A majority of studies on learning disabilities have focused on elementary grades. Although problems with learning disabilities are life-affecting only a few studies focus on deficits in adults. In this study adults with isolated mathematical disabilities (n = 101) and adults with combined mathematical and reading disabilities (n = 130) solved…

Developmental differences in summaries of expository texts were examined for fourth and sixth grade students in two experiments. Experiment 1 used texts that had a description content structure whereas Experiment 2 texts had a thesis/evidence content structure. Manipulation of the presence or absence of the topic sentence allowed the examination…

Tested infants in their second year with a box task to determine whether they would show a hand preference in solutions involving complete differentiation of roles for the two hands. (HOD)

Studies abacus calculation to explore the development of skills and the resulting consequences. Consideration of the effects of abacus training, transfer of the skill to other tasks, and the contexts in which abacus skill develops demonstrates the multiple ways in which specific skills can contribute to cognitive development. (ETS)

Compared performance of high- and low-education adults on traditional and meaningful space and reasoning measures. Separate analyses of variance for reasoning and space revealed main effects for education and age on both abilities. Results indicated highly educated older people performed more like their younger peers. (Author/JAC)

Issues pertaining to thinking skills are discussed in an attempt to clarify what thinking skills are and their components, how they function and how they can be developed in the teaching-learning environment. Chapter 1 reviews the definitions of thinking skills. These definitions are selected from the current literature on education and…

This paper outlines the components of initial cognitive skill acquisition and analyses features of elaborations in the instructional materials that can facilitate each component. Three basic components of skill learning are identified: (1) learning novel concepts and the functionality of novel concepts and procedures; (2) learning how to execute…

Discussion of spatial skills focuses on a quasi-experimental field study that was designed to test the possibility that elementary and secondary school library users' success in stack searches could be related to a particular spatial skill, i.e., the ability to solve large-scale mental-rotation and perspective-taking problems. (13 references) (LRW)