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Conservation and executive function (EF) are important early childhood skills; however, knowledge about their relationship is scarce. Hence, in this study, this relationship is investigated, and a comparison is conducted between the Piagetian conservation and EF tasks to obtain the total hemoglobin (mMmm) for the left and right brain activity in the prefrontal cortex of children, using a functional near-infrared spectroscopy. As a case study, a survey was conducted in the home of a four-year-old child (boy) in Japan in 2020. His home was selected as the primary place of investigation owing to the spread of the coronavirus disease 2019 infection. The researcher was an expert in pedagogy and psychology. The following hypothesis could be formulated from the case studies analyzed herein: From the viewpoint of the brain activity in the prefrontal cortex, there may be a link between the conservation of quantity and EF. The preservation of quantity is closely related to mathematics education. This hypothesis can thus expand the scope of research and practice in the fields of psychology, education, and mathematics education. Furthermore, the results may help psychologists, psychiatrists, teachers, parents, and others involved in the development of children sublate the value of their concept of conservation and improve their support methods.

We investigated performance levels on conducting continuous two-footed jumping of preschool children (4 years old) to high school students (16 years old) to clarify the developmental progression and sex differences in motor coordination and agility. In total, 450 children (boys: 227; girls: 223) participated in this study. We set 10 obstacles to jump over for continuous two-footed jumping and analyzed the movement time (MT), aerial time (AT), and contact time (CT), and variabilities in AT and CT in 7 year-based categories, using a high-speed camera. We also used multiple regression analysis to identify the predictors of MT. MT and CT shortened until 8 years, whereas AT continued to shorten after 8 years, suggesting that the jumping strategy differs between those younger/older than 8 years. MT, AT, and CT were significantly shorter among boys than girls from preschool children to high school students. In addition, when using multiple regression analysis, the main predictor of MT changed gradually from SD of CT to AT with increasing age. Our findings suggest that the motor control mechanisms related to continuous two-footed jumping differ depending on the age and sex and provide findings to advance understanding of the age-related motor coordination and agility in children.

This study explored child behaviours that enable mothers to perceive their child's minds. We administered the Mind Perception Questionnaire to 216 women with children aged between 0 and 24 months and 221 working women without children. Participants responded with mind perceptions for various entities, including for their children (a 0--2-year-old child). Further, to examine child-related behaviours that may influence mothers' perceptions of their children's minds, we asked them about which actions made them perceive what their babies had in mind. We found that mothers perceived their children as having minds similar to their own while working women without children perceived 0--2-year-old children as being different from themselves. Mothers' perceptions of their children's minds were associated with child-related behaviours that made communication possible. Thus, this study was able to identify important milestones of child development, by examining the mother's point of view regarding their children's minds.

Previous research on identity development among adolescents has focused on the processes involved. However, it is unclear how the sense of identity (synthesis and confusion) develops and how it relates to life satisfaction. This study aims to examine the relationship between sense of identity and life satisfaction among Japanese youth living in the urban Kanto, Kansai, and Chubu areas. A total of 5,047 Japanese youth (49.7% female; Time 1 M[subscript age] = 17.08 years, range = 12-22 years) in four age groups (early adolescence, middle adolescence, late adolescence, and young adulthood) participated in a three-wave longitudinal study. Latent growth modeling (LGM) analysis revealed that from early to middle adolescence, synthesis continued to be higher than confusion, whereas from late adolescence to young adulthood, confusion tended to be higher than synthesis. The results of the LGM further showed that the change in synthesis was positively related to the change in life satisfaction and the change in confusion was negatively related to it in all age groups. Using latent class growth analysis (LCGA), five identity classes were extracted: high synthesis-low confusion, low synthesis-high confusion, high synthesis-high confusion, low synthesis-low confusion, and moderate synthesis-moderate confusion. LCGA revealed that youth in the high synthesis classes had a higher sense of life satisfaction than did youth in high confusion classes. These findings provide critical insights into trajectories of identity formation and the relationship between identity development and life satisfaction among Japanese youth that can inform future research and programs designed to facilitate their identity formation.

