摘要:

One hundred and sixty‐one 4‐4 1/2‐year‐old children (82 girls and 79 boys) from Cambridge (UK) and Budapest (Hungary) participated in a cross‐cultural study of the processes of gender differentiation. Children were individually interviewed to assess toy preference, awareness of stereotypes and sex‐role preference. Focal child observations were carried out during free play in preschool (120 observation periods over eight separate 30‐minute sessions per child). Behavioural categories included activities, use of specified toys, sex of playmates, and social interactions with peers and teachers. Variables which differentiated girls and boys were summed within each category to give sex‐typical measures.Girls and boys scored in the expected direction on the several measures, but girls in both locations were less stereotyped than boys in their toy and sex‐role preference. Intercorrelations among the gender‐typing measures were stronger for ‘masculine’ variables than for ‘feminine’ ones. Further, play activities and toys were more clearly differentiated than social interactions. Consistent with previous studies, relations between measures of gender‐typing were at most moderate, supporting a multidimensional approach. In contrast to previous reports, we found short‐term individual stability of same‐sex preference and contrary to expectations, sex‐ segregation was not related to sex‐differentiated behavioural styles. Comparing the samples, there were no differences in toy, sex‐role, or playmate preference, but Budapest children were significantly more ‘masculine’ and

ISSN:0261-510X    

DOI:10.1111/j.2044-835X.1993.tb00607.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1993

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

This paper is concerned with the relations between observational and Q‐sort data on the behaviour of 4‐year‐olds in two societies. The subjects were 161 (82 girls and 79 boys) preschool children. Children's perceived traits were assessed independently by mother, father and teacher by a modified Block Q‐sort. Six composite variables were derived from combined scores: cooperation, friendly, aggression, self‐control, unfocused and inhibition. Focal child observations were carried out during free play in preschool (120 observation periods over eight separate 30‐minute sessions). Behavioural variables which differentiated between girls and boys were summed to give four sex‐typical interaction measures.The Q‐sort data fitted with the behavioural data in yielding two groups of variables, one female‐typical and one male‐typical. Teachers' Q‐sorts reflected behaviour in preschool more accurately than those of parents. Budapest parents appeared to be more stereotypical in their perceptions of sex differences than Cambridge parents.More specifically: (a) parents perceived their children as more friendly and less inhibited than teachers perceived them; (b) parents in Budapest viewed their children as more cooperative and less unfocused than parents in Cambridge viewed theirs, but there were no such differences between teachers. Girls were more cooperative than boys, while boys were more unfocused; (c) boys were rated as more aggressive than girls, but Cambridge girls were rated as more aggressive by parents than by teachers; (d) girls were perceived as more self‐controlled than boys, and in Cambridge more so by teachers than by parents.It is suggested that the Q‐sort data depend not only on differences in behaviour but also on differences in values and how children are perceived in each culture and in each context (e.g. school vs.

ISSN:0261-510X    

DOI:10.1111/j.2044-835X.1993.tb00608.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1993

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

A sample of children assessed for hand preference and hand skill at 14–15 years could be classified on two independent measures of educational success. One was whether they had been selected or not selected for grammar school two years earlier; the other was the performance of unselected children in the examinations of the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) some 18 months later. There were no differences for hand preference, but the successful children were significantly more often in the centre of the distribution of differences between the hands in skill than at the extremes, in both comparisons. The findings support the hypothesis prompted by the right shift theory of handedness (Annett, 1972, 1985) that there is natural variation for laterality and ability as expected for a genetic balanced polymorphism with heterozygote advantage. The findings cannot be attributed to slowness of the non‐preferred hand at the extremes of the distribution, as might be predicted by an explanation in terms of developmental pathol

ISSN:0261-510X    

DOI:10.1111/j.2044-835X.1993.tb00609.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1993

