Karl S Rosengren

University of Rochester | UR · Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences / Department of Psychology

Visual representations of information are prevalent in many academic domains, and students must learn how to interpret and use these visual representations. How do students acquire this representational competence? Past work has focused on the role of explicit instruction. In this work, we consider another route for acquiring representational compe...

For over a hundred years, children’s drawings have been used to assess children’s intellectual, emotional, and physical development, characterizing children on the basis of intuitively derived checklists to identify the presence or absence of features within children’s drawings. The current study investigates whether contemporary data science tools...

With the resumption of face-to-face classes in schools, children have begun to ask questions about the COVID-19 outbreak not only to parents but also to teachers. However, there has not been any research examining children’s questions and teachers’ responses about the Covid-19 pandemic. The study examined 3-12-year-old children’s questions and teac...

Do adults think about genetic inheritance as a deterministic or probabilistic process? Do adults display systematic biases when reasoning about genetic inheritance? Knowing how adults think about genetic inheritance is valuable, both for understanding the developmental end point of these concepts and for identifying biases that persist even after f...

Visualizations are commonly used in educational materials; however, not all visualizations are equally effective at promoting learning. Prior research has supported the idea that both perceptually rich and bland visualizations are beneficial for learning and generalization. We investigated whether the perceptual richness of a life cycle diagram inf...

Do people think about genetic inheritance as a deterministic or probabilistic process? Do adults display systematic biases when reasoning about genetic inheritance? Knowing how adults think about genetic inheritance is valuable, both for understanding the developmental endpoint of these concepts and for identifying biases that persist even after fo...

Parent-child conversations are important for children's cognitive development, children's ability to cope with stressful events, and can shape children's beliefs about the causes of illness. In the context of a global pandemic, families have faced a multitude of challenges, including changes to their routines, that they need to convey to their chil...

Young children sometimes perform actions not afforded by the environmental context that they are currently in. Anecdotal reports and past research have suggested that young children sometimes attempt to perform actions with screen media that they cannot perform successfully given the constraints of the media. These behaviors have been defined as a...

We present three studies examining death in children’s animated films. Study 1 is a content analysis of 49 films. We found that death is often portrayed in films, but many deaths occurred off-screen. Deaths were mostly portrayed in a biologically accurate manner, but some films portrayed biological misconceptions. Study 2 (n = 433) reports on paren...

We present three studies examining death in children’s animated films. Study 1 is a content analysis of 49 films. We found that death is often portrayed in films, but many deaths occurred off-screen. Deaths were mostly portrayed in a biologically accurate manner, but some films portrayed biological misconceptions. Studies 2 and 3 (n = 433) report o...

During the COVID-19 pandemic, resources informing parents on how they should discuss the topic with their children surfaced. However, little is known about the questions that children ask about COVID-19 (and the pandemic in general) and how parents respond to those questions. In this exploratory mixed-method study, we recruited 349 predominantly Wh...

Two foundational concepts in biology education are 1) offspring are not identical to their parents, and 2) organisms undergo changes throughout their lives. These concepts are included in both international and U.S. curricular standards. Research in psychology has shown that children often have difficulty understanding these concepts, as they are i...

This study examines how children learn information about the causes of illness (such as germs or cold weather) through conversations with their parents in two cultures. Mexican (Study 1, N = 35) and European-American (Study 2, N = 31) mothers and their children (ages 4 to 6) read picture books in which one of the characters either got sick or did n...

Parents are typically in charge of purchasing the food that their children eat, but little is known about how parents decide if particular foods are healthy for their children and how their beliefs about nutrition influence their children’s beliefs. In two studies, we investigated how parents of children ages 4–12 (N = 826) make decisions about the...

People often have difficulty understanding processes of biological change, and they typically reject drastic life cycle changes such as metamorphosis, except for animals with which they are familiar. Even after a lesson about metamorphosis, people often do not generalize to animals not seen during the lesson. This might be partially due to the perc...

People often have difficulty understanding processes of biological change, and they typically reject drastic life cycle changes such as metamorphosis, except for animals with which they are familiar. Even after a lesson about metamorphosis, people often do not generalize to animals not seen during the lesson. This might be partially due to the perc...

Using a mixed-methods approach, we examined how participants’ memories of socialization regarding death might influence their self-reported coping with losses in childhood and adulthood. We recruited 318 adults to complete an online survey. Path analyses indicated that participants who remembered their parents shielding them less from issues relate...

