Covariate Measurement Error Correction for Student Growth Percentiles Using the SIMEX Method

In this study, we examined the impact of covariate measurement error (ME) on the estimation of quantile regression and student growth percentiles (SGPs), and find that SGPs tend to be overestimated among students with higher prior achievement and underestimated among those with lower prior achievement, a problem we describe as ME endogeneity in this article. We proceeded to assess the effect of covariate ME correction on SGP estimation at two levels—the individual (student) and the aggregate (classroom). Our ME correction approach was limited to the simulation‐extrapolation method known as SIMEX. For both the individual and aggregate SGP, we find SIMEX effective in bias reduction. Further, because SIMEX is especially effective in reducing SGP bias for students with very high or very low prior achievement, it significantly weakens the ME endogeneity. SIMEX is also effective in reducing the MSE of aggregate SGP, provided that the students are sorted to some extent on their latent prior achievement. Our empirical study confirms the pattern of the simulation results: SIMEX mainly affects the mean SGP of classes in the highest and lowest quintiles of the prior score distribution, and significantly lowers the correlation between class SGP and prior achievement.     

A novel method for the performance of isometric exercise in the home

There is a paucity of research on devices suitable for home-based isometric exercise. Our aim was to compare cardiovascular responses to isometric exercise using novel and established methods. Ten individuals (age 34.0 +/- 8.5 years, mass 68.2 +/- 10.4 kg, height 1.72 +/- 0.09 m; mean +/- s) performed three different isometric exercise protocols with 48 h between each. Each protocol involved four repeated exercise bouts of 2 min at 30% maximum voluntary contraction force using alternate legs (transducer), alternate arms (transducer), or alternate arms (novel device). Systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, mean arterial blood pressure and heart rate were measured every 30 s. The highest (peak) values during each 2 min bout of exercise were recorded (peak systolic blood pressure, peak diastolic blood pressure, peak mean arterial blood pressure and peak heart rate). At the end of each 2 min exercise bout, the participants rated their perceived discomfort using Borg's CR-10 scale. There was a statistically significant difference in peak systolic blood pressure between isometric arm flexion using the force transducer and the novel device [158.1 +/- 10.8 vs. 149.1 +/- 13.9 mmHg (mean +/- s); P = 0.02]. Further analysis showed that peak systolic blood pressure was on average 9 mmHg higher using the force transducer with limits of agreement of - 15.97 to 33.97 mmHg. Analysis of the peak diastolic blood pressure, peak mean arterial blood pressure, peak heart rate and CR-10 data revealed no statistically significant differences between the three protocols. These results suggest that this novel, home-based method elicited similar cardiovascular responses during isometric exercise to those of established laboratory-based methods. However, the lower peak systolic blood pressure using the modified scales warrants further investigation before this method is used widely in the home.     

Satisfying psychological needs on the high seas: explaining increases self-esteem following an Adventure Education Programme

A number of recent studies have revealed that taking part in a sail-training-based Adventure Education Programme elevates youths’ self-esteem. Across two studies, we sought to examine the extent to which youths’ sense of belonging contributed to this increase in self-esteem. Study 1 revealed that participants who completed the voyage showed an increase in self-esteem from the first to the last day of the voyage. Partial correlation revealed that group belonging made a unique contribution to this change. Study 2 replicated Study 1 and, further, demonstrated that the relationship between group belonging and self-esteem was not a function of self-efficacy or group esteem. Such findings suggest that an important contributing factor to the benefits of sail-training interventions is their potential to satisfy psychological needs, in this case the need to belong.     

Walking on Glass: Reconciling Experience and Expectation within Japan

ABSTRACT

This article utilizes an autoethnographic story-telling perspective in which I situate myself as a critical participant observer. Through critiquing the “situatedness of the self and others” in context, I share a selection of narrative snapshots concerning place and positionality as a white male native speaker of English (i.e. an ethnolinguistic minority) employed within Japan for two decades. I structure the discussion around the dominant burden of representation that regulates workplace interactions, experiences, opportunities and inequities. This burden of representation is drawn from to highlight the dualities of privilege which emerge when attempting to move beyond generalized group appraisals toward recognition of a more individual-level experience. Informed by dominant assumptions and taken-for-granted ideologies, I contend that white male native speakers of English in Japan remain erroneously fixed as the privileged recipients of special treatment as opposed to the stigmatized recipients of reductive objectification as experientially evidenced. I further show how personal struggles to establish professional credibility are undermined via historically crafted semiotic meanings, cultural logic and the (in)actions of similarly defined colleagues who are content with an inequitable status-quo.     

Reflections on the value of autistic participation in a tri‐national teacher‐training project through discourses of acceptance,othering and power

The Transform Autism Education (TAE) project is a tri‐national teacher training scheme involving Greece, Italy and the UK, whose purpose is to set up training projects to facilitate the educational inclusion of autistic children. Running over three years from 2014 to 2017, the involvement of autistic participants has been the source of some discussion. Here, TAE team members Wood and Milton reflect on narratives of participation, acceptance and struggle which emerged during a workshop they ran in Greece. Derived from 11 non‐autistic and two autistic participants, and analysed via discourse analysis, these stories suggest a high value placed on autistic participation by non‐autistic TAE team members, but an unwitting tendency to ‘other’ autistic people and a lack of awareness of the power differential. Meanwhile, as the autistic team members describe how educational and social participation can be achieved, the implications for autism education researchers and practitioners are discussed.