Mixed-ethnic children in Japan do not usually acquire the language of their non-Japanese parent. This study looks at their lost opportunity to acquire their minority parent's language through a retrospective investigation of their language experiences from childhood to young adulthood. Transcripts of interviews with ten mixed-ethnic children (ages 18 to 23) were analyzed based on the constructive grounded theory approach (Charmaz 2014 "Constructing grounded theory," 2nd edn. London: Sage). Analysis of codes which emerged from the interviews revealed that family relations, parents' reluctance to speak the minority language and the prioritization of English were some of the factors perceived by the mixed-ethnic children to have contributed to the non-transmission of the minority language. Many of the children described their lost opportunity to acquire the minority language as regretful. Questions posed by Japanese people about their identity and language reminded some participants of their mixed-ethnicity and inability to speak the minority language. These findings suggest that the non-transmission of the minority language has long-term implications on the social and emotional well-being of mixed-ethnic children in Japan.

Aim/Purpose: Although many computer science measures have been proposed, visualizing individual students' capabilities is difficult, as those measures often rely on specific tools and methods or are not graded. To solve these problems, we propose a rubric for measuring and visualizing the effects of learning computer programming for elementary school students enrolled in computer science education (CSE), which is independent of the programming language being used. Background: In this research, we proposed a rubric based on existing CSE standards and criteria having a programming education-learning goal. We then applied this rubric to actual lessons to visualize the educational effects. Methodology: The proposed new rubric for teaching computer programming, based on existing standards and criteria, was applied to fourth- and sixth-grade students in Japan. We assessed which skills were cultivated through quizzes before and after the teaching. Contribution: This paper contributes on how to make and utilize a rubric for programming education in computer science. We evaluated and visualized the proposed rubric's learning effects on children and found that our proposed rubrics are independent of any particular method or tool. Findings: The results of this survey are twofold: (1) we proposed a rubric of programming education in computer science, independent of the programming tools used and (2) we succeeded in visualizing students' learning stages by applying the proposed rubric to programming education conducted in a Japanese elementary school. Recommendations for Practitioners: Evaluating educational effects in CSE is important. In particular, graded assessments of learner abilities can reveal individual characteristics. This research is useful for assessing CSE because it focuses specifically on programming education. Recommendations for Researchers: The rubric's suggestions and quality improvements in CSE help learners assess their learning progress and will clarify the cultivated computer science skills. Impact on Society This research evaluates CSE based on a rubric in the programming education field. Future Research: Future work is needed to improve the proposed rubric's quality and relevance. Also, this rubric should be applied to many classes to increase the number of evaluations and analyses.

We are expected to behave appropriately to suit social situations. One form of behavioral control is the selection of a linguistic register that is appropriate to the listener. Register selection errors can sometimes be interpreted as rude behavior and result in having a bad influence on the relationship with the listener and the evaluation by other people. Previous studies have demonstrated that children begin to show sensitivity to registers from about 2 years of age, and that 5- to 6-year-old children understand the appropriate relationships between a listener and a register. However, it remains unclear whether and when children understand the influence made by register selection errors on listeners, and how children evaluate speakers when they make errors in register selection. Therefore, we investigated the above issues in Japanese children, who are required to use registers strictly. Also, we conducted a control study with Japanese-speaking adults to identify adults' evaluation of register selection errors. The results indicated that 7-year-old, but not 5-year-old children understood that the selection of an appropriate register gives listeners positive feelings. Moreover, 7-year-old children used register selection as an index of selective learning and social preference, although how they use others' register use skills for evaluating them was slightly different from adults. These results suggest that although children notice the social meanings behind the use of registers by the age of 7, a more extended period of development is required to master the social meaning of register selection.

Few, if any, researchers would deny the existence of the developmental stages of language learning. However, there are questions about the applicability and the importance of the stages in pedagogy. Up to this point, these questions regarding the ESL (English as a second language) stages have never been addressed in a Japanese post-secondary educational context. This study is the only one of its kind to measure the developmental stages of a group of Japanese university students and to provide the learners with intensive instruction to see how much/if any changes are made to their interlanguage due to the instruction. As predicted by Pienemann's Teachability Hypothesis (1992), only the learners who had met the prerequisites for instruction could acquire the grammatical points which were instructed. The results of this study point to the need among TESOL (Teaching English as a Second or Other Language) instructors to teach students only slightly above their current language levels. (Contains 5 tables.)

