The utility of schematic maps as tools for the early stages of both peer counseling and self-counseling was explored in two studies. In experiment 1 (self-counseling), 42 students (18 males and 24 females) from undergraduate general psychology classes participated to fill course requirements. Participants were assigned to a schematic map or essay…

Research has shown that unrealistically-optimistic people believe that they will experience fewer negative events and more positive events than other persons. This paper analyzes a scale which was designed to measure the several cognitive dimensions underlying unrealistic optimism about health. For this study, 220 college students completed a…

Discusses cognitive mapping as a way of finding out how a teacher perceives software and describes a study in which student teachers constructed cognitive maps of software to help determine teaching and learning strategies. Implications of teachers' perceptions of software content of courses using computer-assisted learning are discussed.…

Discusses an approach to meeting the reading needs of students who must read and understand difficult technical material but have limited reading skills. Describes a graphic organizer that shows relationships among concepts so that students have a map or diagram of the passage to be read. (JOW)

The article attempts to explain why geography seems to attract more boys than girls. Attention is given to how gender-related differences in spatial behavior around the home influence the development of mapping abilities. Recommendations are suggested in terms of how teachers need to be more aware of the influence of gender upon performance levels…

Because knowledge is constantly in flux, it is important for individuals to accurately incorporate new information into previously developed knowledge structures. Some of the issues surrounding this development of thought are explored in this paper. Although the phenomenon of knowledge integration is relatively common, very little empirical…

Investigates reasons for raters assignment of particular scores on a speaking test through the use of a method called "concept mapping." Based on results, suggests that information gained from this method can be used in rater training to emphasize key rating criteria that have been deemphasized or overlooked by raters to improve the validity of…

The learning process may be described as personal maps of reality--the way in which individuals construct knowledge and how new experiences change the maps. When new material is encountered, learners place it somewhere on their maps; the teacher's role is to relocate it closer to the learner. (SK)

A longitudinal study examined the role of a mapping system in 2-year olds' learning of color and size words. Results indicated that the children acquired color maps in a characteristic order and showed a different acquisition pattern for size words. Results suggest that learning word associations may promote color-word acquisition; learning color…

The present research examined how 3- and 5-year-old Japanese children map novel nouns and verbs onto dynamic action events and generalize them to new instances. Studies 1 to 3 demonstrated that although both 3- and 5-year-olds were able to map novel nouns onto novel objects, only 5-year-olds could generalize verbs solely on the basis of the…

Individuals' mental maps of the world are highly misrepresentative of the actual world. Availability in memory partly explains the reasons for this misrepresentation. When asked to place the 50 states in their correct locations, students have difficulty with states not in close proximity to their own because of availability, such that the…

Implementing generationally appropriate activities for persons with dementia is a challenging task. Horticulture therapy (HT) addresses this challenge through the use of plants to facilitate holistic outcomes. Utilizing the model of environmental press, the current study sought to analyse adult day service (ADS) participants' responses to HT as…

Perceptual discrimination between speech sounds belonging to different phoneme categories is better than that between sounds falling within the same category. This property, known as ''categorical perception,'' is weaker in children affected by dyslexia. Categorical perception develops from the predispositions of newborns for discriminating all…

This article is concerned with the correspondence conditions that hold between certain semantic relations--including part-whole relations, possession, location, and the semantic features [+- animate] or [+- count]--and certain syntactic structures including genitives and relative clauses. The objective is to determine the extent to which these…

Over the past few years evidence-based practice has become of central concern to health and social services in this country. The fundamental tenant is that there must be a clear link between professional practice and its research base. This paper outlines the concept of evidence-based practice and how it rests on the concept of good quality…