The bachelor thesis deals with the problem of the posture of pre-school children. The aim was to found out the posture of two age similar groups of pre-school children at the beginning and at the end of the final year before entering the primary school and to verify if there are some changes in posture at this time period. I used two tests to assess the posture, perspective method Klein, Thomas and Mayer in combination with the build evaluation according to Jaros and Lomicek. I was gaining the research data also by the observation method of common day running in two pre-school institutions and by the method of half-structured interview with class teachers ofthese institutions. Research file formed two age similar groups of pre-school children, specifically children from the last year of a kindergarden and children from preliminary classes. The result of the research is the finding out that in the last year, before entering the primary school, come about negative changes at posture of the pre-school children and that points to the fact that even pre-school age is high risk from posture point of view. KEY WORDS Body posture evaluation Defective body posture Pre-school child Kindergarden Preliminary class Motion activity

Categorisation is the process by which items, behaviours and events are compartmentalised according to their defining attributes or properties. This may be based on simple perceptual similarities or on more complex conceptual webs. Whatever their selection criteria, categories expedite inferential capabilities, facilitating behavioural predictions and subsequently enabling response. Categorisation waives conscious effort whilst preserving that which is salient and as such, provides a highly efficient means of delineating and organising information within semantic memory. An ability to categorise is therefore fundamental to an individual’s capacity to understand the world and a necessary precursor to academic achievement. This thesis comprises a series of studies that were devised in order to investigate categorisational development in children. Study 1 involved the development of a theoretically and practically valid testing mechanism. A sample of 159 children, aged 30-50 months, participated in a series of investigations aimed at establishing the impact of test format and presentation dimensionality on categorisation performance. As a result of this, a new test battery was devised which enabled more fine grain differentiation than had been possible with the tests used by previous researchers. The battery measured four different aspects of preschool children’s categorisational abilities -categorising according to shape; according to colour; when presented with drawings of items, and when presented with the same items in the form of toys. Results found that children’s ability to categorise differed significantly according to their sex, socio-economic background and the dimensionality of the item. Study 2 utilised the same battery with 190 participants from demographically diverse cohorts. Significant differences were found between high and low socio-economic groups and between boys and girls. A Mixed- Factorial ANOVA, with a post-hoc Bonferroni demonstrated a main effect of sex; a main effect of cohort and an interaction between sex and cohort. A Kruskal-Wallis Test also showed age to be significant, confirming the findings of previous researchers concerning a developmental trajectory. However, it also found that relatively sophisticated conceptual webs emerge earlier than had previously been thought. Whilst the results from Study 2 had demonstrated relative homogeneity amongst socio-economic groups, it was noted that participants from the most disadvantaged neighbourhood performed better than those from the other low socio-economic cohort. As the two Nurseries employed different approaches, with one offering a formal curriculum and the other emphasising child-led play, it was decided that the final study would focus on categorical development in these two cohorts. The final study therefore investigated conceptual development during 96 participants’ first twelve weeks of nursery education. Forty-eight participants were drawn from a Community Nursery with a strong emphasis on child-led play and 48 were drawn from a Nursery attached to a Primary School, where the emphasis was on more formalised learning. Children’s categorisational abilities were measured during their first week in Nursery using the test battery devised for Study 1. They were then re-tested using a matched battery twelve weeks later. Change scores were calculated and analysed using a series of one-way ANOVAs. As anticipated, all participants made gains but the children who had participated in play made significantly greater gains in three out of the four measures. It is thus asserted that play is a key conducer in cognitive development and a causal executant in establishing rudimentary automaticity and, as such, should be the polestar of preschool education. This is particularly important for boys from low socio-economic backgrounds who face contiguous disadvantage. Therefore, this research demonstrates that memory-based research with young children should be conducted with toys and objects, rather than images, and that the link between social and educational stratification has its roots in early childhood and is best addressed through the provision of high-quality play opportunities.

Two experiments were conducted to test the effectiveness of a peer-monitoring procedure on the induction of observational learning and observational performance of preschoolers via a combined experimental-control group design with a “nested” multiple probe across participants design (Greer & Du, 2015; Greer, Stolfi, & Pistoljevic, 2007). Six participants in Experiment 1 were split into matched pairs; one participant in each pair was assigned to the in-vivo condition, and one assigned to the video condition. All were assessed on their correct responding to in-vivo observational learning and performance probes prior to and following the peer-monitoring intervention. The peer-monitoring intervention consisted of two stages; the first was a training stage, in which participants monitored responses of peer confederates that were previously in their repertoire, and the second stage required participants to monitor responses not in their repertoire. The results of Experiment 1 showed that five of the six participants demonstrated that they had observational performance following the intervention. However, the emergence of the observational learning capability was only found with participants originally assigned to the in-vivo intervention condition. Upon completing the intervention again, but in the in-vivo condition, all participants originally assigned to the video intervention condition did demonstrate observational learning. In Experiment 2, the same procedures were implemented, however the observational performance and learning pre-and post-intervention probes were conducted in both the video and in-vivo conditions. In addition, I also tested the effects of the peer-monitoring procedure on the emission of social contact in a free play setting between experimental conditions. The findings remained constant in Experiment 2; the video condition was not effective in inducing observational learning, but was for observational performance. Therefore, the peer-monitoring intervention led to the emergence of observational performance, but the presence of a peer audience was required in order for observational learning to emerge. Furthermore, participants originally assigned to the in-vivo condition emitted higher numbers of social contact in a free play setting than the participants originally assigned video condition.

