The purpose of the present study was to clarify the effects of the complexity of the Chinese letter on learning to read it.
It was hypothesized that the Chinese letter is basically composed by attaching the meanings to special physical pattern. Characteristics of the pattern was defined by the physical complexity. And the complexity (C) was measured by simply counting the numbers of the parts (isolated lines, segments and dots) of the letter, regardless of it's meanings.
First, in order to get some indication of validity of the measure, the relationships between the C and use frequency of the Chinese letter were investigated. We got, as we expected, a linear relationship between the C and the logarithm of the order of the frequency, and the lower the frequency of the usage, the greater the C of the letter.
Second, paired-associate learning between the nonsense physical pattern composed randomly with lines and meaningful word was conducted. The stimuli were 12 physical patterns that were divided into six different C levels, and two irregularity (IR) levels. The responses were 12 two-syllabic meaningful words. The results were: (1) Learning trials were statistically significant for the level of the C, but not for the level of the IR.(2) The less complex patterns (level I) were most easy to learn.(3) Except at level I, there was a tendency for the more complex (MC) patterns to be easier to learn.
Third, the effects of the C and use frequency (UF) of the Chinese letters on reading them were tested with normal adults and college students, defining the less complex (LC) letters to be the patterns that are equal to or less complex than 15C, and the MC letters to be the ones that are equal to or more than 30C. Then 160 letters were selected from each group. The results were: (1) The errors of reading were significant for the level of the UF, and the higher the UF of the letters, the easier to read them.(2) The MC letters were significantly more readable than LC letters when the UF were constant.
Those results were discussed by making a distinction between the stimulus differentiation phase and the S-R association phase in the learning of letters. It was suggested that the stimulus differentiation phase is established easier and much faster than S-R association. MC letters have more information or cues that promote the S-R association than do LC ones.

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By means of verbal mediation, one can reduce impulsive behavior and recognize the outside world with a categorized system. This has been made clear through various experiments. Concerning such a function of speech, Luria claims that speech develops from impulsive function to significative function, and from external speech to internal speech during age period from 3 to 5.
The purpose of this experiment is to examine the development of regulatory function of speech, the validity of Luria's developmental stages. The task is to push a button twice in response to a stimulus of one color, or to refrain from pushing the button in response to another, depening on the experimenter's verbal instructions. In experimental groups, subjects are given pre-training to associate the stimuli and the words which they accompany during performance. The inserted words are different among groups, based on Luria's concepts of impulsive and significative function of speech. Subjects are 3, 4, 5 years old.
The main results, f the experiments (including two added experiments) are as follow.
(1) The motor reaction to verbal instructions develops strikingly during age period from 3 to 5. This is interpreted as a reflection of the development of speech as a stimulus for initiating behavior and of correct and strong speech mediation during performance.
(2) Pre-training has a positive effect in initiating the responses, differentiating between two kinds of stimuli. But it has no effect in refining initiated responses. There is no significant difference among four experimental groups, so Luria's hypothesis is not supported.
(3) A subject's behavior becomes refined if he repeats the verbal instructions before he performs the behavior. This shows that it is effective for a subject to be conscious of behavior in the speech system, as strongly as possible.(4) In the experiment under the condition giving a subject acoustic feedback against his own reaction, the result is interpreted as follows. When the power of inner speech is equated, the regulation of behavior is easier than otherwise, when the external condition which makes the subject more conscious of his own motor response is given to him.

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When the teachers introduce some material (u), they usually organize a series of learning content, which means the sequence of learning content the pupils have to study in order to arrive at the goal, in the following order.
(1) At first the teachers have to investigate the various learning contents which will lead the pupils to the goal.
(2) Next they have to select the most effective series of learning content to lead the pupils to the goal (A) of the teaching material (u).
(3) In these series, such unnecessary overlap of the learning contents or large gaps in the learning contents should not be permitted. They should select a series consisting of suitable step sizes
The above models can be formulated as follows.
(1) We can hypothetically construct the series of learning content which lead the pupils to the goal (A) as follows.
αn→ → αi+1→ αi→ αf-1→ → αl→A
(2) Next we give the achievement test connected with A, α1, α2, αn to the pupils who have already learned the teaching material (u), some of whom have got the goal, other haven't yet.
(3) Let P_ai (αj) present the ratio of the pupils who understand the learning content al to the pupils who understand αj, αj₊₁, and let P_ai (αj) represent the ratio of the pupils who understand the learning content α i to the pupils who don't understand αi.
(4) Suppose that the series of the learning content have such structure, then the result of the above achievement test will be shown as follows.
(i) _Pαi (αi+1) 1
Because the learning content ai is expected to be easier for the pupils who have arrived at the learning content αi+1.
(ii) Pαi (αi+j) 0
j=1, 2, n-i
(iii) 0≤Pαi (αi+j) ≤1
j=1, 2, n-i
(iv) Pαi (αi-j) 1
j=1, 2, i-1
(v) IfD (αi, αj) define
D (αi, αj) Pαj (αi)-Pαj (αi)
and if αf→ αj, thenC₁<D (αi, αj)
where C1isconstant and O<C₁<1 and if αi→ αj, thenD (αi, αj) <C₁
These characteristics can be applied to the method of programing a learning sequence.
Using this theory, we made a comparative study on the programed material of the graphic solution of an irrational inequality for the first year pupils of senior high school, with the material programed in an ordinary way. The result verifies that the programed materials which are organized by the above theory are more suitable for the conditions shown in model (2),(3) than the ones made in an ordinary way.

