Clipmarks | tabsey's clips

Dyslexia Differs by Language

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 16:51:18 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Interesting article.

April 8, 2008 -- Dyslexia affects different parts of children's brains depending on whether they are raised reading English or Chinese. That finding, reported in Monday's online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, means that therapists may need to seek different methods of assisting dyslexic children from different cultures.

"This finding was very surprising to us. We had not ever thought that dyslexics' brains are different for children who read in English and Chinese," said lead author Li-Hai Tan, a professor of linguistics and brain and cognitive sciences at the University of Hong Kong. "Our finding yields neurobiological clues to the cause of dyslexia."

Tags: medical

Boys Will Be Boys, Even Among Monkeys

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 11:26:26 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: When you finish your family tree, you will, hopefully, know more about these relationships.

Clip Source: dsc.discovery.com

Like Father, Like Son

April 7, 2008 -- The notion that children's taste in toys might somehow be genetically determined has long been disparaged by psychologists -- pooh-poohed as unscientific, sexist or both.

But a study by researchers in the United States suggests that when it comes to choosing between trucks and cuddly stuffed animals, chromosomes could make a difference.

There have been hundreds of studies that sought to distinguish acquired from innate behavior patterns in small children.

But by the time kids are old enough to choose and play with toys, they have also been socialized -- picking up cues from their parents, peers and television -- on how little girls and boys should behave, making it impossible to tease the two influences apart.

So a team of scientists led by Kim Wallen of the Yerkes National Primate Research Center in Atlanta, Georgia decided to offer typical "male" and "female" toys to rhesus monkeys to see if preferences aligned with sex.

Tags: my, father, had, good, ball, skills

Ancient Knives Unearthed in Australia

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 11:07:26 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: These same tools were used up to the time of influence a few hundred years ago - and we expect them to adjust and become "whites" in a few generations of missionaries.

Clip Source: dsc.discovery.com

April 7, 2008 -- Tools dating back at least 35,000 years have been unearthed in a rock shelter in Australia's remote northwest, making it one of the oldest archaeological finds in that part of the country, archaeologists said Monday.

The tools include a piece of flint the size of a small cell phone and hundreds of tiny sharp stones that were used as knives. One local Aboriginal elder saw it as vindication of what his people have said all along -- that they have inhabited this land for tens of thousands of years.

"I'm ecstatic, I'm over the moon, because it's now indisputable," Slim Parker, an elder of the Martidja Banyjima people, said.

The tools, along with seeds, bark and other plant material, were found nearly 6 1/2 feet beneath the floor of the shelter -- a slight crevice in the hillside protected by an overhang of rock -- on the edges of an iron ore mine site about 590 miles northeast of Perth, the capital of Western Australia.

Tags: arrogant, conquerers