This study investigated the relationship between components of working memory (WM) and the macrostructure (e.g., planning, writing, and revision) and microstructure (e.g., grammar, punctuation) of writing. A battery of WM and writing measures were administered to 160 high-school students. Overall, hierarchical regression analyses showed that the…

The purpose of the present study was to assess the extent to which reading disabilities (RD) in young adults are related to deficits in specific aspects of temporary storage of verbal information, namely, memory span and the central executive (CE) component of working memory. Thirty-two native Hebrew-speaking young adults with and without RD were…

Latent class analysis (LCA) has been successfully applied to tasks measuring higher cognitive functioning, suggesting the existence of distinct strategies used in such tasks. With LCA it became possible to classify post hoc. This important step forward in modeling and analyzing cognitive strategies is relevant to the overlapping waves model for…

It has been widely established that depressed mood states and clinical depression, as well as a range of other psychiatric disorders, are associated with a relative difficulty in accessing specific autobiographical information in response to emotion-related cue words on an Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT; J. M. G. Williams & K. Broadbent, 1986).…

Evidence from 3 experiments reveals interference effects from structural relationships that are inconsistent with any grammatical parse of the perceived input. Processing disruption was observed when items occurring between a head and a dependent overlapped with either (or both) syntactic or semantic features of the dependent. Effects of syntactic…

This report describes the first of three stages in a study in the domain of problem solving: the definition and explication of schema knowledge. One objective of this research is to understand how schema knowledge is acquired and used in the chosen domain. The focus is on ways in which instruction influences the development of specific knowledge…

The "levels effect," the finding that the more central to the meaning of a passage an idea is the more likely that idea is to be retained, does not seem to hold for immediate recognition. Therefore, a study was conducted to test a model of information storage that predicted that when surface structure information was preserved in its…

Discusses the value of memorized factual material in science. Describes the use of mnemonic devices to facilitate memorization. Provides a list of 14 mnemonic devices commonly used in science other than ROY G. BIV, which is used to remember the colors of the visible spectrum. (CW)

Explores the central thesis of cognitive science that the mind is an information processor. Discusses the study of reading as an opportunity to gain insight into how that processor works. Provides several examples that illustrate some of the relationships between eye movement, short-term memory, and long-term memory. (TW)

A set of immediate memory-span tests, concept- and rule-learning tasks, and an IQ test were administered to adolescents. A color-form memory factor and IQ substantially predicted rule-learning proficiency. Effects of memory aids appeared to induce conceptual rules and serve as a base for rehearsing information. (Author/RD)

Emerging areas and critical problems related to computer-based testing are identified. Topics covered include adaptive testing; calibration; item selection; multidimensional items; uses of information processing theory; relation to cognitive psychology; and tests of short-term and spatial memory, perceptual speed and accuracy, and movement…

Explores the relationship between teenagers' working memory and school achievement. Experiments revealed significant correlations between the two, specifically in the field of foreign language. Includes descriptions of the experiments with accompanying statistical tables. (MJP)

Young, middle-aged, and older adults practiced a squaring algorithm. Working-memory and calculation errors were counted. Practice reduced the number of both types of errors; eliminated initial age-related calculation error differences; and slightly reduced initial age-related working-memory error differences. (BC)

Comparison of three training conditions for Spanish-vocabulary development with 30 deaf undergraduates found no significant differences for short-term memory. However, long-term-memory scores under the repeated writing condition were significantly higher than scores under the fingerspelling or silent-reading conditions. (Author/DB)

Student teachers learned about teaching principles with the help of an instructional program that included classroom animation exemplars, where expert teachers demonstrate how to apply teaching principles to a classroom scenario. Some students learned by solely observing the classroom animations, whereas others were presented with the expert's…