Mutualistic Coupling Between Vocabulary and Reasoning Supports Cognitive Development During Late Adolescence and Early Adulthood
通过追踪785名14-25岁青少年的纵向数据，发现词汇和流体推理能力在发展中相互促进，支持了认知发展的互惠模型，为理解认知能力的正相关现象提供了新视角。
One of the most replicable findings in psychology is the positive manifold: the observation that individual differences in cognitive abilities are universally positively correlated. Investigating the developmental origin of the positive manifold is crucial to understanding it. In a large longitudinal cohort of adolescents and young adults ( N = 785; n = 566 across two waves, mean interval between waves = 1.48 years; age range = 14-25 years), we examined developmental changes in two core cognitive domains, fluid reasoning and vocabulary. We used bivariate latent change score models to compare three leading accounts of cognitive development: g-factor theory, investment theory, and mutualism. We showed that a mutualism model, which proposes that basic cognitive abilities directly and positively interact during development, provides the best account of developmental changes. We found that individuals with higher scores in vocabulary showed greater gains in matrix reasoning and vice versa. These dynamic coupling pathways are not predicted by other accounts and provide a novel mechanistic window into cognitive development.