Two experiments found that (1) by age 8 months infants perceived that leaning extends their effective reaching space to grasp objects; (2) by 10 months they perceived the effective limits of leaning and reaching; and (3) by 12 months they began to perceive how this space may be extended by a mechanical aid. (MDM)

This study evaluated whether listeners can distinguish human brainstem auditory evoked responses elicited by acoustic clicks from control waveforms obtained with no acoustic stimulus when the waveforms are presented auditorily. Detection performance for stimuli presented visually was slightly, but consistently, superior to that which occurred for…

Infants were tested at 5, 8, and 13 months of age for numerosity perception. Subjects observed displayed figures on a screen moving at constant speed with irregular trajectories and occasional occlusions. Results demonstrated that discrimination of units, and not of characteristic patterns, underlies numerosity perception. (BC)

The addition of idiosyncratic features to individual members of an artificially constructed category enhanced specific item memory among 13 month olds, but not among 10 month olds. Discussion of findings focuses on their theoretical implications and the nature of the age difference. (RH)

Presents a brief overview of Gestalt theory. Discusses and illustrates six key principles of Gestalt psychology as they apply to document design and graphics. Presents exercise that students may use to improve their understanding of the principles and develop their document design skills. Distinguishes between Gestalt theory and rhetoric. (RS)

Discusses developments in technology that provide high-quality visual access to transition information and multimedia instruction for learners with deafness. Identifies a variety of considerations in using multimedia products and describes the pros and cons of different media in the context of several multimedia projects. (Author/CR)

Reports two sets of lexical priming experiments in which the morphological, semantic, and orthographic relationships between primes and targets are varied in three SOA conditions. Results showed that morphological structure plays a significant role in early visual recognition of English words that is independent of both semantic and orthographic…

Three experiments manipulated 3-month-olds' attention to different components of a training display and assessed the effect on retention. Results suggested that increasing or decreasing attention to an item during encoding produces a corresponding increase or decrease in memorability. Findings were consistent with a levels-of-processing account…

Two experiments examined visual attention in 5- to 13-year olds who were hearing or deaf with or without cochlear implants. Findings indicated that visual selective attention changes occurred around 8 years for all groups, with deaf children without cochlear implants performing less well than others. Differences between deaf children with and…

Visual supports were used to help two boys with autism of elementary school age to transition from one activity to another. A significant decrease in the latency between the time the students were given instructions and the time they began the next activity occurred when the visual supports were used. (Contains references.) (Author/CR)

Habituated 2-, 5-, and 8-month-olds to visual stimuli following statistically predictable pattern, then showed the familiar pattern alternating with novel sequence of identical stimuli. Found significantly greater interest in novel sequence at all ages. Results support likelihood of domain general statistical learning in infancy and imply that…

A preferential looking procedure was used to investigate 7-month-olds' perception of positive and negative affective facial expressions in which a single vocal expression was concordant or discordant with the videotaped facial expression. Results indicated that 7-month-olds discriminated among happy, interested, angry, and sad expressions.…

Three pigeons discriminated between two sample stimuli (intensities of red light). The difficulty of the discrimination was varied over four levels. At each level, the relative reinforcer magnitude for the two correct responses was varied across conditions, and the reinforcer rates were equal. Within levels, discriminability between the sample…

Two experiments investigated the derived transfer of functions through equivalence relations established using a stimulus pairing observation procedure. In Experiment 1, participants were trained on a simple discrimination (A1+/A2-) and then a stimulus pairing observation procedure was used to establish 4 stimulus pairings (A1-B1, A2-B2, B1-C1,…

Two experiments used a mutual imitation paradigm to assess 9-, 14-, and 18-month-old infants' developing understanding of intentions in others. In the first study, 1 experimenter imitated the infants' actions, and another experimenter performed contingent but different actions on an identical toy. From 9 months of age, infants show discrimination…