A study involving 56 boys and 64 girls ranging in age from 9 to 11 years, approximately, found that defensiveness was significantly and positively correlated with impulsivity among boys, both directly and indirectly. Defensiveness did not contribute to impulsivity for girls either directly or indirectly, although test anxiety did correlate with…

Examined persuasive appeals and responses to appeals among kindergarten, second-, and fourth-grade friends and acquaintances. Also evaluated social perspective-taking, friendship, and self-interest reasoning as predictors of appeals and responses. Children, paired with a friend or an acquaintance, participated in a task designed to examine sharing…

Three experiments were conducted to examine the relationship between developmental differences in reinforcer preference value and in learning-set performance. A second purpose was to investigate ontogenetic differences in the effects of experience with continuous but qualitatively inconsistent reward. (Author/SB)

Investigates assumptions young listeners may make about speaker authoritativeness. First and fourth graders were asked how the protagonist in a story would respond to what could be interpreted as redundant directions. Stories varied in terms of age and certainty of speaker. (Author/RH)

Investigates whether unpopular children exhibit a bossy interpersonal style in a problem-solving situation. A detailed sequential category coding system was constructed and focused on patterns of influence among children. Sociometric measures were used to pair 44 third- and fourth-grade children into 22 dyads containing an average-status child and…

Two implications of Bartlett's constructive theory of memory (better memory for schema-consistent material and alteration of schema-inconsistent material) were tested. Procedures involved the recall of gender-relevant pictures by kindergartners, second graders, and fourth graders with either more- or less- stereotyped attitudes. Findings suggested…

Studied the verbal-nonverbal consistency principle to infer truth and lying in two experiments which involved 117 children in kindergarten, second, and fourth grade. Findings in both experiments indicated that the use of the verbal-nonverbal consistency principle increased with age. (RJC)

Second and fourth graders were assessed as skilled or less skilled in reading ability. Less skilled fourth graders performed worse than skilled second and fourth graders in recognizing the odd phoneme in a group of phonemes and performed similarly to skilled second graders on a test of verbal working memory. (BC)

When first, fourth, and fifth grade speakers played a referential communication game with a fictitious listener, they were more likely to give redundant messages to listeners with whom they had no common shared experience or to strangers than to listeners with whom they had shared a previous experience. (RH)

Familiar or unfamiliar rejected, popular, neglected, and average Black fourth-grade boys met in play groups once a week for six weeks. The investigation focused on the extent to which social status becomes reestablished in new social circumstances and behavior patterns associated with the evolution of status positions in new groups. (RH)

Attempts to identify the age range during which Type A behaviors emerge and begin to stabilize. A total of 633 children residing in two communities were assessed on the Matthews Youth Test for Health on two occasions approximately 1 year apart. (Author/RH)

Studied rejected children by assessing aspects of their self-concepts and their perceptions of relationships with significant others. Assessed possible biases in the processing of information about the self across status groups. Explored potential differences among subgroups of children who had been classified as sociometrically rejected. (RH)

Cluster analyses were employed in two studies to explore the possibility of discernible subtypes within the population of peer-rejected boys aged 9-11. Consistent patterns were seen in both studies when children in each cluster were compared with each other and with those in a popular comparison group. (RJC)

Investigates whether third- and fourth-grade children respond differently to conflict with friends and acquaintances. Results support the view that conflict between friends promotes more social development than conflict between nonfriends. Discussion among friends disagreeing on answers to social problems resulted in more mature solutions than…

Experiments revealed that children seemed able to integrate multiple sources of information but were more dependent on clue support and generally less likely to infer reason than adults. Children were more likely than adults to reject premise as an explanation of outcome. Only fourth-graders and adults modified inferences in response to resolution…