Examined changes in preschoolers' ability to distinguish among memories of performed, pretended, and imagined episodes, and used source monitoring as a tool for inferring the nature of preschoolers' conceptualization of pretense. Found significant improvements between ages three and four in their ability to distinguish performed actions from…

Questioned 573 elementary students about alcohol/tobacco. Most said they would ask parents questions about alcohol and tobacco. Students were aware of reasons people used alcohol or tobacco but did not know harm involved in taking drugs. If offered beer or cigarettes, most said they would refuse. Noticeable increase in number who would accept…

Presents study results on gender differences in economic knowledge. Addresses the question of whether gender gaps in economic understanding widen as students progress through college. Reports that no evidence was found to support the hypothesis that significant and consistent gender differences exist in college students' performances on economic…

The article offers six suggestions to help educators teach for true understanding: identify concepts and multiple meanings; create appropriate definitions; pay attention to prior knowledge; provide examples; focus on central elements of the concept; and establish solid evaluation procedures. (SM)

Notes that effective measures of knowledge about mental health in later life are valuable in needs assessments and educational program evaluations. Describes development of two short, true/false quizzes, one on alcohol problems, other on depression and suicide in later life. Discusses usefulness of quizzes in planning and evaluating community…

This study found that parents (n=118) who believed their preschool children to be gifted tended to (1) have specific beliefs concerning the constituents of giftedness, (2) exhibit a fairly high degree of accuracy in their judgements, and (3) have beliefs differing as a function of their children's actual ability levels. (Author/DB)

This paper evaluates the current information base on sexuality of people with intellectual disabilities, specifically in the areas of sexual knowledge, sexual experience, sexual feelings and attitudes, and sexual need. Consideration of this information is critical in developing appropriate sex education programs that can enhance the quality of…

Uses data from the Longitudinal Survey of American Youth to examine the effects of secondary teachers' mathematics and science subject matter preparation on pupil performance gains. Teacher knowledge level positively affects students' learning gains. Effects of subject matter preparation diminish with time and vary across different types of…

Finds that socioeconomic status was significantly linked to public affairs knowledge, both directly and through perceived utility indicators and news media use. (SR)

Thirty-six test-wise and 41 test-naive high school seniors completed a 14-item test designed to assess their abilities to apply selected test-wiseness principles. Results indicate that, before students can profitably apply test-wise skills, they must first possess knowledge about the content of the stem or options. (Author/KS)

A study that has uncovered robust memories among former students for material learned in a college course after as long as 11 years is discussed. This is in contrast to the widespread conviction that the passing of years wipes away most recollections of concepts and facts learned in school. (KR)

The role of a subject's conceptual knowledge in the procedural task of searching a text for information was studied for 51 college undergraduates in 2 experiments involving knowledge of anatomy. Students with more anatomical information were able to search a text more quickly. Educational implications are discussed. (SLD)

This study examined the vocational interests and work motivation of 152 trainees attending vocational rehabilitation centers for the mentally retarded in Israel. Consistent patterns of vocational knowledge, vocational interests, and motivational variables emerged. Vocational knowledge was associated with vocational interests rather than with level…

Two levels of representation in text comprehension were postulated: a propositional representation and a mental (or situation) model of the content of the text. Experimental results suggest that performance differences attributable to domain-specific knowledge reflect differences in the construction of the mental model. (26 references) (Author/LB)

Semistructured interviews with 15 masters-level biology students revealed that most proposed deterministic explanations of evolutionary processes, ignored the role of chance, seemed unaware of debates over deterministic versus probabilistic models of evolution, and confused evolutionary theory (a model) with the actual complex processes it…