Recent studies in neuroimagery and cognitive psychology support the view of sensory-motor based knowledge: when processing an object concept, neural systems would re-enact previous experiences with this object. In this experiment, a conceptual switching cost paradigm derived from Pecher, Zeelenberg, and Barsalou (2003, 2004) was used to…

The development of a diachronic conception of biology has rarely been explored during childhood, except by Maurice-Naville and Montangero (1992). The aim of the present study was to further explore this issue. In the course of an interview, 163 children aged between 6 and 11 expressed their diachronic conceptions of the growth and death of several…

Two studies examined children's concept acquisition for complex emotions. Four- to seven-year olds described situations that evoke a variety of emotions and their feelings about each; four- and five-year olds rated the same emotions for feelings of pleasure and arousal. Combined results suggest children attain partial conceptualization of each…

Describes the development of cognitive structure in adolescence as establishing isomorphism between subject and environment. Identifies two dimensions of stages in the development of individuals'"work structure," i.e., the network of relations existing between the individual and his work.

Children and adults were asked to place something "in front of" or "behind" a featured or nonfeatured object. Most subjects responded to the object's inherent features. A significant number of adults used the observer orientation cue. Children had more difficulty with the nonfeatured object but also used the observer…

Pairs of elementary school children at different concept development levels were given problems to discuss, in order to examine the prediction, derived from the equilibration model, that when two children holding different beliefs must arrive at a consenus, the child possessing the higher level of cognitive development will prevail over the child…

We investigated the nature of graphic formulas in 5-, 7-, and 9-year-old children when they were asked to draw a house and a television in a free condition, and then to draw from photographs of these objects. Assuming that the frequency of occurrence of a feature in children's drawings reflects its semantic weight, we studied the relations between…

Designed to determine whether (1) children of middle socioeconomic status (SES) learn matrix completion rules more rapidly than lower-SES children; (2) feedback influences rate of rule acquisition; (3) rule shifting influences rate of rule acquisition; (4) SES is associated with transfer of training; and (5) effectiveness of rule acquisition and…

School-age children's ability to distinguish among the concepts of aloneness, loneliness, and solitude was the focus of this study. This ability has been largely neglected by researchers. Also, the relation of this ability with self-reported loneliness was examined. Individual interviews were conducted with 180 second, fourth, and sixth graders…

A study of German-speaking kindergartners and adults replicated Canadian research that found that, although children made more errors than adults in recognizing emotional expressions of photographed faces, they structured emotional concepts just as adults did. (Author/BB)