An Experimental Study of Individualized Learning/Instruction in Copying, Tracking, and Handwriting Based on Feedback Principles

During the last 10 to 15 yr. the stressing of individualized instructions has caused a reorganization of some schools, curricula, and instructional methods. Different theoretical approaches have been used for developing individualized instruction programmes in reading, spelling, and writing. The present experimental study of individualized instruction in copying, tracing, tracking, and handwriting was based on theoretical feedback principles. Close relationships between visuo-motor ability, copying, tracing, tracking, and writing performances were hypothesized and so were the main effects of the experimental programme with concern to the educational, psychomotor skills in question. In general, the predictions were confirmed by data in the present study in which 36 third-graders participated. Some additional information was presented, e.g., significant interaction between the experimental programme and subjects' writing skills was found for tracing only.

Theoretical and forensic implications of developmental studies of the DRM illusion

In the study of false memory, developmental research on the Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) illusion has played a pivotal role in theory evaluation and forensic application. The extensive developmental DRM literature (55 experiments published in English-language journals) provided the first clear evidence that false memories can increase dramatically from early childhood onward, whereas traditional ideas about cognitive development predict steady declines. Similar increases have recently been reported in false memory for complex, realistic life events, using forensically oriented paradigms. Age improvements in the ability to connect meaning across words have been found to be necessary and sufficient for developmental increases in the DRM illusion. When the data of developmental DRM studies are combined with parallel findings from forensically oriented paradigms, the result is an existence proof that a principle used by the law to evaluate children's evidence is mistaken. According to that principle, children's versions of events are always more likely to be infected with false memories than those of adults, and hence, juries should give more weight to adults' versions of events.