Information flows continuously in the environment. As we attempt to do something, our senses receive large volumes of information. In any conversation, messages are exchanged rapidly. To understand meaning, we have to focus, record, choose and process relevant information at every moment, before it is displaced by other information. Often,…

Explores the nature and consequences of developmental change in speed of information processing. Summarizes evidence indicating that age differences in processing speed reflect a global mechanism that limits processing speed on most tasks. Describes evidence that suggests a role for processing speed on the development of intelligence. (Author/MKA)

A study of the development of 6- to 12-year-old children's appreciation of verbal jokes was conducted within the framework of the incongruity and resolution theory of humor. Results revealed age differences indicating that older children appreciated both structural components while younger children appreciated the incongruity structure. (ST)

Four types of semantic relation, assumed by different researchers to be implicated in the organization of semantic information, were investigated by means of false recognition and word association tasks presented to independent samples of 4- and 5-year-old children. (Author/SB)

Examined bias in reasoning in adults and in children, ages five through nine years, by presenting story or videotape true/false messages. Found that adults made judgments contaminated by their own background knowledge abut the believability of the message more frequently than did children. (ET)

The relationship of lateral awareness and directionality with intellectual ability, academic achievement, and age was investigated with 288 first through third grade elementary school children. With the exception of first graders, Ss were administered three tests: the Lockavitch Test for Lateral Awareness and Directionality (LTLAD), the Short Form…

A task was used in which subjects at three different Piagetian stages of intellectual development were to induce the missing relationship in different triadic situations. (Authors)

The hypothesized central role of cognitive development in resolving moral dilemmas was examined in sixth grade and college-age females. Results indicated that sophisticated cognitive operations are a prerequisite to advanced moral judgments. (ST)

The study examined whether an awareness that semantic organization is beneficial to picture recall ("semantic enhancement") precedes an awareness that certain types of organization are more beneficial than others ("levels of processing"). A series of pilot studies was conducted with kindergarten and adult subjects and a formal…

One hundred and sixty-two subjects of three age levels were tested to examine the relationship between crystallized and fluid abilities and three problem solving tasks varying in the abstractness/concreteness of their stimuli and emphasis on past experience. These dimensions have been used by Davis to distinguish between Type "O" and Type "C"…

Employed a cross-sectional comparison of 187 mid-level professional managers to assess the relationship of several work-related variables and perceived intellectual aging. Results supported the hypothesis that older managers would report more intellectual processing decline than younger managers, but that both young and old managers would see…

To determine to what extent children of preschool age comprehend the meaning of logical connectives, 64 5- and 6-year-olds were told to hand differently colored and shaped wooden blocks to an experimenter. The commands involved various English idioms used for conjunction (e.g. both black and round), disjunction (either black or round), and…

Investigates differences between adolescents and older adults in their explanations of linguistic metaphors. Adults displayed a synthesizing, integrative perspective, while adolescents displayed an analytic perspective in their explanation of metaphors. (Author/SS)

Piaget's organismic-developmental theory of intelligence was investigated in this study to determine the effectiveness of training middle class 3 and 4 year olds on two logico-mathematical structures: classification and seriation. Twenty-four children were divided into two main age groups (mean ages: 3 years 8 months; 4 years 5 months). Within…

The few studies concentrating on adult age changes in discrimination shift behavior have reported that the performance of elderly adults on such tasks is inferior to that of younger adults and, in fact, similar to that of children. To determine whether verbal labeling, which has facilitated the performance of young children, would also reduce age…