The relation between perceptual and conceptual knowledge is a longstanding research question in developmental psychology. Here we tested children's dependence on figurative information with a reaction time/accuracy task. A sample of 151 children from 5 to 10 years were assessed from two multicultural and multiracial schools in the London (UK)…

Matching the identity of unfamiliar faces is important in applied identity verification tasks, for example when verifying photo ID at border crossings, in secure access areas, or when issuing identity credentials. In these settings, other biographical details--such as name or date of birth on an identity document--are also often compared to…

Working memory (WM) has a limited capacity; however, this limitation can be mitigated by selecting individual items from the set currently held in WM for prioritization. The selection mechanism underlying this prioritization ability is referred to as the focus of attention (FOA) in WM. Although impressive progress has been achieved in recent…

Inconsistent data are available on mental rotation performance in neurotypicals with high autistic-like traits. Here, we tested whether global-local visual processing abilities mediate the influence of specific autistic-like trait domains (social skill, attention switching, attention-to-detail, communication, and imagination) on mental rotation.…

In a 2014 issue of "Learning & Memory," Reagh and Yassa proposed that repeated encoding leads to semanticization and loss of perceptual detail in memory. We presented object images one or three times and tested recognition of targets and corresponding similar lures. Correct lure rejections after one in comparison to three exposures…

This study measured event-related brain potentials (ERPs) to test competing hypotheses regarding the effects of anger and race on early visual processing (N1, P2, and N2) and error recognition (ERN and Pe) during a sequentially primed weapon identification task. The first hypothesis was that anger would impair weapon identification in a biased…

The present study explored whether phonological awareness (PA), morphological awareness (MA) and visual attention (VA) independently predict word and pseudoword reading accuracy in native Arabic-speaking children from grades 4 and 5. A total of 141 participants took part in the study, and were divided into two groups of readers with (n = 30) and…

Visual representations are prevalent in STEM instruction. To benefit from visuals, students need representational competencies that enable them to see meaningful information. Most research has focused on explicit conceptual representational competencies, but implicit perceptual competencies might also allow students to efficiently see meaningful…

The current study investigated the role of visual short-term memory, working memory, and declarative memory as individual differences in the earliest stages of vocabulary and syntactic learning in "Duolingo"-based language instruction. Thirty-eight L1-Greek adults completed memory tasks and engaged in learning Navajo on…

The purpose of this follow-up study was to determine the specific contribution of phonological processing abilities, including phonological awareness (PA), rapid automatized naming (RAN) and verbal short-term memory (VSTM), as well as visual perception (VP), in word reading accuracy. A sample of 62 native Arabic speaking children from Grade 1…

We examined the developmental differences in motor control and learning of a two-segment movement. One hundred and five participants (53 female) were divided into three age groups (7-8 years, 9-10 years and 19-27 years). They performed a two-segment movement task in four conditions (full vision, fully disturbed vision, disturbed vision in the…

Humans have a uniquely sophisticated ability to see past superficial features and to understand the relational structure of the world around us. This ability often requires that we compare structures, finding commonalities and differences across visual depictions that are arranged in space, such as maps, graphs, or diagrams. Although such visual…

Skill acquisition theorists conceptualize second language (L2) learning as the acquisition of a set of perceptual, cognitive, and motor skills. The dominant view in skill acquisition theory is to regard L2 skill acquisition as a three-stage process "from initial representation of knowledge through initial changes in behavior to eventual…

To investigate the critical information in long-term visual memory representations of objects, we used occlusion to emphasize 1 type of information or another. By occluding 1 solid side of the object (e.g., top 50%) or by occluding 50% of the object with stripes (like a picket fence), we emphasized visible information about the object, processing…

The "familiarity effect" (Shen and Reingold, "Perception & Psychophysics" 63(3):464-475, 2001) is a phenomenon in which unfamiliar symbols perceptually "pop-out" when placed among familiar symbols (e.g., letters). In contrast, searching for familiar symbols among unfamiliar symbols is more challenging. Failure to…