Inside Out: Head-Based Ontologies,Vision, and Temporality in the First Neuroturn

Since the early 1800s, mainstream Western discourses that entwined racializing and ableizing discourses have involved, among other things, particular notions of temporality and ways of privileging scopic regimes that presume surface-depth relations mediated by a theory of time and materiality. In this essay, Bernadette Baker analyzes the link between the production of visual surface-depth relations, the theorization of time, and the conception of matter in a high profile movement that today has been discredited. She takes as her case an instance of the first neuroturn (nineteenth century), specifically the physiognomy and phrenology in a textbook-style volume written by F. J. Gall. Translated and published in 1835, Gall's treatise discusses morality and the brain in relation to the shape of the head. The reconstitution of entitlement emerges through Gall's treatise via unexpected epistemological alliances that mark a shift in the architecture of medical perception and that build a bridge from the spirit to the flesh. While relatively humble in tone, Gall's content draws upon empirical and metaphysical reference points that have, in turn, become major legacies for the second neuroturn, education, and other social sciences to deal with. This essay thus examines pivotal horizons in the Gallian approach that, while discredited now as a pseudoscientific fad, raise many difficult questions that expose the link between seemingly oppositional political and intellectual commitments.     

A media course commitment study in a Canadian university: empirical validation of an exchange model

This paper presents a study on the attraction of students to an open‐university‐type, media course programme, and their commitment to remain in the programme over time. The findings from this study include 1. When considering the impact on media (i.e. distance education) course commitment of course satisfaction, investments, and alternatives to media courses, perceived investment alone was able to account for 5% of the variance in the dependent measure.

2. Following multiple discriminant analysis, the profile outlining the highly committed media course student defined one who was regarded, satisfied, highly invested, low‐perceived cost accrued, with a significant number of years out of school (here, 10) prior to commencement in the media course programme.

3. Following multiple discriminant analysis, the profile defining the student who has completed a considerable number of course credits (versus the neophyte) was described as being highly invested, highly cost aware, and relatively lowly satisfied.

Implications of such findings for distance education marketing are discussed.     

Growth and change in the world’s biological literature as reflected in BIOSIS publications

BIOSIS has abstracted and indexed the worldwide biological literature since 1926, publishing firstBiological Abstracts, later alsoBiological Abstracts/Reports, Reviews, Meetings, and more recently theZoological Record. The increases and changes in the contents of these publications, when taken in broad perspective, provide insights into the growth and patterns of life-sciences research worldwide in the past seventy years     

Longitudinal Relations Among Positivity,Perceived Positive School Climate,and Prosocial Behavior in Colombian Adolescents

Bidirectional relations among adolescents’ positivity, perceived positive school climate, and prosocial behavior were examined in Colombian youth. Also, the role of a positive school climate in mediating the relation of positivity to prosocial behaviors was tested. Adolescents (N = 151; M_age of child in Wave 1 = 12.68, SD = 1.06; 58.9% male) and their parents (N = 127) provided data in two waves (9 months apart). A model of bidirectional relations between positivity and perceived positive school climate emerged. In addition, adolescents with higher levels of perceived positive school climate at age 12 showed higher levels of prosocial behaviors in the following year. Positive school climate related positivity to adolescents’ prosocial behavior over time.     

Supporting Communication in a Collaborative Discovery Learning Environment: the Effect of Instruction

We present a study on the effect of instruction on collaboration in a collaborative discovery learning environment. The instruction we used, called RIDE, is built upon four principles identified in the literature on collaborative processes: Respect, Intelligent collaboration, Deciding together, and Encouraging. In an experimental study, a group of learners (ages 15–17) receiving this instruction was compared to a control group. The learners worked in dyads on separate computers in a shared discovery learning environment in the physics domain of collisions, communicating through a chat channel. Qualitative and quantitative analyses of the logged actions in the learning environment and the chat protocols showed that the RIDE instruction can lead to more constructive communication, and improved discovery learning activities, as expected, although no direct effect on discovery learning results was found. This study shows the benefits of providing instruction on effective communication and the learning process in a collaborative discovery learning situation.     

Will that be on the test? Perceived task demands and test performance in a classroom context

Departing from a realistic classroom context, this study focuses on the relationship between students’ perception of task demands and their learning performance. History teachers (N=20) and their 11th-grade students (N=375) rated the relative importance of sections of an instructional text on which teachers would be giving a test. In addition, test grades were collected. It was hypothesized that the degree of correspondence between ratings of individual students and those of their teacher would reflect the accurateness of students’ perception of task demands and therefore would be positively related with test grade. Multilevel analysis revealed partly support for this hypothesis. Students with higher grades more consistently showed a relative close correspondence with their teacher than students with lower grades. Nonetheless, a substantial number of students who showed a relatively close correspondence with their teacher, obtained a low test grade. This suggests that a more accurate perception of task demands did not guarantee a higher test performance.     

Motivation and performance within a collaborative computer-based modeling task: Relations between students’ achievement goal orientation,self-efficacy,cognitive processing,and achievement

Purpose of the present study was to test a conceptual model of relations among achievement goal orientation, self-efficacy, cognitive processing, and achievement of students working within a particular collaborative task context. The task involved a collaborative computer-based modeling task. In order to test the model, group measures of mastery-approach goal orientation, performance-avoidance goal orientation, self-efficacy, and achievement were employed. Students’ cognitive processing was assessed using an online log-file measure. As predicted, mastery-approach goal orientation had a significant positive effect on achievement, which was mediated through students’ use of deep processes. No significant relationships could be found between performance-avoidance goal orientation and surface processing and between surface processing and achievement. Results are discussed with respect to general theoretical implications and lead to suggestions for the design of appropriate scaffolds.     

The role and status of non-governmental (‘daike’) teachers in China's rural education

A key ingredient for countries striving to achieve Education For All is the availability of trained qualified teachers with favourable working conditions. The goal is an elusive one, even for some developed countries, though progress is being made toward it. The problem is particularly challenging in poor rural areas of developing countries where qualified teachers are reluctant to work or employing authorities cannot afford to hire them. This paper examines this situation in the context of a Western province in China (Gansu). It considers the role, characteristics and status of non-governmental (‘daike’) teachers and discusses issues that arise from their employment.