Prompt treatment in hemophilic children can prevent chronic arthropathy, physical dysfunction and social handicap. It is important for the patients to recognize hemophilic bleeding at an early stage to ensure prompt treatment. Therefore, we examined the early symptoms of bleeding in eight adult hemophilic patients who recognized hemophilic bleeding before it became severe (seven cases, hemophilia A; one case, hemophilia B). The major findings are as follows: (1) Early symptoms of hemophilic bleeding were divided into two groups; sensory signs (e.g. warm, stiff) and affective signs (e.g. annoying, tiring). (2) As time passed, the sensory and affective signs changed into pain. It seems that sensory and affective signs are the minimal pain experience. (3) Sensory signs were not limited to the bleeding region at the beginning, but they converged into the bleeding region with the passage of time. (4) Sensory and affective signs caused the patients to initiate investigatory activities such as movement of the bleeding joint. These activities amplified sensory and affective signs. (5) Although the patients recognized sensory and affective signs, they were apt to deny bleeding. In addition, we discussed mechanisms of recognition of hemophilic bleeding at an early stage.

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Two experiments were carried out to examine what 17 congenitally blind subjects who lost their sight before 6 years of age know about kanji. In experiment 1, Ss were asked to indicate all the words in a short story which can be written in kanji. We found that a sensitivity to the correspondence between words and kanji exists in the blind, but a little lower than in sighted people. But poor performance in writing kanji and introspective data revealed that blind people may not have an internal representation of the form of kanji. In experiment 2, Ss retrieved kanji for 5 minutes according to retrieval cues of "bushu" or "on". Blind Ss could not think of any kanji at all on fundamental written element of kanji ("bushu") cues. Although phonetic ("on") cues were almost as effective for retrieving kanji in the blind as in sighted Ss, the frequency of double, or triple retrieval of the same kanji was quite high in the blind subjects but nonexistent in sighted Ss.

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In this paper, we describe the results of the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test given to a group of autistic children and a group of mentally retarded children. This test was used by B. Milner who found that frontal lobectomy patients made many perseverative errors. We used this test for the purpose of considering the frontal dysfunction hypothesis about autistic children which has been set forth by several investigators in the last few years. The results of this study are as follows. 1) The autistic children made significantly more perseverative errors than mentally retarded children group. 2) The subjects showed many types of response. Autistic children had a tendency to perseverate to the category selected voluntarily, to the first category, and to number. 3) In the autistic child group, a significant correlation was found between IQ and perseverative errors, but not in the mentally retarded child group.

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The purpose of the present experiment was to discuss effects of overtraining on nonreversal shift learning in Intellectually Handicapped children. (Experiment I) Effects of overtraining on nonreversal shift learning were examined under stimulus arrengement conditions. The principal hypotheses were as follows; 1. Overtraining tends to hinder nonreversal shift learning when the initial irrelevant dimension was still kept to exist in the transfer situation. 2. Nonreversal shift learning is more facilitated in CW (constant-irrelevant within trial) condition. A 2×2 factorial experiment design was used, with degree of the initial learning (criterion training and 100% overtraining) and the stimulus arrangement conditions (VW and CW). The Ss were 32 mentally retarded children, with a mean MA of 5 years and 7 months and were divided into 4 groups in considering with CA, MA and IQ. They were trained on the two-choice simultaneous discrimination tasks to achieve the criterion of 5 successive correct responses. Immediately after completing the initial discrimination learning, half of the Ss were shifted under the VW condition, and the another half under the CW condition. The correct responses were informed by saying "you got", and the incorrected responses by "you missed". The main results were as follows; (1) With respect to VW condition, there was no significant different between the criterion group and the overtrained. Therefore, the hyposesis 1 was not demonstrated. The result of CW condition was considered to be compatible with that of VW condition. (2) No significant effect was found in different conditions of VW and CW. The hypothesis 2 was not demonstrated. (3) For the criterion group and the overtrained, the correct response rate was significantly higher in UP than in CP in the first pair trial block. (4) In terms of CW condition, the correct response rate was considered to be compatible with PNP and PPP in the first pair trial block. (Experiment II) Effects of overtraining on nonreversal shift learning were examined in mentally retarded children (MR), autistic children (AU) and normal children (NR) with the same MA levels (MA 5-6 years). A 2×3 factorial design was used, with degree of the initial training (criterion training and 100% overtraining) and types of subject (MR, AU and NR). The procedure was the same with that of Experiment I. The main result were as follows; (1) Trials and errors tendency was significantly increased with overtraining according to an order of MR, AU and NR. It was found that the probability of attention to relevant dimension increased with overtraining in the order above mentioned. (2) It was, as awhole, shown that correct response rate was more increased in UP than in CP. (3) It was found that the probability of spontaneous reversal in overtrained group increased in accordance with an order of MR, AU and NR. The result were discussed in considering with two-stage theories of discrimination learning, especially with respect to the Attention Theory (the Sutherland and Mackintosh's analyzer theory and the Zeaman and House's attention theory).

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The aim of present investigation was to compare mental retardates with equal MA normals in order to demonstrate the relation between the hand preference development and MA. The hand preference test was administered to 58 moderate mentally retarded children with MA's between 2 and 4 years and to 115 normal children aged 2 to 4 years. This test consisted of nine tasks. Each task required S to manipulate each experimental object with right, or left hand. Experimental objects were presented on the right, middle, and left side in front of S. By adopting this procedure it was possible to reveal not only the handedness of each S but also the extent of laterality. The handedness of S was evaluated on the basis of the handedness behaviour concerning each task. For instance, if S always manipulated anyone of experimental objects with right (or left) hand wherever it was presented, his handedness behaviour concerning this task was assessed as right-(or left-) handed. The other case was assessed as uncertain behaviour. By combining handedness behaviour concerning each task the handedness of each S could be classified as right-handed, left-handed, mixed, or indistinguishable type. The extent to which the laterality was proceeding was evaluated by the frequency of righthanded response observed in each side. The results obtained were as follows: 1. The incidence of indistinguishable type decreased with CA in normal group, but did not show any change with MA in mentally retarded group. 2. There were no differences between mental retardates and equal MA normals in right-handed response frequency. The implication of these findings was discussed in terms of hand preference development. These findings have encouraged the suggestion that the extent of laterality was determined by MA and that indistinguishable preference type might have the relation to brain damage in mentally retarded group.

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