In 4 experiments 120 three-to four-year-old non readers were asked the identity of a symbolic representation as it appeared with different objects. Consistent with Bialystok (2000), many children judged the identity of written words to vary according to the object with which they appeared but few made such errors with recognizable pictures.…

In 3 studies, 2.5- and 3-year-olds transferred knowledge from an easy task that required appreciation of a symbolic relation to a more difficult task involving a symbolic relation that children their age typically do not appreciate. Results support the theory that young children use insight into one symbolic relation to understand other symbolic…

Two experiments examined children's ability to understand and produce graphic symbols for social communication. Found that 2-year-olds did not effectively produce symbols or use an experimenter's symbols. Three- and 4-year-olds improved their symbols after use in social communication and performed above chance with the experimenter's symbol;…

Observation indicated that children most frequently represent objects by performing actions appropriate to the represented objects. With increasing age, children represent objects without using functional actions and with objects bearing little physical similarity to the represented objects. (Author/DB)

Two studies examined the progress in normally developing preschoolers' ability to produce actions with imagined objects (pantomimes). Found that young children not only had difficulty producing imaginary object representations in contrast to normal adults, they also had difficulty comprehending imaginary object representations and were better at…

An experiment demonstrating that children in Piaget's preoperational stage, who generally still cannot give conceptually correct answers to questions about rate and time, evidence an ability to imitate a given rate-time relationship demonstrated by the experimenter. (ST)

Tested understanding of correspondence on the part of 2.5- to 3.5-year olds who watched a toy hidden in a model and tried to find an analogous toy in a room. Retrieval scores increased with increasing model-room similarity; were higher for older than younger children; and were affected by object and size similarity. (BC)