Let Me Tell You: Experiences with Silent Books in a Framework of Early Literacy

This paper focuses on an experiment with Silent Books with 27 Spanish kindergarten children. Through a qualitative ethnographic methodology based on a multimodal analysis, we study the response to the self-managed reading of Silent Books given by a class group and, specifically, by five students, both in the classroom and at home. The analysis of the results highlights a drastic increase in the motivation towards books and the activation of a series of cognitive precursors.

Cognitive Precursors of Negation in Preverbal Infants

The meaning of verbal negation cannot be created ex-nihilo when words like ‘no’ and ‘not’ are first acquired. Rather, there must exist pre-lexical precursors of negation. This chapter, guided by the analysis of the meaning of early negative utterances, explores the infant cognition literature, in search of such precursors. We show that infants are able to learn behaviors relying on avoidance and to react to unfulfilled expectations. Furthermore, we present recent results suggesting that infants are able to represent the relation different (i.e. not the same), and that such representation suggests the existence of a precursor to truth-functional negation. Finally, the chapter discusses a fourth possible precursor of negation: inhibition.

Using the Short Graph Literacy Scale to Predict Precursors of Health Behavior Change

Background. Visual displays can facilitate risk communication and promote better health choices. Their effectiveness in improving risk comprehension is influenced by graph literacy. However, the construct of graph literacy is still insufficiently understood, partially because existing objective measures of graph literacy are either too difficult or too long. Objectives. We constructed a new 4-item Short Graph Literacy (SGL) scale and examined how SGL scores relate to key cognitive, affective, and conative precursors of health behavior change described in common health behavior theories. Methods. We performed secondary analyses to adapt the SGL scale from an existing 13-item scale. The initial construction was based on data collected in a laboratory setting in Germany ( n = 51). The scale was then validated using data from nationally representative samples in Germany ( n = 495) and the United States ( n = 492). To examine how SGL scores relate to precursors of health behavior change, we performed secondary analyses of a third study involving a nationwide US sample with 47% participants belonging to racial/ethnic minorities and 46% with limited formal education ( n = 835). Results. Graph literacy was significantly associated with cognitive precursors in theoretically expected ways (e.g., positive associations with risk comprehension and response efficacy and a negative association with cognitive risk perception). Patterns for affective precursors generally mirrored those for cognitive precursors, although numeracy was a stronger predictor than graph literacy for some affective factors (e.g., feelings of risk). Graph literacy had predictive value for most cognitive and affective precursors beyond numeracy. In addition, graph literacy (but not numeracy) predicted key conative precursors such as defensive processing. Conclusions. Our data suggest that the SGL scale is a fast and psychometrically valid method for measuring objective graph literacy. Our findings also highlight the theoretical and practical relevance of graph literacy.