Children’s understanding of death has been a topic of interest to researchers investigating the development of children’s thinking and clinicians focusing on how children cope with the death of a loved one. Traditionally, researchers in cognitive development have studied death from a biological perspective. Current research suggests that exploring...

Young children's growing access to touchscreen technology represents one of many contextual factors that may influence development. The focus of the current study was the impact of traditional versus electronic drawing materials on the quality of children's drawings during the preschool years. Young children (2-5 years, N = 73) and a comparison gro...

A mixed‐method approach was used to explore parent and child perspectives on death in Mexico. Parents’ and children’s death‐related experiences and understanding of death were examined. While all children in this sample displayed a biological understanding of death, older children were less likely to endorse that all living things die. Children als...

Slips, trips, and falls (STF) of firefighters may occur while traversing stationary obstacles. STF risk may be amplified by fatigue from firefighting and carrying an asymmetric load. Vertical and horizontal clearances of the lead (VCL, HCL) and trailing (VCT, HCT) foot and contact with a 30 cm obstacle were examined in 24 firefighters. We examined...

One of the most common causes of injuries among firefighters is slips, trips, and falls on the fireground. Acute fatigue from firefighting activities and/or carrying asymmetric loads might impact gait characteristics increasing slip, trip, and fall risk. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of fatigue from simulated firefighting act...

Lockhart and Keil have written an interesting monograph focusing on the development of reasoning about medicine, a relatively underexplored area of research with potentially broad implications with respect to the design of more‐effective medical interventions. In a set of 15 studies with well over 2,200 participants, they examine how children and a...

We investigated children's (n = 120; 3- to 11-year-olds) and adults' (n = 18) reasoning about life-cycle changes in biological organisms by examining their endorsements of four different patterns of life-span changes. Participants were presented with two separate tasks: (a) judging possible adult versions of a juvenile animal and (b) judging possib...

Slips, trips and falls are leading causes of fireground injuries. A functional balance test (FBT) was used to investigate the effects of self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) size and design, plus firefighting work cycle. During the FBT, subjects walked along a narrow platform and turned in defined spaces, with and without an overhead obstacle....

Risk of slips, trips, and falls in firefighters may be influenced by the firefighter’s equipment and duration of firefighting. This study examined the impact of a four self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) -three SCBA of increasing size and a prototype design- and three work cycles -one bout (1B), two bouts with a five-minute break (2B), and tw...

In this chapter, we explore an interesting class of behaviors, referred to as action errors, which, we argue, provide a window in to the early development of the perception-action system. As we examine these behaviors, we discuss how acquisition of motor and cognitive skills interact at particular periods of development to make children more likely...

Firefighters’self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBAs) protect the respiratory system during firefightingbut increases the physiological burden. Extended duration SCBA (>30min) have increased air supply, increasing the duration of firefighting work cycles. To examine the effects of SCBAconfigurationand work cycle (length and rest), 30firefightersc...

Folding paper is a seemingly simple act that requires planning, bimanual coordination, and manual strength and control to produce specific forces. Although paper folding has been used as an assessment tool and as a way to promote spatial skills, this study represents the first attempt to document when paper folding emerges across early childhood. S...

While healthy gait is often characterized as, or assumed to be symmetric, consistent asymmetries often exist. In this study, we test the hypotheses that asymmetries in lower limb function, as measured by ground reaction force characteristics, may be explained by differences in foot orientation or limb dominance. Peak ground reaction force (GRF) mea...

In order to safely negotiate cluttered and dangerous environments, firefighters must efficiently and effectively make affordance judgments. Failure to do so could put them at risk for slips, trips, and falls, which are major causes of injuries for firefighters. We examined how well firefighters were able to perceive their obstacle crossing abilitie...

The chapter explores how young children in the state of Puebla, Mexico are socialized with respect to death by observing and pitching in during the annual celebration for día de los muertos. This chapter focuses on observations made of children's participation in practices related to día de los muertos and their experiences with death as explored t...

Slips, trips, and falls are a leading cause of injury to firefighters with many injuries occurring while traversing stairs, possibly exaggerated by acute fatigue from firefighting activities and/or asymmetric load carriage. This study examined the effects that fatigue, induced by simulated firefighting activities, and hose load carriage have on foo...

