Background: Perception disorders are frequently observed in persons with intellectual disability (ID) and their influence on cognition has been discussed. The objective of this study is to clarify the mechanisms behind these alterations by analysing the visual event related potentials early component, the N1 wave, which is related to perception…

The goal of this study is to investigate the role of working memory capacity in L2 attainment and performance. The study uses an L1 reading span task to measure working memory of a group of 59 high-intermediate/advanced learners of English, and a film retelling task to measure their oral production. The analysis first showed a moderate to high…

This paper presents an initial test of the group task demands-resources (GTD-R) model of group task performance among IT students. We theorize that demands and resources in group work influence formation of perceived group work pressure (GWP) and that heightened levels of GWP inhibit group task performance. A prior study identified 11 factors…

Structural and functional brain abnormalities have been described in anorexia nervosa (AN). The objective of this study was to examine whether there is abnormal regional brain activation during a working memory task not associated with any emotional stimuli in adolescent patients with anorexia and to detect possible changes after weight recovery.…

Critical thinking skills remain at the forefront of educational discussions. These higher order thinking processes, including but not limited to reflection, inference, and synthesizing information, enable individuals to make reasoned judgments not only in the classroom but in everyday life. School systems demand that critical thinking be…

Foreign-language learning is a prime example of a task that entails perceptual learning. The correct comprehension of foreign-language speech requires the correct recognition of speech sounds. The most difficult speech-sound contrasts for foreign-language learners often are the ones that have multiple phonetic cues, especially if the cues are…

Grounded in sociocultural theory, this article outlines a small-scale study exploring metacognitive awareness of second language (L2) listening. In each of five lessons, six pairs of advanced-level, adult, Japanese, EFL learners participated in a sequence of tasks involving the explicit verbalisation of strategies as part of a pedagogical cycle…

Neurophysiological studies yield contrary results whether attentional problems of patients with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are related to early visual processing deficits or not. Evoked gamma-band responses (GBRs), being among the first cortical responses occurring as early as 90 ms after visual stimulation in human EEG, have…

A visual semantic categorization task in English was performed by native English speakers (Experiment 1) and late bilinguals whose first language was Japanese (Experiment 2) or Spanish (Experiment 3). In the critical conditions, the target word was a homophone of a correct category exemplar (e.g., A BODY OF WATER-SEE; cf. SEA) or a word that…

The English curriculum tends to be framed in relation to two unconscious boundaries based on the dichotomies between writing and reading as well as print and image. This paper re-envisions the curriculum as comprising a hybrid space where students are involved in composing texts that integrate writing and reading practices while also considering…

As the field of second language writing embraces the authenticity and meaningfulness of connecting writing with other skills, language teachers and testers require greater understanding of how writers respond to as well as compose for integrated tasks. Research on integrated tasks is critical in highlighting how integration impacts students and…

This study investigated whether children's inversion shortcut use (i.e., reasoning that no calculations are required for the problem 4 x 8 divided by 8, as the answer is the first number) is related to their analogical reasoning ability, short-term memory capacity, and working memory capacity. Children from Grades 6 and 8 solved multiplication and…

By age 2, children attribute referential mental states such as perceptions and emotions to themselves and others, yet it is not until age 4 that they attribute representational mental states such as beliefs. This raises an interesting question: is attribution of beliefs different from attribution of perceptions and emotions in terms of its neural…

This paper examines cross-linguistic influence in third language acquisition relative to language typology, psychotypology and proficiency level. In particular, it observes how learners make use of their background languages when faced with a language they know little to nothing about. The participants, native French speakers with English as a…

Objective: The present study examines the ability of children with ADHD to make inferences and monitor ongoing understanding of texts, to shed light on their academic difficulties. Method: A total of 29 boys with ADHD and 41 comparison boys between the ages of 7 and 12 participated. Three tasks measure how boys create and evaluate inferences,…