Do children use similar processes to read and spell words?

The use of spelling-sound information in both reading and spelling was evaluated by having children read and spell nonwords and five types of words that differed in terms of their regularity for reading and spelling. The subjects were grade 3 children who had been psychometrically defined as good readers and good spellers (“good”), good readers and poor spellers (“mixed”), or poor readers and poor spellers (“poor”). Results indicated that all children attempted to use spelling-sound correspondences in both reading and spelling, although children in both the mixed and the poor groups had weaker knowledge of these correspondences and were less systematic in their use of them. Furthermore, even though the children in the mixed group had been matched with children in the good group on reading comprehension, the number and type of errors made by the mixed subjects on both the reading and spelling tasks were more similar to those of the poor subjects than to those of the good subjects.     

Sex roles and depression: A preliminary investigation of the direction of causality

The present study examined the direction of the relation between sex role self-concept and depression. A total of 23 males and 32 females were given the Personal Attributes Questionnaire and the Beck Depression Inventory at two times separated by a 3-month interval. Results of a cross-lagged panel correlational analysis found no evidence for sex role orientation as a cause of depression. Instead, the data suggested that emotional well being precedes self-perceived instrumentality, but the influence of third variables could not be overlooked. The implications of these data are discussed with particular reference to the need for more complex theoretical formulations of the relation between self-perceived instrumentality and adjustment.     

A measure of agreement for use with the Holland classification system

A measure of agreement for partially ordered data is suggested that makes use of the k categories with the highest ranks, the ranks of the remaining categories being disregarded. The proposed measure is applied to the Self-Directed Search in order to evaluate its agreement with occupational preference. Other forms of agreement in the Holland classification system can also be assessed by the proposed measure. Examples are congruence and husband-wife and counselor-client agreement.     

Knowledge of Breast Cancer Genetics Among Breast Cancer Patients and First-Degree Relatives of Affected Individuals

The cloning of BRCA1, a susceptibility gene for inherited breast cancer, has made genetic screening possible for individuals and families whose medical histories are suggestive of an inherited predisposition to breast cancer. To date, few systematic attempts have been made to determine the level of knowledge about breast cancer genetics among women who are likely to seek BRCA1 screening when it becomes widely available. The present study attempted to assess the general knowledge about BRCA1 mutations in two groups: (1) first-degree relatives (FDRs) of breast cancer patients; and (2) women with a previous diagnosis of breast cancer. A self-administered, thirty-item questionnaire was developed through a pilot study. Ten of the items were objective, factual questions about breast cancer genetics. Responses to these questions were used to generate an overall knowledge score for each respondent. The study population was moderately knowledgeable about breast cancer genetics, with an average score of 5.35 out of 10. Counselors should not underestimate the importance of evaluating each counselee's existing knowledge about breast cancer, which can affect the provision and reception of genetic information. In particular, specific areas of knowledge that may be confusing or misunderstood were identified and these topics are discussed in detail.     

Temporal control of behavior: schedule interactions

In Experiment I the response that terminated the postreinforcement pauses occurring under a fixed-interval 60-second schedule was reinforced, if the pause duration exceeded 30 seconds. The percentage of such pauses, rather than increasing, decreased. There were complex effects on the discriminative control of the pause by the reinforcer terminating the previous fixed interval, depending on whether the fixed interval and the added reinforcer were the same or different. In Experiments II(a) and II(b), each reinforcement initiated an alternative fixed-interval interresponse-time-greater-than-t-sec schedule, the schedule values being systematically varied. When the response following a pause exceeding a given duration was reinforced, fewer such pauses occurred than when they were not reinforced, i.e., on the comparable simple fixed-interval schedule. There was no systematic relationship between mean interrinforcement interval and duration of the postreinforcement pause. The pause duration initiated by reinforcement was directly related to the dependency controlling the shortest pause at that time, regardless of changes in mean interreinforcement interval.     

Infant search tasks reveal early concepts of containment and canonical usage of objects

It is difficult to gain unambiguous evidence on the use of concepts by infants. Many results can be accounted for in terms of action-based strategies. The evidence reported here fulfils the minimal criteria for the operation of working concepts in infants. Search tasks are used with a filled interval which forces memory-search, and the object is hidden in containers which fulfil their customary job or violate it. Infants treat an upright cup as a more reliable location marker than an inverted one. A series of experiments probes the phenomenon. The results indicate that the infants have a working concept of containment which can be triggered by the provision of containers in their canonical orientation. Even “object permanence tasks” lead infants to access their knowledge of the relationships into which things typically enter in the world outside the laboratory.     

A new measure for determining children's subjective organization of speech

A new technique for determining children's subjective organization of speech is described. The technique consists of teaching a child a sentence and then repeatedly (1) reading the sentence up to a selected point, (2) sounding a tone, and (3) having the child supply the next word. The time from the tone to the onset of the child's voice is the dependent variable. In the first study 6- and 8-year-old children memorized the following sentence: “John likes to feed the little puppies in the barn.” Their response times suggested that the dominant segmentation pattern consisted of four phrases: a subject phrase, a verb phrase, an object phrase and a modifier phrase. Within each phrase differences between reaction times were on the order of 30 msec. Across phrases they were on the order of 120 msec. The same trend emerged for subsamples of the children with various short-term memory sizes, and for adults. It also appeared for subsamples of the total scores (e.g., first six trials and last six trials). In order to provide further evidence of the technique's validity, different sentences of the same general type were presented to children with short-term memory spans of either 3, 4, or 5. As predicted, it was found that when children's spans corresponded to the number of hypothesized chunks (i.e., 4), they could repeat the sentences verbatim on the first exposure. They could not do so, however, when their spans were lower than that value or when the number of phrases was increased. It was concluded that the new technique is a promising one for assessing young children's patterns of speech segmentation.     

Unilateral agraphia after section of the posterior half of the truncus of the corpus callosum

Children ranging in age from 3 to 12 tapped on a morse key with their index finger as fast as possible. After a control test, they concurrently tapped and recited a nursery rhyme, recited animal names, and memorized shapes. Previous results suggested that more interference in a motor task results from attempting at the same time to perform another task controlled by the same, than by a different, hemisphere. Right-handed tapping and talking both used left hemisphere space; left-handed tapping and talking were controlled by different hemispheres. Relative to silent tapping concurrent talking caused a greater drop in right-hand tapping rate than in left-hand tapping rate in both the rhyme and animal conditions. Interference by shape memorizing was equal across hands. The differential effect of speaking on right-hand preference indicates the left lateralization of speech output control. The size of this effect did not vary with increasing grade level. The findings support the view that speech output control is fully lateralized at least by age 3 years.