Rituals Improve Children's Ability to Delay Gratification

To be accepted into social groups, individuals must internalize and reproduce appropriate group conventions, such as rituals. The copying of such rigid and socially stipulated behavioral sequences places heavy demands on executive function. Given previous research showing that challenging executive functioning improves it, it was hypothesized that engagement in ritualistic behaviors improves children's executive functioning, in turn improving their ability to delay gratification. A 3‐month circle time games intervention with 210 schoolchildren (M_age = 7.78 years, SD = 1.47) in two contrasting cultural environments (Slovakia and Vanuatu) was conducted. The intervention improved children's executive function and in turn their ability to delay gratification. Moreover, these effects were amplified when the intervention task was imbued with ritual, rather than instrumental, cues.     

Family Bonding with Universities

One justification offered for legacy admissions policies at universities is that that they bind entire families to the university. Proponents maintain that these policies have a number of benefits, including increased donations from members of these families. We use a rich set of data from an anonymous selective research institution to investigate which types of family members have the most important effect upon donative behavior. We find that the effects of attendance by members of the younger generation (children, children-in-law, nieces and nephews) are greater than the effects of attendance by the older generations (parents, parents-in-law, aunts and uncles). Previous research has indicated that, in a variety of contexts, men and women differ in their altruistic behavior. However, we find that there are no statistically discernible differences between men and women in the way their donations depends on the alumni status of various types of relatives. Neither does the gender of the various types of relatives who attended the university seem to matter. Thus, for example, the impact of having a son attend the university is no different from the effect of a daughter.     

National Devolution in Swedish Higher Education -- A Quest for New Local Leadership. The Case of Leadership Development at Göteborg University

In 1993 a new national form for governance was introduced in Swedish higher education. The new regime, best described in terms of deregulation and decentralisation, among other things, required a new individually based leadership at universities.The paper describes the development of one particular 10-day interfaculty leadership training course for heads of departments, directors of study and other local managers, its content and methods and some implications for strategic management in higher education institutions.Four such implications are covered: constructing a new social identity as leaders, getting leadership acceptance in an individualistic academic-freedom culture, training academic leaders in accordance with professional values, and dealing with accountability in a collegial decision-making environment.     

Working memory capacity and disfluency effect: an aptitude-treatment-interaction study

According to Cognitive Load Theory, learning material should be designed in a way to decrease unnecessary demands on working memory (WM). However, recent research has shown that additional demands on WM caused by less legible texts lead to better learning outcomes. This so-called disfluency effect can be assumed as a metacognitive regulation process during which learners assign their cognitive resources depending on the perceived difficulty of a cognitive task. Increasing the perceived difficulty associated with a cognitive task stimulates deeper processing and a more analytic and elaborative reasoning. Yet there are studies which could not replicate the disfluency effect indicating that disfluency might be beneficial only for learners with particular learner characteristics. Additional demands on working memory caused by disfluent texts are possibly just usable by learners with a high working memory capacity. Therefore the present study investigated the aptitude-treatment-interaction between working memory capacity and disfluency. Learning outcomes were measured by means of a retention, a comprehension, and a transfer test. Moreover, the three types of cognitive load (intrinsic, extraneous, and germane) were assessed. The results revealed significant aptitude-treatment-interaction effects with respect to retention and comprehension. Working memory capacity had a significant influence only in the disfluency condition: The higher the working memory capacity, the better the retention and comprehension performance in the disfluency condition. No effects were found with respect to transfer or cognitive load. Thus, the role of metacognitive regulation and its possible effects on cognitive load need further investigation.     

Impacts of a Prekindergarten Program on Children's Mathematics,Language, Literacy,Executive Function,and Emotional Skills

Publicly funded prekindergarten programs have achieved small‐to‐large impacts on children's cognitive outcomes. The current study examined the impact of a prekindergarten program that implemented a coaching system and consistent literacy, language, and mathematics curricula on these and other nontargeted, essential components of school readiness, such as executive functioning. Participants included 2,018 four and five‐year‐old children. Findings indicated that the program had moderate‐to‐large impacts on children's language, literacy, numeracy and mathematics skills, and small impacts on children's executive functioning and a measure of emotion recognition. Some impacts were considerably larger for some subgroups. For urban public school districts, results inform important programmatic decisions. For policy makers, results confirm that prekindergarten programs can improve educationally vital outcomes for children in meaningful, important ways.     

The perceptions of high-level officers in Cyprus about intercultural education and their underlying assumptions

Abstract

This article is based on a year‐long study of elementary to secondary transition in rural Ontario, Canada. The study considered the experience of transition for rural students within the political context of recently mandated changes to the transition years in Ontario. Research elsewhere suggests that the strong academic orientation of the secondary school creates a polarized and fragmented school culture which leads to student alienation and high drop‐out rates. These issues were regarded as less relevant in the rural area where the study took place and, thus, the teachers, parents and students who participated were sceptical about the need for change. The article examines the influence of contextual factors, including the rural setting, school structure and size, and teacher experience, on school culture and curriculum, and participants’ experiences of transition and their perspectives on change. A dialogical approach to enquiry was taken which attempted to bring together, through dialogue, the disparate views of research and participants to achieve new understandings on the critical issues of rural transition.     

Mapping the classroom emotional environment

Harvey and Evans (2003) have proposed that teachers’ emotional skills, as required in the classroom, can be organized into a five-dimensional model. Further research is necessary to validate this model and evaluate the importance of each dimension of teacher emotion competence for educational practice. Using a statistical method for mapping psychological constructs, teachers’ emotional practices were transformed into a ‘map’ with three spatial dimensions, which was supported by comparative validity checks. The nature of emotional practice was further investigated by administering a Q-Sort of emotional practice items to 100 teachers. Ten highly applicable clusters of emotional behavior across six profile patterns with teachers were identified. Authors’ model and the applicability of emotions were generally supported.