Currently, professionals disagree about whether children should be informed about their illnesses and the possibility of their deaths. Some experts feel discussion of these subjects would only upset the children while others feel this knowledge is the children's right and will allay the children's anxieties. What is needed but not available is…

A group of clinically depressed mothers and their infants were studied to ascertain effects of mothers' emotional condition on children's behavior and development. Participants in the study were 29 families with an infant believed to be at psychiatric risk. Maternal depression was assessed at the time of family intake with the Center for…

A study investigated whether children expect color similarity to be less important than form similarity in object label extensions. Twenty 2-year-olds and 20 3-year-olds were asked to sort objects similar in either color or form in two different situations: (1) the "No Label" condition where children were asked to help the puppet put objects that…

The cumulative deficit hypothesis with respect to age decrement in IQ was investigated in large samples of white and black school children in rural Georgia between the ages of 5 and 18. The cumulative deficits hypothesis suggests that the increasing decrement in mental test scores, relative to population norms, is a function of age in groups…

This paper presents an overview of the development of play in children from 9 to 34 months of age, focusing specifically on those aspects of play which occur with sufficient consistency to function as markers for judging developmental progress in clinical populations of young children. A procedure for assessing the sophistication of spontaneous…

Mental ages for normals' and for retardates' achievement on 21 Piagetian measures of reasoning are presented in this exploratory longitudinal study. Before standardization data can be provided, a study which involves a more extended sample is necessary. It is, however, suggested that: (1) Normals' (IQ 90-110) transition from concrete to formal…

Describes a study of fifth grade students' ability to process information from a play, and compares the results to related information from television research. (JC)

Examined oset and acquisition of language comprehension and production in a language delayed child through analysis of a daily diary. In addition to confirming that the gap between comprehension and production was greater than that found in normal children, data from these observations can also be used to add to a general understanding of the…

Presents results of two case studies involving the acquisition of English in a natural environment, as well as the results of two judgment tests in which subjects were asked to judge the grammaticality of sentences containing both correctly and incorrectly used dative verbs. (SL)

Noting that the lower performance of low-income children on false belief tasks in comparison to that of middle-income children has not been adequately explained, this study examined the possibility that black children's experiences and talents with storytelling may facilitate their performance on false belief tasks when narrative questions are…

Little is known of children's knowledge of text search processes and the role of metacognition. This study examined middle school students' knowledge of text search strategies and the correlation between metacognitive awareness and search efficiency. Sixty-nine students in sixth, seventh, and eighth grade were observed as they searched in an…

Compared the social cognitive styles of abused children with a control sample and found differences in perceived locus of control of social events and social role comprehensions. Similar trends emerged in perspective-taking skills and social sensitivity. Suggests these differences could not be attributed to IQ or class disparities. (Author)

In this study 610 kibbutz and city boys and girls from grades 3 to 6 were compared on the following variables: stages of moral judgment, external reactions to transgression (fear and punitiveness), and internal reactions to transgression (guilt and confession). (Author/MP)

This study investigated whether the process of representational change undergoes developmental change or different processes occupy different niches in the course of knowledge acquisition. Subjects--college, third-, and sixth-grade students--solved gear system problems over two sessions. Findings indicated that for all grades, discovery of the…

Results of a study of 23 7th-grade students revealed that underachievers are less self-confident, less socially and emotionally mature, less able to focus on one concern at a time, less accurate in their perceptions about themselves and their work, and less hardworking than achievers. (IAH)