Young children use and comprehend different kinds of speech acts from the beginning of their communicative development. But it is not clear how they understand the conventional and normative structure of such speech acts. In particular, imperative speech acts have a world-to-word direction of fit, such that their fulfillment means that the world…

Working memory capacity is now well established as a rate determining factor in much learning and assessment, especially in the sciences. Most of the research has focussed on performance in tests and examinations in subject areas. This paper outlines some exploratory work in which other outcomes are related to working memory capacity. Confidence…

Theory of mind (ToM) refers to the ability of an individual to make inferences about what others may be thinking or feeling and to predict what they may do in a given situation based on those inferences. Discussions of ToM focus almost exclusively on inferred cognitive structures and processes and shed little light on the actual behaviors…

Research examining the development of social cognition has largely been divided into two areas: infant perception of intentional agents, and preschoolers' understanding of others' mental states and beliefs (theory of mind). Many researchers have suggested that there is continuity in social cognitive development such that the abilities observed in…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to offer a better understanding of the development of neuromotor control for speech breathing and provide a normative data set that can serve as a useful standard for clinical evaluation and management of young children with speech disorders involving the breathing subsystem. Method: Speech breathing was…

Developmental counseling is a promising model integrating theory and practice. A. E. Ivey's (2000; A. E. Ivey & O. F. Goncalves, 1988) work is discussed as a template for proposing a more comprehensive developmental perspective. Where A. E. Ivey's model renders a case for cognition, the current article encompasses other developmental systems…

This study examined collective efficacy, group cohesion, and group performance in 125 randomly assigned groups of older (mean age 13.45 years) and younger (mean age 11.41 years) early adolescents working on three cooperative tasks. Collective motivation significantly predicted performance, even after controlling for past performance and…

Three studies are reported that assess 5-, 7- and 10-year-old children's cognitive inclusion of the ingroup in the self. Each study investigated a different ingroup: gender, family, and age group. Children were shown sets of cards identifying particular trait adjectives and were asked to rate the extent to which the traits applied to the self, the…

Tourette syndrome (TS) is a developmental disorder characterized by unwanted, repetitive behaviours that manifest as stereotyped movements and vocalizations called "tics". Operating under the hypothesis that the brain's control systems may be impaired in TS, we measured resting-state functional connectivity MRI (rs-fcMRI) between 39 previously…

Dabrowski's theory of positive disintegration describes patterns and explains mechanisms of human development and has been successfully applied to understanding of gifted individuals. This article shows how the concepts of chaos theory and self-organization such as the sensitivity to initial conditions, positive and negative feedback, bifurcation…

The researchers studied humour among Chinese and Greek preschool children in relation to cognitive development. The sample included 55 Chinese children and 50 Greek children ages 4½ to 5½ years. Results showed that both Chinese and Greek children's humour recognition were significantly and positively correlated to their cognitive development, but…

The authors use the ECLS-B, a nationally-representative study of children born in 2001 to report the child care arrangements and quality characteristics for 2-year olds in the United States and to estimate the effects of differing levels of child care quality on two-year old children's cognitive development. Their goal is to test whether high…

Mathematics is an increasingly important aspect of education because of its central role in technology (Kuenzi, 2008). Mathematical achievement tests are universally applied throughout schooling in the US to assess yearly progress. The middle school years (e.g., Grade 6-Grade 8) are especially crucial to success in mathematics because students…

The Common Core State Standards, released in June 2010, offer an opportunity to shift education away from shallow, test-prep instruction and toward a focus on key cognitive skills, writes Conley. Two consortia of states are now developing common assessments to measure these standards--assessments that will be designed to capture deeper, more…

This study describes national school district policy and practice regarding elementary school children's outdoor learning and play. District representatives from 173 randomly selected school districts completed questionnaires describing policy and practice related to recess, outdoor play, outdoor curricular studies, playground materials, ADA…