The effects of degree of sexual homogeneity, in groups of preschool children, on performance of a task were studied. Twenty four-year-old male children from the Utah State Child Development Laboratories served as subjects. Each subject performed the task of placing pegs in a pegboard during a sixty-second time interval; once in a group of opposite-sex peers; once in a group of same-sex peers; and once on a one-to-one basis with the author. The findings seemed to indicate that preschool children's rate of task performance is not influenced by the presence or absence of peers of the same-and opposite - sex. Differences between scores of subjects under each experimental condition were not significant.

Young children's perceptions of their parents have been shown to affect responses to parents, and to be relevant in personality development and self-esteem. Typically, research examining children's perceptions of their parents focused on children from intact families. Yet, with the frequent occurrence of divorce in our society, and the trauma and lifestyle changes often associated with marital dissolution, it is possible that children's perceptions of their parents may also change. This study compared two groups of preschool children's perceptions of their parents. Forty - two children (23 males, 19 females) came from two parent, first marriage families. Thirty-two children (16 males, 16 females) were from divorced single parent households. Children were visited in their homes and asked to respond to nine questions in the areas of parental relationships, mother role, and father role. Children's responses were coded, using a 17-category coding scheme. Factor analyses reflected children's perceptions of both traditional and nontraditional parental roles. The developmental level of the children and marital status of parents had the most influence on the children's perceptions of parental relationships. Children from the married sample viewed father's role in a more contemporary and diverse way in comparison to the single sample. Both samples (married and divorced) viewed mother in similar traditional roles. Results can be interpreted in the context of family lifestyles and symbolic interaction theory.

The selection of the initial lexicon is one of the most important decisions made in the implementation of augmentative communication systems with preliterate, nonspeaking preschool children. If a communication aid is to be adopted by a child, the words available on the device must be interesting to the child and encourage communication. The vocabulary must allow for cognitive growth and foster language development. Ideally, a lexicon would be customized for each nonspeaking child's particular interests, vocabulary needs and developmental level. The reality is that vocabulary selection is a difficult and time consuming process. Parents and clinicians do not always have the time or expertise to develop an individualized lexicon and must depend on a prepared list. These lists are not always appropriate for preschool children. A carefully developed core vocabulary could serve as a framework for the initial lexicon and would ensure that the words available to the children promoted communication and language growth. This would allow caregivers to concentrate on the smaller individualized portion of the lexicon.

Thirty-eight preschool children (20 male and 18 females) w ere filmed in a seated dyadic interaction with an adult experimenter. Frame- by-frame film analysis was done for head and arms of subjects and head, arms, and legs of experimenter for expe rimenter and subjects approach and withdrawal movements. Chi- square analysis were pe rformed for the data both between and within zones with the following cells: approach-approach (A-A), experimenter and subject approach each other; approach-withdrawal (A-W), experimenter approaches and subject withdraws; withdrawal-approach (W -A), experimenter withdraws and subject approaches; withdrawal-withdrawal (W - W), both subject and experimenter withdraw. The most frequent and significant movements for each zone and body part were A-Wand W -A. It was found that in the 3 foot zone the A-W cells (of the 2 X 2 contingency table) were the most frequent dyadic movements. For the 2 and 1 foot zones the W -A cells were the most frequent. For all three one-foot zones the W-W and A-A were respectively the least frequent dyadic interactional patterns. The intimate zone of personal space was found to be larger than the 18 inches previously identified for adults; it was found to be over 24 inches. Modifications for personal space and equilibrium theories to accommodate present findings are advanced.

Attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common disorder among children and is usually diagnosed during the school years, although symptoms must be present before age 7. As more children enter into preschool programs, there is great opportunity for early identification and treatment of behaviors related to ADHD. The earlier children with symptoms of ADHD are treated, the better their chances of having successful school experiences. Unfortunately, diagnosing ADHD during early childhood is difficult, in part because there is a lack of adequate assessment instruments designed for this age group. The instruments that are available generally do not focus specifically on ADHD symptomology. The ADHD-SRS, a rating scale specifically developed for ADHD assessment, was designed for school-age (K-12) children. The present research study investigated the psychometric properties of the ADHD-SRS with a preschool-aged sample. The participants were 414 preschool children who were rated by their teachers and/or parents using the ADHD-SRS. The results shed some light on normative levels of ADHD behaviors in preschool children. It was found that the ADHD-SRS has good psychometric characteristics (e.g., internal consistency, convergent/divergent validity) for this population. Teacher and parent concordance was moderate (.31), consistent with other research findings. Limitations, clinical implications, and directions for future research are addressed.

