This paper aims to compare cognitive development in humans and chimpanzees to illuminate the evolutionary origins of human cognition. Comparison of morphological data and life history strongly highlights the common features of all primate species, including humans. The human mother-infant relationship is characterized by the physical separation of…

The conditional intervention principle is a formal principle that relates patterns of interventions and outcomes to causal structure. It is a central assumption of experimental design and the causal Bayes net formalism. Two studies suggest that preschoolers can use the conditional intervention principle to distinguish causal chains, common cause…

Looking-time studies examined whether 11-month-old infants can individuate two pairs of objects using only shape information. In order to test individuation, the object pairs were presented sequentially. Infants were familiarized either with the sequential pairs, disk-triangle/disk-triangle (XY/XY), whose shapes differed within but not across…

Weak Central Coherence (Frith, 1989) predicts that, in autism, perceptual processing is relatively unaffected by conceptual analysis. Enhanced Perceptual Functioning (Mottron & Burack, 2001) predicts that the perceptual processing of those with autism is less influenced by conceptual analysis only when higher-level processing is detrimental to…

This study tests the firm distinction children are said to make between living and nonliving kinds. Three, 4-, and 5-year-old children and adults reasoned about whether items that varied on 3 dimensions (alive, face, behavior) had a range of properties (biological, psychological, perceptual, artifact, novel, proper names). Findings demonstrate…

We conducted four experiments to examine developmental differences in preferences for using color, size, and location information to disambiguate hiding places. Three- and 4-year-olds and adults described how to find a miniature mouse that was hidden in one of two highly similar small objects in a dollhouse. In Experiment 1, the hiding places…

While research indicates that humans tend potentially to develop towards wisdom in later years, a review of mainly participant-determined groups and courses in 338 lifelong learning centers for older people shows little interest in wisdom or personal development activities. With the suggestion that this apparent lack of interest may be partially…

This paper examines the effects of different child-care arrangements on children's cognitive and social proficiencies at the start of kindergarten. Using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, we identify effects using OLS, matching and instrumental variables estimates. Overall, center-based care raises reading and math scores, but has…

Fuzzy trace theory explains why children do not have to use rules of logic or premise information to infer transitive relationships. Instead, memory of the premises and performance on transitivity tasks is explained by a verbatim ability and a gist ability. Until recently, the processes involved in transitive reasoning and memory of the premises…

The Boehm Test of Basic Concepts (BTBC) (Boehm, 1971) was administered to 99 children (ages 7-10) who had been diagnosed as learning disabled and attended special schools in the New York area. It was hypothesized that the learning disabled children would exhibit a delay in the acquisition of the basic concepts, but would display a similar order of…

The third in a series of three booklets intended for parents of young handicapped children addresses cognition. The development of cognition is discussed and milestones charted from birth to age five. Learning processes are enumerated (using the senses, attending, exploring, adapting, imitating, and asking questions). Suggestions are given for…

Forty-four 7- and 8-year-old boys were classified as having high or low concrete reasoning ability or as being in a transitional state. Findings indicated that frustrated boys exhibit regression more than nonfrustrated boys and that the extent to which they regress is dependent upon cognitive level. (GO)

This study identified new methodological variables which might affect the responses of second and third grade children to Piagetian conservation tasks. (GO)

Two experiments were conducted which investigated the developmental patterns of children's rehearsal and organization of material to be memorized. (JMB)