An assessment of cerebral dominance in language-disordered children via a time-sharing paradigm

A time-sharing paradigm was used to assess language lateralization in language-disordered and normal children aged 4–7 years. Several expressive language tasks as well as a vocal, but nonlinguistic, task were administered concurrently with unimanual finger tapping. Dependent variables were percent disruption scores and number of syllables produced per concurrent trial. All language concurrent tasks produced tapping reductions for both hands for both groups. This result contrasts to similar time-sharing studies claiming asymmetrical interference and hence language lateralization in children (N. White & M. Kinsbourne, 1980, Brain and Language, 10, 215–223; J. Obrzut, G. Hynd, A. Obrzut, & J. Leitgeb, 1980, Brain and Language, 11, 181–194). A multiple regression analysis revealed a significant interaction effect differentiating language-disordered from normal children. Normals exhibited a parallel response pattern for speech and tapping (both increased or decreased in rate) under all lateralization conditions. Language-disordered children exhibited an inverse response pattern (e.g., if speech output increased, tapping rate decreased) only under left-hemisphere time-sharing.     

“But that's not really mean”: Competing in a cooperative mode

Girls' games are widely perceived as impediments to the goal of a more equitable society because they are simpler and less competitive than boys' games, and foster skills, attitudes, and competencies that are inappropriate to the achievement of higher status adult roles. Girls' more cooperative social orientation, their concern for being “nice,” and for relationships with small groups of friends has been cited to explain why girls avoid more complex, competitive games. Observations from an ethnographic study of one girls' play group are used to illustrate that this type of social orientation is not incompatible with competition among girls. It shapes their ways of competing, not whether they compete at all. The girls in this study used a stereotypically feminine rhetoric of “nice” and “friends” to support, and even demand, aggressive competition among players.     

Contextual constraints on usage of cognitive words

The conversations of 36 41/2 to 5-year-olds differing in race (black and white) and social class (professional and working class) and the adults with whom they spoke were tape-recorded during play and teaching time at preschool and dinnertime at home. Usage of cognitive words was analyzed for six levels of meaning that differed in depth of processing from reference to (1) perception and attention, (2) recognition, (3) fact recall, (4) understanding, (5) metacognition, and (6) evaluation of presuppositions. Although the rank order of usage was the same, children devoted less of their lexicon to the three higher levels of meaning than adults. Even in adults, perceptual references predominated. Use of higher-level meaning was less prominent in school and in the black working-class population. There were significant correlations between exposure to adult conversations with high-level meaning and child use of those meanings, and between the diversity of cognitive vocabulary in children and adults, but those correlations were smallest in the black working-class population.Funds to the project on which this paper is based were given by The Carnegie Corporation of New York to William S. Hall. The authors wish to thank the Computer Science Center of the University of Maryland for funds for data analysis.     

Spontaneous alternation behavior in hamsters

Male and female golden hamsters spontaneously alternated successive entries of T-maze arms (derived from a + − maze) rather than body turns during a series of eight consecutive trials except when not confined to the arm chosen on each trial. Only unconfined males failed to alternate on their first opportunity. Confinement to an entered arm for 30 seconds had no effect on females but increased alternation in males. Increasing the visual discriminability of the arms had no effect on alternation in either sex. It was concluded that spontaneous alternation behavior in hamsters depended upon whether or not they were confined to a chosen arm and their sex. It is possible that the phenomenon was escape-related.     

Callous-Unemotional Traits,Relational and Social Aggression,and Interpersonal Maturity in a Sample of Behaviorally Disordered Adolescents

The authors examined the degree to which callous-unemotional traits and narcissism predict relational aggression, social aggression, and prosocial skills in a sample of 79 adolescent offenders (13–18 years old; 26% girls; 74% boys) attending a school for youth with behavior disorders in the Mid-Atlantic United States. Narcissism made a significant contribution to the prediction of both relational aggression and social aggression, accounting for most of the unique variance in the prediction of these indirect forms of aggression. Conversely, callous-unemotional traits—but not narcissism—made a significant contribution to the prediction of lower prosocial skills. Furthermore, in contrast to the large number of studies indicating gender differences in the expression of aggression, no significant gender differences in the present study were found.     

