Text Comprehension Training for Disabled Readers: An Evaluation of Reciprocal Teaching and Text Analysis Training Programs

Forty-six reading disabled adolescents were randomly assigned to one of three 25-hr instructional programs. Two programs provided training in expository text comprehension, and a third offered training in academic problem solving and organizational and study skills (an alternative treatment control). One reading comprehension program was designed to remediate a deficient knowledge base, forcing disabled readers to elaborate and further process new text knowledge, focusing on both specific informational content in a text and knowledge of text structure per se. The second program was patterned after the Palincsar and Brown (1984) reciprocal teaching techniques and focused on training four text comprehension strategies used by skilled comprehenders. Both the “knowledge-base” and the “strategy” training approaches were associated with significant improvement in disabled readers' comprehension skills, although training effects did not generalize across all aspects of reading comprehension performance. Strategy-trained readers applied the trained strategies with equal success on instructed and uninstructed text materials, providing strong evidence of transfer of learning. Knowledge-base readers also demonstrated successful transfer of specifically trained procedures (semantic mapping, text analysis) to unfamiliar text. In both programs, the best outcomes were obtained when specific strategies and operations were targeted for training.     

A classical IQ model of the stages of cognitive development

Based on the construct of classical IQ (mental age/chronological age), a model of the proportions of the population at various stages of cognitive development as a function of age is proposed. The model, which accounts well for empirical data for the age range 13 through 17 years, is shown to compare favorably with other theoretical models. The success of the model provides further evidence of the salience of the construct of general cognitive capacity in differential psychology.     

Inhibition in ADHD,aggressive, and anxious children: A biologically based model of child psychopathology

In this study the stop signal task was employed to investigate inhibitory control in 15 children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), 18 aggressive and 20 anxious children, and a group of 17 normal controls. The psychopathological groups were recruited from special educational services. Parent, teacher, and child questionnaires were used to select children with pervasive disorders. Controls attended regular classes and scored low on all questionnaires. Based on Quay's model of child psychopathology (Quay, 1988, 1993), we hypothesized a deficit in inhibitory control in children with externalizing disorders, whereas anxious children were predicted to be overinhibited. The ADHD group and the aggressive group showed poor inhibitory control and a slower inhibitory process. No evidence of overinhibition was found in anxious children.     

A NINETEENTH-CENTURY IRASian: SARAH ALDEN BRADFORD RIPLEY

Abstract. Almost entirely self-educated, Sarah Alden Bradford Ripley (1793–1867) combined wide-ranging personal studies with the daily responsibilities of a New England minister's wife, mother, and teacher in her husband's boarding school. As she struggled to reconcile the conventional Unitarian Christian beliefs of her time with her own life experience and with the discoveries of advancing science, her childhood faith gave way to skepticism. Gradually she was able to integrate her understanding of nature, science, philosophy, and religion into a mature faith. She would have welcomed the companionship and support of IRAS if it had existed in her day.     

WHY A BRAIN CAPABLE OF LANGUAGE EVOLVED ONLY ONCE: PREFRONTAL CORTEX AND SYMBOL LEARNING

Abstract. Language and information processes are critical issues in scientific controversies regarding the qualities that epitomize humanness. Whereas some theorists claim human mental uniqueness with regard to language, others point to successes in teaching language skills to other animals. However, although these animals may learn names for things, they show little ability to utilize a complex framework of symbolic reference. In such a framework, words or other symbols refer not only to objects and concepts but also to sequential and hierarchical relationships with other symbols. This process is essential to human mental operations, including language, mathematics, and music. In humans, these operations may have coevolved with the prefrontal area of the cerebral cortex, which is proportionately much larger in humans than in other animals and more intricately linked with other areas of the brain. Analysis of the structure and function of the prefrontal area suggests that it is centrally involved in the operation of higher-order associative relationships involving the subordination of one set of associations to another. This alternate learning strategy apparently appeared at the cost of certain sensory, motor, or limbic abilities. The payoff was symbolic thinking. Humans thus are unique among species, not just for their highly developed language ability but for their odd style of thinking and learning.     

