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.     

Eckpunkte des Universitätsrechts-Änderungsgesetzes 2009 (Teil 2)

In Abkehr von ihrer Einrichtung als auf demokratischer Partizipation basierender Bundesdienststelle nach UOG, wurden die staatlichen Universit?ten ab dem UOG 1993 zunehmend in Richtung eigenverantwortlicher "Bildungsbetriebe" umgebaut. Diese auf Deregulierung und Dezentralisierung universit?rer Handlungsparameter abstellende Entwicklung fand ihren vorl?ufigen H?hepunkt in der Umwandlung der Universit?ten in vollrechtsf?hige juristische Personen durch das UG (2002). Die aufrechte Funktion des Staates als Erhalter und insb Financier der Universit?ten hat zu einem auf universit?re Leistung und Verantwortung gegründeten Beziehungssystem zwischen Staat, Gesellschaft und Universit?ten geführt, das auch mit Rechtsunsicherheiten und Friktionen behaftet ist. Der bisher letzte Schritt in Richtung des intendierten umfassenden "Kulturwandels" der Universit?ten wurde mit dem Universit?tsrechts-?nderungsgesetz 2009 getan, das eine umfassende Novellierung der bisher geltenden Rechtslage beinhaltet.     

Reading race in a rural context

This is an ethnographic case study examining how discussions of multicultural young adult literature among a group of white, rural teachers and researchers were shaped by sociopolitical contexts and participants' constructions of racial identity. Focusing on the interactions of three teachers and ourselves, we used performance theory to help us understand how our ways of performing the self were shaped at the macro level by institutional and societal ideologies and the micro level by professional affiliations and identities. In analyzing data, we used qualitative coding procedures to arrive at key and illustrative events. These events were then analyzed using the tools of discourse analysis, which helped us to focus on the ideological underpinnings of the discourse. Our analyses revealed that as participants attempted to engage with the literature and bond with one another, we enacted personal, professional and group affiliations that served to sustain particular norms of whiteness even as we attempted to disrupt them.