Discusses five- and six-year-old children's conceptions of life and death. Children were questioned about animals, plants, and inanimate objects. The most errors occurred when children judged inanimate objects; the fewest when they judged animals. The order of questions about either life or death significantly influenced children's responses. (NH)

Paper present the findings from a study focusing on the relationship between levels of object concept construction and achievements in several other branches of functioning. (Author/CB)

An account of studies conducted by author and others concerning Piaget's view of object concept development in infants. (HS)

The central idea behind this study is that at about seven years of age the concept of normative difficulty emerges, resulting in changes in interpretation of terms such as "hard" and "easy," as well as of normative cues. (Author/DB)

This is a detailed review of studies of extinction of Piagetian concepts, stressing that interpretation of such research is complicated by methodological problems, some avoidable, some intrinsic to the extinction paradigm; and that this paradigm retains the potential for contributing important information about the nature of concrete-operational…

Study lends support to the view that the problem with left-right stems from the imperfect mastery of the basic discrimination, not from an inability to deal with the logic of relational concepts. (Author/CB)

Investigated whether or not spatial relational concepts could be taught to preschool children. Specifically examined the relative effectiveness of movement-oriented vs. verbal visual-oriented spatial training programs. (Author/SB)

Explores children's understanding of a variety of interpersonal events, focusing mainly on the question of whether, and in what way, their conceptions of these events were heterogeneous or undifferentiated. (HOD)

The ability of preschool children to comprehend comparative sentences was studied in order to test previous findings and to test for a developmental shift. Subjects were 50 children aged 3 to 5 1/2 years. Data was analyzed in terms of functional versus relational responses as well as changes in relational responses. (MS)

Reports two studies. The first study compared adults and children (aged four, six, and eight) on ability to sort paintings according to artist, a conceptual task that can reveal cognitive organization. The second study compared three groups of eight- to nine-year-olds using slightly different procedures. The results showed strong developmental…

Argues that Bartsch and Wellman are successful in analyzing natural language to understand the emergence and development of a theory of mind in everyday social interaction. Discusses their delineation of the transition from a focus on desire to a concept of belief, and describes their views on contextual and cultural variables in theory of mind…

Examines a general developmental hypothesis concerned with children's understanding of perceptual experience, memory, intentions, and emotions. It is hypothesized that young children view the mind as passive in relation to the external world and regard external events as determining subjective experience, whereas older children know many ways that…

Reviews the research literature on the abilities of infants to categorize visual information on dot patterns; schematic faces; hue; and orientation. (HOD)

Reviews four books: (1) "A Dynamic Systems Approach to Development: Applications" (Linda B. Smith and Esther Thelen, Eds.); (2) "The Psychology of Gender" (Anne E. Beall and Robert J. Sternberg, Eds.); (3) "Children's Understanding: The Development of Mental Models" (Graeme S. Halford); and (4) "Adolescent Storm…

A critical analysis of the current knowlege concerning the development of the concept of death in childhood is the purpose of this paper. Theoretical models and methodological limitations of the literature are addressed. Many factors have been implicated as contributing to the development of the concept of death. (Author/BN)