Increasing patient satisfaction and compliance: An examination of physician humor orientation,compliance‐gaining strategies,and perceived credibility

This study examined the impact that patients' perceptions of a physician's humor orientation, credibility, and compliance‐gaining strategies had on their satisfaction and compliance. Perceived physician humor orientation positively related to perceived physician credibility, physician compliance‐gaining strategies, and patient satisfaction. Other positive relationships among perceived physician credibility, physician compliance gaining strategies, and patient satisfaction emerged. Compliance did relate significantly to physician humor orientation and perceived credibility. Aspects of patient satisfaction and physician use of compliance‐gaining strategies affected compliance. Additionally, this study revealed minimal differences among data collection methods (undergraduate (N = 44), graduate (N = 48), general public (N = 66), and online participation (N = 26)).     

The impact of relational consequences and intimacy on the selection of interpersonal persuasion tactics: A reanalysis

This study investigated the effects of situational variables on the likelihood of use of four types of compliance‐gaining strategies: justification, exchange, manipulation and personal rejection. Subjects rated the strategies on the probability that they would actually use them to gain compliance in each of four situations that varied systematically in intimacy and relational consequences. Both situational variables were found to he significant predictors of strategy preference. Message strategy selection was concluded to be based upon an assessment of the relative risk associated with the implementation of a given strategy and on the basis of the relative importance of three communicative goals: (1) whether strategy implementation would lead to successful compliance; (2) whether strategy implementation would result in relational harm; and, (3) whether strategy implementation would result in poor management of the agent's image. Recommendations for future research were noted.     

Perspectives on and conceptualizations of compliance and compliance‐gaining 1

Scholars have offered a number of different conceptualizations of compliance and compliance‐gaining which reflect broader competing perspectives. While there have been attempts to synthesize and clarify the empirical literature on compliance‐gaining, there has been little attention devoted to reviewing critically perspectives and conceptualizations focusing on persuaders attempting to get persuadees to do what they want. A review of the theoretical literature reveals that scholars have frequently developed their conceptualizations of compliance and compliance‐gaining from a social exchange or power perspective. It is shown how these two perspectives are manifested in the empirical research, especially those studies focusing on factors affecting strategy selection. The argument is made that conceptualizations and empirical studies reflecting these perspectives typically push communication into the background and reward/cost and power principles into the foreground of the compliance‐gaining process. Studies on teacher power in the classroom are provided as examples of how it is possible to adopt a power perspective and not undercut the role of communication in the gaining of compliance.     

A model of properties of compliance‐gaining strategies

This paper intends to induce a set of properties that unify and distinguish compliancegaining strategies and to determine whether coders can reliably classify messages on the basis of the proposed properties. The first goal was accomplished by deriving codified strategies from open‐ended responses of subjects to persuasive situations. Properties that reflected differences in the strategies were induced. The second goal had three coders content‐analyze the original responses in terms of the derived properties. Measures of unitizing and coder reliability and content validity were assessed. In addition, information concerning representational validity was presented. The approach taken in this paper provides us with an assessment of the state of affairs found in a compliance‐gaining strategy.     

Engineering studies in Britain for students from Commonwealth developing countries

In early 1979 an exploratory discussion meeting on “Engineering Education and Developing Countries of the Commonwealth” was hosted in the House of Commons by the Council for Education in the Commonwealth (CEC). Subsequent to the meeting, the relevant courses subcommittee of the CEC decided that the issues raised in discussion warranted closer investigation and a working group was established to consider factors affecting engineering education in and for Commonwealth developing countries. These factors include (a) existing educational provision in Britain and overseas (b) deficiencies in practical training for overseas students (c) staff development of overseas lecturers (d) engineering manpower forecasting (e) relevant financial problems. The present report, however, is only concerned with the difficulties students from Commonwealth developing countries meet in gaining admission, studying in and successfully completing engineering courses in Britain. Additionally, consideration is given to the appropriateness of the studies undertaken in Britain to future careers at home.     

