Learning concepts implies certain attitudes and skills on the part of both teachers and student; means recalling specific perceptions, discovering relationships, and applying these structures to situations. Students who have learned to conceptualize have the ability and training to view their own lives in relations to their physical and cultural…

Research supported in part by a United States Public Health Service grant. Article based on a PhD thesis submitted to the University of Pittsburgh. Reprints from: E.N. Murray, Dept of Psychology, State Univ of N.Y., Buffalo, N.Y.

Results of a study involving 10 mentally retarded and 10 nonretarded (mean age 16 and 4 years, respectively) indicated high levels of acquisition and maintenance for both groups. No difference occurred in magnitude of acquisition, but the mentally retarded Ss took approximately three times as many trials to complete training. (Author/CL)

The authors suggest that simply by changing the method of questioning, a teacher can change not only the intellectual demands in the classroom, but also the range of thinking strategies that provide for understanding and competence. (KC)

Eighteen educable mentally retarded adolescents, 18 chronological age (CA) matched nonretarded adolescents, and 18 mental age (MA) matched nonretarded children stylus-tracked an intermittently disappearing rotary pursuit target with and without auditory feedback. (Author)

Results of the study involving five moderately/severely retarded adolescents indicated that picture prompts can be successully used to promote both acquisition and generalization of performance, and the subsequent training time on a novel task was reduced when the use of picture prompts had been previously trained. (Author/CL)

The operation of means-ends analysis (MEA) involves attempts at reducing differences between problem states and the goal state. It was paradoxically found that the more problem solvers knew of the goal state, the less they learned of the problem structure during the solution process. (PN)

In four conditioned taste aversion experiments with rats as subjects, the effects of extinguished or pre-exposed flavors on retardation and summation tests was compared. Experiment 1 showed that when steps were taken to ensure similar exposure to the target flavor in all conditions, acquisition after pre-exposure and reacquisition after extinction…

Among the 12 documents selected for this annotated bibliography of documents and journal articles in the ERIC database is an expert's argument that the brain's multipath and multimodal capacities are ignored by educators. Another writer fears that the "back-to-basics" movement may have eclipsed the prominence earlier accorded to thinking…

The study was intended to determine the effect of the mode of verbalization of a discovered generalization on short-term retention of ability to use the generalization. Fifty preservice elementary teachers were assigned to one of the five verbalization methods: speaking, listening, writing, reading, or no verbalization. Each performed on six…

The concern of the experiment is to find out the roles of abstraction and generalization in the learning of mathematical structures. The basic question is whether to generalize before abstracting or vice-versa in order to maximize transfer. The experiment involves four mathematical tasks and a transfer of activity. Experimental procedures are…

A demonstration-plus-feedback technique was applied in an attempt to reduce the systematic inversion errors in subtraction in nine learning disabled students (ages 9-11 years). Journal availability: see EC 112 927. (DLS)

Seven mentally retarded adolescents received either verbal or nonverbal training on a shape-sorting task within a multiple baseline design. Both training sequences resulted in the successful acquisition of the target performance, but only the verbal training sequence facilitated generalization of performance to a novel shape and to a new…

This paper describes the rule-assessment approach to cognitive development. The basic question that motivated the rule-assessment approach is how people's existing knowledge influences their ability to learn. Research using the rule-assessment approach is summarized in terms of eight conclusions, each illustrated with empirical examples.…