不同汉字解码技能与小学生阅读理解的关系

探讨不同汉字解码技能在小学生阅读理解发展中的作用。208名二、四年级学生完成了认读准确性、流利性、声旁意识、形旁意识等汉字解码技能测验及阅读理解和言语理解测验。结果表明,汉字解码技能是阅读理解变异的重要来源。汉字认读准确性对二、四年级学生的阅读理解均有显著的独立贡献,汉字认读流利性仅对二年级学生有显著的独立贡献,声旁与形旁意识没有显著的独立贡献。结果对认识儿童阅读发展及有效促进阅读学习具有启示。     

Language, thought, and real nouns

We test the claim that acquiring a mass-count language, like English, causes speakers to think differently about entities in the world, relative to speakers of classifier languages like Japanese. We use three tasks to assess this claim: object-substance rating, quantity judgment, and word extension. Using the first two tasks, we present evidence that learning mass-count syntax has little effect on the interpretation of familiar nouns between Japanese and English, and that speakers of these languages do not divide up referents differently along an individuation continuum, as claimed in some previous reports [Gentner, D., & Boroditsky, L. (2001). Individuation, relativity, and early word learning. In M. Bowerman, & S. Levinson (Eds.), Language acquisition and conceptual development (pp. 215-256). Cambridge University Press]. Instead, we argue that previous cross-linguistic differences [Imai, M., & Gentner, D. (1997). A cross-linguistic study of early word meaning: Universal ontology and linguistic influence. Cognition, 62, 169-200] are attributable to “lexical statistics” [Gleitman, L., & Papafragou, A. (2005). Language and thought. In K. Holyoak, & R. Morrison (Eds.), Cambridge handbook of thinking and reasoning (pp. 633-661). Cambridge University Press]. Speakers of English are more likely to think that a novel ambiguous expression like “the blicket” refers to a kind of object (relative to speakers of Japanese) because speakers of English are likely to assume that “blicket” is a count noun rather than a mass noun, based on the relative frequency of each kind of word in English. This is confirmed by testing Mandarin-English bilinguals with a word extension task. We find that bilinguals tested in English with mass-count ambiguous syntax extend novel words like English monolinguals (and assume that a word like “blicket” refers to a kind of object). In contrast, bilinguals tested in Mandarin are significantly more likely to extend novel words by material. Thus, online lexical statistics, rather than non-linguistic thought, mediate cross-linguistic differences in word extension. We suggest that speakers of Mandarin, English, and Japanese draw on a universal set of lexical meanings, and that mass-count syntax allows speakers of English to select among these meanings.     

国外有关学习时间分配决策能力的研究概述

学习时间分配决策是记忆监控的核心内容之一。文章围绕学习时间分配决策能力的新近研究,重点介绍了如下问题：（1）儿童学习时间分配决策能力的发展;（2）学习时间分配决策机制的探讨,特别对最新的理论模型——学习层次模型和最近学习区假设进行了比较详细的介绍;（3）对今后研究发展的趋势进行了展望。     

The attentional window configures to object and surface boundaries

Attention can select items based on location or features. Belopolsky and colleagues posited the attentional window hypothesis, which theorized that spatial and featural selection interact such that featural selection occurs within a “window” of spatial selection. Kerzel and colleagues recently found that the attentional window can take complex shapes, but cannot configure around non-contiguous locations. The current experiments investigated whether perceptual grouping cues, which produce perceptual objects or surfaces, enable the attentional window to configure around non-contiguous locations. Using the additional singleton paradigm, we reasoned that observers (1) would be slowed by a colour singleton distractor that appears within the observers’ attentional window and (2) would be unaffected by distractors that do not appear within the attentional window. In separate blocks of trials, a target appeared upon one of two objects. Observers were cued to the relevant surface, and we asked if responses were affected by distractors on the cued task-relevant surface, and on the uncued irrelevant surface. Colour singleton distractors slowed responses when they appeared on the cued surface, even when those locations were non-contiguous locations. Distractors on the irrelevant surface did not affect responses. The results support a highly adaptable attentional window that is configurable to the surfaces and boundaries established by intermediate-level vision.     

Attentional sets influence perceptual load effects,but not dilution effects

Perceptual load theory [Lavie, N. (1995). Perceptual load as a necessary condition for selective attention. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 21, 451–468.; Lavie, N., & Tsal, Y. (1994) Perceptual load as a major determinant of the locus of selection in visual attention. Perception & Psychophysics, 56, 183–197.] proposes that interference from distractors can only be avoided in situations of high perceptual load. This theory has been supported by blocked design manipulations separating low load (when the target appears alone) and high load (when the target is embedded among neutral letters). Tsal and Benoni [(2010a). Diluting the burden of load: Perceptual load effects are simply dilution effects. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 36, 1645–1656.; Benoni, H., & Tsal, Y. (2010). Where have we gone wrong? Perceptual load does not affect selective attention. Vision Research, 50, 1292–1298.] have recently shown that these manipulations confound perceptual load with “dilution” (the mere presence of additional heterogeneous items in high-load situations). Theeuwes, Kramer, and Belopolsky [(2004). Attentional set interacts with perceptual load in visual search. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 11, 697–702.] independently questioned load theory by suggesting that attentional sets might also affect distractor interference. When high load and low load were intermixed, and participants could not prepare for the presentation that followed, both the low-load and high-load trials showed distractor interference. This result may also challenge the dilution account, which proposes a stimulus-driven mechanism. In the current study, we presented subjects with both fixed and mixed blocks, including a mix of dilution trials with low-load trials and with high-load trials. We thus separated the effect of dilution from load and tested the influence of attentional sets on each component. The results revealed that whereas perceptual load effects are influenced by attentional sets, the dilution component is not. This strengthens the notion that dilution is a stimulus-driven mechanism, which enables effective selectivity.     

