Background: Recent reports showed that children born with intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR) are at greater risk of experiencing verbal short-term memory span (STM) deficits that may impede their learning capacities at school. It is still unknown whether these deficits are modality dependent. Methods: This long-term, prospective design study…

The effects of lexical context on phonological processing are pervasive and there have been indications that such effects may be modulated by attention. However, attentional modulation in speech processing is neither well documented nor well understood. Experiment 1 demonstrated attentional modulation of lexical facilitation of speech sound…

An experimental test battery designed to measure several perceptual abilities was administered to 1,368 (51.8% male) paying clients of the Johnson O'Connor Research Foundation (JOCRF) in an effort to identify and measure three perceptual abilities: (1) flexibility of closure; (2) speed of closure; and (3) spatial scanning. Subjects, who ranged in…

This paper develops a theoretical context for the concept that visual literacy involves a specific type of information processing that has been discussed in the literature on symbolism and epistemology for a number of years. Literacy is discussed first, as a general process of information processing involving the generation of knowledge through…

In an attempt to address the issue of bimodal coordination of featural stimuli, the sensitivity of 3-month-old infants to the auditory and visual components of male and female stimulus configurations was examined. Measures were made of the infants' visual attention to a male or female face while they listened to a male voice, female voice, or to…

Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children scores obtained by 20 Down's syndrome children (ages 8-12) were compared with scores of 20 younger siblings and 20 nonretarded children matched for mental age. Among results were that Down's syndrome children performed significantly better on subtests employing visual as opposed to auditory channels of…

Right-hemispheric specialization for tactual processing was investigated in right-handed preschool children. Cross-modal transfer from touch to vision was assessed while children palpated shapes with hand while music was simultaneously played to ear. Left-hand advantage and lateralized nature of interference among older children supports…

Discusses how an individual's visual system processes cues to motion in depth. A theoretical model of the operations of the visual system that underlie the perception of motion in depth is included. (HM)

Two experiments studied the impact of the nature of information available at different processing levels on differences in haptic (tactile) and in visual, free classification development. Found that exploration characteristics (involving simultaneous versus independent processing of stimulus dimensions) and presentation of the stimulus dimensions…

Four experiments tested the hypothesis that the importance of linguistic labels for young children's conceptual organization stems from a privileged processing status of auditory input over visual input. Findings indicated that when auditory and visual stimuli were presented separately, 4-year-olds were likely to process both kinds of stimuli,…