Temporal generalization in 3-to 8-year-old children

Children aged 3, 5, and 8 years were tested on temporal generalization with visual stimuli. Different groups received 4- and 8-s standards. Gradients at all ages superimposed when plotted on the same relative scale. indicatin g underlying scalar timing. The principal developmental changes were (i) in creasing sharpness of the generalization gradient with increasing age and ( ii) a change from symmetrical (3 and 5 years) to adultlike asymmetrical gen eralization gradients in the oldest children. Theoretical modeling attribut ed these changes to increasing precision of the reference memory of the sta ndard with increasing age, as well as a decreased tendency to "misremember" the standard as being shorter than it actually was, as the children develo ped. (C) 2001 Academic Press.