Children's memory for oblique orientation: a matter of degree?

Research on children's memory for oblique orientation has typically focused on the left-right component while little attention has been directed at memory for slope. Experiment 1 establishes that the ability to remember the slope of a line develops between 3 and 4 years of age. 16 3-year-olds and 16 4-year-olds were tested on 2 discrimination problems using successive presentation and feedback: (1) between lines varying only in slope, and (2) between lines varying only in left-right direction. 3-year-olds found both problems difficult while 4-year-olds solved these problems with ease. Further investigation determined that young children's difficulty lay in the nature of the slope problem rather than in our procedure. In experiment 2, 15 children (mean age = 4-6) who had discriminated both slope and left-right problems under successive presentation were tested on these same discriminations under simultaneous presentation. While all children discriminated lines varying in slope, the left-right problem proved to be quite difficult. This finding suggests that the slope-the obliqueness-of a line does not play a critical role in children's difficulty with simultaneously presented mirror-image obliques. Different coding strategies for the slope and left-right components of the oblique are suggested.