central to vygotsky-inspired sociocultural theory (sct) is the notion of zpd seen by sla researchers as a useful framework within which l2 teaching and learning can take place. van lier (2004) argues that the zpd could be activated in diverse proximal contexts (pcs) and is not limited to the expert-novice scenario. . this study probed whether iranian efl learners' collaborative task performance...

In two experiments, visual search and speeded classification were used to study perception of hierarchical patterns among participants aged 5 to 23 years. Perception of global configurations of few-element patterns and local elements of many-element patterns showed large age-related improvements. Only minor age-related changes were observed in perception of global configurations of many-element...

Children confront the formidable task of assimilating information in the environment and accommodating their cognitive structures to that information. Developmental science is concerned equally with two distinctive features of these processes: children's group mean level of performance through time and the standing of individual children through time. Prevailing opinion since the inception of t...

The ability to choose problem solving strategies flexibly and adaptively is an important part of proficiency. However, it is unclear how simple forms of problem solving practice as well as feedback affect this ability. On the one hand, as demonstrated by the Einstellung and Stroop effect, practice can decrease adaptivity. On the other hand, practice helps to associate problem types with effecti...

THE MAIN QUESTIONS WE ASKED IN THIS WORK ARE THE FOLLOWING: Where are representations of shape, color, depth, and lighting mostly located? Does their formation take time to develop? How do they contribute to determining and defining a visual object, and how do they differ? How do visual artists use them to create objects and scenes? Is the way artists use them related to the way we perceive the...

Two experiments were conducted to examine whether and how 4- and 5-year-olds learn to distinguish determinate from indeterminate evidence. Children were asked to decide whether various patterns of evidence were sufficient to reach unambiguous conclusions. This study replicated the finding that young children tend to use a strategy that, although generally successful, fails on evidence patterns ...

The aim of this article is to reinterpret the results obtained from the research analyzing the role played by spatial frequencies in face perception. Two main working lines have been explored in this body of research: (a) the critical bandwidth of spatial frequencies that allows face recognition to take place (the masking approach) and (b) the role played by different spatial frequencies while ...

Nurmoja, Eamets, Härma, and Bachmann (2012) revealed that strongly pixelated pictures of faces still provide relevant cues for reliably assessing the apparent (i.e., subjectively perceived) traits of the portrayed. The present article responds to the paper by developing the outline of a framework for future research to reveal certain steps in processing complex visual stimuli. This framework co...

Genetic algorithms (GAs) are considered very useful tools for the optimal allocation of capacitor banks in distribution systems. Nonetheless a high computational effort can be requested mainly in large scale systems. In the paper three GA-based methods for the optimal sizing and siting of capacitors in unbalanced multiconverter distribution networks are applied and compared to obtain a good sol...