Current Search: Department of Psychology (x) » Cognition in children (x)
View All Items
- Title
- Accuracy of child event frequency reports.
- Creator
- Dirghangi, Shrija R., Laursen, Brett, Florida Atlantic University, Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
The current study assessed whether the accuracy of children’s self-reports of events experienced differs as a function of age and how the question is asked. Additional factors like metamemory and distractibility were assessed. Primary-school students (M= 7.7 years) and middle-school students (M = 9.7 years) completed two different versions of an event frequency measure, two times, at one week intervals. In one of the measures of event frequency, no memory prompts were provided (uncued...
Show moreThe current study assessed whether the accuracy of children’s self-reports of events experienced differs as a function of age and how the question is asked. Additional factors like metamemory and distractibility were assessed. Primary-school students (M= 7.7 years) and middle-school students (M = 9.7 years) completed two different versions of an event frequency measure, two times, at one week intervals. In one of the measures of event frequency, no memory prompts were provided (uncued questionnaire condition), while in the other measure, recall categories for aiding recollections were provided (cued questionnaire condition). Participants’ self-reported event frequencies for the cued and uncued questionnaires were compared with trained observers’ event frequencies for the cued and uncued conditions. Older children reported event frequency more accurately than younger participants. Participants also reported events with greater accuracy with the aid of memory prompts than without, an effect that was especially strong among the younger children. Neither metamemory nor distractibility was accountable for the differences within age groups. The findings suggest that age-related improvements in accuracy of event frequency across the transition into adolescence may, in part, be due to improvements in the ability to recall and recount those events in the absence of memory cues.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2014
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004190, http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004190
- Subject Headings
- Cognition in adolescence, Cognition in children, Memory -- Age factors, Memory in adolescence, Memory in children, Metacognition
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Children's adaptave strategies in a tool use task.
- Creator
- Weinstein, Allison., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Problem solving and strategy adaptation was assessed in 47 children ranging from 36 to 67 months. This was evaluated through problem sets in which participants were given tools that failed to reach given goal states, and then instructed to select appropriate tools in order to reach desired results. Analyses revealed that when participants were given a choice of tools to solve a given problem, they were more likely to select a correct tool when options were similar in function and appearance....
Show moreProblem solving and strategy adaptation was assessed in 47 children ranging from 36 to 67 months. This was evaluated through problem sets in which participants were given tools that failed to reach given goal states, and then instructed to select appropriate tools in order to reach desired results. Analyses revealed that when participants were given a choice of tools to solve a given problem, they were more likely to select a correct tool when options were similar in function and appearance. Additionally, participants were more likely to verbalize the need for a new tool when there was a lack of novel tool choices. However, the presence of a novel tool choice was linked to longer problem solving time. Findings are congruent with literature that suggests children possess the ability to select tools based on functional, not superficial, qualities, and can be easily distracted by the presence of novel stimuli.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3356896
- Subject Headings
- Learning, Psychology of, Educational tests and measurements, Cognition in children, Cognitive styles in children, Human information processing in children, Individual differences in children
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Children's conceptual understanding of growth.
- Creator
- Copeland, Aquilla D., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Growth is a property that is unique to living things. Studies demonstrate that even preschool children use growth to determine whether objects are alive. However, little identifies explanations that children use to attribute growth. The goal of the present study was to investigate how people reason about growth. We hypothesized that older children would outperform younger children in understanding that growth is inevitable for living things, while adults would consistently perform at ceiling...
Show moreGrowth is a property that is unique to living things. Studies demonstrate that even preschool children use growth to determine whether objects are alive. However, little identifies explanations that children use to attribute growth. The goal of the present study was to investigate how people reason about growth. We hypothesized that older children would outperform younger children in understanding that growth is inevitable for living things, while adults would consistently perform at ceiling levels. Our hypothesis was partially supported. Although adults consistently outperformed children, older children rarely outperformed younger children. Still, both younger and older children performed above chance in attributing growth. Moreover, all participants were more likely to use biological explanations to explain growth. Taken together, this research qualifies the early hypotheses of Piaget (1929) and Carey (1985) that children lack a well developed biological domain before age nine, but suggests that a biological domain, though less developed, is present. Based on these findings, implications for more efficient approaches to science education are discussed.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2010
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/2974434
- Subject Headings
- Cognition in children, Imagery (Psychology) in children, Child development, Identity (Psychology) in children
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Developing mechanisms of self-regulation: an integrative perspective.