This study described the communication and spoken language development of a Japanese girl with profound hearing loss who used a cochlear implant from 19 months of age. The girl, Akiko, was born in Belgium where her family was living at that time. After she was identified as deaf at birth, she and her parents were provided with support services. The family relocated to Japan when Akiko was 1 year 5 months of age. When she was 1 year 6 months of age Akiko underwent cochlear implantation. The cochlear implant device was activated when Akiko was 1 year 7 months of age. The parents routinely made video recordings of Akiko interacting with family members and teachers at home and at school. The video recordings taken by the parents used as the data for this study contained scenes of Akiko from the time she was 3 months of age until she was 4 years 11 months of age. Micro-ethnographic methods were used to analyze the dynamics and development of selected communicative interactions over this age span of fifty-six months. The original pool of video recordings contained 213 scenes. As a result of video viewing and editing, Akiko's communication development was found to follow expected patterns of development as described by other child language researchers of children with normal hearing. There were seven demarcations that represent Akiko's communication and spoken language development: 1) perlocutionary, 2) transition of perlocutionary to illocutionary, 3) illocutionary, 4) transition of illocutionary to locutionary, 5) locutionary, 6) dialogue, and 7) narrative. (Contains 8 tables.)

This study addresses children's Kyoiku (education) as it is explored by two kindergartens in Japan. It reports how the teachers, parents and children defined and experienced children's education and draws on the sociocultural concepts to understand their perspectives. Situated in the personal, educational, and sociocultural landscape of the educational environment, the analysis foregrounds a lens to identify the influences on children's education. The focus on children's education in this study enables the threads of different perspectives within the fabric of the kindergartens and Japanese contexts to be shared. The findings reveal that theorising about children's education invites scholarship that takes as axiomatic the complexity and distinctiveness of individual children, their families and the Japanese social and cultural dynamics.

The purpose of this study was to examine similarities and differences of American, Japanese, and Taiwanese kindergarten teachers' perspectives about clean-up time. The participants consisted of two female American kindergarten teachers in the southeastern US, two female Japanese kindergarten teachers on the main island, and two female Taiwanese kindergarten teachers from central Taiwan, all of whom teach four-year-olds. Qualitative analysis of the data yielded four themes regarding teachers' views of clean-up time: teaching cleaning-up methods, the developmental stages, the extension of play, and reflection of one's own practical knowledge and skills. These teachers perceived clean-up time was more than just a transitional time. The implications for early childhood education are presented.

The purpose of this article is to explore the way preschool teachers teach reflective care in Japan. The article builds on a two-month ethnographic study conducted in Japanese kindergartens and nurseries among children aged 3-6 years. The data were analysed using concepts of age and gender. The results show that care in Japan, in contrast to strong discoursers of learning in several western countries, is seen as part of teaching children how to behave in public space together with others. Teaching care tends to be reflectively and thoughtfully planned by the pedagogues. It is organized to teach children self-reliance, using common projects and with pedagogues working with inclusion. Care was seldom analysed in relation to the children's gender but rather in terms of their age or developmental "steps" such as being able to take care of oneself, take care of the preschool space and care for others.

We conducted 3 studies to explore cultural differences in global versus local processing and their developmental trajectories. In Study 1 ("N" = 363), we found that Japanese college students were less globally oriented in their processing than American or Argentine participants. We replicated this effect in Study 2 ("N" = 1,843) using a nationally representative sample of Japanese and American adults ages 20 to 69, and found further that adults in both cultures became more globally oriented with age. In Study 3 ("N" = 133), we investigated the developmental course of the cultural difference using Japanese and American children, and found it was evident by 4 years of age. Cultural variations in global versus local processing emerge by early childhood, and remain throughout adulthood. At the same time, both Japanese and Americans become increasingly global processors with age.

