Of mice (Mus musculus) and toddlers (Homo sapiens): Evidence for species-general spatial reorientation.

There is ongoing debate in spatial cognition about the mechanisms by which organisms are able to reorient, or reestablish a position, in the world after losing their bearing. The traditional view is that there is an encapsulated reorientation module that can only process environmental geometry such as distances or angles (Cheng, 1986). Recently, this view has been challenged on the grounds that the reorientation mechanism is only able to accept geometric information and may instead depend on a more general ability to use relative cues. J. Huttenlocher and S. F. Lourenco (2007) demonstrated that toddlers are successfully able to reorient with continuous cues but show remarkable deficits using categorical cues that are similar in perceptual complexity for reorientation. Here, the authors show the same pattern of results with mice (Mus musculus). These findings provide evidence that there is a homologous reorientation mechanism between mice and humans. Thus, future researchers can examine the genetic basis of this important cognitive ability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Learning about environmental geometry: An associative model.

K. Cheng (1986) suggested that learning the geometry of enclosing surfaces takes place in a geometric module blind to other spatial information. Failures to find blocking or overshadowing of geometry learning by features near a goal seem consistent with this view. The authors present an operant model in which learning spatial features competes with geometry learning, as in the Rescorla-Wagner model. Relative total associative strength of cues at a location determines choice of that location and thus the frequencies of reward paired with each cue. The model shows how competitive learning of local features and geometry can appear to result in potentiation, blocking, or independence, depending on enclosure shape and kind of features. The model reproduces numerous findings from dry arenas and water mazes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Encoding of geometric and landmark information in the left and right hemispheres of the avian brain.

Chicks were trained binocularly to find food buried under sawdust in the center of a square enclosure. When tested in an enclosure made larger or smaller in size, binocular and left-eyed chicks searched mainly on the basis of relative distance of the food from the enclosure walls, whereas right-eyed chicks searched on the basis of absolute distance. Moreover, binocular and left-eyed chicks relied mainly on global spatial information (i.e., distances from the walls), whereas right-eyed chicks also used information provided by visual landmarks. These results suggest that the right hemisphere of the avian brain (fed mostly by the left eye) is primarily concerned with encoding of relational spatial information, whereas the left hemisphere (fed mainly by the right eye) is concerned with absolute metric information, possibly as part of an encoding strategy based primarily on local (both spatial and nonspatial) cues. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A sourcebook for whom? Review of Adaptive learning: Behavior modification with children.

Reviews the book, Adaptive learning: behavior modification with children by B. A. Ashem and E. G. Poser (1972). The remarkable rate of growth in the development and application of behavior modification programs over the past few years has been paralleled by an equally remarkable proliferation of books and articles. This proliferation is reflected in a recent bibliography of behavior modification bibliographies (Klein, 1973) and several listings indicating the existence of not less than 100 books on the topic (e.g., Martin, 1971; Mash, 1973). It is within this framework that the offering by Ashem and Poser of a sourcebook in behavior modification techniques for children must be considered. It is my general conclusion that while the readings included in this collection are certainly of a high enough quality, the absence of sufficient editorial integration and introduction makes them somewhat less than useful. However, for those having an initial background and wanting to get some feel for a range of applications, the book could be useful. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The sources of normativity: Young children's awareness of the normative structure of games.

In two studies, the authors investigated 2- and 3-year-old children's awareness of the normative structure of conventional games. In the target conditions, an experimenter showed a child how to play a simple rule game. After the child and the experimenter had played for a while, a puppet came (controlled by a 2nd experimenter), asked to join in, and then performed an action that constituted a mistake in the game. In control conditions, the puppet performed the exact same action as in the experimental conditions, but the context was different such that this act did not constitute a mistake. Children's normative responses to the puppet's acts (e.g., protest, critique, or teaching) were scored. Both age groups performed more normative responses in the target than in the control conditions, but the 3-year-olds did so on a more explicit level. These studies demonstrate in a particularly strong way that even very young children have some grasp of the normative structure of conventional activities. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

From children's hands to adults' ears: Gesture's role in the learning process.

Children can express thoughts in gesture that they do not express in speech--they produce gesture-speech mismatches. Moreover, children who produce mismatches on a given task are particularly ready to learn that task. Gesture, then, is a tool that researchers can use to predict who will profit from instruction. But is gesture also useful to adults who must decide how to instruct a particular child? We asked 8 adults to instruct 38 third- and fourth-grade children individually in a math problem. We found that the adults offered more variable instruction to children who produced mismatches than to children who produced no mismatches--more different types of instructional strategies and more instructions that contained two different strategies, one in speech and the other in gesture. The children thus appeared to be shaping their own learning environments just by moving their hands. Gesture not only reflects a child's understanding but can play a role in eliciting input that could shape that understanding. As such, it may be part of the mechanism of cognitive change. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Ability mindsets influence the quality of mothers' involvement in children's learning: An experimental investigation.

