学优生与学困生内隐与外显协同学习的比较研究

根据目前国内采用的标准,选取学优生和学困生各120人。运用内隐学习中的双条件人工语法材料和强分离的实验范式,考察和比较了两种学生的内隐学习、内隐与外显协同学习的成绩。结果显示:(1)学优生在外显学习、协同学习(先内隐后外显以及内隐与外显交替)方式下的成绩显著好于学困生,而在内隐学习方式下,二者成绩差异不显著。(2)学优生的外显学习及协同学习成绩显著好于内隐学习成绩,而学困生在四种学习方式下成绩差异不显著。表明在人工语法学习中学优生的有意识学习及其与无意识的协同学习效果较好,而学困生的有意识学习及协同学习较差。     

Sensation seeking and danger invulnerability: Paths to college student risk-taking

This study examines the roles of sensation seeking and invulnerability as predictors of health compromising behaviors in a multiethnic sample of 1690 emerging adult college students (mean age = 19.8, range 18–25 years) from nine US colleges and universities. Participants completed the Arnett Sensation Seeking Inventory and the Adolescent Invulnerability Scale; and reported how often they had participated in a set of health compromising risk behaviors (i.e., substance use, impaired driving, and sexual behaviors) in the 30 days prior to assessment. Sensation seeking and danger invulnerability scores were moderately correlated (r = .30). Findings from a series of multivariate Poisson regression analyses suggest that when considered simultaneously as predictors, sensation seeking appears to be a general risk factor associated with engagement in a variety of risk behaviors, whereas danger invulnerability is primarily a factor in those risk behaviors that are less common among peers (e.g., hard drug use, casual sex, and driving while intoxicated).     

Inhibitory response capacities of bilateral lower and upper extremities in children with developmental coordination disorder in endogenous and exogenous orienting modes

This study was designed to investigate separately the inhibitory response capacity and the lateralization effect in children with developmental coordination disorder (DCD) in the endogenous and exogenous modes of orienting attention. Children with DCD on the lower extremities (DCD-LEs), along with age-matched controls, completed four tasks that involved various applications of asynchronous stimuli to the feet or hands at various intervals. The results demonstrated that children with DCD-LEs had a significantly longer reaction time than the controls for all tasks, and were not alert to the appearance of the target. However, they displayed a deficit in volitional shifts of attention (endogenous mode), but not in automatic dislocation of attention (exogenous mode), whenever they performed the tasks with either their lower or their upper-limbs-even 6 months after the initial study. These findings confirm the deficit in the inhibitory response capacity in terms of volitional movement of attention by children with DCD. Additionally, the negative effect of lateralization on the bilateral extremities was not present in children with DCD-LEs. Significantly differences in response ability were detected only between the dominant and non-dominant sides of upper-limbs, but not between the lower-limbs, suggesting a future avenue for further experimentation on bilateral extremities.     

Mechanisms of deficit of visuospatial attention shift in children with developmental coordination disorder: A neurophysiological measure of the endogenous Posner paradigm

The purpose of this study was to investigate and compare the mechanisms of brain activity, as revealed by a combination of the visuospatial attention shifting paradigm and event-related potentials (ERP) in children with developmental coordination disorder (DCD) and typically developing children. Twenty-eight DCD children and 26 typically developing children were recorded with regard to their behavioral performance and ERP measures during a variant of the endogenous Posner paradigm, in which they should react to visual targets preceded by spatial cues or presented uncued. Children with DCD showed longer reaction time and a deficit in inhibitory response capacity when compared to typically developing children. The electrophysiological characteristics also showed distinct modulatory effects upon attentional orienting, anticipatory mechanisms, and cognitive-to-motor transfer in children with DCD: longer cue-P3 and target-N1 latency, smaller target-P3 amplitude, an elongated interval between N2 and the motor response (N2-RT), and small areas on contingent negative variation (CNV). The combined analysis of behavioral performance and ERP data suggested that children with DCD had deficits of slower target identification (N1), less ability in interhemispheric (P3) and cognitive-to-motor transfer speed (N2-RT), as well as a less mature anticipatory and executive process (CNV).     

Environmental enrichment improves behavioral performance and auditory spatial representation of primary auditory cortical neurons in rat

Environmental enrichment (EE) has an important role in brain plasticity. Early research has shown that EE increases the response strength of neurons in the auditory cortex, but it remains unknown whether EE can influence the process of spatial localization in the auditory system. In this study, we raised rats in enriched and standard conditions from postnatal day 10 to day 56. By testing behavioral tasks via auditory cues, we have shown that EE improved the number of correct scores, but decreased the reaction time and azimuth deviation in behavioral performance of sound-azimuth discrimination. By in vivo extracellular recording, we have shown that EE enhanced the directional sensitivity of neurons in the primary auditory cortex. For example, EE rats had a smaller spatial receptive field, sharper frequency tuning curve and directional selective curve of auditory neurons compared with normal rats. Our findings indicate that early exposure to EE increases directional sensitivity. These results provide an insight into developmental plasticity in the auditory system.     

语文学习困难儿童的工作记忆与加工速度

加工速度和工作记忆反应了不同的认知加工过程,在认知发展研究中,加工速度和工作记忆所起的作用仍存在较大的分歧.采用多因素混合实验设计,在严格控制条件下,比较了语文学习困难和控制组儿童的工作记忆和加工速度.结果发现,与控制组相比,语文学习困难儿童在工作记忆和加工速度方面均存在明显的不足,但加工速度不能解释不同能力组之间的差异,语文学习困难儿童的缺陷在于工作记忆能力的下降.工作记忆的缺陷在于言语工作记忆和中央执行功能的不足,与视空间工作记忆能力无关.语文学习困难既存在一般的工作记忆缺陷(中央执行功能)也存在特定的工作记忆(言语工作记忆)能力的不足.     

小学3~5年级学习不良儿童社会比较的特点

以小学三、四、五年级95名儿童为被试,采用访谈法探讨了小学学习不良儿童的社会比较特点。结果表明:70%学习不良儿童自发地进行上行比较,即群体外比较,其动机为自我提升;学习不良儿童的社会比较和时间比较的频率均低于一般儿童;学习不良儿童的社会比较目标水平显著低于一般儿童,随着年级的升高其目标水平呈不断下降的发展趋势。     

学习不良儿童对情绪表达规则的认知特点

采用儿童对情绪表达规则的认知访谈故事,比较了学习不良儿童和一般儿童对情绪表达规则认知的发展特点。结果发现,学习不良儿童表情调节知识水平显著低于一般儿童,性别差异不显著,组别与年级交互作用不显著,表明两组儿童发展趋势类似,发展水平不同;学习不良儿童报告出较少的社会定向目标,自我保护目标得分与一般儿童差异不显著;学习不良儿童缺少根据不同人际关系类型灵活运用情绪表达规则的知识,而且较少把情绪表达规则的使用和目标联系起来     

The Processing of Non-canonically Ordered Constituents in Long Distance Dependencies by Pre-school Children: a Real-time Investigation

Four experiments were performed which had the goal of determining how and when young children acquire the ability to understand long distance dependencies. These studies examined the operations underlying the auditory processing of non-canonically ordered constituents in object-relative sentences. Children 4–6 years of age and an adult population participated in the study, which employed a cross modal picture priming methodology to determine when constituents in a non-canonical position are reactivated during ongoing sentence comprehension. The results support the view that even very young children have the same structural processing reflex seen in adults. Namely, children re-activate a non-canonically positioned (fronted) direct object NP immediately at the post-verb gap site during sentence processing.