Secondary school students’ reasoning about evolution

This study examined age differences in young people's understanding of evolution theory in secondary school. A second aim of this study was to propose a new coding scheme that more accurately described students’ conceptual understanding about evolutionary theory. We argue that coding schemes adopted in previous research may have overestimated students’ grasp of evolutionary concepts. A total of 106 students aged 12, 14, and 16 took part in individual interviews investigating their understanding of evolution. Using the new coding scheme, we found that while 16‐year olds were more likely than 12‐year olds to endorse scientific concepts when answering a question about finches, their understanding of natural selection, however, did not generalize to the other four questions. Furthermore, students began to incorporate relevant terminology (e.g., adapt, evolve, etc.) and structure their explanations using relevant language at around age 14. Students often used relevant terminology without having a more advanced understanding of evolutionary theory. Instead, they used the relevant terms in a colloquial rather than a scientific sense. Implications of the current findings for teaching and theory are discussed. © 2016 The Authors. Journal of Research in Science Teaching published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of National Association for Research in Science Teaching. J Res Sci Teach 54: 247–273, 2017     

Retention of a running response following appetitive acquisition,extinction, and discrimination

In Experiment 1, hungry rats received 30 rewarded runway trials and then either extinction trials followed by retention tests or just retention tests. Different groups were tested after retention intervals of 1 min, 1, 3, or 24 h, or 30 days. Retention of extinction training was a nonmonotonic, cubic function of time for the early portion of the response chain, with good retention at 1 min and 3 h and little retention at 1 h, 24 h, or 30 days. In the latter portions of the response chain, retention of extinction decreased monotonically with time. Retention following reward-only training varied little in time, though slight losses occurred after 30 days. Experiments 2–3 differed from Experiment 1 in imposing nonchoice discrimination training (reward vs. nonreward) instead of extinction following 30 rewarded trials. After different time intervals (.017, .75, 1.25, 3, and 24 h in Experiment 1; and .017, 1, and 3 h in Experiment 2), retention tests revealed poorest discrimination at intermediate intervals in the initial portion of the response chain, i.e., a Kamin effect appeared. The deficit seemed the result of a loss of response suppression to the cue that signaled nonreward. In latter segments of the response chain, a Kamin effect tended not to appear. Implications for a number of observations and theoretical views are noted.     

Science Background and Spatial Abilities in Men and Women

Deficits in spatial abilities, particularly mental rotation (MR), may contribute to women's avoidance of areas of study that rely on MR, including chemistry. Women who do experience success in chemistry may do so because they have good MR skills. We examined MR ability, assessed by the Purdue Visual Rotations Test (PVRT; Bodner and R. B. (1997)) in three groups of students: those with no college science background, those with a limited college science background that did not include organic chemistry, and those with more extensive science background including organic chemistry. Men and women with extensive background that included organic chemistry performed equally on the MR task, as did those students who had no college science background. However, men outperformed women on the MR task if they had limited science training, although this effect was mediated by the total number of chemistry courses taken. Self-reports of competence on the task were positively related to MR ability, but neither self-described effort nor other background variables (such as experience with spatial tasks and participation in athletics) were important to MR. Grades in science courses were not related to MR capability for any group of students. Our results suggest that while women often show a lesser ability with MR tasks, this deficit may not be an important contribution to women's tendency to avoid the physical sciences.     

Young Children''s Understanding of Other People''s Feelings and Beliefs: Individual Differences and Their Antecedents

Individual differences in young children's understanding of others' feelings and in their ability to explain human action in terms of beliefs, and the earlier correlates of these differences, were studied with 50 children observed at home with mother and sibling at 33 months, then tested at 40 months on affective-labeling, perspective-taking, and false-belief tasks. Individual differences in social understanding were marked; a third of the children offered explanations of actions in terms of false belief, though few predicted actions on the basis of beliefs. These differences were associated with participation in family discourse about feelings and causality 7 months earlier, verbal fluency of mother and child, and cooperative interaction with the sibling. Differences in understanding feelings were also associated with the discourse measures, the quality of mother-sibling interaction, SES, and gender, with girls more successful than boys. The results support the view that discourse about the social world may in part mediate the key conceptual advances reflected in the social cognition tasks; interaction between child and sibling and the relationships between other family members are also implicated in the growth of social understanding.     

African American Counselor Educators' Job Satisfaction and Perceptions of Departmental Racial Climate

Forty‐eight African American counselor educators completed the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire‐Short Form (D. J. Weiss, R. V. Dawis, G. W. England, & L. H. Lofquist, 1967), the Racial Climate Scale (R. J. Watts & R. T. Carter, 1991), and a biodata questionnaire. Results indicated that African American counselor educators' perceptions of departmental racial climate predicted their level of job satisfaction. However, African American counselor educators' job satisfaction was not related to their academic rank and tenure status. Implications for counselor education and future research are discussed.     

Emergence of choice strategies in the rat: Shift-stay differentiation precedes win-lose differentiation

The choice strategies of rat pups between 12 and 21 days of age were studied in a two-choice discrimination procedure that used access to a nonlactating anesthetized dam as a reward. After receiving a reward (win) or not receiving a reward (lose), a pup repeated a previous choice (stay) or made an alternative response (shift). At 12 and 15 days of age, pups demonstrated neither a stay nor a shift response strategy; at 18 and 21 days of age, pups had a robust tendency to shift. Winning or losing did not alter behavior until 21 days of age, at which point winning produced a greater tendency to return to the initially visited location for rats in the stay condition.     

Bridging identity ‘chasms’: occupational therapy academics’ reflections on the journey towards scholarship

The performative context of higher education demands that practice-oriented academics shift their priorities from preparing practitioners for the profession, towards ‘productive’ scholarship. We present narratives from occupational therapy academics at the end of a year-long journey through an action research project focussed on academic identity and scholarly growth. Our analysis captures subtle and striking shifts in being and becoming, doing and belonging. The findings, re-presented as an adapted Hero’s Journey, also reveal the powerful impacts on identity and practice that are enabled when academics have the opportunity to create spaces for scholarship that are experienced as caring, collaborative and collegial.     

Teachers' attributions and beliefs about girls,boys, and mathematics

Thirty-eight first grade teachers were asked to identify their two most and least successful girls and boys in mathematics, to attribute causation of these students' successes and failures, and to describe their characteristics. Teachers' choices of most and least successful students were compared to mathematics test scores of their students. Teachers were most inaccurate when selecting most successful boys. Teachers tended to attribute causation of boys' successes and failures to ability and girls' successes and failures to effort. Teachers thought their best boy students when compared to their best girl students, were more competitive, more logical, more adventurous, volunteered answers more often to mathematics problems, enjoyed math more, and were more independent in mathematics.     

Teachers' approaches to teaching and responses to student evaluation in a problem‐based medical program

Teachers' approaches to teaching may influence the way they interpret and respond to student evaluations. In this article we explore the relationship between teachers' approaches to teaching and responses to qualitative student feedback in a problem‐based medical program. We asked all lecturers and theme session presenters in 2003 who had received student feedback comments in the past 2 years (N=121) to complete anonymously the Approaches to Teaching inventory (16 items) and an Approach to Feedback Inventory (14 items). Results were that most teachers report making changes to their teaching in response to students' suggestions at least sometimes. The types of change(s) teachers make are consistent with their approach. Teachers strong on a conceptual‐change student‐focussed (CCSF) approach are more responsive to feedback and positive about strategies for improving their teaching. To encourage teachers to use student feedback as a guide to improving their teaching, institutions may need to provide a systematic program of teacher education that focuses on teachers' conceptions, approaches and supports observation of exemplary practice.