A study assessed auditory sequential, short-term memory (SSTM) performance in 24 children (ages 5-11) using cochlear implants (CI). The CI group did not have a sequential memory deficit specific to the auditory modality. Visual spatial memory was the main predictor of variance in the language scores of the CI group. (Contains references.)…

Reviews the literature on the role of self understanding, language, theory of mind, attachment security, and parental style in children's autobiographical memory development. Discusses evidence that social-cognitive factors appear to interact with parental style in producing children's first verbal memories. Emotional factors, such as attachment…

Twenty-four gifted children with learning disabilities and a control group of nondisabled gifted children were administered the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised. The 8- to 12-year-old subjects were found to be more reliant on verbal conceptualization and reasoning than controls and demonstrated deficiencies in short-term auditory…

The Cognitive Levels Test (CLT) and the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised (PPVT-R) were administered to 30 freshman college students at a small state college in the mid-Atlantic region. Significant correlations indicate that the PPVT-R measures a component of the CLT. Mean PPVT-R scores were significantly higher than CLT means. (Author/PB)

Investigated 48 preschool, kindergarten, and first grade children's use of perceptual and taxonomic memory organization strategies. Addressed age differences in qualities, coordination, and effectiveness of study and retrieval organization strategies, and age and individual differences in relationships between memory knowledge and strategy use.…

Reviews research that has led to new ways of understanding mathematical development in young children. Covers research on information processing theory and cognitive science. (BB)

The effects of pictorial illustrations on memory for text were studied in 144 college students. Two experiments indicated that illustrations serve a supplementary function; adjunct pictures alone, without special processing instructions, do not help learners encode information that is not normally encoded in the first place. (SLD)

Measures of working memory capacity and measures of word knowledge were used as predictors of three measures of reading skills in 95 undergraduates. Vocabulary size and speed of accessing it were independent of word knowledge. Reading comprehension, reading speed, and text inferencing ability were independent measures of reading skill. (SLD)

Investigates the effects of reader perspective and cognitive style on encoding, storage, and retrieval processes. Finds that structural characteristics of the text itself may affect storage and retrieval processes but not encoding processes, and that reader perspective shows no effect on a delayed recognition test. (RS)

Refutes the idea that critical thinking is not a skill by analyzing it from the phenomenological perspective of Edmund Husserl, and from the hermeneutic perspective of Martin Heidegger. Develops the thesis that critical thinking is a restructuring of schemata. Addresses the problem of attention or student engagement. (LS)

The effects on mathematics achievement of having fifth graders engage in elaborative and integrative processing were studied using 121 students. Subjects were randomly assigned to cognitive-processing, fact-sheet, or control groups. Results show that cognitive processing is related to memory and understanding and is more effective for higher…

A computerized assessment battery was developed to determine memory impairment in head-injured individuals, using an interactive video system, consisting of a videodisc player, microcomputer, and video display. Subtests measure reaction time; reaction time with distractors; recall of object locations, grocery list, and names/faces; telephone use;…

Examined whether speech rate is related to the amount recalled and if developmental increases in speech rate allow faster rehearsal with age, and hence, greater recall. Found that the group relationship was clear and replicable but that speech rates of individual children were not good predictors of those children's memory spans; age was found to…

Seventy-seven children (ages 5-13) with mild to moderate mental retardation were presented with addition problems. The patterns of strategies used were found to be similar to those used by intellectually normal children, though counting-on and memory strategies were used by subjects with greater frequency. Strategies became more sophisticated with…

Thirty-four children (ages 5-16) born to alcoholic mothers were assessed on measures of intelligence, reading, receptive vocabulary, memory for sentences, visual memory, and visual-motor integration. The children were found to be least deficient on intellectual measures and most deficient on memory for sentences and silent and oral readings.…