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Four experiments investigated 3‐ and 4‐year‐olds' understanding that different perceptual modalities provide knowledge about different aspects of the world. In Expt 1, children were asked to choose among looking, listening and touching as means of discovering an object's colour, sound or shape, and to choose which of two puppets, each of whom had performed a different perceptual act, could provide information about an object's colour, sound or shape. In Expt 2, children were asked to direct a puppet's actions or decide what they themselves should do to acquire information about a hidden object. Four‐year‐olds performed better than 3‐ year‐olds, but neither age group performed consistently above chance for all three object properties. In Expt 3 neither 3‐ nor 4‐year‐olds chose correctly between looking and listening, but both age groups correctly chose a perceptual act, rather than a non‐perceptual act, as means of obtaining information. In Expt 4, 4‐ and 5‐ year‐olds usually attributed knowledge of colour or sound correctly following perceptual or non‐perceptual actions, but 3‐year‐olds made frequent errors. The results are interpreted as evidence that 3‐ and 4‐year‐olds understand that know‐ledge occurs in the presence of perceptual access, but do not know which aspects of knowledge are related

ISSN:0261-510X    

DOI:10.1111/j.2044-835X.1993.tb00610.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1993

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

This study investigated children's and adults' ability to solve logical and illogical syllogisms, the latter involving unconnected premises. In Expt 1, 58 5‐ and 6‐year‐olds were individually presented with logical syllogisms set within a fantasy context involving toy play and child play, the latter in the absence of toys. Results showed that a high percentage of children were able to reason solely on the basis of the information given, making reference to the appropriate premise information in drawing their conclusions. Experiments 2 and 3 investigated Markovits, Schleifer&Fortier's (1989) claim that this ability is not sufficient evidence for deductive reasoning. Experiment 2 (168 primary school children) addressed both logical and illogical syllogisms, while Expt 3 (85 secondary students and 81 university students) examined illogical syllogisms only. The results of Expt 2 showed that children responded differently to the two syllogistic forms, with their responses to the illogical syllogisms indicating an implicit awareness of the unconnectedness of the premises. It is argued that this implicit understanding is sufficient evidence for deductive reasoning with illogical syllogisms and that an explicit recognition of indeterminacy, the criterion demanded by Markovitset al., is a more sophisticated application of this reasoning. While the students in Expt 3 demonstrated a more explicit awareness, they nevertheless gave a large number of responses of the implicit type indicating the presence of some non‐age‐related differences in adults' ability explicitly to recognize situations of undec

ISSN:0261-510X    

DOI:10.1111/j.2044-835X.1993.tb00611.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1993

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Preschool and infant‐school children are often claimed to learn about number from their experiences of counting but several studies show they neither count to answer questions about number nor rely on information from counting if it conflicts with other strategies. Explanations of children's failure to count are reviewed and two studies comparing methods of encouraging children to count are reported. Yemeni children aged between 5 and 8 years and English children aged between 3 and 5 years were all encouraged to count by methods which emphasized that counting yielded the right relative number judgement and that it yielded the same judgement as matching. The older children also showed a very marked improvement in their judgements. These results suggest that children do not count either because they do not know how much better counting is than other strategies for comparing number or because they are not confident that they can use counting to derive accurate judgement

ISSN:0261-510X    

DOI:10.1111/j.2044-835X.1993.tb00612.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1993

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Normal schoolchildren aged 9 to 11 years were tested on Warrington's Recognition Memory Test for words and faces (Warrington, 1984) which was originally designed for use with neurological patients. Amongst the schoolchildren, there was an overall task advantage for words over faces, which was of greater magnitude than that previously recorded for adults. Whilst boys and girls performed at comparable levels for recognition memory for faces, there is a significant female advantage on recognition memory for words. The material‐specific task effects suggest that distinct processing mechanisms are involved in analysing these two sets of visually complex objects and support modularity in the development of cognitive function

ISSN:0261-510X    

DOI:10.1111/j.2044-835X.1993.tb00613.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1993

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Book reviewed in this article:Autobiographical Memory: An Introduction.ByMartin A. ConwayVisions of Aesthetics, the Environment and Development: The Legacy of Joachim F. Wohlwill.Ediled byR. M. Downs, L. S. Liben&D. S. PalermoThe Mind's Staircase: Exploring the Conceptual Underpinnings of Children's Thought and Knowledge.ByRobbie Case and collaborators (13).

ISSN:0261-510X    

DOI:10.1111/j.2044-835X.1993.tb00614.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1993

数据来源: WILEY