The purpose of this study was to investigate three different programs designed to increase verbal and physical sharing and to determine the generalizability and durability of the behaviors that were trained. Eight groups of four preschool children, balanced for sex, were observed for 16 minutes daily during a free play period in their preschool classroom. After eight days of baseline, 24 children received one of three types of training for eight sessions. Eight children were taught to verbally share, eight to physically share, and eight to both verbally and physically share. All of these children received a treatment package composed of instructions, modeling, behavioral rehearsal, prompting, and praise. After the training phase, these children were returned to the baseline condition for eight days. The remaining eight children served as a no treatment control. Each day immediately following free play the children were observed for 12 minutes while working on a different task (art) in a different classroom, with a different experimenter, observers, and materials. Four weeks after training ended all the children were observed for an additional five days during both the free play and art activities. Children trained to verbally share showed an increase in verbal sharing which diminished when treatment was withdrawn and failed to generalize to another setting (art). There was, however, a concomitant increase in physical sharing during both activities that was maintained even during the follow-up. Similarly, children taught to share verbally and physically demonstrated the same effects of treatment as those receiving only training in verbal sharing. The magnitude of these effects, however, was slightly greater for those children who were taught both types of sharing. Training in only physical sharing produced larger increases in physical sharing in both settings than the other two approaches but these effects were lost when treatment was terminated. Verbal sharing among these children was unaffected by the treatment. Finally, for those children who did not receive any training, no systematic increases in either verbal or physical sharing were observed. Therefore, the high level of physical sharing during the follow-up for those children who were only taught to verbally share and for those who were instructed to verbally and physically share was not due to the change in the natural course of sharing over time but rather due to the treatments. Training children to verbally share, physically share, or both had no effect on the rate with which they refused to share. The present findings suggest that to facilitate sharing among preschool children, at a minimum they must be taught to share verbally. Training children to share only physically is not recommended because it was not durable and did not generalize. Training both verbal and physical sharing produced results with a magnitude slightly greater than teaching just verbal sharing but in the absence of a cost-benefit analysis, the additional training is questionable. Without special programming some of the effects generalized to another setting and were maintained about four weeks after the termination of the treatment. There was response generalization of verbal to physical sharing but not vice versa. Hypotheses concerning why generalization occurred without specific programming, future areas of research, and ethical considerations are discussed.

I conducted a descriptive study consisting of 30 preschool participants with and without disabilities to examine the relation between the 3 bidirectional operants. The bidirectional operants were speaker-as-own-listener cusps, which included bidirectional verbal operants between people, bidirectional self-talk conversational units, and Bidirectional Naming (BiN). Using previously recorded videos of 10-min of social play (between-people condition) and 10-min of isolated fantasy play (self-talk condition), I recorded each instance of verbal behavior as a vocal initiation (VI), a non-vocal initiation (NI), a vocal response (VR), and a non-vocal response (NR). These initial recordings were further analyzed into the number of unidirectional and bidirectional verbal operants between people, unidirectional and bidirectional self-talk, single topography verbal behaviors, multiple topography verbal behaviors, missed opportunities, initiations, responses, and numbers of verbal episodes. The data collection procedure consisted of identifying each instance of verbal behavior during the between-people and self-talk fantasy play conditions and identifying the rotation in the participant’s role as a speaker and a listener within the verbal episodes to measure the social reinforcement function. For BiN, I measured the number of untaught listener responses (10 selection responses) and the number of untaught speaker responses (10 tact and 10 intraverbal responses) with familiar and unfamiliar novel stimuli following a naming experience in which the participants received 20 opportunities to hear the names of 5 novel stimuli while observing the pictures of the stimuli. Data were statistically analyzed using parametric and nonparametric analyses with Bonferroni corrected p-value. The results of the study were as follow: (1) the participants’ demographic characteristics were independent of their demonstrations of the three bidirectional operants, (2) BiN with unfamiliar stimuli was related to the participants’ emission of the bidirectional verbal operants between people, (3) the components of BiN and the bidirectional self-talk conversational units were independent but the results are inconclusive, (4) the unidirectional verbal operants between people were related to the bidirectional self-talk conversational units, and (5) the participants’ additional communicative verbal behaviors (i.e., vocal and non-vocal verbal behaviors, single and multiple topographies verbal behaviors, initiations, and responses) were independent of their degrees of BiN. The analyses of data suggested that there may be an underlying social reinforcement that is shared amongst the three bidirectional operants. Some may be more observable, such as the shared social reinforcement function between the bidirectional verbal operants between people and BiN with unfamiliar stimuli; whereas some may be less observable, as it may be manifested in a form of an audience control rather than social reinforcement function. Thus, the current study adds to the existing literature on verbal development as it shows the relation between the three bidirectional operants and the importance of social reinforcement not only to engage in conversation with others but to learn names of new unfamiliar objects or to come under audience control.