Attentional Abilities and Performance on Conservation Tasks

Summary

Kindergarten children were pretested on attention and conservation tasks. At pretest, “natural” conservers performed better than nonconservers on attention tasks. Nonconservers received training in one of three attention training groups or in a control group. Posttests of attention and conservation did not differentiate training groups from one another though the training groups considered together performed better than the control group on tests requiring sustained attention and on conservation tasks. Posttests of sustained attention showed younger children benefited more from attention training when compared with younger controls and with older children who received training.