This study aims to examine the developmental changes in young children's perception. A matching completion task consisting of three geometric figures and one bird-like figure were completed by children 3-5 years of age ("N" = 99). The rotation effect, in which the correct response decreased with orientation (45°, 90° 135°, and 180°), was confirmed, except in one of the geometric conditions. We found that two factors were needed for a child to perform the bird-like completion task: clarification of the reference to each stimulus and awareness of the turning orientation. These studies suggest that the children processed the contour and feature information individually, and that the contour information was processed earlier than the feature information. We derived three criteria for sensitive information to resolve the task, contact, contour, and left-right. Findings are discussed with regard to the reference action and the part-whole relationship.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss the developmental stages of lesson study for learning community (LSLC) and to clarify the measures necessary for promoting the progress of LSLC, targeting consultants working on educational development projects for developing countries. Design/methodology/approach: The paper is organised as a conceptual paper. First, LSLC is positioned in the context of literature on school reform, then an explanation of the LSLC framework and the LSLC developmental stages is offered. Findings: LSLC is a systemic school reform activity based on lesson study. However, unlike lesson study models in international literature, the entire school is involved from the very beginning and observation and joint reflection are focused upon across subject boundaries. There are five stages in LSLC development, from confusion at the initial stage to sustainment. Practical implications: Using LSLC, teachers learn how to respond to children and how to enhance the quality of students' learning through mutual observation and reflection. Because of the tendency for teachers to focus on teaching methods and techniques, consultants first have to allow teachers to pay more attention to children. As they become able to describe children and their learning in lessons, it becomes important to let them discuss enhancing the quality of learning. Originality/value: LSLC is a very new approach to school reform and lesson study. Thus, despite the existing literature on LSLC cases in developing countries, few theoretical explanations have been undertaken. This paper targets professional consultants in developing countries and aims to provide a detailed explanation from a conceptual perspective. (Contains 1 table.)

In young infants, activation or inhibition of body movements on perception of environmental events is important to enable them to act on the world or understand the world. To reveal the development of this ability, we observed movement patterns in all four limbs under the two experimental conditions. Infants assigned to the interaction condition were provided a connection between their arm and a toy, which allowed movements of the critical arm to produce movements in the overhead mobile. Infants assigned to the stimulation condition were presented with similar movements of the toy emulated by the experimenter. In 3-month-old infants, the arm movements increased under the interaction condition, whereas they decreased under the stimulation condition. Such condition-dependent behavior dissociation was not observed in 2-month-old infants. These results suggest that the distinct behavior of an "observer" of environmental events was differentiated from that of a "player" interacting with the surroundings between 2 and 3 months of age. The emergence of differentiation of behaviors points toward the development of self-referential and inhibition mechanisms in the perceptual-motor and attention/evaluation system in the cortico-subcortical network. (Contains 9 figures.)

In a review of 46 meta-analyses of gender differences, overhand throwing had the largest gender difference favoring boys (ES greater than 3.0). Expectations for gender-specific performances may be less pronounced in female Australian Aborigines, because historical accounts state they threw for defense and hunting. Overhand throwing velocities and kinematics were recorded in 30 female and male Aboriginal Australian children 6-10 years old. Results indicated the Aboriginal girls and boys were more similar in horizontal ball velocities than U.S. girls and boys. Throwing kinematics between girls and boys were also more similar in Australian Aborigines than U.S. children. Aboriginal girls threw with greater velocities than U.S., German, Japanese, and Thai girls, while the boys were similar across cultures. (Contains 1 note, 5 tables and 6 figures.)

The purpose of these studies was to examine the frequency and stability of relational and physical aggression and their associations with social-psychological adjustment or peer victimization, and how friendships are involved in the relations between forms of aggression and peer victimization in Japanese children. The sample consisted of 452 (Study 1) and 138 (Study 2) children who were in the fourth and fifth grades. Results of Study 1 demonstrated that relational aggression was uniquely and more strongly associated with internalizing adjustment problems than physical aggression. Moreover, Study 2 revealed that relational aggression and physical aggression were stable over a 6-month period and the stability of relational aggression was reinforced by negative friendships (i.e., high levels of exclusivity and friend victimization). Further, the association between relational aggression and relative increases in relational victimization was attenuated by positive friendships (i.e., high levels of intimacy, companionship, and friendship satisfaction). Interestingly, friendships were unrelated to physical aggression and its relation to physical victimization. The age and gender of the children in the two studies were also examined. Cultural and developmental processes involving forms of aggression, friendships, social-psychological adjustment, and peer victimization were discussed.