This was a secondary data analysis of a cluster-randomized clinical trial that tested the efficacy of a 20-week Sun-style Tai Chi (TC) program in reducing pain in community-dwelling elders with cognitive impairment and knee osteoarthritis (OA). The study also examined whether elders' level of cognitive function was related to the outcomes of the TC...

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of firefighter's self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) air bottle design and vision on postural control of firefighters. Twenty-four firefighters were tested using four 30-minute SCBA bottle designs that varied by mass and size. Postural sway measures were collected using a forceplate unde...

For decades, research to quantify the effects of firefighting activities and personal protective equipment on physiology and biomechanics has been conducted in a variety of testing environments. It is unknown if these different environments provide similar information and comparable responses. A novel Firefighting Activities Station, which simulate...

Slips, trips, and falls are a major cause of firefighter injuries. We examine how factors associated with the individual firefighter, specific tasks involved in firefighting, and the environment relate to the incidence of slips, trips, and falls. We also review our own research examining how aspects of firefighting gear and fatigue influence the ba...

The previous chapter revealed that death was an affectively charged topic for European American parents and teachers in Centerville. Most adults believed that young children do not have the affective or cognitive resources to cope with death, and thus should be shielded from death and its associated rituals and representations. In this chapter we d...

We investigated the effects of wearing personal protective equipment (PPE), design of PPE (Standard vs. Enhanced), and fatigue during a simulated firefighting activity on the functional balance of firefighters. We defined functional balance as the ability to prevent a loss of balance and maintain body posture while performing functional tasks. A no...

Children are widely celebrated for their imaginations, but developmental research on this topic has often been fragmented or narrowly focused on fantasy. However, there is growing appreciation for the role that imagination plays in cognitive and emotional development, as well as its link with children’s understanding of the real world. With their i...

Biological kinds undergo a variety of changes during their life span, and these changes vary in degree by organism. Understanding that an organism, such as a caterpillar, maintains category identity over its life span despite dramatic changes is a key concept in biological reasoning. At present, we know little about the developmental trajectory of...

Biological kinds undergo a variety of changes during their life span, and these changes vary in degree by organism. Understanding that an organism, such as a caterpillar, maintains category identity over its life span despite dramatic changes is a key concept in biological reasoning. At present, we know little about the developmental trajectory of...

Evolution Challenges: Integrating Research and Practice in Teaching and Learning about Evolution goes beyond the science versus religion dispute to ask why evolution is so often rejected as a legitimate scientific fact, focusing on a wide range of cognitive, socio-cultural, and motivational factors that make concepts such as evolution difficult to...

This book presents new ideas for why the acceptance and understanding of evolution and related concepts is so difficult for both children and adults. Drawing from diverse fields, the contributors include the foremost researchers and practitioners in the study of children’s cognitive development, science education, teaching of evolution, and the des...

This chapter summarizes the content of the first section of the book highlighting factors that influence the acceptance and understanding of evolution. These factors are described as constraints within the child, the specific task, and the broader social-cultural environment. It is argued that some of these constraints may lead to misconceptions, a...

Although often conceptualized in contradictory terms, the common assumption that natural and supernatural explanations are incompatible is psychologically inaccurate. Instead, there is considerable evidence that the same individuals use both natural and supernatural explanations to interpret the very same events and that there are multiple ways in...

Using a questionnaire, the present study examined parents’ beliefs regarding the development of children’s beliefs about science, religion, and the paranormal. The study also investigated parental encouragement of children’s beliefs, as well as parents’ own beliefs within these domains. Results revealed that parents make distinctions between domain...

The Flexibility, Toning, and Balance (FlexToBa) Trial is a two-armed randomized controlled trial which will contrast the effects of a DVD-delivered, home-based, physical activity intervention and a Healthy Aging attention control condition on physical activity, functional performance, functional limitations, and quality of life in low active, older...

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Each year, roughly 11,000 firefighters are injured as a result of slips, trips and falls, which account for over 25% of all fireground injuries. Wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) can increase risk of fall-related injuries due to its weight, restrictiveness, and increased heat stress. Modification of PPE may serve to mitigate firefighter i...

This one-arm pilot study investigated the effect of tai chi on cognition in elders with cognitive impairment. Although no significant difference existed between pre- and post-test performance on all cognition measures, a dose-response relationship was demonstrated between attendance and some cognition measures.

