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A Child's World: Infancy through Adolescence, 9/e
Diane E. Papalia, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Sally Wendkos Olds
Ruth Duskin Feldman

Cognitive Development in Middle Childhood

Glossary


acceleration  approach to educating the gifted, which moves them through a curriculum at an unusually rapid place.
achievement tests  tests that assess how much children know in various subject areas.
aptitude tests  tests that measure children's general intelligence, or capacity to learn.
attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)  syndrome characterized by persistent inattention and distractibility, impulsivity, low tolerance for frustration, and inappropriate overactivity.
bilingual  fluent in two languages.
bilingual education  system of teaching non-English-speaking children in their native language while they learn English, and later switching to all-English instruction.
bullying  aggression deliberately and persistently directed against a particular target, or victim, typically one who is weak, vulnerable and defenseless.
central executive  in Baddeley's model, element of working memory that controls the processing of information.
class inclusion  understanding of the relationship between a whole and its parts.
componential element  Sternberg's term for the analytic aspect of intelligence.
concrete operations  third stage of Piagetian cognitive development (approximately from ages 7 to 12), during which children develop logical but not abstract thinking.
contextual element  Sternberg's term for the practical aspect of intelligence.
convergent thinking  thinking aimed at finding the one "right" answer to a problem.
cultural bias  tendency of intelligence tests to include items calling for knowledge or skills more familiar or meaningful to some cultural groups than to others.
culture-fair  describing an intelligence test that deals with experiences common to various cultures, in an attempt to avoid cultural bias.
culture-free  describing an intelligence test that, if it were possible to design, would have no culturally linked content.
deductive reasoning  type of logical reasoning that moves from a general premise about a class to a conclusion about a particular member or members of the class.
divergent thinking  thinking that produces a variety of fresh, diverse possibilities.
dyslexia  developmental disorder in which reading achievement is substantially lower than predicted by IQ or age.
elaboration  mnemonic strategy of making mental associations involving items to be remembered.
encoding  process by which information is prepared for long-term storage and later retrieval.
English-immersion  approach to teaching English as a second language in which instruction is presented only in English.
enrichment  approach to educating the gifted, which broadens and deepens knowledge and skills through extra activities, projects, field trips, or mentoring.
experiential element  Sternberg's term for the practical aspect of intelligence.
external memory aids  mnemonic strategies using something outside the person.
generalized anxiety disorder  anxiety not focused on any single target.
horizontal d‚calage  Piaget's term for inability to transfer learning about one type of conservation to other types, which causes a child to master different types of conservation tasks at different ages.
inductive reasoning  type of logical reasoning that moves from particular observations about members of a class to a general conclusion about that class.
Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC)  Nontraditional individual intelligence test designed to provide fair assessments of minority children and children with disabilities.
learning disabilities (LDs)  disorders that interfere with specific aspects of learning and school achievement.
long-term memory  storage of virtually unlimited capacity, which holds information for very long periods.
mental retardation  significantly subnormal cognitive functioning.
metacognition  awareness of a person's own mental processes.
metamemory  understanding of processes of memory.
mnemonic strategies  techniques to aid memory.
morality of constraint  first of Piaget's two stages of moral development, characterized by rigid, egocentric judgments.
morality of cooperation  second of Piaget's two stages of moral development, characterized by flexible judgments and formation of one's own moral code.
organization  
Otis-Lennon School Ability Test  group intelligence test for kindergarten through twelfth grade.
rehearsal  mnemonic strategy of categorizing material to be remembered.
retrieval  process by which information is accessed or recalled from memory storage.
self-fulfilling prophecy  false expectation or prediction of behavior that tends to come true because it leads people to act as if it already were true.
sensory memory  initial, brief, temporary storage of sensory information.
separation anxiety disorder  condition involving excessive, prolonged anxiety concerning separation from home or from people to whom a child is attached.
seriation  ability to order items along a dimension.
social promotion  policy in which children are automatically promoted from one grade to another even if they do not meet academic standards for the grade they are completing.
Sternberg Triarchic abilities test (STAT)  test to measure componential, experiential, and contextual intelligence.
storage  retention of memories for future use.
theory of multiple intelligences  Gardner's theory that each person has several distinct forms of intelligence.
transitive inference  understanding of the relationship between two objects by knowing the relationship of each to a third party.
triarchic theory of intelligence  Sternbreg's theory describing three types of intelligence: componential (analytical ability). experiential (insight and originality), and contextual (practical thinking).
two-way (dual-language) learning  approach to second-language education in which English speakers and on-English speakers learn together in their own and each other's languages.
Weschler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC-III)  individual intelligence test for schoolchildren, which yields verbal and performance scores as well as a combined score.
working memory  short-term storage of information being actively processed.