The Inner Eye and the Inner Scribe of Visuo-spatial Working Memory: Evidence from Developmental Fractionation

Abstract

Evidence for two major hypotheses that attempt to explain the development in memory span with age is reviewed: the identification time hypothesis and the rehearsal hypothesis. The rehearsal hypothesis is also strongly related to the recent application of the working memory model to memory development. In this model, rehearsal is assumed to occur from an extremely young age. This assumption is critically evaluated. It is concluded that there is no strong support for the identification time hypothesis, except as a facet of familiarity. Neither was there good evidence that very young children use verbal rehearsal, although it did appear to be a factor later on. A revised model is proposed, based on three factors. The first is a speech perception system and phonological store; the second is a speech output system which can be used for sublexical segmentation and later rehearsal. The third system is long-term memory with links to both the speech perception and speech output systems. These links enable active strategies to be developed.     

Attention and Attachment Related Behavior Toward Professional Caregivers in Child Care Centers: A New Measure for Toddlers

The authors attempted to develop and validate the Toddler Attention Questionnaire (TAQ) by examining the relationship between attention and attachment to a professional caregiver. The psychometric reliability and validity of the TAQ was tested with 72 children ranging from 20 to 36 months old. Attentive processes were also measured by the Italian Questionnaire on Temperament, while attachment behaviors to professional caregivers were measured by the Attachment Q-Sort. Factor analysis supported four identifiable factors reflecting different concepts, theoretically discussed, related to attentive processes: attentive flexibility, attentive lability, attentive detachment, and attentive disorientation. Attachment security to professional caregivers is predicted through attentive flexibility and negative emotionality. Secure attachment behaviors were found to be related to flexibility of attention. The implications of the findings for future theoretical and empirical development of research in this field are also discussed.     

Color Vision in Relation to Artistic Ability

The present experiment tests Hobbes' superiority theory of humor in relation to identification classes (a replacement for the construct of reference group)—i.e., a vicarious superiority theory of humor is examined. Joke content concerns Canadian-American relations. Ss were selected so as to be either pro-Canadian Canadians or pro-American Americans. Consistent with prediction (p < .01) each of the two groups tended to find that permutation of jokes funnier in which its positive identification class was victorious and its negative the butt than was the opposite permutation in which the negative identification class was victorious and the positive the butt.     

Remembering the silver lining: Reappraisal and positive bias in memory for emotion

Reappraisal and distraction, unlike suppression, are known to decrease the intensity of negative emotion in the short term. Little is known about long-term characteristics associated with emotion regulation strategies, however. In a longitudinal study, we examined the relation between the strategies people reported using to regulate emotions during a stressful situation and their later memory for their emotions. Students in Italy rated the intensity of positive and negative emotions they were experiencing as they prepared for their high school exit exam. They also rated the extent to which they were regulating emotion using reappraisal, distraction, and suppression. Six weeks later, students recalled their pre-exam emotions. The more students reported engaging in reappraisal before the exam, the more they overestimated positive emotion and underestimated negative emotion when recalling their experience. The association between reported reappraisal and memory bias was partially mediated by positive changes over time in students’ appraisals of the exam preparation experience. Reports of engaging in distraction and suppression were not associated with memory bias. Because remembered emotion guides future choices, these findings suggest that reappraisal is a highly adaptive strategy for coping with stressful situations, not only in the short run, but also in the long run.     

Physiological and behavioral parameters of infants' categorization: changes in heart rate and duration of examining across trials

This report investigates the relations between duration of examining and heart rate (HR) across several trials of an object-examination task. A total of N= 20 11-month-olds were familiarized with a sequence of 10 different exemplars from the same global category (animals or furniture) before they received an exemplar from the contrasting category at test. Consistent with previous findings, HR was lower during states of focused attention (i.e. examining) than during states of casual attention (i.e. looking) or non-looking. Over the familiarization trials, examining stayed about the same, while mean HR increased. At test, examining increased and mean HR decreased, indicating that infants focused their attention on the out-of-category object. Psychophysiological and behavioral measures of attention were systematically related over trials, suggesting that heart rate provides a suitable objective measure to study infants' categorization performance in object-examination tasks.     

Implications of positive and negative sociometric status for assessing the social competence of young children

Positive and negative sociometric status were examined with reference to observed classroom behavior and performance on two laboratory measures of social skills: decoding emotion from facial expression and referential communication. Based on a sample of 38 preschool children, results indicated different patterns of correlations for liked (positive nomination) and disliked (negative nomination) scores. High-liked children were observed to spend more time in positive interaction with peers and less time in solitary play or alone with an adult. High-disliked children scored less well on both laboratory measures. Using median splits on the liked and disliked dimensions, results indicated that children who were rated by their peers as Low-Liked/High-Disliked were the most deviant with respect to both classroom behaviors and task scores. The importance of obtaining both positive and negative nominations in investigations of social competence is stressed. Implications of the results for the identification of preschool children with social problems and the planning of intervention strategies for these children are discussed.     

Difference as a Resource for Thinking: An Online Dialogue Showing the Role Played by Difference in Problem Solving and Decision Making

Contemporary societies require citizens and workers to face unexpected challenges. This calls for a shift of emphasis from individualistic competence to the importance of collective intelligence. This article describes a plan for a project in which students who are eight to twelve years old will not only realize that difference is a crucial resource in problem solving and decision making but also live out their personal value as thinking, active beings. They will participate in an online dialogue that takes place among children who attend schools in under‐resourced communities and in middle‐class and upper‐class communities. The students will work on learning units based on philosophical content designed to stimulate their critical ability. The philosophical scenarios will be related to the everyday lives of the children through concrete examples. These examples will be followed by questions that aim to promote the advancement of the students’ thinking skills.     

From the Marrow of the Mountain

This article focuses on the experience of finding a new source of water since the fountain fed by the neighbor’s source dried up in the middle of an alpine summer of farming in the Swiss Alps. This new water source is on ancestral land owned by three cousins of different viewpoints. Central to the story is the developing friendship between the local dowser and one of the owners, a Swiss-Californian woman determined to move the management of this jeweled terrain, with structures and customs, out of patriarchal ways into stewardship. The pristine land is highlighted, as is the vanishing knowledge of the old ways.     

The role of importance/consequentiality appraisal in flashbulb memory formation: the case of the death of Pope John Paul II

This study investigates how flashbulb memories (FBMs) relative to the death of Pope John Paul II vary according to the persons' evaluation of the event's importance and consequences. In particular, FBMs were investigated in persons who were expected to attribute different degrees of importance/consequentiality to the event as a function of two factors: (1) religious involvement, (2) nationality (Polish, Italian, Swiss). The comparison was made with respect to the following hypothesized determinants of FBMs: surprise, emotional reaction, rehearsal, event memory and especially the attitudes towards the Pope and the appraisal of the importance and the consequences of his death. Structural equation modelling indicates that importance/consequentiality is a fundamental determinant of FBM and is influenced by antecedent personal and social characteristics reflected in the person's attitudes. Moreover, memory consistency seems to be both directly influenced by emotional intensity and indirectly through rehearsal, whereas surprise seems not a critical determinant of FBM. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.