Significant gains in conservation of number, amount, mass and weight were made by 53 previously nonconserving first graders who either simply observed conservers' performance on mass and weight problems or argued with conservers about these problems. (Author/CW)

Tests the hypothesis that age-related shifts in infants' visual preferences for stimuli (varying in complexity as defined by number of light-dark intersections) are due to changing attention value both within and between the inversely varying dimensions of size and number. (Author/ED)

An investigation of peer relationships through longitudinal and cross-sectional studies of 62 children at age 2 1/2 and again at age 7 1/2. These studies specifically examined the differentiation and location of correlates of intensive and extensive peer relationships, sex differences in peer behavior, and the nature of peer-oriented behavior for…

Describes a study designed to test (1) the effects of an educational prosocial television program on learning and behavior of kindergarten children; and (2) two types of training, verbal labeling and role playing, designed to help children learn the content of the program. Children were able to generalize learning. (ED)

Examined the effects of two levels of causality (intentional-accidental), outcome quality (good-bad), and affected object (human being-physical object) on the evaluations of acts and actors and the related response latencies. Four age groups of 128 children (5-11 years) were studied, using eight stories and two 4-point scales of good-bad and…

This study examined the factors influencing the choice of the conjunctions "and" or "but" in joining two clauses of a compound sentence. Subjects were students at first-, fourth-, seventh-, and tenth-grade and adult levels. (Author/ED)

Presents a description and analysis of group glee (joyful screaming, laughing and intense physical acts occurring in simultaneous bursts or in a contagious fashion), studied by means of videotapes of 596 formal lessons in a preschool. Information collected concerned occurrence, location, frequency and duration, teachers' responses, incidence of…

Describes a group method for determining the influence of reinforcement on a child's recognition learning. Subjects were found to recognize designs and abstract paintings which they had idiographically prejudged as positive in reinforcement value more readily than those which they had prejudged as megative. (ED)

Describes a study involving administration of a home environment inventory to a sample of 77 mothers and infants in order to explore its ability to predict later mental test performance. Correlations between home inventory data and measures of infant development over a period of 30 months were higher than those typically reported. (ED)

Twenty children, 3-12 years old, were given a newly constructed interview on their concepts of human reproduction (social causality), in conjunction with Piaget-type tasks assessing physical conservation-identity, physical causality, and a new social identity task. The children's concepts of human reproduction appeared to proceed through a…

Examines themes evident in children's and mother's definitions of illness to determine how views of illness develop. Subjects were 264 children (ages 6 to 12-11) and their mothers. Two issues were considered: (a) patterned similarity in illness definitions, and (b) developmental changes in illness concepts. (ED)

Presents four studies of concept identification behavior in first graders and kindergarten children under the blocking paradigm as implemented within a multidimensional discrimination task. While blocking was observed in children's learning, the data indicate the need for more sensitive and individualized measures of stimulus control in future…

A study of the use of multiple form dimensions in pattern classification by children in Grades 2 and 5, and adults. Reliability of classification, number and saliency of features selected, and accuracy with which they were used all implied continuous development of perceptual skills. (Author/ED)

Intra- and crossmodal performance of normal and retarded third-grade readers were compared in a reaction-time task. Results suggest that the demands of stimulus complexity within the visual modality rather than the demands of crossmodal shifting were related to reading ability. (Author/ED)