- Creator
- Kadin-Pessoa, Aviva R., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Parents' and children's behaviors are intricately woven together over the course of development. Consequently it is difficulty to determine the sources of influence predicting socially and academically oriented outcomes. Research from several developmental fields suggests that developing mechanisms of attention during the preschool years is crucial for both emotional and cognitive control. The current study shows that parental responsive behavior is important in understanding the development...
Show moreParents' and children's behaviors are intricately woven together over the course of development. Consequently it is difficulty to determine the sources of influence predicting socially and academically oriented outcomes. Research from several developmental fields suggests that developing mechanisms of attention during the preschool years is crucial for both emotional and cognitive control. The current study shows that parental responsive behavior is important in understanding the development of voluntary attention. More specifically, the results suggest that parental awareness, assessed utilizing their perceptions of attentive temperament is an important factor in predicting their own behavior and the developmental outcomes of their children.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2010
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/2705084
- Subject Headings
- Parent and child, Attachment behavior in childhood, Family, Psychological aspects, Emotions and cognition, Cognition in children, Human information processing, Attribution (Social psychology)
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Development of inhibition as a function of the presence of an intentional agent.
- Creator
- King, Ashley., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
This thesis examined the developmental differences in inhibition and theory-of-mind of 4-8 year olds as a function of the suggested presence of a supernatural agent. All children played four games designed to assess their current level of inhibition and theory-of-mind performance; Children in the experimental condition, only, were also introduced to an invisible Princess Alice and were told that she was watching during the games. Following these measures, all children engaged in a resistance...
Show moreThis thesis examined the developmental differences in inhibition and theory-of-mind of 4-8 year olds as a function of the suggested presence of a supernatural agent. All children played four games designed to assess their current level of inhibition and theory-of-mind performance; Children in the experimental condition, only, were also introduced to an invisible Princess Alice and were told that she was watching during the games. Following these measures, all children engaged in a resistance-to-temptation task to determine any differences in inhibition resulting from Princess Alice's suggested presence. I found that children exhibiting a well-developed theory-of-mind were more likely to express belief in Princess Alice than were children lacking this cognitive ability. This research provided support that cognitive maturity, rather than immaturity, may be necessary for children to express belief in novel supernatural agents, and highlighted the importance of context as a mediating factor in children's behavioral inhibition.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/227977
- Subject Headings
- Child psychopathology, Physiological aspects, Cognition in children, Philosophy of mind in children, Inhibition
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- The development of math strategies in a sociocultural context.
- Creator
- Hubertz, Martha J., Florida Atlantic University, Bjorklund, David F., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Current studies are rapidly investigating strategy choice on tasks such as math and reading that children encounter in day to day life; it follows that strategy development should also be examined in the naturalistic settings where children actually perform these tasks. From a sociocultural learning perspective, we examined five year old children's arithmetic strategy use, in a game context, with the most likely of mentors for a young child, his or her parents. Children played three games of...
Show moreCurrent studies are rapidly investigating strategy choice on tasks such as math and reading that children encounter in day to day life; it follows that strategy development should also be examined in the naturalistic settings where children actually perform these tasks. From a sociocultural learning perspective, we examined five year old children's arithmetic strategy use, in a game context, with the most likely of mentors for a young child, his or her parents. Children played three games of a modified version of "Chutes and Ladders" with one of their parents. Children's strategy use and parents' behavior were coded and analyzed. Results indicate that parents usually provided appropriate support to their children, providing more direction and assistance to the children who required them, and less to those who did not.
Show less - Date Issued
- 1999
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fcla/dt/15731
- Subject Headings
- Mathematical ability, Problem solving in children, Cognition in children
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Functional constraints on young children's object problem solving.
