A previous study by Gibson et al. (1972) that investigated the effect of orthographic structure on letter search was replicated and extended in order to identify factors that might explain the apparent discrepancy between their results and those of comparable studies. Experiment one tested whether the discrepancy might be explained by difference…

Reviews recent experimental and theoretical analyses of the relationship between level of processing and retention, and reports on two studies which tested predictions about the effects of orienting activities on retention. (AM)

In experiments where hypnotized subjects learned one word list while happy or sad, retention proved to be surprisingly independent of the congruence of learning and testing moods. Learning mood provided a helpful retrieval cue and differentiating context only where subjects learned two word lists, one while happy, one while sad. (EJS)

In six experiments subjects saw and pronounced, either aloud or silently, seven-item lists made from vocabularies of phonologically identical items. These materials were used to test the predictions of a precategorical and a postcategorical hypotheses for the modality effect in immediate memory. (Author/SW)

Examined overregularization of irregular verb forms in children's language learning. Found that overregularization errors are relatively rare; occur at a constant rate; and are not correlated with the proportion of regular verbs in parents' or children's speech. Also found that a period of correct performance precedes the child's first error. (BC)

A study examined use of passive and antipassive constructions in the spontaneous utterances and picture comprehension responses of young speakers of Quiche Mayan, aged 1-5. This usage was compared with use of similar constructions in English-speaking children. Quiche-speakers' usage was found to be precocious in comparison with English-speakers'…

Focusing on language development--from beginning speech to literacy--with particular attention paid to growth in writing, this paper identifies and describes: (1) links between speech and writing; and (2) features of children's written and spoken texts that indicate growth. The process of constructing "texts" is presented as the fabric…

A question of both theoretical and practical importance for the study of phonological development is whether there is a difference in the status of productions rendered spontaneously by the child and those repeated by the child after either an adult model or his own production. The relevant theoretical questions are: (1) Are all the child's…

Reports on research showing that when an event, or a problem, is repeated, the processing of that event is not necessarily repeated. Instead, sometimes the solution is remembered, and this is shown to influence subsequent retention, as well as such tasks as word perception. (AM)

A cross-section method was used to study the developmental changes in elementary decoding and encoding processes of 163 Swedish-German bilingual students, whose length of residence in Sweden varied. It was demonstrated that decoding in two languages, expressed in terms of reaction time, develops faster than encoding. (SW)

The acquisition of the copula and auxiliary "be" forms of "am,""is," and "are" was studied with 16 children. Spontaneous social speech samples were obtained from each child. One child's speech was sampled for approximately one hour per week from age 2;5 through 4;0, and for one-half hour per week from age 4;1 to 5;0. A second child's speech was…

The ontogenetic development of human vocal utterances and their role in early interaction processes were studied with a three-month-old baby. Recordings were made of infant vocalizations in the home and the sounds were classified. During a five-minute segment between the mother and infant, the infant produced 59 utterances, 93 percent of which had…

The results of a number of experiments with the memorizing of several different subject-matters are presented in such a way that the relationship between number of opportunities for error (word elements faded) and number of errors actually made can be observed for individuals and groups. The particular selection of word elements to be taught by…

Phonetic symbolism implies that there are intrinsic relationships between sounds employed in words and the meanings of the words. Research in phonetic symbolism and how it operates has implications for foreign language learning. Such research seeks to determine whether one's capacity for correctly guessing the meanings of words in another language…

A study was conducted to determine if verbs were learned as easily as other words by primary school children. One hundred eight kindergarten children were divided into high, medium, and low I.Q. ranges and each range group was further divided--one group for each of three testing methods at each intelligence level. A list of words including 25…