Examined whether the former East Germany has produced authoritarian personalities and whether there is age and gender variation on authoritarianism regardless of culture. Subjects were 552 West German, 320 East German, and 619 American adolescents. Found that all three cultures have similar proclivities to exhibit an authoritarian character…

Usher syndrome, Type I, requires multiple adaptations throughout the life cycle because each stage of life has tasks and losses associated with deafness and progressive retinitis pigmentosa. This article examines the issues raised at each stage, using clinical vignettes from persons who have this condition and their families. (Author/DB)

In order to evaluate possibilities of fitting myoelectrically controlled prosthetic arms on infants, this study examined whether 32 infants (1-6 months) could learn to control environmental contingencies by means of contracting the forearm flexor muscle group. Results indicated that older subjects (age greater than 104 days) demonstrated learning,…

Two experiments examined the effects of drawing on young children's memory of an event one day and one month later, respectively. Children who were asked to draw what happened were as accurate and reported more information than children who were asked to tell what happened, although only the verbal reports of both groups were scored. (MDM)

Reports results of analyses of key tables in the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Atlas of Type Tables. Significant age group effects on every dimension indicates the need to reestimate population norms for each continuum on the MBTI for interpreting scores of people of various ages. (LKS)

Evaluation of 95 students in grades 3 and 6 on measures of mathematics anxiety, test anxiety, and attitudes toward mathematics found that test and problem-solving anxiety took 2 distinct forms. Mathematics test anxiety increased with age relative to problem-solving anxiety. (SLD)

Children of 5, 9, and 13 years of age were asked to allocate resources in hypothetical situations in which norms of equity, equality, or need were applicable. Young children were insensitive to the contextual information, whereas older children appropriately tailored their decisions to the situation. (BC)

Tested the ability of 19 older adults, given additional training in a mental imagination technique, to approach the performance of 16 younger adults on serial word recall tasks. Results indicated that negative age differences in older adults' performance were substantial, resistant to extensive practice, and applicable to all subjects. (BC)

Studied the possibility that children's decisions regarding naughtiness and types of punishment differ according to age and sex. Subjects were interviewed after hearing two stories from Piaget's study of children's moral reasoning. Significant age variability was found. Findings imply that children did not make the connection between the act and…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) uses item response theory (IRT) based scaling methods to summarize information in complex data sets. The necessity of global scores or more detailed subscores, creation of developmental scales for different ages, and use of scale anchoring for scale interpretation are discussed. (SLD)

Examined three and four year olds' judgments about transgressions. Children judged moral transgressions to be more serious, punishable, and wrong than conventional transgressions; hypothetical transgressions to be more wrong independent of rules than actual transgressions; and hypothetical moral transgressions to be more independent of rules than…

This study found that personality characteristics (including locus of control and self-esteem) of 33 maltreated adolescent females interacted with maltreatment status in predicting depression, suggesting that they are protective factors. Adolescents first experiencing maltreatment during childhood were less likely than those first experiencing…

Measurement scales developed using Thurstone and item-response theory (IRT) methods of scaling achievement tests for the same single-level data were compared for approximately 4,000 high school students taking the Iowa Tests of Educational Development in 1975. Results of both approaches indicate that variability increases as grade level increases.…

An error in the data analysis for a study reported in a 1988 paper by Kail is cited. The paper postulated a model that explained individual differences in the speed of processing on cognitive tasks. Reanalysis of the data suggested that support for the original conclusions is considerably weaker than reported. (LB)

Examined free recall of kindergartners and third and eighth graders. The use of organizational strategies, which was demonstrated by third and eight graders, led to increased performance only for eighth graders. These results suggest a phase in strategy development when production of a strategy results in little benefit in performance. (LB)