We often have a feeling that we know ourselves much better than others know us, coupled with a feeling that our minds are not transparent to other people. In this article we begin to explore cultural variations in the development of this feeling. Children in Britain and Japan aged 7, 9 and 11 years judged how well they and how well their parent/teacher knew about aspects of the child's mind (e.g., dreams, feeling sick, feeling hungry). Compared with British children, Japanese children credited adults with relatively large amounts of knowledge about themselves and this was most notable in the youngest group. Differences in patterns of judgements between the two nations could arise from differences in the cultural influences on the rate of development. (Contains 3 figures and 1 table.)

This study explores educators' reflections on professional childcare practice in different national contexts. The data were collected by showing video clips of classroom activities in Japanese, Dutch and German pre-schools to experienced German and Dutch pre-school teachers. The clips were used to elicit their opinions on playing and learning in educational settings through a standardized questionnaire completed immediately after viewing each clip. The participants were also invited to rate the strength of cognitive, social, physical and emotional developmental domains during the activity. These data were analysed by classifying the questionnaire responses into four categories: remarks related to teachers, to children, to peers and to context. The frequencies of the categories and the ratings of developmental domains were computed and compared by t-tests between the German and the Dutch sample. The findings revealed that pre-school teachers offered more elaborated perspectives on the content of the foreign video clips than on the clips from their own country. There were also some differences with regard to developmental domains. With regard to pre-school teacher training it was concluded that the teachers' knowledge base should be used as an input for their professional practice. (Contains 1 figure, 3 tables and 1 note.)

The purposes of this study were to clarify how social problem-solving processes develop and to identify developmentally-sensitive intervention components for children's aggression. Elementary and junior-high school Japanese students (N = 1100) from urban public schools participated in the present investigation. Their alternative thinking skills, solution evaluation, and aggressive behaviors were assessed. Results showed that age was predictive of the application of appropriate problem-solving skills to problematic situations. Alternative thinking skills predicted children's aggressive behavior across all grades. Evaluative thinking about aggression becomes predictive of aggressive behavior in children in grades 6 and above. Accordingly, traditional problem-solving training which deals with both alternative thinking and solution evaluation is likely to be effective for older children, while younger children would benefit from problem-solving skills training focused on alternative thinking. (Contains 3 tables.)

The McGurk effect paradigm was used to examine the developmental onset of inter-language differences between Japanese and English in auditory-visual speech perception. Participants were asked to identify syllables in audiovisual (with congruent or discrepant auditory and visual components), audio-only, and video-only presentations at various signal-to-noise levels. In Experiment 1 with two groups of adults, native speakers of Japanese and native speakers of English, the results on both percent visually influenced responses and reaction time supported previous reports of a weaker visual influence for Japanese participants. In Experiment 2, an additional three age groups (6, 8, and 11 years) in each language group were tested. The results showed that the degree of visual influence was low and equivalent for Japanese and English language 6-year-olds, and increased over age for English language participants, especially between 6 and 8 years, but remained the same for Japanese participants. This may be related to the fact that English language adults and older children processed visual speech information relatively faster than auditory information whereas no such inter-modal differences were found in the Japanese participants' reaction times.

