The uses and abuses of boredom in the classroom

Although the educational and psychological hazards of boredom are well documented, an increasing number of researchers have argued that boredom may be a helpful, rather than harmful, emotion for the growing individual. In this paper, we engage with this re-conception of boredom and explore its implications for contemporary education: Can boredom enhance student learning, or support certain forms of it? Can it be put to use in the classroom? What are the risks involved? In addressing these questions, we show that boredom can fulfil several important psychological functions under certain special conditions. At the same time, we argue that careful attention to the moral psychology of boredom reveals that it has significant disadvantages for helping students to develop a meaningful and fulfilling relationship to subject matter in the classroom. Against the backdrop of this analysis, we discuss the concept and experience of aspiration as a potential way of tempering and eventually obviating the psychological pitfalls of boredom. In the final section, we draw out several principles of an aspirational approach to grappling with boredom in education.     

How do socioeconomic attainment gaps in early mathematical ability arise?

Socioeconomic attainment gaps in mathematical ability are evident before children begin school, and widen over time. Little is known about why early attainment gaps emerge. Two cross-sectional correlational studies were conducted in 2018–2019 with socioeconomically diverse preschoolers, to explore four factors that might explain why attainment gaps arise: working memory, inhibitory control, verbal ability, and frequency of home mathematical activities (N = 304, 54% female; 84% White, 10% Asian, 1% black African, 1% Kurdish, 4% mixed ethnicity). Inhibitory control and verbal ability emerged as indirect factors in the relation between socioeconomic status and mathematical ability, but neither working memory nor home activities did. We discuss the implications this has for future research to understand, and work towards narrowing attainment gaps.     

Sensitivity to rime unit frequency and children's early word‐reading strategies

The current work examines children's sensitivity to rime unit spelling–sound correspondences within the context of early word reading as a way of assessing word‐specific influences on early word‐reading strategies. Sixty 6–7‐year‐olds participated in an experimental reading task that comprised word items that shared either frequent or infrequent rime unit correspondences. Retrospective self‐reports were taken as measures of strategy choice. The results showed that the children were more accurate in identifying word items that shared a common rime unit (consistent items) when compared with those containing infrequent rime units (unique and exception items). Moreover, while nonlexical (phonological) attempts were most frequently applied across all word types, these resulted in lower levels of accuracy, especially for the exception word items. The current data support the argument that children are increasingly sensitive to rime unit sound–spelling correspondences during the early stages of their word reading and the nature of these word‐specific orthographic representations shape their reliance on using particular lexical or non‐lexical‐based word‐reading strategies.     

II. DEVELOPMENT OF ADOPTED CHILDREN WITH HISTORIES OF EARLY ADVERSITY

This chapter first presents a review of research on the development of adopted children, focusing on meta‐analytic evidence and highlighting comparisons between adopted children with and without histories of early adversity. Some methodological issues arising from this literature are considered as well. Second, 7 longitudinal studies of adopted children's development are described, and the convergence of findings across the longitudinal studies and with the cross‐sectionally based meta‐analytic evidence is discussed. Third, the role of the adoptive family in supporting adopted children's development is explored.     

ACHIEVEMENT MOTIVATION OF INTELLECTUALLY GIFTED STUDENTS WHEN CONFRONTED WITH CHALLENGING AND UNCHALLENGING TASKS

Two groups of gifted adolescents solved two similar intelligence tests with differing levels of task difficulty in reverse order. Under both conditions the performance level on the less complex test was much lower, a result not observed in a control group of average intelligence. Behavioural observations revealed that the low performance of the gifted students was combined with lack of effort. This performance pattern is discussed with respect to recent postulates of achievement motivation theory, which empasize the impact not only of the achievement motive, but also of the informational value of a given task for evaluating own level of ability. It is argued that the perceived informational value of the easier test was not high enough to create an incentive for the gifted students to perform at the highest possible level     

Economics of cultural tourism: issues and perspectives

The special issue aims at exploring, with an economic perspective, the interconnections between cultural participation, in all its expressions, and tourism organization and patterns with the purpose of understanding economic effects, emerging trends and policy implications. The expanding notion of the cultural consumption of tourists makes the definition of cultural tourism increasingly elusive. Empirical investigations of the relationships between cultural participation and cultural heritage and tourism offer interesting hints in many directions. This introduction briefly overviews the premise of this special issue, the literature and the several perspectives taken by the included articles. Aside from their cultural topics—general, intangible or temporary—these essays all tackle some important economic dimensions of tourism. We encourage cultural economists to invest more in these fascinating areas as more than just intellectual tourists.