A significant task x proverb interaction (p less than .01) revealed the difficulty of precise control over the language of the items. Proverb structure had no measurable impact on difficulty. Analogy score was a significant factor in performance (p less than .01) but not as potent as age (p less than .01). The sequential order of abilities received only weak confirmation, though tasks did correlate among themselves with medium strength (r's = .50-.70). Individual interviews added a qualitative dimension to the findings. The suitability of cognitive hierarchical models for proverb comprehension was questioned.     

A developmental study of school theft

Two hundred students in grades 4-8 and 10 participated in a study of school theft. Students responded to a four-part questionnaire designed to measure perceptions of theft incidence and seriousness, personal responsibility for correcting theft, causal attributions of theft, and perceived consequences of thievery. A main grade effect was observed for personal responsibility and consequences, but represented counter directions. Eighth graders reported the highest incidence of theft, and females prescribed harsher penalties for theft. Results only weakly support a developmental interpretation of school theft patterns. Overall, students uniformly report that theft is a major problem in their schools.     

Learning the functional significance of mnemonic actions: A microgenetic study of strategy acquisition

How children learn to use memory strategies in a microgenetic investigation of learning and metacognition is examined. Seven- and eight-year-olds were given two memory trials with 24 pictures on each of 5 consecutive days. Days 1 and 2 were baseline, practice trials; Day 3 included strategy training; and Days 4 and 5 were unprompted tests of strategy maintenance. All children were taught how to label, rehearse, and group the pictures as well as to self-test their own memories and use blocked recall. Half of the children were shown the actions and told to do them; the other half received elaborated feedback on the usefulness and appropriateness of the techniques for remembering. The elaborated instructional group exhibited significantly greater recall, clustering, strategic study behavior, and metamemory regarding the mnemonic techniques than the other group. Path analysis provided evidence of a causal role of training and metacognitive awareness that mediated the use of sorting and higher recall. The study illustrates how learning the significance and utility of mnemonic techniques can influence children's acquisition of the tactics as self-controlled strategies. In addition, the microgenetic method affords patterns of data across time and experience that permit richer interpretations of strategy learning and memory development.     

Olfactory categorization: A developmental study

This study examined the ability of children to classify fruit and flower odors. We asked four groups of children (4-11years of age) and a group of adults to identify, categorize, and evaluate the edibility, liking, and typicality of 12 fruit and flower odors. Results showed an increase in interindividual agreement with age for the taxonomic (fruit/flower) and function-based (edible/nonedible) categories but not for the hedonic component. So, it seems that this hedonic component is not the explicit basis for this increase in interindividual agreement when categorizing an odor as a fruit/flower odor or as being edible or nonedible. An age-related trend was also observed on the typicality scores: The youngest group of children did not show a typicality gradient, but all of the other groups did. Blackcurrant and lemon were rated as the most typical fruit odors, whereas raspberry and peach were rated as the least typical. For flower odorants, results were not as clear, yet it seems that for all groups lavender was considered as quite typical.     

Personality perception: A developmental study

We investigated the ability of adults and children to perceive the Big Five personality traits in others from “thin slices” of the behavioral stream. Targets were videotaped in five carefully crafted situations, each designed to maximally reveal a different trait domain. In addition, each target’s personality was assessed by close friends or parents, serving as the personality criterion. Judges’ agreement with the criterion improved generally with age, but different developmental trends were observed across traits.     

A developmental study of visual search behavior

Children in second, fourth and sixth grades and college sophomores were compared on a visual search and scanning task under three experimental conditions. In Condition I, a single target letter was sought in a list of letters of low visual confusability. In Condition II, two target letters were sought but only one appeared in a given list. In Condition III, a single target letter was sought in a list of letters of high confusability. Search time decreased with age in all three tasks. Searching for two targets was no harder than searching for one. A highly confusable visual context increased search time at all age levels.     

A developmental study of visual search behavior

Children in second, fourth and sixth grades and college sophomores were compared on a visual search and scanning task under three experimental condilions. In Condition I, a single target letter was sought in a list of letters of low visual confusability. In Condition II, two target letters were sought but only one appeared in a given list. In Condition III, a single target letter was sought in a list of letters of high confusability. Search time decreased with age in all three tasks. Searching for two targets was no harder than searching for one. A highly confusable visual context increased search time at all age levels.     

Conceptual implicit memory: A developmental study

The widely accepted standpoint that implicit memory emerges earlier in development than explicit memory, and is more stable from childhood to adult age, is based on experimental data essentially collected in perceptual tasks. The present study was aimed at investigating whether these findings still hold when a more conceptual task is used. We compared the performance of children at two age levels (2nd and 4th grades) on a category-exemplar generation task. Results showed that performances of the two groups were comparable when the target items were typical of their categories, as in Experiment 2, and for a subset of the items in Experiment 1. However, the older children outperformed the younger children in Experiment 1 when the items selected were atypical of their categories. Interpretations of these findings are discussed.Preparation of this article was supported by the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (URA CNRS 316 and 1838), the Université de Bourgogne, and the Université René-Descartes