This article presents a qualitative study following a 6-month Taiji (T'ai Chi)/Qigong (Ch'i Kung) intervention for older adults. The researchers conducted in-depth interviews of eight selected participants who elected to continue practicing Taiji after the intervention ended, in order to explore their subjective experiences of Taiji's effects and t...

A recent graphic schemas account of drawing development that emphasizes the appropriation of graphic conventions has provided an alternative to constructivist theories, which have viewed development as a progression through universal stages. The present study addresses the limitations of this account by investigating younger children than have usua...

Children learn many new categories and make inferences about these categories. Much work has examined how children make inferences on the basis of category knowledge. However, inferences may also affect what is learned about a category. Four experiments examine whether category-based inferences during category learning influence category knowledge...

In this study, the interaction of biomechanical and cognitive factors in drawing development was explored. Children (4- to 6-year-olds) and adults copied four shapes (two familiar and two novel) six times alternating between their dominant and non-dominant hands (starting hand was counterbalanced). Similarity in the production sequences within and...

Injuries to the lower extremity often cause limitations to joint motion and alter movement patterns of limb segments during gait. We hypothesized that complexity and variability of limb segment motion during gait would increase in both limbs due to unilateral injury. Using simulated injury to generate asymmetric gait, we developed new methods to qu...

The air bottle configuration (mass and size) used with a firefighter's self-contained breathing apparatus may affect functional gait performance and slip/trip/fall risk, contributing to one of the most common and costly fire ground injuries to this population. To examine the potential effect of bottle mass and size on firefighter gait performance,...

Individual differences in the production and persistence of committing scale errors were examined in children (age range 18-29 months) attending a laboratory preschool. Miniature replica toys were placed in the classrooms during three 20-min observation periods for 10 weeks. The majority of the children (88%, n=24) performed scale errors providing...

We present a review of novel techniques developed by our research group to improve quantitative assessment of human movement, especially assessments related to symmetric and asymmetric gait patterns. These new methods use motion capture data of the lower limb joints (e.g., joint and body segment angular position and/or velocity, or joint center loc...

This article describes the authors' experience and strategies in teaching Tai Chi, a gentle exercise derived from an ancient Chinese martial art, to mildly cognitively impaired elders to relieve osteoarthritic knee pain. The 12-form Sun-style Tai Chi, a set of Tai Chi forms endorsed by the American Arthritis Foundation, was used in the program. Tea...

Tree-thinking is increasingly recognized as a crucial skill in the biological sciences. However, for students, the task is wrought with challenges. Even as representations are meant to facilitate reasoning about difficult concepts such as macroevolution and the phylogenetic relationships among taxa existing tree diagrams that are so crucial to the...

Scale errors refer to behaviors where young children attempt to perform an action on an object that is too small to effectively accommodate the behavior. The goal of this study was to examine the frequency and characteristics of scale errors in everyday life. To do so, the researchers collected parental reports of children's (age range = 13-21 mont...

Exercise is an adjunct intervention for treating osteoarthritis (OA) knee pain, but many older adults, especially those with cognitive impairment, refuse to participate because of their frailty. Tai chi is a gentle alternative to Western-style aerobic exercise. In this article, we report recruitment experiences based on older adults' comments and o...

The importance of maintaining strength in older adults is well documented and various training modalities have been recommended; however, the effectiveness of various interventions with high translation to public health practice has not been completely characterized. Additionally, the interrelations among mode, strength, and lower extremity physica...

Six preschool classrooms, containing children between the ages of 4.0 and 40.0 months, were seeded with miniature items to examine how easily scale errors could be elicited. Observations occurred over a period of 3 months, with a total of 280 min of observations per classroom. A concealed observer documented all interactions with the miniature item...

To determine the sex-specific relationships between physical activity, aerobic fitness, adiposity (%Fat), mineral-free lean mass (MFLM), and balance and gait performance in older adults. Eighty-five female and 49 male sedentary, healthy, community-dwelling older adults (mean [SD] age, 69.6 [5.4] and 70.3 [4.7] years, respectively) were evaluated on...

This article reports a pilot study of the effect of tai chi (TC), a pharmacological adjunct and mild aerobic exercise, on osteoarthritic knee pain in elders with cognitive impairment (CI). The TC program included a warm-up, 12-form Sun-style TC, and a cool-down period, for a total of 20-40 minutes per session, twice a week for 15 weeks. The results...