Jana Marie Havigerová

Talent and Creativity in Preschool Age Children: A Pilot Study

This paper analyses the relationship between giftedness and two types of creativity (figural and verbal) in preschool age children. The paper aims to describe and analyze the relationship between the two types of creativity, their relationship to the overall level of giftedness, and to explore the predictive model for the overall level of giftedness as a dependent variable. The overall level of giftedness was measured with the C haracteristics of giftedness scale , verbal creativity was measured with a test of verbal creativity known as Telling of stories , and figural creativity was measured with Urban’s Test for creative thinking. The research data was gathered through testing 32 randomly selected children of preschool age. The results suggest that there is a moderate level of correlation between the two types of creativity (which is statistically significant) and a statistically non-significant weak correlation between creativity and giftedness (verbal creativity r=0.361; figural creativity r=0.222). As for partial characteristics, the fact that a child gives imaginary names to imaginary animals has the closest relationship with the overall level of giftedness. The same applies to a child’s ability to conceive an unfinished drawing as a conceptually whole drawing. These two elements are also most strongly represented in the included predictive model. The paper also describes that the overall level of giftedness in preschool age children has weak correlation with the achieved education of their fathers (r=0.248) and instead posits a correlation with the achieved education of their mothers (r=0.363) . The paper also discusses limits of the presented research and directions for further research.

Chování související se zdravím: determinanty, modely a konsekvence

Monografie shrnuje hlavni výstupy výzkumu podporovaneho agenturou GACR s nazvem Chovani zdravi podporujici a chovani zdravi ohrožujici: determinanty, modely, konsekvence. Integruje pět studii rozdělených do jednotlivých kapitol, ktere řesi problematiku vztahů komponent chovani souvisejiciho se zdravim s vybranými osobnostnimi charakteristikami, konstrukty optimismu a pesimismu, naději, ontogenezi a neuropsychologickými jevy. Prezentovane poznatky a vyvozene zavěry přispivaji nejen k hlubsimu teoretickemu pochopeni sledovaných vztahů, ale take k prakticke podpoře seberegulacnich mechanismů ctenařů vedoucich k peci o jejich vlastni zdravi. Publikace je urcena odborne veřejnosti, tematicky oslovuje předevsim odborniky a studenty v oblasti psychologie, zdravotnictvi, pedagogiky a dalsich socialnich věd, kterým je blizka problematika lidskeho zdravi.

Gender Differences in Characteristics of Giftedness Scale Scores in Preschool Children

The results of this study suggest that 35 (4% of all pre-schoolers) are exceptionally gifted children and could be expected to enter first grade. Interestingly, when looking at gender differences, our screening seems to favour girls as generally more gifted than boys. This difference might be associated with generally faster biological maturation of girls as well as different paths of brain development (young female brain is supposed to be better predisposed to good verbal performance and fine motor skills, which are the most essential components of school readiness).

Computational psycholinguistic analysis and its application in psychological assessment of college students

Abstract The paper deals with the issue of computational psycholinguistic analysis (CPA) and its experimental application in basic psychological and pedagogical assessment. CPA is a new method which may potentially provide interesting, psychologically relevant information about the author of a particular text, regardless of the text’s factual (semantic) content and without the need to obtain additional materials. As part of our QPA-FPT research we studied the link between the linguistic form of a text by Czech college students and their personality characteristics obtained from a psychodiagnostic test battery. The article also discusses the basis of the method, opportunities for practical application and potential use within psychological and pedagogical disciplines