Individual differences in young children's recall and clustering of pictures

Children's incidental recall of pictures was examined in two related experiments. Extrapolating from adult research, it was predicted that categorizing pictures with respect to their semantic properties would yield greater recall than categorizing them according to their physical properties. In Experiment 1, second-grade children were exposed to 16 line drawings cross-classified to represent four taxonomic categories and four shape categories, with four instances per category. Control subjects simply looked at pictures. Semantic subjects identified each picture's semantic category, and Physical subjects identified each physical category. In Experiment 2, first graders freely sorted the pictures and were classified as Semantic or Physical sorters based on their predominant bases for sorting. Following exposure (Experiment 1) or sorting (Experiment 2), all subjects were asked to recall the picture names. Results of both experiments show that semantic classification yields greater recall than physical classification. Experiment 2 also shows that semantic sorting yields greater semantic clustering in recall and that sorting by physical category yields greater physical clustering. It was suggested that children's preferences for a mode of processing (Experiment 2) may constitute an individual difference dimension with fairly clear-cut instructional implications.     

A transition model for placement of handicapped children in regular and special classes

Mainstreaming and deinstitutionalization are current phenomena which call for a variety of handicapped children to be transitioned to a range of educational settings not previously available to them. A model is presented in which critical transition parameters are conceived as functionally related continua, indicating degrees of readiness for both special and regular classroom settings. The model is based upon actual experience in placement of disturbed, learning disabled, and retarded children into school settings after discharge from a psychiatric hospital.     

Ground zero: The information war in the Persian Gulf

This article provides an overview for the symposium while delving into specific facts about the development and implementation of the Pentagon's press policy during the Persian Gulf War. The article assesses the military-media relationship, and the Pentagon's own policy development, in the aftermath of the invasions of Grenada and Panama. It describes the power and authority of the President, and civilian and military leaders, at the time of the war, to supersede the best intentions and plans of Pentagon public affairs specialists. It reveals the inability of the media during war to perceive and impact how such policy is shaped. The article identifies, as a high priority, the independent, timely, and accurate reporting to the nation when America enters combat.     

Effects of knowledge of semantic roles on summarizing written prose

College students wrote summaries of eight short passages as a test of their ability to identify important information. After pairing naive summaries according to length and original passage, those summaries which judges identified as “better” were found to contain significantly more of the major semantic roles, such as Agent and Instrument, than did summaries judged “not as good.” It was also found that students wrote significantly better summaries when instructed to base the summaries on the major semantic roles within the passage. These summaries were significantly better than summaries based upon the traditional paragraph analysis of “topics” and “main ideas,” and they were significantly better than summaries written without any special instructions.     

The development of visual short-term memory capacity in infants

Four experiments assessed visual short-term memory capacity in 4- to 13-month-old infants by comparing their looking to changing and nonchanging stimulus streams presented side by side. In each stream, 1 to 6 colored squares repeatedly appeared and disappeared. In changing streams, the color of a different randomly chosen square changed each time the display reappeared; the colors remained the same in nonchanging streams. Infants should look longer at changing streams, but only if they can remember the colors of the squares. The youngest infants preferred changing streams only when the displays contained one object, whereas older infants preferred changing streams when the displays contained up to 4 objects. Thus, visual short-term memory capacity increases significantly across the first year of life.