In a study of 6 to 14 year olds' knowledge of illness, younger children used concepts not related to illness when sorting illness-related stimuli. They also used concepts related to behavior, rather than symptoms, when performing tasks involving recognition of illness and causes of illness. Older children believed that symptoms signaled disease.…

Changes in children's understanding of experimentation are examined. Sixteen fifth and sixth graders worked on two experimentation problems consistent with an engineering and science model, respectively. The science model was associated with broader exploration, more selectiveness about evidence interpreted, and greater attention to establishing…

Reviews two major theories of cognitive development based on Perry's Developmental Process and the Wellesley Study, and offers examples and suggestions for their application in academic library instruction. Learning strategies that respond to differences in levels of cognitive abilities are described, and the role of faculty who request…

Traces the relationship between human development and education through various philosophies. Explores differences in early forms of understanding, the goals of education, and the kinds of knowledge that specific fields require. Encourages a form of apprenticeship to provide students with a model for bridging the gap between scholastic and…

Discusses the effects of gender differences in education and employment on the economies of countries worldwide. Stresses some strong points of the monograph reported in this issue, such as the discrimination between cognitive and affective dimensions of sex typing, and suggestions for alleviating sex stereotyping. Suggests that the monograph has…

Found that recent stressful life events were negatively associated with aspects of children's social development. Also found that certain coping styles and family characteristics were more predictive of children's social development than were other coping styles and were more predictive of children's psychosocial adjustment than their cognitive…

Presents study results of how children reason about international trade. Explains that open ended questions were posed to students in grades 1-11 asking why nations trade, the benefits of trade, and their understanding of barriers to trade. Concludes that teaching fundamentals of international trade can be introduced as early as grade six. (DK)

Argues that the capacity for consciousness of self and others arises from developing representational and perceptual activities, especially during play. Examines young children's development of symbolic play, from sensorimotor exploration to representational play through five stages involving gestures of recognition, self-pretend and pretend play,…

Questionnaires assessed preschool teachers' concepts of cognitive development, educational goals for children's cognitive development, and curriculum activities used to foster children's cognitive development. Teachers' goals and activities were more consistent with environmental learning theory than with cognitive development theory or…

Verbal and musical stimuli were presented to infants in a study of the relations of evoked potential left-right amplitude asymmetries to gender and hand preference. There was a relation between asymmetry and hand preference, and for girls, between asymmetry and stimulus condition. Results suggest a gender difference in cerebral hemisphere…

Presents an annotated bibliography on religious development that covers the areas of psychology and religion, measurement of religiousness, religious development during the life cycle, religious experiences, conversion, religion and morality, and images of God. (Author/BB)

Results of three experiments indicate that the developmental increase in memory span cannot be explained by differences in identification time or by the hypothesis that articulation time is the sole or major cause for the increase. It is argued that the development of memory span with age depends on a combination of factors. (BC)

Discussed are categorization schema, with elaborations about attendant epistemological obstacles, concerning the twin notions of understanding and comprehension, per se, as well as the processes affecting their attainment. Included is an example of such a schema involving the concept of the limit of a numerical sequence. (JJK)

This study assessed social perspective taking in 57 children classified as educable mentally retarded divided into 3 age groups from 8-16 years. Significant differences in social perspective taking were obtained between the three groups in understanding individuals and between the older and two younger groups in understanding friendship.…

Children either saw, were told about, or felt the contents of a toy tunnel. They were asked what was in the tunnel and how they knew the contents. Three year olds had difficulty identifying the sources of their knowledge. Questions that involved inference proved to be especially difficult for them. (BC)