Design of the Steps to Health Study of Physical Activity in Survivors of Endometrial Cancer: Testing a Social Cognitive Theory Model

Physical activity has been shown to benefit cancer survivors' physical functioning, emotional well-being, and symptoms. Physical activity may be of particular benefit to survivors of endometrial cancer because they are more likely to be obese and sedentary than the general population, as these are risk factors for the disease, and thus experience a number of related co-morbid health problems. However, there is little research systematically studying mechanisms of physical activity adherence in cancer survivor populations. This paper describes the design of the Steps to Health study, which applies a Social Cognitive Theory-based model of endometrial cancer survivors' adoption and maintenance of exercise in the context of an intervention to increase walking or other moderate intensity cardiovascular activity. In Steps to Health we will test the influence of self-efficacy and outcome expectations on adherence to exercise recommendations, as well as studying the determinants of self-efficacy. Endometrial cancer survivors who are at least 6 months post-treatment are provided with an intervention involving print materials and telephone counseling, and complete assessments of fitness, activity, self-efficacy and outcome expectations, and determinants of self-efficacy every two months for a six month period. In addition to testing an innovative model, the Steps to Health study employs multiple assessment methods, including ecological momentary assessment, implicit tests of cognitive variables, and ambulatory monitoring of physical activity. The study results can be used to develop more effective interventions for increasing physical activity in sedentary cancer survivors by taking into account the full complement of sources of self-efficacy information and outcome expectations.     

Changes and challenges in 20 years of research into the development of executive functions

This review of 20 years of developmental research on Executive Functions (EF) offers a broad‐brushstroke picture that touches on multiple issues including: (i) findings from typical and atypical groups, from infancy to adolescence; (ii) advances in assessment tools and in statistical analysis; (iii) the interplay between EF and other cognitive systems (e.g. those involved in children's developing understanding of mind, and in their processing of reward signals); (iv) integration of cognitive and neuroscience perspectives on EF; and (v) environmental factors that have either a positive influence (e.g. training/intervention programmes; parental scaffolding) or a negative influence (e.g. maltreatment, neglect, traumatic brain injury) on EF. Of the several themes to emerge from this review, two are particularly important; these concern the need to adopt developmental perspectives and the potential importance for intervention work of research on social influences on EF. Specifically, the review highlights both developmental continuities (e.g. in the correlates of EF) and contrasts (e.g. in the nature of EF and its neural substrates) and calls for research that compares developmental trajectories for EF in different groups (e.g. children with autism versus ADHD). In addition, findings from both family‐based research and randomized controlled trials of school‐based interventions highlight the importance of environmental influences on EF and so support the development of interventions to promote EF and hence improve children's academic and social outcomes. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Executive function deficits in autism spectrum disorders and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: examining profiles across domains and ages

Deficits in 'executive function' (EF) are characteristic of several clinical disorders, most notably Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). In this study, age- and IQ-matched groups with ASD, ADHD, or typical development (TD) were compared on a battery of EF tasks tapping three core domains: response selection/inhibition, flexibility, and planning/working memory. Relations between EF, age and everyday difficulties (rated by parents and teachers) were also examined. Both clinical groups showed significant EF impairments compared with TD peers. The ADHD group showed greater inhibitory problems on a Go-no-Go task, while the ASD group was significantly worse on response selection/monitoring in a cognitive estimates task. Age-related improvements were clearer in ASD and TD than in ADHD. At older (but not younger) ages, the ASD group outperformed the ADHD group, performing as well as the TD group on many EF measures. EF scores were related to specific aspects of communicative and social adaptation, and negatively correlated with hyperactivity in ASD and TD. Within the present groups, the overall findings suggested less severe and persistent EF deficits in ASD (including Asperger Syndrome) than in ADHD.