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Children and youth: Psychosocial development
Book Reviews
119
Ainsi il nous apparait que I’initiative de J. E. DESMEDTde proposer une nouvelle collection d’ouvrages consacres, pour ces trois volumes, a une mise au point par les meilleurs specialistes de nos connaissances actuelles dans le domaine des potentiels evoquts, contribuera a mieux tvaluer I’inttret de I’electrophysiologie humaine dans la comprehension de mecanismes certbraux extremement complexes et de leurs troubles. Cet important travail devrait faciliter, sur des bases methodologiques rigoureuses, le nouvel essor conjoint de differentes disciplines, parfois un peu negligees, dans l’etude des fonctions cerebrales et de leurs deriglements. J. BANCAUD
Children
and Youth:
Holt-Saunders,
Psychosocial
Eastbourne,
Development. Second edition. E. D. EVANSand B. R. MCCANDLESS. 1978, 568 pp. f8.50.
DANSCETouvrage les auteurs etudient I’influence de I’environnement sur le dtveloppement de I’enfant et de I’adolescent sans tenir compte des differentes interpretations thtoriques que I’on trouvera regroupees en appendice. Aprbs une introduction visant a definir le concept de developpement, les influences sociales les plus importantes sont abordees: le role des parents, les relations dans un groupe, I’ecole et les mass media. Enfin, la partie la plus dense de I’ouvrage traite de I’interaction entre ces influences sociales et les differents aspects du developpement tel le developpement physique, linguistique, cognitif, etc. Loin d’etre exhaustif, ce livre plus specialement destine aux Ctudiants, presente I’avantage d’etre facile a consulter de par sa composition en trois rubriques illustrtes de nombreuses etudes de cas et d’exemples concrets, et de par la presence en fin d’ouvrage de deux appendices, I’un consacre aux differentes theories explicatives I’autre au maniement de la statistique en sciences humaines. Un glossaire et un index par sujets et par auteurs le completent utilement. J. RUEL
On the Biological Basis of Human Laterality-I. Evidence for a Maturational Left-Right Gradient-Il. The Mechanisms of Inheritance. M. C. CORBALLISand M. J. MORGAN. The Behoviorul und Bruin Sciences 4, 261-336, 1978.
GIVEN its length and style of presentation the following monograph appearing in the new journal: The Behavioral und Bruin Sciences (an open peer review journal that presents theoretical issues followed by critical reviews by numerous workers in the field), is reviewed as a book. The authors consider cerebral laterality and human handedness in a general biological context. They suggest that asymmetry is under the influence of a maturational gradient that seems to favour more rapid development of the left side than the right, for example it appears from anatomical studies on human brain (Wada, Clarke) that there is a larger asymmetry in adults’ brains than in infants’. Morgan and Corballis cite a number of animals having organs more developed on the left than on the right side of the body and the differences increase more than proportionally with the age of the animal (e.g. Rum femporuriu, some echinoderms). They also cite the classical works of Nottebohm showing the role of the right hypoglossal nerve in chaffinch’s song. They postulate an equipotentiality of the two sides of the human brain that would be demonstrated by good verbal performances of children with unilateral cortical lesions prior to 2, or prior to 10 yr of age, and by subjects who received hemispherectomies (Dennis and Whitaker). They also discuss the possibility of crabs (Alphem eterochelis) of developing more the right chela if the left has been cut (and vice versa). They stress the role of critical periods for different activities and they add that such critical periods can be different for the two sides of the brain. The second article tries to bridge the gap between biological structural asymmetries and the heredity of handedness and hemispheric specialization in man. They suggest that structural asymmetries of some organs (e.g. heart) are accounted for by an asymmetry coded in the cytoplasm which is expressed by a gradient favouring the left side of the embryo. As to handedness and cerebral lateralisation, the authors note that there may be two different factors, one that could account for the fact that right handers have language represented in the left hemisphere and another that could account for the existence of left handers and of a minority with language in the right hemisphere. After a brief review of Levy and Nagylakis, and Annett’s genetic models they conclude that there is not enough evidence that genetic variations account for lateral variations in man, and that everything seems to point in the direction of a role of the environment.
