A major task of social work doctoral programs is preparing the next generation of researchers and educators in the profession. To develop competence in generating new knowledge relevant to social work practice and disseminating it to future practitioners, doctoral candidates need to master a broad and complicated set of theoretical, empirical, and…

Children, Play, and Development, Fourth Edition, discusses the relationship of play to the physical, social, intellectual, and emotional growth of the child. Author Fergus P. Hughes focuses on the historical, sociocultural, and ethological context of play; the role of development in play; and the wide range of theories that provide a framework for…

Research on the determinants of intelligence and factors that relate to variability in intellect are discussed. It is argued that studies in this area usually focus on individual determinants and rarely reflect the true nature of the processes through which variability in determinants relates to variability in intellectual development. (SLD)

For this followup study an attempt was made to retest all 136 children evaluated in the Austin, Texas Day Care Program nine months earlier but only 95 children were available. Subjects were Negro and Mexican-American. The original study indicated that significantly higher scores were earned on tests of intellectual performance as a function of…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the Ivanov-Smolensky procedure as an effective clinical device for the assessment of cognitive development in children under four years old. This procedure, expressly developed for assessing development in children with limited verbal skills, minimizes some of the research problems associated with young…

A brief discussion of theories of general intelligence precedes a report of relevant empirical data. Results from the factor analysis of more than 20 sets of Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) data indicate that the WAIS clearly is not a one-factor scale. It does not measure a single, general intelligence. Roughly 17 percent of the reliable…

This reply to Horn and Donaldson is previous critique of Schaie and Baltes' Research and writings on intelligence in adulthood and old age has two parts: the first discusses theoretical perspectives and the second makes observations on the empirical data base. (Author/AM)

Suggests that a careful review of the logical and empirical bases for the myth argument indicates that there is little to justify it. The evidence suggests that if one lives long enough, decrements in at least some of the important abilities of intelligence is likely to occur. (Author/AM)

The effects of father absence on educational achievement and intellectual development of 6- to 11-year-old children were investigated by employing a nationally representative sample of 5,493 father-present and 616 father-absent children from the Health Examination Survey of the National Center for Health Statistics. (Author/RH)

Studies reporting predictions from assessments of infant recognition memory to later developmental performance and IQ are critiqued. Inelegancies in design, procedure, and analyses are noted. While this approach may have potential, its utility for practical or clinical purposes is still not demonstrated. (Author/RD)

Selective subject attrition from longitudinal study panels can bias estimates of developmental change. Particularly in studies of older adults, sampling effects can adversely affect attempts to estimate true ontogenetic change. Selective attrition effects were examined in 636 Pennsylvania adults (138 males, 498 females), aged 58-91, who were…

Following a brief outline of vitamin therapy's effects on schizophrenia and learning disabilities, research is reviewed on vitamin therapy for children with Down's Syndrome, concluding with a discussion of critical responses to research endorsing vitamin therapy. It is concluded that vitamin therapy contributes nothing to the development of…

This brief report summarizes the findings and conclusions of studies concerning the relation between birth order and various aspects of personality and intellectual development. Major topics discussed are the relation between birth order of the child and: (1) the effects of sex and spacing between siblings on personality characteristics of the…

Sex difference research has been plagued with a myriad of problems,. Specifically, intelligence testing, if dependent on measurement of spatial or verbal proficiency, may not be an accurate indicator of native ability. Similarly, infrequent replication of studies, studies that only include subjects of one sex yet imply sex differences, and poor…

Substantive and methodological problems encountered in a five-year synthesis of research on college impact are discussed, including general issues in higher education research and scholarship, relevance of assessments of student change, unnoticed indirect effects of college experience, inattention to individual differences, validity of common…