We investigated the conditions under which preparatory information presented 1 day before a novel event influenced 6-year-olds' recall 1 week later. Children were assigned to one of six experimental conditions. Three conditions involved preparatory information that described the event accurately but differed according to the presence and type of…

Overtensing (the use of an inflected form in place of a nonfinite form, e.g. *"didn't broke" for target "didn't break") is common in early syntax. In a ChiLDES-based study of 36 children acquiring English, I examine the effects of phonological and lexical factors. For irregulars, errors are more common with verbs of low frequency and when…

Background: Medication errors can result in harm, unless barriers to prevent them are present. Drug administration errors are less likely to be prevented, because they occur in the last stage of the drug distribution process. This is especially the case in non-alert patients, as patients often form the final barrier to prevention of errors.…

In visual search tasks, observers look for targets in displays containing distractors. Likelihood that targets will be missed varies with target prevalence, the frequency with which targets are presented across trials. Miss error rates are much higher at low target prevalence (1%-2%) than at high prevalence (50%). Unfortunately, low prevalence is…

Many theories of category learning assume that learning is driven by a need to minimize classification error. When there is no classification error, therefore, learning of individual features should be negligible. The authors tested this hypothesis by conducting three category-learning experiments adapted from an associative learning blocking…

This study tested the prediction that the error-related negativity (ERN), a physiological measure of error monitoring, would be enhanced in anxious individuals, particularly in conditions with threatening cues. Participants made gender judgments about faces whose expressions were either happy, angry, or neutral. Replicating prior studies, midline…

This study examined the interrelations among negative cognitive errors, anxiety sensitivity, and anxiety control beliefs and explored their unique and specific associations with anxiety symptoms in a community sample of youth. Existing research has suggested that these constructs are related to childhood anxiety disorder symptoms; however,…

Errors made by language learners in learning a language are regarded as failure of competence. Linguists believe that errors are committed when the learner makes use of the learning strategies. By analyzing the learner's errors, we can better understand his inter-language and his learning process. It's necessary to understand the roots of errors…

This study investigated middle school students' conceptual understanding of algebraic equations. Participants in the study--257 sixth- and seventh-grade students--were asked to solve one set of algebraic equations and to generate story problems corresponding with another set of equations. Structural aspects of the equations, including the number…

The Decennial Census is the most important data collection activity undertaken by the U.S. federal statistical system. Because census data are used to apportion Congress and draw redistricting lines for thousands of state and local single-member districts to meet the one-person/one-vote guidelines, the census is at the heart of the political…

Diagnostic errors are an important source of medical errors. Problematic information-gathering is a common cause of diagnostic errors among physicians and medical students. The objectives of this study were to (1) determine if medical students' information-gathering patterns formed clusters of similar strategies, and if so (2) to calculate the…

In this research, we examined overall performance and gender differences in measurement skills in elementary-school students from low-income families. In Study 1, accuracy and error patterns were analyzed in a large sample of fourth-graders; in Study 2 error patterns and strategy usage were examined with a smaller sample of fourth-graders. Study 1…

Ease of processing of 3,969 English words for native speakers and Japanese learners was investigated using lexical decision and naming latencies taken from the English Lexicon Project (Balota et al. The English Lexicon Project: A web-based repository of descriptive and behavioral measures for 40,481 English words and nonwords, 2002) and accuracy…

This retrospective case study assessed the influence of item non-response error on subsequent response to questionnaire items assessing adolescent alcohol and marijuana use. Post-hoc analyses were conducted on survey results obtained from 4,371 7th to 12th grade students in Ohio in 2005. A skip pattern design in a conventional questionnaire…

An equation, introduced by Goodman and Kruskal for obtaining a reliability measure of one item was expanded. This formula determines inter-rater reliability for a series of items across many subjects. The statistic that results is easily interpreted and in many ways is analogous to the conventional reliability for quantitative data. (Author/BJG)