Summer Reading: Predicting Adolescent Word Learning from Aptitude,Time Spent Reading,and Text Type

Mostly low-income African American and Hispanic teens (N = 192) were tested in (a) passage comprehension, (b) vocabulary ability, (c) cloze task performance, and (d) listening comprehension in the spring and vocabulary in the fall. Students were surveyed about reading (a) narrative, (b) expository, (c) teen culture, and (d) online texts. Interaction terms created by the product of cloze task scores with the time and frequency of student narrative and expository reading were both significant predictors of fall vocabulary. Online reading was popular but did not predict vocabulary gains. Teen culture reading predicted vocabulary loss. Text type and student profiles both play a role in predicting fall vocabulary scores from summer reading.     

Simultaneous attentional guidance by working-memory and selection history reveals two distinct sources of attention

Recent theories of attention have proposed that selection history is a separate, dissociable source of information that influences attention. The current study sought to investigate the simultaneous involvement of selection history and working-memory on attention during visual search. Experiments 1 and 2 used target feature probability to manipulate selection history and found significant effects of both working-memory and selection history, although working-memory dominated selection history when they cued different locations. Experiment 3 eliminated the contribution of voluntary refreshing of working-memory and replicated the main effects, although selection history became dominant. Using the same methodology, but with reduced probability cue validity, both effects were present in Experiment 4 and did not significantly differ in their contribution to attention. Effects of selection history and working-memory never interacted. These results suggest that selection history and working-memory are separate influences on attention and have little impact on each other. Theoretical implications for models of attention are discussed.     

The Search for Adam Revisited: Evolution,Biblical Literalism,and the Question of Human Uniqueness

Abstract

This article questions the adequacy of the philosophical category of realism in characterizing Rheticus' endorsement of Copernicus' astronomy. Rheticus and Osiander agree that the human intellect is restricted in its aspirations to truth, resulting in a condition of “causal ignorance” regarding the celestial phenomena on Rheticus' part. Copernicus' pupil advances trust in the most true hypothesis of the motion of the earth without postulating its absolute truth. Causal knowledge waits after Resurrection. In line with Luther's comment on Genesis 1:14, Rheticus ascribes a theological meaningfulness to the pursuit of mathematics, alerting the astronomer to his immortal soul and divine creation.     

Predictors of Response and Mechanisms of Change in an Organizational Skills Intervention for Students with ADHD

The purpose of the study was to evaluate predictors of response and mechanisms of change for the Homework, Organization, and Planning Skills (HOPS) intervention for middle school students with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Twenty-three middle school students with ADHD (grades 6–8) received the HOPS intervention implemented by school mental health providers and made significant improvements in parent-rated materials organization and planning skills, impairment due to organizational skills problems, and homework problems. Predictors of response examined included demographic and child characteristics, such as gender, ethnicity, intelligence, ADHD and ODD symptom severity, and ADHD medication use. Mechanisms of change examined included the therapeutic alliance and adoption of the organization and planning skills taught during the HOPS intervention. Participant implementation of the HOPS binder materials organization system and the therapeutic alliance as rated by the student significantly predicted post-intervention outcomes after controlling for pre-intervention severity. Adoption of the binder materials organization system predicted parent-rated improvements in organization, planning, and homework problems above and beyond the impact of the therapeutic alliance. These findings demonstrate the importance of teaching students with ADHD to use a structured binder organization system for organizing and filing homework and classwork materials and for transferring work to and from school.     

Deliberate Self-Harm and State Dissociation: An Experimental Investigation

The purpose of this study was to test the relation between deliberate self-harm (DSH) and state dissociation. Participants (N = 85) were randomly assigned to self-administer either a very mild electric shock below their pain threshold (a no-self-harm control condition) or an electric shock they were told could “cause minor tissue damage that would heal quickly,” but which was in fact equal to a predetermined pain threshold (a DSH condition). After task completion, 42 participants rated the extent of their dissociation before the shock and 43 rated the extent of their dissociation after the shock. Results indicated that women in the DSH group experienced more dissociation compared to men, but only after the shock. Potential reasons for this gender effect are discussed.     

An investigation of everyday prospective memory

Prospective memory, remembering to carry out one’s planned activities, was investigated using a naturalistic paradigm. Three experiments, with a total of 405 participants, were conducted. The goal was to demonstrate that the cognitive processing underlying successful everyday prospective remembering involves components other than mere “memory.” Those components are probably best represented as individual differences in various cognitive capacities. More specifically, metamemory, attentional capacities, and planning processes that reprioritize intentions according to the demands of everyday life may determine how people actually accomplish the plans they establish for themselves. The results of these experiments suggest that researchers interested in the topic will have to contend with a multidimensional set of factors before any comprehensive understanding of prospective remembering can be realized.     

Children read normal and reversed letters: A simple test of reading skill

Above- and below-average readers in grades 3, 5 and 7 named letters under two conditions. In one condition, letters were presented in normal orientation. In the other condition, letters were presented in left-right mirror image orientation. The ratio of (1) naming time on normal letters to (2) naming time on mirror image letters was calculated for each child. Good readers had lower ratios than poor readers. This was due primarily to the faster naming of normal letters by good readers. Good and poor readers named mirror image letters at similar speeds. Two possible explanations for the results are discussed. One explanation is that the skilled readers have a better memory for the normal orientation of the letter shapes. A second explanation is that skilled readers process more peripheral information, when naming, than their less skilled counterparts, but that this peripheral processing is curtailed when transformed text is presented.