Purpose: The aim of this review is to illuminate the connection between inferential skills and spoken language idiom comprehension (SLIC) with a focus on autism. Idioms are frequently occurring figurative expressions, such as feeling blue, on cloud nine, and all tied up, that have literal and nonliteral meanings. Method: In this review article, an…

Words are seldom read in isolation. Predicting or anticipating upcoming words in a text, based on the context in which they are read, is an important aspect of efficient language processing. In sentence reading, words with congruent preceding context have been shown to be processed faster than words read in neutral or incongruous contexts. The…

Purpose: Children's ability to adjust one's language according to discourse context is important for success in academic settings. This study examined whether second graders vary in linguistic and discourse features depending on discourse contexts, that is, when describing pictures in contextualized (describing the picture to an examiner while…

Purpose: Children's ability to adjust one's language according to discourse context is important for success in academic settings. This study examined whether second graders vary in linguistic and discourse features depending on discourse contexts, that is, when describing pictures in contextualized (describing the picture to an examiner while…

A primary objective of development is to build a knowledge base. To accumulate knowledge over time and experiences, learners must engage in productive processes, going beyond what is explicitly given to generate new knowledge. Though important to accumulating knowledge, these processes are also easily disrupted. Individuals often depend on surface…

This study investigates how children negotiate social norms with peers. In Study 1, 48 pairs of 3- and 5-year-olds (N = 96) and in Study 2, 48 pairs of 5- and 7-year-olds (N = 96) were presented with sorting tasks with conflicting instructions (one child by color, the other by shape) or identical instructions. Three-year-olds differed from older…

The current study investigates the degree to which preschoolers can engage in causal inferences in a blocking paradigm, a paradigm in which a cue is consistently linked with a target, either alone (A-T) or paired with another cue (AB-T). Unlike previous blocking studies with preschoolers, we manipulated the causal structure of the events without…

Increasing age is characterized by greater positive affective states. However, there is mixed evidence on the implementation of emotion regulation strategies across the life span. To clarify the discrepancies in the literature, we examined the modulating influence of contextual factors in understanding emotion regulation strategy use in older and…

Background: There is variability in the language of children with autism, even those who are high functioning. However, little is known about how they process language structures in real time, including how they handle potential ambiguity, and whether they follow referential constraints. Previous research with older autism spectrum disorder (ASD)…

The present study aimed at determining and examining high school first, second, third and fourth class grade students' attitudes towards context based learning approach with respect to the variables of gender, class grade and school. The study was carried out with a total of 5325 high school students in Turkey (n1(first class grade) = 1509,…

We compared year-long gains in fluency and comprehension in grades 3-5 in 3 treatment and 4 comparison schools. Treatment schools implemented a comprehensive school reform (CSR) program called Bookworms. The program employed challenging text and emphasized high text volume, aggressive vocabulary and knowledge building, and contextualized strategy…

The authors evaluated age-related variations in contextual cueing, which reflects the extent to which visuospatial regularities can facilitate search for a target. Previous research produced inconsistent results regarding contextual cueing effects in young children and in older adults, and no study has investigated the phenomenon across the life…

Research Findings: We present 3 studies that focused on preschoolers' electronic book (e-book) reading in different contexts aimed at supporting children's early literacy. In Study 1 we researched the impact of children's age and number of independent readings on phonological awareness and word reading. We found that all age groups benefited from…

Purpose: In this study, the authors investigated how acoustic distortion affected younger and older adults' use of context in a lexical decision task. Method: The authors measured lexical decision reaction times (RTs) when intact target words followed acoustically distorted sentence contexts. Contexts were semantically congruent, neutral, or…

We documented cross-cultural similarities and differences in values concerning personal achievement between Latino immigrant parents, a group of multiethnic teachers, and European American parents. We also explored intergenerational similarities and differences between parents and their fifth-grade children. The theoretical premise was that…