The study sought to examine developmental processes of substitution in the pretend play of Down's syndrome children and to clarify the onset mechanism of subskills in decontextualization, which refers to the progress from imitation to substitution and then to invention. Eighteen Japanese children, aged 29-55 months, with Down's syndrome were given various lifelike objects, miniature toys, and ambiguous objects, and observed in their manipulation of the objects in play with their mothers. The developmental process of decontextualization in Down's syndrome children was the same as that in nonretarded children in previous studies. However, the onset of substitution showing double knowledge of objects (type 2) was delayed and the repertory of substitution hardly increased. Delayed emergence in type 2 substitution and little increment in the repertory of substitution suggest a relation to delayed language development in Down's syndrome children. (JDD)

Unlike Japanese and European schools, U.S. public schools treat music as a nonserious, peripheral "activity" suitable for a few talented students. However, music education is as fundamental to the curriculum as math or reading. One study showed that high-school musicians achieved higher Scholastic Aptitude Test scores. (15 references) (MLH)

Compares interview results to identify moral stages of United States and Japanese adults. Includes findings of postconventional reasoners to substantiate evidence of postconventional stages as adult stages. Reports major cultural differences in the approach to the fundamental value of human life. Suggests a need for examination of the conception of postconventional stages. (DK)

To understand aging cross-culturally, used photography to perceive the perceiver. Asked persons averaging seventy-three years old from Japan and the United States to describe "Who are you?" by taking six photographs. Content analysis showed older Japanese to be inward and aesthetically oriented, while older Americans were more oriented toward other people. (Author/ABB)

Studies two determinants of male puberty rites: communitywide exclusive male work groups and polygyny which act as an extension of male subculture; and sexual integration in the division of labor and distant father-child relationship which act to reduce the distance between the sexes. (Author/RC)

Recently, there has been a rapid proliferation of lesson study groups in the United States. Since deep knowledge about lesson study is rare in the U.S., it is likely that some of these groups have an incomplete understanding of this Japanese practice. Some may focus on structural aspects of the process of lesson study or may mimic its superficial features, while ignoring the underlying rationale for them. The purpose of this study is to clarify some of the guiding principles behind the process of lesson study by identifying three categories of challenges that U.S. practitioners of lesson study may encounter at different "developmental stages" in their learning about the process. Another purpose is to help lesson study practitioners focus on core principles and more coherently define the purpose of their lesson study work, so that they can move beyond its procedural aspects toward richer, more sustainable practice.

The Japanese grass lizard, Takydromus tachydromoides, is a species endemic to Japan. While several studies have investigated the reproductive ecology of T. tachydromoides, the embryogenesis of this species has not been reported in detail. In the current study, we observed the external morphological characteristics of 247 embryo specimens that developed under a constant temperature (28°C) throughout the duration from oviposition to hatching. We identified 17 consecutive developmental stages for the postovipositional developmental process of this species based on the staging criteria that have been widely used for the description of embryogenesis of lizards. The youngest embryos on the day of oviposition corresponded to stage 26, which is a relatively early period in pharyngula stages, and juveniles hatched at stage 42, approximately 30 days after oviposition. The entire developmental sequence of key morphological features was shared with other species of Lacertidae, except for the timing of the beginning of the first body pigmentation. This is the first description of the complete sequence of postovipositional developmental stages for the oviparous species of Lacertidae, providing valuable information for further evolutionary developmental studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The morphogenesis of snake embryos is an elusive yet fascinating research target for developmental biologists. However, few data exist on development of early snake embryo due to limited availability of pregnant snakes, and the need to harvest early stage embryos directly from pregnant snakes before oviposition without knowing the date of fertilization. We established an ex vivo culture method for early snake embryos using the Japanese striped snake, Elaphe quadrivirgata. This method, which we named "sausage-style (SS) culture", allows us to harvest snake embryos at specific stages for each experiment. Using this SS culture system, we calculated somite formation rate at early stages before oviposition. The average somite formation rate between 6/7 and 12/13 somite stages was 145.9 min, between 60/70 and 80/91 somite stages 42.4 min, and between 113-115 and 126/127 somite stages 71 min. Thus, somite formation rate that we observed during early snake embryogenesis was changed over time. We also describe a developmental staging series for E. quadrivirgata. This is the first report of a developmental series of early snake embryogenesis prior to oviposition by full-color images with high-resolution. We propose that the SS culture system is an easy method for treating early snake embryos ex vivo., (© 2014 The Authors Development, Growth & Differentiation © 2014 Japanese Society of Developmental Biologists.)