Participants (N=24) included undergraduates and nontraditional students over age 25. Of the critical events investigated, 27 percent were qualitatively different from Chickering's description of developing autonomy but were similar to his relationship task. Concluded there is no single way to develop autonomy. (Author/ABL)

Offers specialists in group work with incest survivors a developmental perspective. Links suggestions for therapy to developmental issues. (Author/ABB)

Discusses utility of Kantor and Lehr's three family types for the study of divorce, including these types in their ideal and flawed forms. Traces a course for each type, from factors leading to divorce through plausible postdivorce responses. Closes with implications for the treatment and study of families who divorce. (Author/ABL)

Examines the perceptions of one experienced and four inexperienced college writers regarding the functions of writing in academic settings, citing social and personal factors influencing content and motivation. Presents 13 functions following a developmental sequence identified through inference by the researcher, including responsive, evaluative,…

One factor leading to the "invention" of modern adolescence was what the reformers saw as the corruption of youth by the city. The plight of youth set the stage for a child-saving movement during the last century, taking youth off the streets, putting them in schools, and stretching out the home-leaving age from 14 to 18. (Author/KS)

Used a set of six measures to analyze both the products and process of spatial grouping in 40 children between the ages of 18 and 42 months. Results confirmed and elaborated on previously established developmental findings for each measure. (SKC)

An examination of the relationship of faculty levels of moral reasoning to that of students at various stages of a teacher education program revealed that no group of students (including graduate level) exhibited faculty members' abilities to recognize principled moral judgments and that the student groups did not differ from each other in such…

Four studies investigated whether inconsistency of children aged four to six on developmental tasks may reflect a misinterpretation of the experimenter's intent in communication under repeated questioning. (SKC)

Discusses adolescent spiritual development using the three traditional stages in Catholic spiritual heritage (the purgative, illuminative, and unitive). Suggests specific strategies for helping young people "progress" or move to higher levels in their spirituality. (GEA)

This article reports on a pilot study on the development of historical understanding of elementary school children. Historical fiction was shared with second, fourth, and sixth grade children who retold the story and answered questions. Results are evaluated and suggestions for history instruction at the elementary level are discussed. (Author/MT)

This article describes sensory input systems and reflexes that are critical to normal functioning and explains some commonly used techniques for evaluating neurological development. Skillful use of evaluation and intervention techniques can help neurologically developmentally delayed children reach mature performance levels. (MT)

Defines life-span developmental psychology as the study of constancy and change in behavior throughout the life course. Advances metatheoretical view regarding development. Stresses focus on the dynamic and continuous interplay between growth (gain) and decline (loss). Examines structural contextual factors and study of range of plasticity in…

A model of individual developments is described and a framework is presented for developing group environments that match the developmental levels of women and men who are dealing with sex role issues. (Author/KS)

Examines criticisms of existing models of adult development from both feminist and developmental psychologists. A model of women's adult self-definition is presented, based upon current research on women's adult experience. The model combines a dialectical approach, which considers the effects of social/historical factors, with a feminist…

In three experiments, a multiple habituation paradigm was used to examine the ability of 7- and 9-month-old prelinguistic infants to form a natural, basic-level object category. Findings constitute independent evidence for the existence of a linguistically relevant nonlinguistic category prior to the onset of word comprehension. (SED)