Externally Funded Research in Counselor Education: An Overview of the Process

“Publish or perish” is a phrase familiar to untenured and tenured faculty alike. In recent years, prominence has been placed on academicians to secure external funding for their research and training projects. The counselor education field has not been immune to this call for externally funded projects. This article includes strategies for seeking and receiving external funding for counseling‐related research in an effort to help counselor educators flourish in a paradigm that increasingly calls for greater external funding. Emphasis is placed on gaining knowledge and experience with federal funding agencies.     

Collective Effects of Individual,Behavioral, and Contextual Factors on High School Students’ Future STEM Career Plans

This study explored the structural relationships among secondary school students’ conceptions, self-regulation, and strategies of learning science in mainland China. Three questionnaires, namely conceptions of learning science (COLS), self-regulation of learning science (SROLS), and strategies of learning science (SLS) were developed for investigating 333 Chinese high school learners’ conceptions, metacognitive self-regulation, and strategies in science. The confirmatory factor analysis results verified the validity of the three surveys. Moreover, the path analyses revealed a series of interesting findings. Learners with lower-level COLS, namely “memorizing,” “testing,” and “practicing and calculating,” tended to use surface learning strategies such as “minimizing scope of the study” and “rote learning.” However, learners’ higher-level COLS, namely “increase of knowledge,” “applying,” “understanding,” and “seeing in a new way,” had complicated connections with their SROLS and SLS. On the one hand, learners’ higher-level COLS had negative relations to “minimizing scope of the study” and “rote learning.” On the other hand, their higher-level COLS were powerful predicators for their metacognitive self-regulation and further affected their use of “deep strategy” and “rote learning.” Though Chinese secondary students with higher-level COLS usually have a negative view of “rote learning,” the functioning of their metacognitive self-regulation may change their initial attitudes towards the surface strategy. Learners with higher-level COLS still used “rote learning” as a prior step for achieving deep learning. Therefore, we concluded that the SROLS played an important mediating role between the COLS and SLS and may change learners’ original intention to utilize learning strategies.     

孙子“三伐”视角下的南海战略

《孙子兵法》提出的"上兵伐谋、其次伐交、其次伐兵"的战略思想自古以来就得到人们的赞许,"伐谋""伐交"是实现"不战而屈人之兵"的条件和途径,而"伐兵"则是实现这一最高战略的保证。近年来,南海问题不断升级,作为中国"核心利益"的南海问题的和平解决将对中国的和平发展产生深远影响。以孙子的"三伐"战略为视角探讨我国南海战略,以"上兵伐谋以争全胜"作为解决南海问题的最佳指导思想,处理好中美间的战略博弈;借鉴孙子"伐交"思想,做好南海问题上的外交斗争;做好"伐兵"的准备,全力维护我国在南海的领土主权。通过"三伐"并起,既宣示我国重视和平的良好意愿,又要宣示我国具有通过"伐兵"来维护国家主权的坚定意志,从而真正有效地遏制战争,维护我国南海的领土和主权。     

INTERNATIONALIZING FRESHMAN COMPOSITION I AND II THROUGH LITERATURE AND FILM: A CROSS‐CULTURAL APPROACH

This recent study sought to examine the marketing orientations found in community, junior and technical colleges and to relate these orientations to enrollment trends within those same institutions. “High” and “low” marketing orientation campuses were defined based upon a marketing typology developed for the study. Analyses of variance revealed differences between these two types of campuses in terms of the stability of their full‐and part‐time headcount enrollments for a nine‐year period. Among other findings, the study describes the diversity of marketing approaches employed by the nation's two‐year colleges. Results of the study indicate that chief executives can look to establishing sound marketing management organizations, sensitive marketing intelligence systems, and efficient marketing planning and control systems to influence enrollment trends.     

