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While studies in learning and verbal behavior show that learning comes through paired-associate problems, they do not explain the acquisition of language. Three paradigms demonstrate mediation effect in paired-associate learning: response equivalence, stimulus equivalence, and chaining model. By reviewing children's language acquisition patterns in terms of the three paradigms, several conclusions were reached. A child utters words which are related to his experience. He establishes response and stimulus equivalence paradigms simultaneously. In a response equivalence situation, he learns one response can apply to several stimuli, and in a stimulus equivalence situation, one stimulus is paired with many responses. When learning complex utterances, the child chains equivalence paradigms. The same patterns are applied in learning plurals, tenses, and negatives. In an addendum, the author discusses the positions of a psychologist and a linguist in language acquisition. The psychologist ignores the complexities of the language, oversimplifies imitation, and disregards the relationship between memorizing and meaningful learning. The linguist assumes hierarchical learning but does not test it, and he rejects mediation learning theories. Although maintaining separate goals, the two schools should act jointly to stimulate needed further research in language acquisition. (JS)

Two hypotheses concerning children's treatment of "less" as a synonym of "more" were tested with 4- and 5-year-olds. It was hypothesized: (1) that the "less"-"more" distinction can be taught; and (2) that conservation is dependent on the capacity to distinguish "more" and "less". (Author/CS)

Presents evidence that young children's comprehension of the locatives "in", "on", and "under" is, at least in part, contextually determined. Children were given tasks with verbal instructions which were either contextually congruent or incongruent. Results are interpreted in terms of the non-linguistic as well as linguistic strategies apparently used to interpret speech. (Author/RC)

Free-association norms for 200 words were obtained in 1964 from the responses of 500 subjects in each of grades four through eight, 10, and 12 and from 1,000 college students. An analysis of this normative data revealed that (1) the frequency of occurrence of the most popular associative responses to stimulus words increases with the age of the subject, (2) the number of different responses to a word decreases with the age of the subject, (3) the response words themselves undergo about a 50 percent change from the fourth grade to college, (4) contrast or opposite responses increase with age, and (5) paradigmatic responses also increase with the age of the subject. Thus, word-association characteristics vary importantly between children and adults. The influence of the associative strength of words on different verbal learning tasks has been investigated. Such an influence has been demonstrated for paired-associate learning, clustering in free recall, associative generalization, and mediated generalization. Normative word association data have also been collected for children in grades one through four. Analysis of these data shows the same trends as observed in the norms discussed for the larger population. (WD)

Research supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, Public Health Service Research Center, and National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. (DS)

Research supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation; reports results of experiments in general cognitive development of children tested for their comprehension of the words more'' and less'' (RS)

Examines whether the use of weight or linear array comparisons provide a contextual cue which facilitates the comprehension of the comparative terms "more" and "less". (Author/ED)