Social and Emotional Competence in Children of Depressed Mothers

The relations between maternal unipolar major depression and children's self-concept, self-control, and peer relationships were studied in a middle-class, predominantly white sample of 96 families. Each family included a target child between the ages of 5 and 10. Depressed mothers varied on whether or not the child's father also had a psychiatric disorder. Well mothers all had spouses with no psychiatric disorders. Analyses controlled for marital status, age, and sex of child. Children completed measures of self-concept and peer relations skills; teachers completed measures of self-control and a rating of popularity with peers. Results supported the multiple risk factor model in that fathers' psychiatric status and parents' marital status explained much of the variability in children's social and emotional competence. Maternal depression alone, in the context of a well husband/father, was only related to children having been rated by their teachers as less popular. Results are discussed in terms of possible mechanisms by which maternal depression may interact with paternal psychopathology and divorce in relation to children's social and emotional competence. The findings may further indicate that older children are more vulnerable to these multiple risk factors than younger children.     

Social Interactions of Retarded Children: Generalization from Mainstream to Special School

Seven IH children attending a special school were integrated into a mainstream school on a part‐time basis over a period of 18 weeks. Effects were evaluated using behavioural measures of activity participation and social interactions during class time and free‐play periods in both the mainstream school and the special school which the children continued to attend. Compared to IH children who remained in the special school, the integrated children showed larger increases in Associative play in the special school free‐play period, but no differential change in classroom behaviour. In the mainstream school, social interactions between IH and non‐handicapped children occurred at high levels in both class and playground periods.     

Employability pathways for young adults: lived experiences of learners and practitioners in Youth Guarantee programmes

ABSTRACT

Until today, thousands of young adults still dropout of school with no or low qualifications and experience difficulties in entering the labour market. The European Commission offers funding and opportunities for young adults to enter employability enhancing training, often organised under its flagship initiative ‘The Youth Guarantee’. The aim of these programmes is to make young adults a work, training or educational offer within four months of their start into this initiative.

In this paper, we critically explore the concept of employability and focus on the roles of both the young adults undergoing training interventions, but also of practitioners whose work is ideally embedded within the local context of the labour market and the economy. We were interested in the participation experiences by both groups to analyse the strengths and weaknesses of these programmes. Evidence from interviews demonstrated that learners and practitioners were generally satisfied with the interventions, although individualised support was preferred over group-based activities. Working with stakeholders was strongly recommended for this target group who tends to experience cumulative disadvantages. Long-term follow-up of participants’ destinations will provide better evidence on the effectiveness of these programmes.     

The writing approaches of university students

University students' beliefs about themselvesas writers and about the experience of learningin writing were investigated as related towriting approaches as measured by the Inventoryof Processes in College Composition (Lavelle 1993). General findings included support forthe deep and surface paradigm as well asvariation in students' conceptions of writing,in their attitudes about themselves as writers,and in their felt need for personal expressionin writing. Implications for instruction andfurther research are included.     

Employment and Achievement: Mothers' Work Involvement in Relation to Children's Achievement Behaviors and Mothers' Parenting Behaviors

Mothers' total weekly work hours and psychological work involvement were examined in relation to children's achievement behaviors and mothers' parenting. 105 middle-class children ( M = 6 years old) and their mothers (both employed and not employed) participated in this study. Data were collected from lab observations, teacher ratings, and parent surveys. Findings of interest include. (1) for the full sample, higher weekly work hours were associated with poorer teacher ratings of children's grades, school work habits, and aspects of personality conducive to achievement: (2) within the employed sample, as mothers' weekly hours of work increased, daughters' grades were higher but sons' grades, work habits, and ego control were poorer, and (3) mothers' psychological motivation to work related to mothers' support of children's achievement and girls' stronger achievement motivation. The study findings point to the utility of including multiple measures of work involvement and children's achievement-related behaviors.     

The impact of an online tool for monitoring and regulating learning at university: overconfidence,learning strategy,and personality

Being overconfident when estimating scores for an upcoming exam is a widespread phenomenon in higher education and presents threats to self-regulated learning and academic performance. The present study sought to investigate how overconfidence and poor monitoring accuracy vary over the length of a college course, and how an intervention consisting of (1) a monitoring exercise and (2) a monitoring and regulation strategy, improves students’ monitoring accuracy and academic performance. Moreover, we investigated how personality factors (i.e., grandiose and vulnerable narcissism, optimism) influence monitoring accuracy. We found that the Monitoring and Regulation Strategy positively influenced monitoring accuracy and exam scores, whereas the Monitoring Exercise that confronted students with their overconfidence protected students against overconfidence in the second exam score prediction but did not affect exam score. The results further revealed that exam score predictions lowered from the start to the end of the course for both poor and high performing students, but still leaving poor performers overconfident and high performers underconfident. Topic knowledge gained in the course did not wash out the Dunning Kruger effect, and results indicate that poor and high performers use different cues when predicting exam scores. Both grandiose and vulnerable narcissism contributed to overconfidence on exam score predictions but not on the Monitoring Exercise. These findings underline the potential of the Monitoring and Regulation Strategy intervention and ask for upscaling it to include measurements of self-regulated learning activities.     

Conceptualising play-based learning from kindergarten teachers’ perspectives

This study sought to gain insight into how Ontario teachers define play-based learning, and how their perspectives affect its implementation in kindergarten classrooms. Using survey data from kindergarten teachers from around the province of Ontario, two definitions of play were developed: one focused on social development through play and the other on academic and social development in play. Results revealed inconsistencies in participants’ definitions and implementations of play-based learning in kindergarten classrooms. Several participants described the enactment of play that was entirely separate from learning, yet still indicated some belief in the ability to learn through play. While all participants described positive perspectives of play-based learning, more than half described the implementation of kindergarten programmes that did not fully integrate play-based learning as it is described in the Ontario curriculum. Participants were also asked to identify challenges they experienced in their implementation of play-based pedagogy. Participants in all enactment groups indicated experiencing challenges to their play implementation. These results support the need for a clear and consistent definition of play-based learning that will help determine how best to integrate play and the learning of academic skills.     

Rubric formats for the formative assessment of oral presentation skills acquisition in secondary education

Educational technology research and development - Acquiring complex oral presentation skills is cognitively demanding for students and demands intensive teacher guidance. The aim of this study was...     

Television and Movie Viewing Predict Adults’ Romantic Ideals and Relationship Satisfaction

The current study examined the associations between television and movie use, romantic ideals (belief in love conquers all and soul mates), and relationship satisfaction among adults who were currently in romantic relationships. Participants were 306 individuals aged 18–64. They were asked about their media use, their romantic beliefs, and their current relationship. In addition to overall time spent watching television and movies, seven specific genres were measured. Results indicated that viewing each genre of television and movie analyzed (including relationship reality TV, TV drama, TV comedy, soap opera, and romantic movie) was positively associated with romantic ideals. The results for television were not in the hypothesized direction or consistent with prior studies. Television drama and romantic movie viewing were the strongest predictors of belief in love conquers all and relationship satisfaction, whereas soap opera viewing was the strongest predictor of belief in soul mates. None of these associations were moderated by age or relationship length. Mediation analyses also showed that specific genres of viewing were positively associated with relationship satisfaction via romantic ideals. The implications of viewing television and movies for adults’ romantic relationships are discussed.