International student persistence in U.S. postsecondary institutions

The study used the data from the Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study data set to observe the characteristics of international students in their first-year in college and examine the factors that influenced their persistence in U.S. postsecondary institutions. Results from logistic regression analysis revealed that GPA, degree plans, and academic integration were positively related to persistence of international students, while remediation in English and social integration had the negative effects on their persistence outcome. The results of the study signal the importance of encouraging collaboration between offices of international student services and other academic departments or support services on campus. The retention of international students should not be viewed as the responsibility of only international student advisors. Instead, it should become a joint responsibility of faculty, academic advisors, English language program staff, and student affairs professionals on campus.     

Surprise and change: Variations in the strength of present and absent cues in causal learning

It is said that “absence makes the heart grow fonder.” But, when and why does an absent event become salient to the heart or to the brain? An absent event may become salient when its nonoccurrence is surprising. Van Hamme and Wasserman (1994) found that a nonpresented but expected stimulus can actually change its associative status—and in the opposite direction from a presented stimulus. Associative models like that of Rescorla and Wagner (1972) focus only on presented cues; so, they cannot explain this result. However, absent cues can be permitted to change their value by assigning different learning parameters to present and absent cues. Van Hamme and Wasserman revised the Rescorla-Wagner model so that the α parameter is positive for present cues, but negative for absent cues; now, changes in the associative strength of absent cues move in the opposite direction as presented ones. This revised Rescorla-Wagner model can thus explain such otherwise vexing empirical findings as backward blocking, recovery from overshadowing, and backward conditioned inhibition. Moreover, the revised model predicts new effects. For example, explicit information about the absence of nonpresented cues should increase their salience (that is, their negative α value should be larger), leading to stronger associative changes than when no explicit mention is made of cue absence. Support for this prediction is detailed in a new causal judgment experiment in which participants rated the effectiveness of different foods’ triggering a patient’s allergic reaction. Overall, these and other findings encourage us to view human causal learning from an associative perspective.     

Response rate is not an effective mediator of learned stimulus equivalence in pigeons

We explored response rate as a possible mediator of learned stimulus equivalence. Five pigeons were trained to discriminate four clip art pictures presented during a 10-sec discrete-trial fixed interval (FI) schedule: two paired with a one-pellet reinforcer, which supported a low rate of responding, and two paired with a nine-pellet reinforcer, which supported a high rate of responding. After subjects associated one stimulus from each of these pairs with a discriminative choice response, researchers presented two new clip art stimuli during a 10-sec FI: one trained with a differential reinforcement of low rate schedule (DRL) after the FI and the other trained with a differential reinforcement of high rate schedule (DRH) after the FI. Each of the stimuli that were withheld during choice training was later shown to see if the choice responses would transfer to these stimuli. The results suggest that response rate alone does not mediate learned stimulus equivalence.     

Chemistry for whom? Gender awareness in teaching and learning chemistry

Marie Ståhl and Anita Hussénius have defined what discourses dominate national tests in chemistry for Grade 9 in Sweden by using feminist, critical didactic perspectives. This response seeks to expand the results in Ståhl and Hussénius’s article Chemistry inside an epistemological community box!—Discursive exclusions and inclusions in the Swedish national tests in chemistry, by using different facets of gender awareness. The first facet—Gender awareness in relations to the test designers’ own conceptions—highlighted how the gender order where women are subordinated men becomes visible in the national tests as a consequence of the test designers internalized conceptions. The second facet—Gender awareness in relation to chemistry—discussed the hierarchy between discourses within chemistry. The third facet—Gender awareness in relation to students—problematized chemistry in relation to the students’ identity formation. In summary, I suggest that the different discourses can open up new ways to interpret chemistry and perhaps dismantle the hegemonic chemistry discourse.     

What makes a landmark effective? Sex differences in a navigation task

In Experiment 1, two groups of female rats were trained in a triangular pool to find a hidden platform whose location was defined in terms of a single a landmark, a cylinder outside the pool. For one group, the landmark had only a single pattern (i.e., it looked the same when approached from any direction), while for the other, the landmark contained four different patterns (i.e., it looked different when approached from different directions). The first group learned to swim to the platform more rapidly than the second. Experiment 2 confirmed this difference when female rats were trained in a circular pool but found that male rats learned equally rapidly (and as rapidly as females trained with the single-pattern landmark) with both landmarks. This second finding was confirmed in Experiment 3. Finally, in Experiment 4a and 4b, male and female rats were trained either with the same, single-pattern landmark on all trials or with a different landmark each day. Males learned equally rapidly (and as rapidly as females trained with the unchanged landmark) whether the landmark changed or not. We conclude that male and female rats learn rather different things about the landmark that signals the location of the platform.     

Context matters in child and family policy

The traditional model of translation from basic laboratory science to efficacy trials to effectiveness trials to community dissemination has flaws that arise from false assumptions that context changes little or matters little. One of the most important findings in developmental science is that context matters, but this fact is not sufficiently taken into account in many translation efforts. Studies reported in this special issue highlight both the potential of systematic interventions in parenting, peer relations, and social-cognitive skills training, and the problems that will be encountered in trying to bring these interventions to a community context. It is advocated that developmental scientists start from within the community context itself so that translation to policy is only a small step. It is also advocated that this research be conducted through rigorous community randomized controlled trials.     

Towards Building Direct Educational Partnership: The Foundation of Shanxi University in 1902

The foundation of Shanxi University is a prime example of the collaborative efforts in higher education between the Chinese and British in late Qing China (1842–1912). Both sides made compromises, with the Chinese adapting their ideas of educational sovereignty, and the British agreeing to work under the supervision of the local government. Such a collaboration was made possible by the individual personalities of the two founders and their visions for China’s higher education. The dual structure of the university, with one department to teach Chinese learning and the other to teach Western learning, showed that, at a local and personal level, these officials and missionaries opted for direct cooperation, despite the myriad changes and upheavals following the Boxer Movement. In addition, by allowing foreign missionaries into critical roles in a government university, the principle of ti-yong dualism was gradually being adapted. The formation of Shanxi University not only demonstrates the dynamics of the Sino-Western educational relationship and the roles individuals played in it, but also stimulates reflection on China’s contemporary cross-border partnerships in higher education     

The recognition of facial expressions in the first two years of life: mechanisms of development

In recent years the infant's ability to recognize facial expressions of emotion has attracted considerable attention from developmental psychologists. The rationale guiding much of this research has been that this ability plays an important role in later socioemotional development. In the present article, the research relating to this topic is reviewed and synthesized. It is concluded that the recognition of facial expressions develops slowly over the first 2 years of life, and that even at the end of the second year the infant's understanding of facial expressions is still quite rudimentary. Following this review is a discussion of 2 unresolved issues regarding the development of this ability. 1 issue relates to the biological/experimental basis on which the ability to recognize facial expressions develops. Research with primates is brought to bear on this point, and useful analogues with human infants are sought. From this research it is suggested that a component of the ability to recognize facial expressions is unlearned, although experience of some as yet undetermined nature affects this biological readiness. The second issue relates to the possible neurological mechanisms that mediate this ability. Research with primates, normal adults, and brain damaged adults is used to support the speculation that a posterior region of the right hemisphere is responsible for mediating the recognition of facial expressions.