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)

Examined development of concept of suicide in 60 children. Found that 10 percent of first, 50 percent of third, and 95 percent of fifth graders had basic understanding of suicide. Attitudes toward suicide were neutral or negative. Concept of suicide was significantly related to concept of death and experiences with death and was also related to…

A study compared child and adult dyslexic readers to normal readers. Results indicated that dyslexics do not acquire appropriate levels of phoneme awareness, regardless of their age or reading levels. However, their awareness of onsets and rimes developed as their reading skills developed. (BG)

Studied 120 children's understanding of indebtedness. Fifth graders reported a diminished obligation to reciprocate help that was given at a low cost to the helper; the obligation remained high for first and third graders. All children reported more obligation to reciprocate help from acquaintances than help from friends. (LB)

Age-related differences in language and other neuropsychological variables in 60 noninstitutionalized adults with Down syndrome were examined. Results indicated that there were significant relations between advanced age and the ability to comprehend spoken language and between advanced age and independence in activities of daily living skills.…

Reports on experiments to determine effects of overt speech on children's use of inner speech in short-term memory. Word length and phonemic similarity had greater effects on older children and when pictures were labeled at presentation. Suggests that speaking or listening to speech activates an internal articulatory loop. (Author/GH)