The purpose of present experiments with subjects approximately three, five, and seven years of age was to provide additional evidence for the obviousness of the generative transmission principle and to provide initial evidence for the secondary principles of absence and facility. Empirical support was found for each of these selection principles,…

Tests the distinction between inferring new categories on the basis of property information (predicted to be difficult) and inferring new properties on the basis of category information (predicted to be easier) among 57 preschool children. (HOD)

Examines developmental change in 4- 7- and 10-month-old infants' perceptions of correlations among attributes to determine whether relational information plays a role in abilities ranging from the perception and recognition of a simple pattern to the formation of a category. (HOD)

Examines how children's responses to questions about object terms varied across objects and the degree to which children specified common and conventional values for different object dimensions. (HOD)

Reviews the research literature on the abilities of infants to categorize visual information on dot patterns; schematic faces; hue; and orientation. (HOD)

Studies five-year-olds' relative number judgements of small and large number displays with and without perceptual aids. Children were found to respond to local rather than global density differences and to benefit from the provision of perceptual aids on both small and large number displays. (Author/AS)

Describes two experiments that investigated the effects of two thematic retrieval cues on the types of information recalled from short stories by elementary school children and adults. Shows adults and fourth graders, but not younger children, spontaneously generated thematic retrieval plans which enabled them to remember information from both…

Compares kindergartners' and third and sixth graders' understanding of an illusion reported by the philosopher John Locke, in which two hands simultaneously experience two different temperatures from a container of water at one temperature. (HOD)

Tested 32 4-year-olds and 32 6-year-olds for free and cued recall following either play-and-remember or sort-and-remember instructions and assessed them for their metamemory of the efficacy of conceptual and perceptual sorting strategies. Younger children recalled more items under sort-and-remember, whereas no recall differences were found for the…

Describes two studies investigating the development of recursive thinking in 60 Dutch children five, seven, and nine years of age. The first study replicated earlier research employing a verbal production procedure. The second study used verbal comprehension procedures and concluded that development appears two years earlier than indicated by the…

Children with mental retardation are particularly prone to failure on relational tasks such as oddity and match-to-sample, suggesting a differential sensitivity to relational information. This paper reports on several studies in which characteristics of stimulus arrays were enhanced. Results demonstrated the theoretical and practical significance…

This is volume 3 of the series of translations of books from the Soviet literature on research in the psychology of mathematics instruction and on teaching methods influenced by the research. This volume presents a detailed and careful technical analysis of the constituent aspects underlying spatial thinking as well as interesting reports of…

This is volume 5 in the series of translations of books from the Soviet literature on research in the psychology of mathematics instruction and on teaching methods influenced by the research. The heart of this volume is the need to establish a continuity between sensory perceptions and conceptual development as children progress from work in…

Reports on a study in which children aged 7 to 9 years and 11 to 13 years were asked to judge which one out of three wooden blocks would float, given weight and volume information for each block relative to a block that was known to float. Indicates that judgments may have been based on the size-weight illusion. (HOD)

This is volume 4 of the series of translations of books from the Soviet literature on research in the psychology of mathematics instruction and on teaching methods influenced by the research. The introduction to this English language translation highlights the fact that significant advances have been made in the understanding of both the…