Verbal fluency is a basic function of language that refers to the ability to produce fluent speech. Despite being an essentially linguistic function, its measurements are also used to evaluate executive aspects of verbal behavior. Performance in verbal fluency (VF) tasks varies according to age, education, and cognitive development. Neurodevelopmental disorders that affect the functioning of frontal areas tend to cause lower performance in VF tasks. Despite the relative consensus that has been reached in terms of the use of VF tasks for the diagnosis of dyslexia and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, few studies have considered regional variations in Brazil. The present study sought to provide normative data on VF tasks in children by considering gender, age, education, and geopolitical region of origin with auxiliary purposes in neuropsychological diagnosis of disorders that occur with executive changes The study included 298 participants, 7–10 years of age of both genders, who performed three letter fluency tasks and three category fluency tasks. The data were subjected to correlational and variance analyses, with age and gender as factors. No effect of gender on the children's performance was found. However, significant differences between age groups were observed, with better performance in letter tasks in older children and better performance in letter tasks compared with category tasks. Significant regional differences in performance on the letter VF task were observed. These results reinforce the importance of regional normative data in countries with high regional cultural variations, such as Brazil.

Studies that used the Hebb paradigm have contributed to our understanding of the way in which short-term serial information is consolidated in long-term memory. However, it is unclear whether the learning of repeated series occurs solely within a serial context. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine whether the repetition of intermediate items in a given list is conducive to learning these items. We modified the Hebb paradigm by introducing repeated stimuli only in midlist positions. Letter lists were introduced in 4 different experimental conditions. Experiment 1 involved repetition of the intermediate items with participants who did not benefit from central item repetitions. In Experiment 2, only the first item was highlighted within the repeated intermediate series, and learning was restricted to just that item as opposed to the entire sequence. In Experiment 3, the repeated intermediate items were circled, and learning was observed exclusively within the highlighted series. Experiment 4 had no repeated sequences, and all intermediate items were circled; no learning effect of these items was observed. We conclude that the repetition of only the midlist items is insufficient to produce learning. Similarly, perceptual aspects were advantageous in the learning of repeated series. These findings may support future studies on the benefit of repetition and distinctiveness in serial learning.

This study investigated the performance of children from the Brazilian Northeast region, from 7 to 10 years in phonemic and semantic verbal fluency tasks. The participants were 102 subjects (62 girls and 40 boys) who performed three phonemic and three semantic fluency tasks. The results were submitted to correlational and variance analysis to investigate the influence of the variables age and gender on the subjects performance. There was no effect of gender on the results. Significant contrasts between age groups were found, and better performance was observed on phonemic tasks. Also, the performance in this task changed along development, in contrast to what happened with the semantic fluency. The findings seem to be in accordance to neurodevelopmental aspects, taken into account that explicit memory systems show more precocious maturational course, with earlier consolidation, in comparison to the executive functions and frontal lobes, which go on developing until adult ages.