Two experiments examined the relationship between developmental improvement in performance on tasks requiring acquisition of spatial knowledge and age-sensitive cognitive abilities. Found that age differences in landmark knowledge were mediated primarily by recognition-in-context memory and that age differences in route knowledge were mediated…

Attention regulation was studied with 35 children with Down syndrome, ages 13-42 months, and 23 children with typical development, focusing on alternating looks between a person and an object, social referencing (using emotional responses of others to appraise ambiguous events), and links to language and cognitive development. (SW)

Previous research suggests that not until about age six do children recognize that one can gain knowledge through inferential rather than direct means. Three experiments were conducted in which important task information was made more salient to determine whether children's performance in previous research on their understanding of inference had…

Notes that violations of parent's expectancies, which are more likely during periods of rapid developmental change, provoke realignments in parent-adolescent relationships. Describes a systematic program of research exploring the nature of parental expectancies, the extent of expectancy violations during adolescence, and the consequences of these…

According to responses from 498 Australian professional women representing Levinson's 7 stages, pay satisfaction was the only 1 of 12 variables that displayed cyclic alternation between stability and transition. Some age differences appeared in terms of work involvement, aspiration, and plans to move. (SK)

This study examined qualitative developments in 96 school-aged children's expressible knowledge of 434 words (selected to represent dictionary contents). Developmental changes were found in proportions of high quality definitions, semantic and syntactic form, effects of parts of speech, morphological composition, and lexical organization. Results…

Examined children's ability to describe, understand the causes of, and realize the value of three types of pain. Preschoolers, elementary school students, and college students were interviewed using open-ended questions. Although older children had more complex and precise understandings of pain, this pattern differed according to the type of pain…

Investigated the manner in which the temporal order and variability of events influence three and seven year olds' event representation. Children participated in three events: a logical-invariant, a logical-variable, and an arbitrary-invariant event. Both the structure of the event and children's representational capabilities influenced children's…

Conducted interview with C. H. Patterson regarding the client-centered practice of supervision. Areas discussed include the importance of counseling theory to supervision, components, the question of developmental stages, the supervisory relationship, and roles. Patterson emphasizes need for supervisor to work from explicit theoretical base, both…

A total of 95 boys between 6 and 12 years of age were assigned to 1 of 4 groups based on the presence or absence of aggression and rejection and were assessed for conduct problems, sociability, and adaptability to peer expectations. Discusses the distinct problem profiles that emerged. (MDM)

Reports a study involving students who were exposed to an educational intervention curriculum designed to facilitate moral development. Describes a means of promoting moral reasoning through conceptualizing and integrating essential philosophical concepts. Concludes that the curriculum is effective in stimulating moral development and principled…

Consistency of moral judgment across different dilemmas and social contexts and the relationship between the structure and content of moral judgment was studied for 40 men given hypothetical dilemmas. Findings demonstrate that type of dilemma may affect the structure of moral reasoning and illustrate various stages of moral reasoning. (SLD)

Presented is an alternative method for analyzing the van Hiele level of students' geometrical reasoning. The accuracy of students' answers may afford a description of acquisition and/or expertise for each of the van Hiele levels simultaneously rather than the traditional assignment and evaluation of one level at a time. (JJK)

Investigated developmental change in symbolic representational ability by examining infants' imitation of vocalizations, words, visible motor actions, and nonvisible motor behaviors at ages 10, 13, 17, and 21 months. Results revealed a pattern of increasing imitation, supporting the view that a domain-independent representational capacity develops…

This study tested the predictions of Fischer's skill theory for Kitchener and King's reflective judgment model. A total of 156 14- to 28-year-old students were tested, utilizing the Reflective Judgement Interview (RJI) and Prototypic Reflective Judgement Interview (PRJI). Subjects scored higher on the PRJI than they did on the RJI. There was a…