Teacher stress and guidance work in Hong Kong secondary school teachers

Major sources of stress in Hong Kong teachers were investigated, with specific reference to guidance work as a potential source of stress. A survey of 415 secondary school teachers revealed that guidance-related aspects of work constituted a major dimension of stress, with guidance teachers, female teachers, younger teachers and junior teachers perceiving more stress than their counterparts in this dimension. Workload and time pressure were perceived as the most stressful aspects of work for all teachers. Results also showed an association between stress and job satisfaction, and biographical variables. Implications of the findings for teachers doing guidance work in Hong Kong and internationally are discussed.     

Spatial compatibility of signal-response position in pointing

Two experiments are reported in which, by means of a pointing task, we studied the stimulus-position effect, i.e. the inverted U-shape form of the reaction-time function in relation to stimulus position in tasks in which stimuli and/or responses are arranged in a horizontal array. The response consisted of aiming the index finger from a central starting point at a target area on a screen. Reaction time was the main dependent variable. The spatial relation between the position of the imperative signal and the position of the response was manipulated by varying the spatial S-R compatibility and physical distance that separated the positions of stimulus and response. The stimulus-position effect was shown to depend on the compatibility of the S-R relation (Exp. 1). In Exp. 2 it was found that the modulation of the stimulus-position effect by spatial compatibility disappeared completely when the distance between the positions of stimulus and response was reduced. None of the experiments revealed that the stimulus position effect depended on signal discriminability, which renders an interpretation of this effect in terms of perceptual processes unlikely. We argue that the attentional model of spatial coding provides the most reasonable explanation of the obtained reaction-time patterns.     

The Relative Importance of Anticipated Test Format and Anticipated Test Difficulty on Performance

In this investigation, the relative importance of the effects of anticipated test format and anticipated test difficulty on performance was examined by simultaneously manipulating both. Experiments 1 and 2 showed that test performance was affected more by anticipated test format than by anticipated test difficulty. This suggests that the superior performance of subjects who had anticipated a recall test versus those who had anticipated a recognition test, reported here and in previous studies, is more likely to be due to anticipating a recall format than to anticipating a more difficult test. Experiment 2 showed that subjects who had anticipated a recall test studied longer than subjects who had anticipated a recognition test, even when recall tests were less difficult than recognition tests. One explanation for this finding is that subjects inaccurately monitor the relative difficulty of tests across test formats. Subjects rated recall items as more difficult than recognition items, even when recall items are actually less difficult (Experiment 3). These findings suggest that a priori metacognitive knowledge may reduce the accuracy of on-line metacognitive monitoring.     

TWO ISSUES IN AUDITORY COGNITION:

Abstract— The study of auditory and music cognition provides opportunities to explore general cognitive mechanisms in a specific, highly structured domain We discuss two problems with implications for other domains of perception the self-organization of perceptual categories and invariant pattern recognition The perceptual category we consider is the octave We show how general principles of self-organization operating on a cochlear spectral representation can vield octave categories The example of invariant pattern recognition we consider is the recognition of invariant frequency patterns transformed to different absolute frequencies We suggest a system that uses pitch or musical key to map tones into a pitch-invariant format.     

A Comparison of the Validity of Handwriting Analysis With That of the Cattell 16PF

Few British organizations utilize handwriting analysis for personality assessment, but in some European countries handwriting analysis is extremely popular. Research has examined the reliability and validity of both methods of assessment, but few studies have directly compared the two. In this study, the personality of 120 subjects was assessed by the Cattell 16PF and by handwriting analysis. Each subject was presented with five handwriting analysis textual reports and five personality textual reports (one of each being their own) and asked to rank order each set in terms of perceived accuracy. The same ranking process was undertaken by each respondent's social partner. The results demonstrated that handwriting reports were ranked at a chance level by Self and by Other and that personality reports were ranked at a well above chance level by Self and by Other. Self-rankings were more accurate than Other-rankings.