119
Ainsi il nous apparait que I’initiative de J. E. DESMEDTde proposer une nouvelle collection d’ouvrages consacres, pour ces trois volumes, a une mise au point par les meilleurs specialistes de nos connaissances actuelles dans le domaine des potentiels evoquts, contribuera a mieux tvaluer I’inttret de I’electrophysiologie humaine dans la comprehension de mecanismes certbraux extremement complexes et de leurs troubles. Cet important travail devrait faciliter, sur des bases methodologiques rigoureuses, le nouvel essor conjoint de differentes disciplines, parfois un peu negligees, dans l’etude des fonctions cerebrales et de leurs deriglements. J. BANCAUD
Children
and Youth:
Holt-Saunders,
Psychosocial
Eastbourne,
Development. Second edition. E. D. EVANSand B. R. MCCANDLESS. 1978, 568 pp. f8.50.
DANSCETouvrage les auteurs etudient I’influence de I’environnement sur le dtveloppement de I’enfant et de I’adolescent sans tenir compte des differentes interpretations thtoriques que I’on trouvera regroupees en appendice. Aprbs une introduction visant a definir le concept de developpement, les influences sociales les plus importantes sont abordees: le role des parents, les relations dans un groupe, I’ecole et les mass media. Enfin, la partie la plus dense de I’ouvrage traite de I’interaction entre ces influences sociales et les differents aspects du developpement tel le developpement physique, linguistique, cognitif, etc. Loin d’etre exhaustif, ce livre plus specialement destine aux Ctudiants, presente I’avantage d’etre facile a consulter de par sa composition en trois rubriques illustrtes de nombreuses etudes de cas et d’exemples concrets, et de par la presence en fin d’ouvrage de deux appendices, I’un consacre aux differentes theories explicatives I’autre au maniement de la statistique en sciences humaines. Un glossaire et un index par sujets et par auteurs le completent utilement. J. RUEL
On the Biological Basis of Human Laterality-I. Evidence for a Maturational Left-Right Gradient-Il. The Mechanisms of Inheritance. M. C. CORBALLISand M. J. MORGAN. The Behoviorul und Bruin Sciences 4, 261-336, 1978.
GIVEN its length and style of presentation the following monograph appearing in the new journal: The Behavioral und Bruin Sciences (an open peer review journal that presents theoretical issues followed by critical reviews by numerous workers in the field), is reviewed as a book. The authors consider cerebral laterality and human handedness in a general biological context. They suggest that asymmetry is under the influence of a maturational gradient that seems to favour more rapid development of the left side than the right, for example it appears from anatomical studies on human brain (Wada, Clarke) that there is a larger asymmetry in adults’ brains than in infants’. Morgan and Corballis cite a number of animals having organs more developed on the left than on the right side of the body and the differences increase more than proportionally with the age of the animal (e.g. Rum femporuriu, some echinoderms). They also cite the classical works of Nottebohm showing the role of the right hypoglossal nerve in chaffinch’s song. They postulate an equipotentiality of the two sides of the human brain that would be demonstrated by good verbal performances of children with unilateral cortical lesions prior to 2, or prior to 10 yr of age, and by subjects who received hemispherectomies (Dennis and Whitaker). They also discuss the possibility of crabs (Alphem eterochelis) of developing more the right chela if the left has been cut (and vice versa). They stress the role of critical periods for different activities and they add that such critical periods can be different for the two sides of the brain. The second article tries to bridge the gap between biological structural asymmetries and the heredity of handedness and hemispheric specialization in man. They suggest that structural asymmetries of some organs (e.g. heart) are accounted for by an asymmetry coded in the cytoplasm which is expressed by a gradient favouring the left side of the embryo. As to handedness and cerebral lateralisation, the authors note that there may be two different factors, one that could account for the fact that right handers have language represented in the left hemisphere and another that could account for the existence of left handers and of a minority with language in the right hemisphere. After a brief review of Levy and Nagylakis, and Annett’s genetic models they conclude that there is not enough evidence that genetic variations account for lateral variations in man, and that everything seems to point in the direction of a role of the environment.