We tested whether changes in attribution processes could account for the developmental differences observed in how children's use fluency to guide their memory decisions. Children ranging in age from 4 to 9 years studied a list of familiar or unfamiliar cartoon characters. In Experiment 1 (n = 84), participants completed a recognition test during…

What processes do infants employ in categorizing? Infants might categorize on line as they encounter category-related entities; alternatively, infants might depend on prior experience with entities in formulating categories. These alternatives were tested in forty-four 5-month-olds. Infants who were familiarized in the laboratory with a category…

When presented simultaneously with equally discriminable, but unfamiliar, visual and auditory stimuli, 4-year-olds exhibited auditory dominance, processing only auditory information ( Sloutsky & Napolitano, 2003). The current study examined factors underlying auditory dominance. In 6 experiments, 4-year-olds (N181) were presented with auditory and…

Three experiments used a familiarization/novelty or a habituation/dishabituation procedure to examine developmental change in infants' tendency to parse exemplars into separate categories. Results indicated that 10-month olds appeared to form differentiated categories, whereas 4- and 7-month olds formed a single category to include the range of…

Children often perseverate, repeating prior behaviors when inappropriate. This work tested the roles of verbal labels and stimulus novelty in such perseveration. Three-year-old children sorted cards by one rule and were then instructed to switch to a second rule. In a basic condition, cards had familiar shapes and colors and both rules were stated…

Four-year-olds were tested for their ability to use differences in the spacing among features to recognize familiar faces. They were given a storybook depicting multiple views of 2 children. They returned to the laboratory 2 weeks later and used a "magic wand" to play a computer game that tested their ability to recognize the familiarized faces…