- Creator
- Bidmead, Sarah, Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Although some research has suggested that very young children are "immune" to functional fixedness (FF), other work has shown that young children form robust associations between objects and their prescribed functions. Across two studies, I investigated (a) the developmental trajectory of FF and (b) its relationship with executive function components (inhibitory control and working memory) in 3- to 6-year old children. Both older and younger children experience FF, but older children use...
Show moreAlthough some research has suggested that very young children are "immune" to functional fixedness (FF), other work has shown that young children form robust associations between objects and their prescribed functions. Across two studies, I investigated (a) the developmental trajectory of FF and (b) its relationship with executive function components (inhibitory control and working memory) in 3- to 6-year old children. Both older and younger children experience FF, but older children use familiar tools more flexibly than younger children (3- and 4-year olds). Furthermore, inhibitory control was related to overcoming FF, indicating that it may be an important cognitive capacity for creative problem-solving. Finally, in a third study, children were instructed to use mental imagery to help them solve the functional fixedness problems. However, these instructions were ineffective at reducing FF compared to a control condition, underscoring the robust nature of object-function relationships in early childhood.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3359286
- Subject Headings
- Learning, Psychology of, Developmental psychology, Cognition in children, Visual perception in chldren
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Infants' perception of synthetic-like multisensory relations.
- Creator
- Minar, Nicholas J., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Studies have shown that human infants can integrate the multisensory attributes of their world and, thus, have coherent perceptual experiences. Multisensory attributes can either specify non-arbitrary (e.g., amodal stimulus/event properties and typical relations) or arbitrary properties (e.g., visuospatial height and pitch). The goal of the current study was to expand on Walker et al.'s (2010) finding that 4-month-old infants looked longer at rising/falling objects when accompanied by rising...
Show moreStudies have shown that human infants can integrate the multisensory attributes of their world and, thus, have coherent perceptual experiences. Multisensory attributes can either specify non-arbitrary (e.g., amodal stimulus/event properties and typical relations) or arbitrary properties (e.g., visuospatial height and pitch). The goal of the current study was to expand on Walker et al.'s (2010) finding that 4-month-old infants looked longer at rising/falling objects when accompanied by rising/falling pitch than when accompanied by falling/rising pitch. We did so by conducting two experiments. In Experiment 1, our procedure matched Walker et al.'s (2010) single screen presentation while in Experiment 2 we used a multisensory paired-preference procedure. Additionally, we examined infants' responsiveness to these synesthetic-like events at multiple ages throughout development (four, six, and 12 months of age). ... In sum, our findings indicate that the ability to match changing visuospatial height with rising/falling pitch does not emerge until the end of the first year of life and throw into doubt Walker et al.'s (2010) claim that 4-month-old infants perceive audiovisual synesthetic relations in a manner similar to adults.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fcla/dt/3362552
- Subject Headings
- Cognition in children, Individual differences in children, Infant psychology, Infants, Development, Perception in infants, Intersensory effects
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Multisensory Cues Facilitate Infants’ Ability to Discriminate Other-Race Faces.
- Creator
- Minar, Nicholas J., Bjorklund, David F., Florida Atlantic University, Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Our everyday world consists of people and objects that are usually specified by dynamic and concurrent auditory and visual attributes, which is known to increase perceptual salience and, therefore, facilitate learning and discrimination in infancy. Interestingly, early experience with faces and vocalizations has two seemingly opposite effects during the first year of life, 1) it enables infants to gradually acquire perceptual expertise for the faces and vocalizations of their own race and, 2)...