“基于设计的研究”在音乐教育研究中的运用

基于设计的研究近年来活跃于教育研究领域,具有问题、理论、设计、自然情境相互交融的特点。将基于设计的研究引入音乐教育研究具有重要意义,建立学习共同体、理论与技术兼顾、挖掘音乐教育中“学”与“教”的智慧是该研究未来发展的趋势。     

Banal Race‐thinking: Ties of blood,Canadian history textbooks and ethnic nationalism

This paper examines how the idea of “race” is represented in high school Canadian history textbooks. It looks at textbooks authorized by the Province of Ontario between 1940 and 1960 and those authorized after 2000. It is argued in this paper that even though historical racisms have increasingly made their way into Canadian history textbooks as valid and important topics of study, and despite explicit efforts by those responsible for the production of these textbooks to clarify the meaning and consequences of racism, the idea of “race” has persisted in much the same way as it did centuries ago – as a take‐for‐granted fact of Nature tied to ideas about human type, lineage and heritage. Through problematic use of the term “race” and through a redundant emphasis on seemingly neutral categories such as origin, ethnicity and descent, the textbooks preoccupy themselves with human typology and articulate a sense that blood matters in the constitution and construction of the Canadian nation.     

A typology of undergraduate students' conceptions of size and scale: Identifying and characterizing conceptual variation

The importance of “size and scale” in nanoscience and engineering has been recognized by both scientists and science educators. A solid understanding of this concept is key to the learning of nanoscience. Students, however, have been reported to have considerable difficulty grasping this concept; yet little is known regarding their state of understanding. To address this knowledge gap, we conducted a series of studies that were aimed at exploring the different ways students conceive of “size and scale” in the context of undergraduate nanoscience and engineering courses. Informed by Variation Theory of Learning (Marton and Booth, 1997), we identified four major categories (with two sub‐categories within each) of student conception—fragmented, linear, proportional, and logarithmic. These conception categories, together with the aspects of variation that characterize and distinguish them, are summarized in a typology. In addition to serving as a diagnostic tool to describe students' understanding, this typology can also be used to guide the development of instructional interventions that facilitate students to move toward a more sophisticated understanding of “size and scale.” © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc., Inc. J Res Sci Teach 48: 512–533, 2011     

Skilling for the Workforce: A tertiary education response to enrich professional development

Tertiary educators are being directed by government policy: to develop a learning environment where participants become more than passive receivers of knowledge and to skill the workforce through technical skills and competency‐based education. Professional development is needed for compliance, and to develop and maintain generic, productivity, and technical attributes relevant to the profession. Profession and career development, for continued employability and professional recognition, involves “skilling for the workforce” through enriched self‐directed and lifelong learning. The article examines what could be a tertiary education response on the part of universities. This is through developing a learning environment which addresses the various motivating policies and common educational drivers in professional practice. It further examines the suitability of Work‐Integrated Learning (WIL), as a recognised integrative learning environment, to provide a foundation for effecting self‐directed professional development.     

When easy comes hard: the development of adaptive strategy selection

Can children learn to select the right strategy for a given problem? In one experiment, 9‐ to 10‐year‐olds (N = 50), 11‐ to 12‐year‐olds (N = 50), and adults (N = 50) made probabilistic inferences. Participants encountered environments favoring either an information‐intensive strategy that integrates all available information or an information‐frugal strategy that relies only on the most valid pieces of information. Nine‐ to 10‐year‐olds but not older children or adults had more difficulties learning to select an information‐frugal strategy than an information‐intensive strategy. This counterintuitive finding is explained by children’s less developed ability to selectively attend to relevant information, an ability that seems to develop during late childhood. The results suggest that whether a strategy can be considered “easy” depends on the development of specific cognitive abilities.     

