ABSTRACT
In this introductory chapter we briefly summarize the contributions in this volume. Our purpose is to highlight the topic or key ideas in each chapter, and also to look at the chapters as a set to illuminate the unifying themes, which are those of the conference from which they stemmed. Those themes were: (1) To provide a forum for debate on current theoretical issues, (2) To capture the state of the art in reviews of research methods and results, and (3) To generate ideas for new research directions and methods. The contributors were encouraged to ponder questions that are fundamental to cognitive psychology, such as: How do people learn to read? What happens during the processes of speech perception? How do people acquire problem-solving skills? How do cognitive and motor skills develop and integrate with one another?