Show moreOur everyday world consists of people and objects that are usually specified by dynamic and concurrent auditory and visual attributes, which is known to increase perceptual salience and, therefore, facilitate learning and discrimination in infancy. Interestingly, early experience with faces and vocalizations has two seemingly opposite effects during the first year of life, 1) it enables infants to gradually acquire perceptual expertise for the faces and vocalizations of their own race and, 2) it narrows their ability to discriminate the faces of other-race faces (Kelly et al., 2007). It is not known whether multisensory redundancy might help older infants overcome the other-race effect reported in previous studies. The current project investigated infant discrimination of dynamic and vocalizing other-race faces in younger and older infants using habituation and eye-tracking methodologies. Experiment 1 examined 4-6 and 10-12-month-old infants' ability to discriminate either a native or non-native face articulating the syllable /a/. Results showed that both the 4-6- and the 10-12-month-olds successfully discriminated the faces,regardless of whether they were same- or other-race faces. Experiment 2 investigated the contribution of auditory speech cues by repeating Experiment 1 but in silence. Results showed that only the 10-12-month-olds tested with native-race faces successfully discriminated them. Experiment 3 investigated whether it was speech per se or sound in general that facilitated discrimination of the other-race faces in Experiment 1 by presenting a synchronous, computer-generated "boing" sound instead of audible speech cues. Results indicated that the 4-6-month olds discriminated both types of faces but that 10-12-month-olds only discriminated own-race faces. These results indicate that auditory cues, along with dynamic visual cues, can help infants overcome the effects of previously reported narrowing and facilitate discrimination of other-race static, silent faces. Critically, our results show that older infants can overcome the other race-effect when dynamic faces are accompanied by speech but not when they are accompanied by non- speech cues. Overall, a generalized auditory facilitation effect was found as a result of multisensory speech. Moreover, our findings suggest that infants' ability to process other- race faces following perceptual narrowing is more plastic than previously thought.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2015
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004525
- Subject Headings
- Cognition in children, Individual differences in children, Infant psychology, Infants -- Development, Intersensory effects, Perception in infants
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Neuroplasticity and the developing brain: the psychophysiological effects of mindfulness meditation on school-aged children.
- Creator
- Worch, Sarah M., Jones, Nancy Aaron, Florida Atlantic University, Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Many studies have supported the overall health benefits of mindfulness meditation practices for adults, but research exploring such benefits for children is sparse. The present study explored the psychophysiological effects of mindfulness meditation over a 10 week-period on a sample of 2nd-and 4th-grade children. Electroencephalograph (EEG) asymmetry and coherence were recorded at baseline and immediately after the meditation intervention for the experimental group, and at baseline and after...
Show moreMany studies have supported the overall health benefits of mindfulness meditation practices for adults, but research exploring such benefits for children is sparse. The present study explored the psychophysiological effects of mindfulness meditation over a 10 week-period on a sample of 2nd-and 4th-grade children. Electroencephalograph (EEG) asymmetry and coherence were recorded at baseline and immediately after the meditation intervention for the experimental group, and at baseline and after 10 weeks for the control group. Measures of affect, behavioral motivation, creativity, and depression were also administered. The primary findings indicated that when improvement in depressive symptoms occurred for 4th-grade students who were somewhat engaged in meditation practice, left-sided frontal EEG activity was also more prominent. Additionally, 4th-grade students who actively participated in meditation practice experienced decreases in self-reported levels of negative affect. Results suggest that mindfulness meditation is beneficial for improving 4th-grade students’ mood and brain regions associated with mood.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2014
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004238, http://purl.flvc.org/fau/fd/FA00004238
- Subject Headings
- Brain -- Physiological aspects, Cognition in children, Mind and body, Mindfulness based cognitive therapy, Psychophysiology
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Remembering the future: individual differences in metacognitive representation predict prospective memory performance on time-baseed [sic] and event-based tasks in early childhood.
- Creator
- Causey, Kayla B., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Prospective memory is remembering to perform an action in the future, such as attending a meeting (a time-based task) or picking up milk at the gas station (an eventbased task), and is crucial to achieving goal-directed activities in everyday life. Children who fail to develop prospective memory abilities are likely to experience difficulties interacting with parents, teachers, and peers. To date, research on prospective memory development has been primarily descriptive or focused on...
