Twenty high mental age (MA) subjects and 33 low MA subjects who had been in a free word association test 30 months previously were retested with the Moran 80-Word List. At the time of the previous testing, subjects in the high group had a mean chronological age (CA) of 17.1 and mean MA of 11.5; subjects in the low group had a mean CA of 15.3 and…

Intelligence tests should be used to help persons; they should not be used to penalize persons. Furthermore, our focus should be on treatment; it should not be on labeling. IQ testers often stigmatize young children and poor persons (children, adolescents, adults). Large groups of Black Americans, Spanish Americans, and Indian Americans are…

This study of individual differences in performance of a geometric analogies task included four-alternative test items and studied eye movements and confidence judgments as well as latency and error. Results were interpreted using two hypothesized performance strategies: constructive matching and response elimination. (Author/BW)

Intended as a nontechnical review of current scientific knowledge in the field, this essay considers the nature of primary and secondary intellectual abilities, plus the major features of, and the development of individual differences in, the skills and capacities constituting intelligence. Part of a theme issue on intelligence. (Author/SJL)

A study explored working memory (WM) capacity, WM task requirements, as well as effects between WM, skills, knowledge base, and intelligence in adults with mental retardation and children aged 3-6 years. Adults were better on measures reflecting skills and knowledge base. Children performed better in phonological and visuo-spatial WM tasks.…

Fifty-six children (ages 43 to 83 months) participated in an event conducted by two undergraduates dressed as clowns. Ten days later, interviews found metamemory ability, intellectual functioning, and temperament were helpful in determining a child's capacity to accurately recall information, although for the most part age was the best predictor.…

This illustrated booklet describes research procedures in the Infant Laboratory of the Educational Testing Service to investigate measurable factors in infant behavior which can predict intellectual potential. The research is currently focusing on attending, the manner in which infants respond to various stimuli presented to them during their…

Retarded and nonretarded persons were compared on a task designed to preclude the use of cognitive strategies. Results suggest the possible importance of automatic processing deficiencies and invite a reconsideration of the idea that the relationship between intelligence and memory is due entirely to effortful processes. (LMO)

The concurrent and discriminant validity of La Prueba de Analisis Auditivo, a Spanish auditory perception test, and the validity of the perceptual deficit hypothesis and of hypotheses derived from verbal processing theory were evaluated in a sample of 114 second-grade Hispanic pupils receiving reading instruction in Spanish. (Author/BW)

Cognitive style identifies the ways individuals react to different situations. Cognitive styles include stable attitudes, preferences, or habitual strategies that distinguish the individual styles of perceiving, remembering, thinking, and solving problems. Intended for researchers, psychologists, child development specialists, and early childhood…

In a study of the relationship between speed of information processing and general intelligence, vocational college students (50 black males and 56 white males) took eight different reaction time tests measuring the speed with which individuals perform various elementary cognitive processes, and a group test of scholastic aptitude (the Armed…

Groups of retarded and nonretarded children were investigated as they learned three rules underlying problems adapted from the Raven Progressive Matrices Test: rotation, imposition, and subtraction. Results were seen as consistent with theories that emphasize transfer flexibility as one potential source of individual and comparative differences in…

Current studies of cognition emphasize the contrast between two approaches to analysis of individual differences. It is concluded that the cognitive components approach incorporates the cognitive correlates approach, avoids the inadequacy of correlational methods, and models individual differences on various dimensions of cognitive functioning.…

Two introductory passages, one regular passage, and one experimental advance organizer passage developed to facilitate initial learning were assigned to normal and retarded children. The subjects were 184 normal 8-year-olds (controls' mean IQ 118.00, organizers' 118.80) and 184 educable mentally retarded 15-year-olds (EMR controls' mean IQ 74.85,…

In behavioral science research, language has been increasingly seen to reflect the concepts that the child has acquired prior to, and hence independent of, the acquisition of language. Analyses based on this idea are confined largely to words that denote clear perceptual referents. Language, however, contains many terms that have no portrayable…