Empathy and executive functions (EFs) are multimodal constructs that enable individuals to cope with their environment. Both abilities develop throughout childhood and are known to contribute to social behavior and academic performance in young adolescents. Notably, mentalizing and EF activate shared frontotemporal brain areas, which in previous…

This study contributes to the investigation of the variability of the schooling effect on cognitive development between educational systems and its underlying factors, by focusing on 3 cases differing in the characteristics assumed to affect the magnitude of the schooling effect (the quality of the schooling and students' mean ability to benefit…

The expansion of digital technologies and the rapid changes they undergo through time face users with new cognitive, social, and ergonomic challenges that they need to master in order to perform effectively. In recent years, following empirical reports on performance differences between different age-groups, there is a debate in the research…

The Snijders-Oomen Nonverbal Intelligence Test (SON) was administered to 251 deaf children (6-15 years old) and 101 hearing children (10-12 years old) in Israel. The SON was judged appropriate for measuring cognitive functioning in the deaf because it requires no verbal instructions or responses and includes a measure of abstract thinking ability.…

Tests the hypothesis that semantic memory changes with age such that concepts become more strongly associated with their superordinate classes than with their exemplars. The Stroop color-naming technique was employed with 48 children 8 through 12 years of age to measure the degree of semantic activation between concepts in memory. (Author)

A grouping task revealed a chronological progression: color and form determined the 4-year-old children's grouping about equally; form dominated in the 5-year-olds; and 9-year-olds grouped primarily by conceptual attributes. Performance on a memory task showed the developmental shift from color to form to concept, while cued recall showed…

Used a Jewish Rating Scale and Piagetian scale to investigate the influence of intellectual growth on ethnic self-definition and the meaning of Jewishness to Jewish children in Israel. Found a high positive correlation between children's age and the mode of their definition of their Jewishness. (Author/BB)

Examined effects of negative group stereotypes on reasoning about peer retribution (child hits another child in response to name calling) among 2,604 Arab and Jewish adolescents in Israel. Found evidence that Arab and Jewish students hold stereotypes about one another and that in-group bias affected approval and reasoning about peer retribution…