The Effects of Naming Experiences and Properties of Visual Stimuli on Language Acquisition and the Relationship between Curiosity and Naming

Children typically acquire language rapidly during their first few years of life. Their rates and levels of proficiency vary, but it is clear that the development of one’s language repertoire impacts academic outcomes and future success across many domains. There are both genetic and environmental factors that affect and contribute to one’s development. For children whose vocal verbal behavior is less well developed, it is imperative that we continue to develop and implement tactics and procedures to intervene in order to accelerate their language development. Researchers have identified Naming as a critical verbal developmental capability that allows one to learn language incidentally. Are there different types of Naming capabilities? Do properties of stimuli affect language acquisition? Does the Naming repertoire relate to children’s level of curiosity about the world around them? In the 3 experiments that follow, I examined the effects of 2 types of Naming experiences and varying properties of visual stimuli on measures of Naming. In Experiments 2 and 3, I also conducted measures of curiosity to assess the possibility of a relationship between Naming and question asking. In my first experiment there were 31 participants. I investigated the effects of match-to-sample and exclusion Naming experiences on incidental acquisition of listener and speaker responses in both adults without disabilities and youth with disabilities. I examined the differences between the 2 age groups and Naming experiences. The adult means of listener and speaker responses were greater than the youth means. All adults met criterion for Naming with the match-to-sample experience, and 9 of 14 adults also achieved criterion levels with the unfamiliar stimuli following the exclusion Naming experience. The adult group’s results showed that the group’s Naming repertoire was fairly balanced for listener responses across the Naming experiences with minimal variability, and its speaker repertoire was not as balanced. The youth group’s results demonstrated similar levels of variability across both topographies. The effect of the Naming experience was significant for speaker responses. In the second experiment, I implemented an intervention to try to establish unfamiliar stimuli as reinforcers to test its effects on the 2 types of Naming probes and curiosity measures in 6 elementary age children with disabilities. There were some effects from the treatment, but following 2 intervention conditions none of the participants met criteria for Naming. The participants’ numbers of accurate listener responses were greater than their speaker responses. In Experiment 3, I conducted tests for curiosity and Naming with sets of stimuli that had varying levels of familiarity and complexity for 9 preschool age children with and without disabilities. As with the first 2 experiments, the numbers of listener responses for participants were greater than their speaker responses, and there was more variability in the speaker responses compared to the listener responses. The results suggested that the type of Naming experience or the familiarity level of the visual stimuli alone did not appear to influence the dependent variables, but rather that there may be an interaction among the independent variables. The means of responses were greater with more familiar stimuli following match-to-sample experiences whereas the means were greater with less familiar stimuli following the exclusionary Naming experiences. The results of the 3 experiments affirmed the independence of the listener and speaker components of Naming and suggest that the demonstration of Naming with unknown, unfamiliar types of stimuli may be a type of Naming capability that may not be present in all individuals who demonstrate Naming with unknown, familiar stimuli

Humaneness Supersedes Curiosity

Ethical considerations need to be addressed with respect to educational use of animals. Society extends greater latitude in what is permissible to do to an animal in the name of science to a professional research worker than to a high school student. A balance needs to be made of the significance of the expected experimental results, on the one hand, which the ethical costs, (in terms of pain or death to the animal), on the other. A reasonable boundary can be drawn, based on ethical as well as on practical considerations, to exclude invasive procedures on vertebrate animals in high school student work. The view is presented that such procedures should only be conducted in research institutions and should not be conducted in students\u27 homes or in elementary or secondary schools. The rational basis for this stance is discussed. Enhancement of secondary school biology education with classroom maintenance and study of a wide range of species of plants, invertebrate and vertebrate animals is needed. However, progress in this direction is dependent upon establishing sound policies on the educational use of animals based on considerations of social accountability. Current lax standards in science fairs have resulted in animal abuse and this has hampered progress in this direction. Encouragement to teachers and students to study living things must go hand in hand with proper observance of humane considerations

Classification System for Degree of Animal Harm

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LETTER TO THE EDITOR

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The Impact of Deafness on Family Life

Produced by Center on Disabilities, University of Hawai'i at Manoa, Honolulu, Hawai'i, Frank Sawyer School of Management, Suffolk University, Boston, Massachusetts and The School of Social Sciences, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, Texas for The Society for Disability Studies

Levels of adenosine deaminase in some experimental animal tumours and the possible therapeutic effect of the ADA inhibitor 2-deoxy-coformycin.

The intracellular adenosine deaminase activities (ADA) in 12 different experimental animal tumours were measured. Unlike the leukaemic lymphoblasts of man, those of two spontaneous rat leukaemias did not have elevated levels of the enzyme. Very high levels were found in a rat plasma-cell tumour (IR 461) and an attempt was made to treat such tumours with the specific enzyme inhibitor, 2-deoxy-coformycin. The shortage of this drug prevented a systematic study, but a daily dose of 8 mg/kg had a significant inhibitory effect on the growth of tumours

Multi-Disease Data Management System Platform for Vector-Borne Diseases

Background Emerging information technologies present new opportunities to reduce the burden of malaria, dengue and other infectious diseases. For example, use of a data management system software package can help disease control programs to better manage and analyze their data, and thus enhances their ability to carry out continuous surveillance, monitor interventions and evaluate control program performance. Methods and Findings We describe a novel multi-disease data management system platform (hereinafter referred to as the system) with current capacity for dengue and malaria that supports data entry, storage and query. It also allows for production of maps and both standardized and customized reports. The system is comprised exclusively of software components that can be distributed without the user incurring licensing costs. It was designed to maximize the ability of the user to adapt the system to local conditions without involvement of software developers. Key points of system adaptability include 1) customizable functionality content by disease, 2) configurable roles and permissions, 3) customizable user interfaces and display labels and 4) configurable information trees including a geographical entity tree and a term tree. The system includes significant portions of functionality that is entirely or in large part re-used across diseases, which provides an economy of scope as new diseases downstream are added to the system at decreased cost. Conclusions We have developed a system with great potential for aiding disease control programs in their task to reduce the burden of dengue and malaria, including the implementation of integrated vector management programs. Next steps include evaluations of operational implementations of the current system with capacity for dengue and malaria, and the inclusion in the system platform of other important vector-borne diseases