Stability of Intelligence from Preschool to Adolescence: The Influence of Social and Family Risk Factors

Intelligence scores of children in a longitudinal study were assessed at 4 and 13 years and related to social and family risk factors. A multiple environmental risk score was calculated for each child by counting the number of high-risk conditions from 10 risk factors: mother's behavior, mother's developmental beliefs, mother's anxiety, mother's mental health, mother's educational attainment, family social support, family size, major stressful life events, occupation of head of household, and disadvantaged minority status. Multiple risk scores explained one-third to one-half of IQ variance at 4 and 13 years. The stability between 4- and 13-year environmental risk scores ( r = .77) was not less than the stability between 4- and 13-year IQ scores ( r = .72). Effects remained after SES and race, or maternal IQ, were partialled; multiple risk was important in longitudinal prediction, even after prior measurement of child IQ was accounted for; the pattern of risk was less important than the total amount of risk present in the child's context.     

ORIENTATION OF STUDENTS IN THE HUMAN AND SOCIAL SCIENCES TOWARDS INDUSTRY

The article highlights the Project, Magister in den Beruf (the Master of Arts and the Professions) launched at the University of Heidelberg in 1992. The rationale for the project was that the vacancies in some traditional careers like teaching, journalism, the printing industry, tourism, etc., can no longer absorb the growing number of graduates in the human and the social sciences. Consequently, undergraduates tend to prolong their studies or, on the contrary, to drop out, while graduates end up accepting employment beneath their intellectual levels, despite the fact that society will, in the future, require a large number of highly trained professionals. The two aims of the project are to familiarize interested students with certain sectors of the business world (e.g., public relations, advertising, personnel management, continuing education, etc.) and to inform the body of employers about the key qualifications of graduates. The means to this end include foundation courses in economics, talks given by employers and trainees, guided visits to enterprises, trade fairs, and internships.     

School transition from elementary to secondary school: changes in psychological adjustment

School transition is a critical life event for many children. However, the effects of school transition on children's stress experiences reported in the literature have been inconsistent. The present study with 564 third- to sixth-graders compared the changes in experienced stress level and in somatic and psychological symptoms during the transition from elementary to secondary schools (from grade 4 to grade 5) to the changes of two control groups (experiencing changes from grades 3 to 4 and from grades 5 to 6, but without school transition). The results show decreases in experienced stress levels and somatic and psychological symptoms after school transition. However, these decreases reflect mainly recovery effects after the school summer break, as comparisons with the control groups indicate.     

Temporal Contingency as an Independent Component of Parenting Behavior

Several theoretical conceptions emphasize the importance of prompt responses to infant's signals in providing them with early causal experiences. The present paper examines if a maternal tendency toward prompt responses can be identified by distributional analyses of maternal response latencies and if this response tendency can be shown for different communicative channels (in verbal/vocal, nonverbal, intermodal communication). In addition, the paper focuses on the relation between the temporal contingency of maternal behavior and measures of maternal interactional quality. Interactional sequences of 54 mother and 3-month-old infant dyads were analyzed using microanalytical assessment techniques and ratings of interactional quality. Distributional analyses of maternal expressions during face-to-face encounters revealed that promptness of responses toward infant signals with a short latency is a typical response tendency in maternal behavior. There are, however, individual differences between mothers, indicating that this response tendency is expressed in different communicative channels by individual mothers. This is shown by low correlations between the contingency indices of different communicative channels. The relation between contingency and rated indicators of interactional quality turned out to be rather small, indicating that maternal contingency may be conceptualized to contribute an independent factor to the quality of maternal interactional behavior.     

Creatine kinase,myosin heavy chains and magnetic resonance imaging after eccentric exercise

The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between myosin heavy chain (MHC) release as a specific marker of slow-twitch muscle fibre breakdown and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of skeletal muscle injury after eccentric exercise. The effects of a single series of 70 high-intensity eccentric contractions of the quadriceps femoris muscle group (single leg) on plasma concentrations of creatine kinase and MHC fragments were assessed in 10 young male sport education trainees before and 1 and 4 days after exercise. To visualize muscle injury, MRI of the loaded thigh was performed before and 4 days after the eccentric exercise. All participants recorded an increase ( P ? 0.05) in creatine kinase after exercise. In five participants, T2 signal intensity was unchanged post-exercise compared with pre-exercise and MHC plasma concentration was normal; however, they showed an increase ( P ? 0.05) in creatine kinase after exercise. For the remaining five participants, there was an increase in T2 signal intensity of the loaded vastus intermedius and vastus lateralis. These changes in MRI were accompanied by an increase in MHC plasma concentration ( P ? 0.01) as well as an increase in creatine kinase ( P ? 0.01). We suggest that changes in MRI T2 signal intensity after muscle damage induced by eccentric exercise are closely related to damage to structurally bound contractile filaments of some muscle fibres. Additionally, MHC plasma release indicates that this damage affects not only fast-twitch fibres but also some slow-twitch fibres.     

Using Consulting for Teaching Elementary Statistics

Consulting in statistics is usually deferred until at least near the end of a first degree, but this article shows how some aspects can be effectively taught to students in upper secondary or early tertiary courses in a way which reinforces their learning of standard basic concepts. We suggest that the existence of a real client adds a degree of realism not available in other ways, and emphasizes to students the importance of blending statistical calculations with meaningful communication.