This research examined the role of mothers' mindsets about the malleability of children's ability in the quality of their involvement in children's learning. Mothers (N = 79) of early elementary school children (mean age = 7.65 years) were induced to hold either an entity mindset, in which children's ability is seen as unchangeable, or an incremental mindset, in which children's ability is seen as changeable. Mothers and children were then observed as they worked on a set of challenging problems for 15 min. Unconstructive involvement (i.e., performance-oriented teaching, control, and negative affect) was more frequent among mothers induced to hold an entity mindset than those induced to hold an incremental mindset. Mothers with an entity (vs. incremental) mindset also responded to children's helplessness more unconstructively. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex and contextual effects on children's use of interference competition.

Prior research with children and nonhuman animals suggests that females engage in interference competition, in which 1 individual reduces another's chances of gaining access to a resource, only when resources are scarce, whereas males use it ore widely. This study was designed to compare males' and females' use of interference competition in games in which resources were scarce or plentiful. Forty groups of 4 same-sex children from kindergarten or Grade 4 played the 2 games on 2 days. Grade 4 girls used less interference competition when resources were plentiful than when they were scarce. Results are useful for generating a contextually based model of the development of sex differences in competitive behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fears, phobias, and preparedness: Toward an evolved module of fear and fear learning.

An evolved module for fear elicitation and fear learning with 4 characteristics is proposed. (a) The fear module is preferentially activated in aversive contexts by stimuli that are fear relevant in an evolutionary perspective. (b) Its activation to such stimuli is automatic. (c) It is relatively impenetrable to cognitive control. (d) It originates in a dedicated neural circuitry, centered on the amygdala. Evidence supporting these propositions is reviewed from conditioning studies, both in humans and in monkeys; illusory correlation studies; studies using unreportable stimuli; and studies from animal neuroscience. The fear module is assumed to mediate an emotional level of fear learning that is relatively independent and dissociable from cognitive learning of stimulus relationships. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

An associative model of geometry learning: A modified choice rule.

In a recent article, the authors (Miller & Shettleworth, 2007; see record 2007-09968-001) showed how the apparently exceptional features of behavior in geometry learning (reorientation) experiments can be modeled by assuming that geometric and other features at given locations in an arena are learned competitively as in the Rescorla-Wagner model and that the probability of visiting a location is proportional to the total associative strength of cues at that location relative to that of all relevant locations. Reinforced or unreinforced visits to locations drive changes in associative strengths. Dawson, Kelly, Spetch, and Dupuis (2008; see record 2008-09669-009) have correctly pointed out that at parameter values outside the ranges the authors used to simulate a body of real experiments, our equation for choice probabilities can give impossible and/or wildly fluctuating results. Here, the authors show that a simple modification of the choice rule eliminates this problem while retaining the transparent way in which the model relates spatial choice to competitive associative learning of cue values. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The influence of landmark salience in a navigation task: An additive effect between its components.

In 2 experiments, rats were trained in a Morris pool to find a hidden platform in the presence of 1 landmark. After acquisition, the rats were tested without the platform. Experiment 1 tested whether the size of a landmark and its relative distance from the platform are additive effects. On test, the rats' best performance was with a near and big landmark; intermediate performance was with either a near and small landmark or a far and big one; and the worst performance was with a far and small landmark. The results of Experiment 2 suggested that the different distances from the goal of the 2 landmarks might not be sufficient to explain the previous results. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Spatial learning based on the shape of the environment is influenced by properties of the objects forming the shape.

In 3 experiments rats had to find a submerged platform that was located in a corner of a kite-shaped pool. The color of the walls creating this corner provided an additional cue for finding the platform in the shape + color condition but not the shape-only condition. During tests in a pool with walls of a uniform color but no platform, more time was spent in the corner where the platform was originally located after training in the shape + color than in the shape-only condition. The results challenge theories that assume either that learning about the shape of the environment takes place in a dedicated module or that cues compete for the control they acquire over behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

The development of children's intentions to use alcohol: Direct and indirect effects of parent alcohol use and parenting behaviors.

The purpose of this study was to explore the effect of parent alcohol use and parenting behavior on the development of children's intentions to use alcohol in Grades 1 through 8. The authors hypothesized that the effect of parent alcohol use on children's intention to use alcohol would be mediated through parenting behavior, specifically monitoring/supervision, positive parenting, and inconsistent discipline. Using cohort-sequential latent growth modeling (LGM), the authors tested 3 models examining the effect of the development of parent alcohol use on the development of children's intentions to use alcohol, as mediated by the development of each of the 3 parenting behaviors. Multiple group analyses were used to explore gender differences. The effect of growth in parent alcohol use on growth in children's intentions was mediated only by parent monitoring/supervision and was significant only for girls. The effect of inconsistent discipline was directly related to growth in intentions for both boys and girls. Although parent alcohol use was related to less positive parenting, positive parenting was unrelated to children's intentions to use alcohol. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Screaming, yelling, whining, and crying: Categorical and intensity differences in vocal expressions of anger and sadness in children's tantrums.

