Does using our hands help us to add the value of a set of coins? We test the benefits and costs of direct interaction with a mental arithmetic task in a computerized yoked design in which groups of participants vary in their interactive mode (move vs. look) and the initial configuration of coins (pseudo-random vs. another mover’s final layout). By assessing performance and conducting a microgen...

The Overlapping Waves Model (OWM) is a metaphor introduced by Siegler (1996) to illustrate a typical sequence of increasing and decreasing use of strategies during development. Going beyond metaphor, a new model synthesized from Latent Growth Modeling (LGM) and Item Response Theory (IRT) will be presented to analyze such categorical longitudinal data. Use of strategies can be scored as a variab...

The article presents cluttering as understood as a specific communication disorder. Cluttering has received less coverage in the subject literature than stuttering and is comparatively poorly understood. Defining cluttering presents us with a problem due to differences of opinion as to which of the behaviours associated with the disorder are crucial to its diagnosis and which are rather periphe...

Alexander Romanovich Luria (1902-1977), Russian psycho logist and neuropsychologist, is recognized throughout the world as one of the most eminent and influential psychologists of the 20th century, who made advances in many areas, including cognitive psychology, the processes of learning and forgetting, mental retarda tion and neuropsychology. Luria’s scientific career was build in “the stages ...

Computer-mediated communication (CMC) implementations, in particular among teachers, have not lived up to public expectations. This study examines some reasons for this and outlines a conceptual and methodological framework for characterizing the engagement of experienced and novice teachers in informal network-based professional learning communities. I postulate sustainability to positively co...

Individuals with autism exhibit hypersensitivity to local elements of the input, which may interfere with the ability to group visual elements perceptually. We investigated the development of perceptual grouping abilities in high-functioning individuals with autism (HFA) across a wide age range (8-30 years) using a classic compound letter global/local (GL) task and a more fine-grained microgene...

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...

People can behave in a way that is consistent with Bayesian models of cognition, despite the fact that performing exact Bayesian inference is computationally challenging. What algorithms could people be using to make this possible? We show that a simple sequential algorithm "Win-Stay, Lose-Sample", inspired by the Win-Stay, Lose-Shift (WSLS) principle, can be used to approximate Bayesian infere...

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...

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 ...