We explore the following two cognitive questions regarding crosslinguistic variation in lexical semantic systems: Why are some linguistic categories--that is, the associations between a term and a portion of the semantic space--harder to learn than others? How does learning a language-specific set of lexical categories affect processing in that…

Adults with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have shown deficits in switching between rules governing their behaviour, as have high-functioning children with ASD. However, there are few studies of flexibility in lower-functioning children with ASD. The current study investigated this phenomenon with a group of low-functioning children with ASD…

In two experiments children with autism and two groups of controls matched for either chronological or non-verbal mental age were tested on tasks of colour discrimination and memory. The results from experiment 1 showed significantly poorer colour discrimination in children with autism in comparison to typically developing chronological age…

A small sample of 20 hearing students and 20 students who are deaf and hard-of-hearing participated in this study, which compared their performances on two measures of metacognition. The first measure required participants to visually analyse real-life pictures and then to choose a response from four options (voiced or signed) indicating which was…

We sought to clarify the nature of the face processing strength commonly observed in individuals with Williams syndrome (WS) by comparing the face recognition ability of persons with WS to that of persons with autism and to healthy controls under three conditions: Upright faces with neutral expressions, upright faces with varying affective…

Purpose: This research examined how the color distribution of symbols within a visual aided augmentative and alternative communication array influenced the speed and accuracy with which participants with and without Down syndrome located a target picture symbol. Method: Eight typically developing children below the age of 4 years, 8 typically…

Methods to automatically convert graphics into tactile representations have been recently investigated, creating either raised-line or relief images. In particular, we briefly review one raised-line method where important features are emphasized. This paper focuses primarily on the effects of such emphasis and on comparing both raised-line and…

Objective: To examine the ability of the flicker task to demonstrate greater utility in discriminating performance in young adults with and without ADHD compared to the Conners' CPT (CCPT). Method: Flicker task and CCPT performance were compared between an ADHD (n = 28) and control (n = 30) group of college students. Results: This study replicated…

Two experiments were designed to investigate possible abnormal face processing strategies in children with autistic spectrum disorders. A group of 11 children with autism was compared to two groups of normally developing children matched on verbal mental age and on chronological age. In the first experiment, participants had to recognize faces on…

Comparing the effectiveness of four methods for training young children (4-4.5 years) in the skills of visual discrimination necessary to letter knowledge acquisition, this study indicates that training in oral description of critical cues of letters contributes to superior achievement in learning to match letters. (JC)

This study measured the differential effects of simplified and typical verbal antecedents on acquisition of picture discriminations for four preschool children with autism. During baseline probes, participants emitted no correct selection responses to pictures of common stimuli during either simplified or typical verbal antecedent conditions.…

Designed to assess the effect of alternative display (CRT) screen sizes and resolution levels on user ability to identify and locate printed circuit (PC) board points, this study is the first in a protracted research program on the legibility of graphics in computer-based job aids. Air Force maintenance training pipeline students (35 male and 1…