Young children's temper tantrums offer a unique window into the expression and regulation of strong emotions. Previous work, largely based on parental report, suggests that two emotions, anger and sadness, have different behavioral manifestations and different time courses within tantrums. Individual motor and vocal behaviors, reported by parents, have been interpreted as representing different levels of intensity within each emotion category. The present study used high-fidelity audio recordings to capture the acoustic features of children's vocalizations during tantrums. Results indicated that perceptually categorized screaming, yelling, crying, whining, and fussing each have distinct acoustic features. Screaming and yelling form a group with similar acoustic features while crying, whining, and fussing form a second acoustically related group. Within these groups, screaming may reflect a higher intensity of anger than yelling while fussing, whining, and crying may reflect an increasing intensity of sadness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of alphabet-letter instruction on young children's word recognition.

This study examined the influence of letter-name instruction on beginning word recognition. Thirty-three preschool children from low-socioeconomic-status families participated in 16 weeks of letter-name or comprehension-focused instruction. After instruction, children's ability to learn 3 types of word spellings was examined: words phonetically spelled with letters children had been taught (e.g., BL for ball), words phonetically spelled with letters children had not been taught, and words with visually distinct letter spellings that were nonphonetic. Children who received letter-name instruction learned words phonetically spelled with letters included in instruction significantly better than other words. Children receiving comprehension instruction performed significantly better on visually distinct word spellings. Results demonstrate the beneficial effects of alphabet-letter instruction on beginning phonetic word recognition. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Learning about environmental geometry: A flaw in Miller and Shettleworth's (2007) operant model.

Many studies have examined how humans and other animals reestablish a sense of direction following disorientation in enclosed environments. Results showing that geometric shape of an enclosure is typically encoded, sometimes to the exclusion of featural cues, have led to suggestions that geometry might be encoded in a dedicated geometric module. Recently, Miller and Shettleworth (2007; see record 2007-09968-001) proposed that the reorientation task be viewed as an operant task and they presented an associative operant model that appears to account for many empirical findings from reorientation studies. In this paper we show that, although Miller and Shettleworth's insights into the operant nature of the reorientation task may be sound, their mathematical model has a serious flaw. We present simulations to illustrate the implications of the flaw. We also propose that the output of a simple neural network, the perceptron, can be used to conduct operant learning within the reorientation task and can solve the problem in Miller and Shettleworth's model. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Absence of overshadowing between a landmark and geometric cues in a distinctively shaped environment: A test of Miller and Shettleworth (2007).

Rats in the first 2 experiments, which were designed to test predictions from a model of spatial learning by N. Y. Miller and S. J. Shettleworth (2007), had to escape from a triangular pool by swimming to a submerged platform in a geometrically unique corner. A spherical landmark was suspended above the platform for an overshadowing group. A control group was trained with the same arrangement and with a second, identical landmark suspended in another corner. The platform could thus be found by reference to the landmark or the geometric cues in the overshadowing group, whereas the control group had to rely on geometric cues. There was no indication of overshadowing between the geometric cues and the landmark in the overshadowing group. The final 2 experiments revealed that the absence of overshadowing was not a consequence of the landmark being an ineffective cue for overshadowing. The results indicate either that the landmark and geometric cues were not in competition for the control they acquired over behavior or that an additional process compensated for any such competition that might have occurred in the overshadowing group. This additional process could involve between-cues associations or the provision of a stable spatial framework. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Making a silk purse out of two sow's ears: Young children's use of comparison in category learning.

Comparison mechanisms have been implicated in the development of abstract, relational thought, including object categorization. D. Gentner and L. L. Namy (1999) found that comparing 2 perceptually similar category members yielded taxonomic categorization, whereas viewing a single member of the target category elicited shallower perceptual responding. The present experiments tested 2 predictions that follow from Gentner and Namy's (1999) model: (a) Comparison facilitates categorization only when the targets to be compared share relational commonalities, and (b) providing common labels for targets invites comparison, whereas providing conflicting labels deters it. Four-yr-olds participated in a forced-choice task. They viewed 2 perceptually similar target objects and were asked to "find another one." Results suggest an important role for comparison in lexical and conceptual development. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social reinforcement of children's motor behavior: A review.

This review highlights a number of methodological weaknesses and problems of measurement found in many studies which have attempted to evaluate the effectiveness of positive social reinforcement on repetitive motor behavior in children. The omission of control groups has frequently resulted in the confounding of reinforcer effects with regression-to-the-mean or warm-up effects. Problems relating to the use of difference scores, the effect of various schedules of reinforcement, the measurement of developmental changes, and the function of mediating response strategies are discussed. Recommendations for future research focus on the possible role of awareness of the reinforcement contingency and on the influence of other mediating responses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Token reinforcements in the shaping of children's mealtime behaviour.

Shaping and subsequent extinction of acceptable mealtime behavior through selective token reinforcement was attempted with institutionalized, emotionally disturbed children. Results suggested the feasibility of utilizing individual judgements by staff personnel in behavior shaping and dispensing of reinforcements. In addition, control of mealtime behavior in some children was seen to vary as a function of the presentation or withholding of tokens. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)