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The aim of this study was to investigate some aspects of the social behavior of institutionalized mentally retarded children in order to provide some cues for the organization and the guidance of the cottage-life members and of the training or teaching class members.
Their modes of interacting with others in free action were observed systematically by the auther and four nurses (teachers).
Four types of the interaction with mates (positive, negative, care and help, quarrel and persecution) were checked. The observation was carried out both at the situation of the cottage-life (H, mixed group in terms of IQ, CA) and at the situation of the training or teaching class (A or B, same IQ level within each group).
Ss were 32 mentally retarded children (25 boys, 7 girls) in a national institution for mentally retarded children. 24 of them were living in one cottage and 8 of them in another cottage. And also 13 of the 24 who lived in.me cottage belonged to the training class, A (severely retarded), 5 of same 24 plus 8 other cottage members to the teaching class, B (slightly higher IQ than A), and all of the rest to C class (higher IQ, CA than B).
The following results were obtained from the observations. Slightly higher social behavior (lower type of associative play) were observed in a few higher children in H situation. And severely retardeds were not only disturbed by their mates but were also more intervened by the nurses (teachers) in the same situation.
The severely retardeds behaved timidly, nervously and restlessly in the H situation, but they were more contented in the A situation since they were not disturbed by their mates and had more favorable contacts with nurses (teachers).
It was suggested that neurotic kind of behaviors that some of the severely retarded children had shown (during the institutional life as a whJle) may be due to those unfavorable interpersonal contacts in the H situation.

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Two experiments were designed to verify the gross assumption that as an index of adjustment, it is necessary but insufficient to use the only discrepancy between present self and ideal self, and so we should simultaneously use the discrepancies between present self and subject's perception of self as perceived by significant others (his friends, mother and father).
The first experiment aimed mainly to explore that each D score would be the sensitive index for any aspects of the malajustment. 55 college students were given Self-Differential scales for measurement of five kinds of self concepts i. e. present self concepts, ideal-self concept, friend's self concepts, mother's self concept and father's self concept, and then YATABE-GUILFORD PERSONALITY INVENTORY with twelve subtests for measurement of adjustment. Four discrepancy scores between present self and four other self concepts (ideal self, friend's self, mother's self and father's self) were computed within each subjects. They are referred to as D_pI, D_{P F}, D_pm and D_pFa, respectively. The latter three were the discrepancies between present self and the subject's notion of himself in his relation to his significant others. Each D score was related to Y. G. scores.
The following results were found.
a) All four D scores were proved to be the indices of emotional adjustment.
b) D_pF D_pm and D_pFa, except D_{p I} were proved to be the indices of the social adjustment.
c) When the high D_{p F} group was compared with low D_PF group, statistically significant differences were found in seven subtests' scores of Y. G. inventory. This means that D_{p f} is the most effective index of adjustment.
The second experiment was designed to compare schizophrenic patients with normal students for each D score.
The findings were as follows:
a) D_{p I} discriminated both groups sensitively in five of six factors of Self-Differential.
b) D_{p F a} discriminated two groups in four factors.
c) D_{p f} and D_{p m} were not so effective in discriminating two groups.
d) With respect to Self Differential factors, three D scores (except D_{p m}) discriminated two groups in factor I (volition and toughness) and factor IV (sensibility).
e) Only D_{p I} discriminated in factor IV (sociability including introversion-extroversion) and in factor VI (intelligence).
The following, therefore, can be concluded:
a) Within a normal student group, all four D scores can be seen to be the indices of emotional adjustment. Three D scores, not including the D_pi, indices of social adjustment. Especially D_{p F} is the most effective.
b) D_pi and D_{p F a} seem to be effective in comparing the normal with schizophrenic patients. Furthermore, the schizophrenic person tends to represent greater discrepancies on the aspects of his volition-toughness, sensibility in his phenomenal world than the normal.
c) Finally it may be said that the predictability for the personal and social adjustment will be increased when we use not only D_{p I} but D scores reflecting the self-other context.

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