Reports on the findings of a comparative study of mental abilities of Mexican and American children. Discusses age, sex, social class, and urban-rural differences, as well as cultural differences. (SS)

The relative difficulty levels of Stanford-Binet items between the ages of four and six among prekindergarten Head Start children were studied. A comparison sample of prekindergarten white middle class children was included to evaluate the age norms on a culturally typical sample of children and to assess performance on the Binet as it might…

This report examines the results of a study designed to compare various aspects of sex role development among upper middle, middle, and lower class white and Spanish language heritage children in three different preschool daycare centers. The 168 children studied ranged in age from 30 months to six-and-a-half years. Measuring instruments were…

This paper discusses research exploring the performance factors involved in studies which test for formal operations. It is suggested that several previous studies dealing with formal operations confound performance and competence in determining the extent of subjects' formal operations schemata. Factors which might account for performance…

The authors are emmersed in a comprehensive review of the literature on intellectual sex differences. This paper consists of the first progress report and the tentative hypotheses of the work completed so far. Discussion is initially concerned with verbal and spatial abilities. It is concluded that girls learn language earlier, and may continue to…

Compared the performance of 29 institutionalized cultural-familial mental retardates on Piagetian conservation tasks. Examined the effects of age, sex, and degree of retardation on conservation performance. (BD)

This study provides evidence of sex-typed behavior in the spontaneous play of infants between 9 1/2 and 15 1/2 months. Eight boys and eight girls at 9 1/2, 11 1/2, 13 1/2, and 15 1/2 months were observed during 15 minutes of free play with a variety of realistic toys equally divided into male, female, and neutral categories. Stereotypical,…

This interview study gathered information about the prior knowledge and thinking of kindergarten to third- graders regarding the supply of water, heat, and light to modern homes. Findings indicated that students possessed only limited and spotty knowledge about utilities in modern homes. Within general trends, there was evidence of growth in…

A study of 700 children (ages 5-12) investigated whether children's conceptions of and expectations of friendship are determined by chronological age or by mental age. Results found children of differing intellectual abilities pass through the five conception stages of friendship at different ages and at different rates. (Contains 4 references.)…

Mentally retarded (N=36) and nonretarded (N=37) children matched for MA (48 months) were assessed on gender understanding with the expectation that the two groups would show similar sequencing and attainment. The nonretarded subjects' data mirrored previous cross-sectional findings, but the retarded respondents displayed signficantly better gender…

Investigates the relationship between self-recognition and self-evaluative emotions in two studies on 27 children aged 9-24 months and 44 children aged 22 months. The results of both studies indicate that embarrassment but not wariness was related to self-recognition. (RJC)

Analyzed 1.5- and 2.5-year-olds' problem solving and learning. Found that changes in toddlers' strategies could be assessed reliably on a trial-by-trial basis, that changes followed the basic form predicted by the overlapping waves model, and that analyses could reveal information about the qualitative and quantitative aspects of their learning.…

This study investigates the development of multiplicative classification skills in lower class black and middle class white children on tasks which contain either three-dimensional objects or two-dimensional pictorial representations of the same objects. Multiplicative classification refers to the simultaneous classification of objects into two or…