Prejudice‐reduction in Culturally Mixed Classrooms: The Development and Assessment of a Theory‐driven Intervention Among Majority and Minority Youth in Finland

The aim of this field experiment was to develop and assess an intervention promoting positive intergroup relations in culturally diverse schools. The intervention was based on extended contact and social learning and utilized behavioural journalism as its method. Intervention effects were assessed on out‐group attitudes, perceived importance of future contact, perceived peer norms and intergroup anxiety among ethnic majority (N = 583) and minority (N = 214) youth in grades 7–9 in Finnish secondary schools (total N_experimental = 388; total N_control = 409). As a result of the intervention, both groups showed a tendency to perceive future intergroup contact as more important, and this effect was most notable for younger participants and girls. Prototypicality of in‐group and out‐group peer models contributed positively to intervention effects. However, unexpectedly, the intervention also increased experiences of intergroup anxiety among the oldest participants. The results are discussed taking into account the developmental stage of the youth studied. Besides critically assessing the effectiveness of the intervention, recommendations for improving theory‐driven prejudice‐reduction and for the development of future interventions in culturally diverse contexts are given. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Confusion of Fear and Surprise: A Developmental Study of the Perceptual-Attentional Limitation Hypothesis Using Eye Movements

The goal of the present study was to test the Perceptual-Attentional Limitation Hypothesis in children and adults by manipulating the distinctiveness between expressions and recording eye movements. Children 3–5 and 9–11 years old as well as adults were presented pairs of expressions and required to identify a target emotion. Children 3–5 years old were less accurate than those 9–11 years old and adults. All children viewed pictures longer than adults but did not spend more time attending to the relevant cues. For all participants, accuracy for the recognition of fear was lower than for surprise when the distinctive cue was in the brow only. They also took longer and spent more time in both the mouth and brow zones than when a cue was in the mouth or both areas. Adults and children 9–11 years old made more comparisons between the expressions when fear comprised a single distinctive cue in the brow than when the distinctive cue was in the mouth only or when both cues were present. Children 3–5 years old made more comparisons for brow only than both. The results of the present study extend on the Perceptual-Attentional Limitation Hypothesis showing an importance of both decoder and stimuli, and an interaction between decoder and stimuli characteristics.     

Control of behavior by an establishing stimulus

Seventeen pigeons were exposed to a three-key discrete-trial procedure in which a peck on the lit center key produced food if, and only if, the left keylight was lit. The center key was illuminated by a peck on the lit right key. Of interest was whether subjects pecked the right key before or after the response-independent onset of the left keylight. Pecks on the right key after left-keylight onset suggest control of behavior by the left keylight—an establishing stimulus. In three experiments, the strength of center-keylight onset as conditioned reinforcer for a response on the right key was manipulated by altering the size of the reduction in time to food delivery correlated with its onset. Control of pigeons' key pecks by onset of the left keylight occurred on more trials per session when the center keylight was a relatively weak conditioned reinforcer and on fewer trials per session when the center keylight was a relatively strong condtioned reinforcer. Differences across conditions in the degree of control by onset of the establishing stimulus were greatest when changes in conditioned reinforcer strength occurred relatively frequently and were signaled. The results provide evidence of the function of an establishing stimulus.     

A taste of words: linguistic context and perceptual simulation predict the modality of words

Previous studies have shown that object properties are processed faster when they follow properties from the same perceptual modality than properties from different modalities. These findings suggest that language activates sensorimotor processes, which, according to those studies, can only be explained by a modal account of cognition. The current paper shows how a statistical linguistic approach of word co-occurrences can also reliably predict the category of perceptual modality a word belongs to (auditory, olfactory-gustatory, visual-haptic), even though the statistical linguistic approach is less precise than the modal approach (auditory, gustatory, haptic, olfactory, visual). Moreover, the statistical linguistic approach is compared with the modal embodied approach in an experiment in which participants verify properties that share or shift modalities. Response times suggest that fast responses can best be explained by the linguistic account, whereas slower responses can best be explained by the embodied account. These results provide further evidence for the theory that conceptual processing is both linguistic and embodied, whereby less precise linguistic processes precede precise simulation processes.     

Extending the classical view of representation

Representation has always been a central part of models in cognitive science, but this idea has come under attack. Researchers advocating the alternative approaches of perceptual symbol systems, situated action, embodied cognition, and dynamical systems have argued against central assumptions of the classical representational approach to mind. We review the core assumptions of the representational view and these four suggested alternatives. We argue that representation should remain a core part of cognitive science, but that the insights from these alternative approaches must be incorporated into models of cognitive processing.