Subjects rated how certain they were that each of 60 statements was true or false. Embedded in the list was a set of statements that were either repeated across several sessions or were not repeated. Frequency of occurrence is apparently a criterion used to establish referential validity of plausible statements. (CHK)

Decisions about whether pairs of letter strings are both words or not are faster for semantically related words than unrelated words. Two experiments showed the semantic relatedness effect is greatly reduced when orthographically illegal, unpronounceable strings were used as negative items. Lexical decisions involve options on codes representing…

This study investigated developmental changes in the role of causality in perceiving and remembering events. Subjects were 99 children in kindergarden, third and sixth grades. (MS)

Learning and retention of procedural versus declarative memory tasks were examined with 26 young adults with mild mental retardation and 27 school children matched for mental age. The MR adults performed more poorly on both types of tasks, although learning rate and retention over time were comparable, thereby maintaining the control group's…

Investigated 4- to 6-year olds' creation and use of external representation strategies in problem solving. Found that direct training and increasing salience of task dimensions increased use of external representations. Four-year olds showed a utilization deficiency in external representation strategy use in the prompt conditions, but not in the…

A comparison of the Rivermead Behavioural Memory Test (B. Wilson, 1987) and the Wechsler Memory Scale--Revised conducted with 20 neurotoxin-exposed and 20 unexposed adults finds that the two tests do not differ significantly in their relationships to estimates of everyday memory, and using both tests does not improve prediction of memory function.…

The Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning (WRAML) (D. Sheslow and W. Adams, 1990) was given to 51 children. The General Memory Index (GMI) of the WRAML was compared with a short form of the WRAML, the Memory Screening Index (MSI). The MSI was higher than the GMI in 41 of 51 cases. (SLD)

Wechsler Memory Scale-Revised (WMS-R) scores were analyzed for 82 epilepsy surgery candidates and used in combination with receiver operating characteristic curves to classify patients with left (LTL) and right (RTL) temporal lobe seizure onset. Results indicate that WMS-R scores used alone or in combination provide relatively poor discrimination…

Investigated time delays (immediate, two-three days, one week) between viewing a staged theft and attempting an eyewitness identification. Compared lineups to one-person showups in a laboratory analogue involving 412 subjects. Results show that across all time delays, participants maintained a higher identification accuracy with the showup…

Investigated the effects of the presence and typicality of detail in a witness' testimony on mock juror judgments. Results indicate that the presence of detail affected the ratings of witnesses. Atypical or typical detail provided by one witness, with no detail provided by the opposing witness, enhanced assessments of the former. (RJM)

Two studies explored the following two issues important in understanding the development of knowledge-based inferencing: (1) how children of different ages use a circumscribed and available knowledge base to make two types of inferences important for comprehension; and (2) how the accessibility of an available knowledge base is related to…

Investigated preschool children's suggestibility following exposure to biased information. Children heard a story followed the next day by either biased, unbiased, or no information. Found that children were able to identify the original story details six days later when the questions were phrased in an explicit manner that referred to the time of…

Describes several "inaccurate" statements made in L. Thomas' and T. Levine's article in this journal (volume 21, page 103) regarding the current author's research and positions on the listening construct. Suggests that Thomas' and Levine's model has serious methodological flaws. (RS)

Presents comments about R. Bostrom's article in this journal. Suggests that Bostrom missed the point of Thomas' and Levine's original article. (RS)

In their homes, older adults who were not informed that they were to be given memory tests completed the Metamemory in Adulthood Questionnaire. Motivation and anxiety during testing had more effect on memory than did self-efficacy. The setting influenced performance. (SK)