Show moreProspective memory is remembering to perform an action in the future, such as attending a meeting (a time-based task) or picking up milk at the gas station (an eventbased task), and is crucial to achieving goal-directed activities in everyday life. Children who fail to develop prospective memory abilities are likely to experience difficulties interacting with parents, teachers, and peers. To date, research on prospective memory development has been primarily descriptive or focused on underlying executive functioning. This dissertation investigated the developmental relationship between metacognitive representation and prospective memory in preschool and elementary school children and adults. Findings from Study 1 indicated that individual differences in representational ability independently predicted individual differences in 3-year-olds' performance on event-based tasks that are of low-interest. Qualitative changes are important to consider when modeling prospective memory develop ment, as with episodic memory. Study 2 presents findings based on a study using the CyberCruiser 2.0, an Xbox-style racing game designed to assess time-based prospective memory. This study confirmed that kindergarten children are capable of completing this time-based prospective memory task but revealed that performance improved with age. Between kindergarten and 2nd grade, children become better aware of their own mental processes and abilities, allowing them to adjust their strategies and perform more comparable to adults. As a result, in this study, younger children tended to overestimate their prospective memory abilities and were less likely to monitor passing time, causing them to fail more time-based task trials than older children and adults., Similarly, participants who underestimated the costs of prospective memory failed more time-based tasks relative to those who more accurately assessed these costs. Although this latter relationship was limited to adults, it suggests that a poor metacognitive understanding of the costs of prospective memory may result in missed opportunities to carry out a delayed intention if individuals fail to allocate attentional resources appropriately. These findings have theoretical implications for models of prospective memory and development. Practical implications for educating children are also discussed.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2010
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/2974431
- Subject Headings
- Metacognition, Memory, Pyschological aspects, Social psychology, Cognition in children
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- THE ROLE OF ASSOCIATIVITY IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF STRATEGIC ORGANIZATION IN CHILDREN'S MEMORY.
- Creator
- JACOBS, JOHN WILLIAM, Florida Atlantic University, Bjorklund, David F., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
Cognitive theorists hypothesize two types of cognitive processes (e.g., automatic and effortful) which may influence human information processing. This thesis investigates age differences in when children use intralist associative relationships (thought to be automatic in nature) to identify other (categorical) relations. Use of conceptual/ categorical relations to organize recall is thought to be effortful in nature. Sixty children each from grades 3, 5, 7, and 9 were presented orally with...
Show moreCognitive theorists hypothesize two types of cognitive processes (e.g., automatic and effortful) which may influence human information processing. This thesis investigates age differences in when children use intralist associative relationships (thought to be automatic in nature) to identify other (categorical) relations. Use of conceptual/ categorical relations to organize recall is thought to be effortful in nature. Sixty children each from grades 3, 5, 7, and 9 were presented orally with lists of 20 words under free-recall instructions. Results provide support for the position that recall memory of young children is mediated primarily by associative rather than conceptual relationships. Also, partial support was obtained for the three stage model of the development of organization proposed by Bjorklund and Zeman (1982). However, the model's prediction of when children will optimally use associative relationships to identify categorized relations was inaccurate. These results indicate that older childrens' recall can be facilitated by automatic cognitive processes resulting in higher levels of clustering (organization) and recall.
Show less - Date Issued
- 1984
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/fcla/dt/14187
- Subject Headings
- Memory in children, Association of ideas, Cognition in children
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- Young children's artifact conceptualization: a child centered approach.
- Creator
- Schultz, Patricia P., Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, Department of Psychology
- Abstract/Description
-
One of the most fundamental functions of human cognition is to parse an otherwise chaotic world into different kinds of things. The ability to learn what objects are and how to respond to them appropriately is essential for daily living. The literature has presented contrasting evidence about the role of perpetual features such as artifact appearance versus causal or inductive reasoning in chldren's category distinctions (e.g., function). The present project used a child-initiated inquiry...
Show moreOne of the most fundamental functions of human cognition is to parse an otherwise chaotic world into different kinds of things. The ability to learn what objects are and how to respond to them appropriately is essential for daily living. The literature has presented contrasting evidence about the role of perpetual features such as artifact appearance versus causal or inductive reasoning in chldren's category distinctions (e.g., function). The present project used a child-initiated inquiry paradigm to investigate how children conceptualize artifacts, specifically how they prioritize different types of information that typify not only novel but also familiar objects. Results underscore a hybrid model in which perceptual features and deeper properties act synergistically to inform children's artifact conceptualization. Function, however, appears to be the driving force of this relationship.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3320103
- Subject Headings
- Cognition in children, Child development, Reasoning in children, Reasoning (Psychology)
- Format
- Document (PDF)