Chinese teachers' attributions and coping strategies for student classroom misbehaviour

In this study, we investigated Chinese teachers' attributions and coping strategies for classroom misbehaviour across grade levels. A total of 244 teachers (Grades 1–12) from the Chinese mainland participated in this survey. Results indicated that Chinese teachers first attributed misbehaviour to student characteristics, such as being “lazy, not making enough effort”, and second to “bad learning habits”. Looking across grade levels, elementary teachers first blamed student learning habits while secondary teachers blamed student effort. With regard to coping strategies, inconsistencies were found across grade levels and between teachers' perceptions and actions. The majority of sampled elementary teachers tended to choose “praising good students” as the most effective and often-used strategy, while secondary teachers believed in “talking after class”. In fact, “talking after class” was viewed to be more effective as grade level increased. However, teachers reported that they did not actually use the strategy of “talking after class” very often when coping with misbehaviours.     

A Review of Research Concerning the Implementation of Site‐Based Management∗

Seventy‐seven empirical and case studies of the implementation of school‐based management (SBM) reported between 1985 and 1995 are reviewed in order to determine obstacles typically encountered in the early to middle stages of such implementation and promising strategies for dealing with them. Results are reported in terms of obstacles relevant to teachers, principals, parents and the wider community, site councils, schools as a whole, and district administrators. These results are discussed in terms of the potential role for SBM in the creation of “high involvement” schools.

     

Facilitating change in undergraduate STEM instructional practices: An analytic review of the literature

This article reviews current scholarship about how to promote change in instructional practices used in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses. The review is based on 191 conceptual and empirical journal articles published between 1995 and 2008. Four broad categories of change strategies were developed to capture core differences within this body of literature: disseminating curriculum and pedagogy, developing reflective teachers, enacting policy, and developing shared vision. STEM education researchers largely write about change in terms of disseminating curriculum and pedagogy. Faculty development researchers largely write about change in terms of developing reflective teachers. Higher education researchers largely write about change in terms of enacting policy. New work often does not build on prior empirical or theoretical work. Although most articles claim success of the change strategy studied, evidence presented to support these claims is typically not strong. For example, only 21% of articles that studied implementation of a change strategy were categorized as presenting strong evidence to support claims of success or failure of the strategy. These analyses suggest that the state of change strategies and the study of change strategies are weak, and that research communities that study and enact change are largely isolated from one‐another. In spite of the weak state of the literature, some conclusions related to the design of change strategies can be drawn from this review. Two commonly used change strategies are clearly not effective: developing and testing “best practice” curricular materials and then making these materials available to other faculty and “top‐down” policy‐making meant to influence instructional practices. Effective change strategies: are aligned with or seek to change the beliefs of the individuals involved; involve long‐term interventions, lasting at least one semester; require understanding a college or university as a complex system and designing a strategy that is compatible with this system. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 48: 952–984, 2011     

Primary school teachers and outdoor education: Varying levels of teacher leadership in informal networks of peers

ABSTRACT

The study concentrated on an area in Greece with a multiplicity of sites for outdoor education. Informal networks of teachers were detected through a snowball technique and data were collected by means of a questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. A typology was first enriched to account for teacher interaction. This typology was then operationalized to assess teacher leadership in outdoor education. Participants were classified in three clusters, namely, “strugglers,” “domesticators,” and “succeeders”. Leadership covariated with ability to overcome obstacles, master “affordances” of destinations, and focus on on-site instruction. Peer interaction offered opportunities for reflection. Leadership categories revealed a transient character, which implied that peer interaction might facilitate empowerment. However, there were indications of protecting existing practice against innovation. Implications for leadership development are discussed.     

RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN FRENCH HIGHER EDUCATION REGARDING ACCESS TO LIFELONG EDUCATION

The following article, dealing with the problem in France of the demand for the type of higher education which would adhere to the principle of lifelong education, is based on a paper written by Violette Rey from the “Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique” in collaboration with Madeleine Brocard from the University of Rouen. The paper was presented during the CEPES Symposium on Relations between Education, Research and Production in Higher Education in Europe. (Editor's Note: The main findings and some papers prepared for this meeting were presented in the July‐September 1979, Vol. IV, No. 3 issue of “Higher Education in Europe”, pp.7‐23, and pp.33‐35.)