Individual and Peer Characteristics in Predicting Boys' Early Onset of Substance Abuse: A Seven-Year Longitudinal Study

Early onset of substance abuse is a clear marker for future maladjustment in adolescents. The present study employed data originating from 755 6-year-old boys from low SES neighborhoods, who were followed through age 13, to predict this marker. 3 models were tested using LISREL analyses to determine whether individual characteristics and/or peer influences were linked to subsequent substance abuse. Individual characteristics consisted of fighting, hyperactivity, oppositional behaviors, and likability. Peer influences referred to mutual friends' characteristics (aggressiveness and likability). Data were obtained from 3 different sources: teacher ratings, peer ratings, and self-reports. Results were replicated at ages 10, 11, and 12 years with 3 subsamples of the original sample and indicated that individual characteristics, more than friends' deviance, are pivotal in the development of substance abuse. This finding is consistent with results from other longitudinal studies involving children from a variety of cultural backgrounds. It suggests that prevention programs should target individual characteristics and begin at an early age.     

Mathematical olympiads in the People's Republic of China

Conclusions This new series of Chinese olympiads is admittedly experimental. Chinese educators are studying the results of these contests. Building upon this acquired experience, they hope to improve and expand such competitions in the future. New standards of mathematical excellence are now being established in the PRC and future mathematical olympiads will accordingly be more demanding. It appears evident that in the near future, a team from the People's Republic of China will participate in the International Mathematical Olympiad [10].     

Food sharing in albino rat pups: Does familiarity breed contempt?

The present experiment investigated the effects of kinship and familiarity upon food sharing in pairs of albino rat pups. Five pairs of rats from each of the following groups were tested: (1) familiar siblings, (2) nonfamiliar siblings, (3) familiar nonsiblings, and (4) nonfamiliar non-siblings. A small food portion was used, necessitating not only close physical contact, but also cooperation in the sense that both pups were required to remain relatively immobile in order for both to feed simultaneously. Results indicated more frequent sharing among unfamiliar pups, whether related or not. Results also indicated that food sharing increased in frequency among all four groups over the 5-day testing period, suggesting that cooperation in the form of food sharing can develop, or increase in frequency, over time in albino rat pups.     

Community of practice versus community of readers: the literacy tutors’ dilemma

This paper describes a journey undertaken by literacy tutors who were caught between incompatible values and needs in building apprentices’ literacy. The highly literate tutors were committed to teaching critical literacy. They believed that improved literacy could support learners’ aspirations to advance their prospects at work, build their connections within their community and improve their health. Hence, the tutors aimed to guide their learners into membership of an imagined community of fluent readers. They found, however, that the apprentices, along with their managers and training coordinators, saw literacy as instrumental rather than a desired outcome in its own right. Essentially, achieving a sufficient level of literacy was needed for the apprentices to become members of workplace communities of practice. Tutors then questioned their prior assumptions about the intrinsic importance of literacy, slowly accepting a dichotomous way of thinking where industrial ways of learning and knowing were predominant. Tutors’ realisation that apprentices already possessed embodied and oral literacies helped them to support the apprentices in escaping (though not leaving) workplace contexts that were becoming increasingly document-driven in character and featuring rising expectations of improved print literacy.     

Impact of the Good Behavior Game on special education teachers

This study tested effects of a program that offers teachers universal classroom management strategies, on teachers’ burnout symptoms and self-efficacy, and their teaching behaviors. Data were collected from 147 teachers (mean age = 38.4 years, SD = 10.8) in 15 special secondary education schools for students with emotional and behavioral problems, at the start and end of the school year. Schools were randomly assigned to the experimental condition or a care-as-usual condition. Results show that the program impacted beneficially on self-reported levels of emotional exhaustion, and self-efficacy in engaging students and in classroom management, but not on teaching behaviors. Implications of this study for the professional development of teachers in special education and research are discussed.     

Sources of academic and self-regulatory efficacy beliefs of entering middle school students

The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of Bandura’s (1997) hypothesized sources of self-efficacy on the academic and self-regulatory efficacy beliefs of entering middle school students (N = 263) and to explore whether these sources differ as a function of gender, reading ability, and race/ethnicity. For the full sample, mastery experience, vicarious experience, social persuasions, and physiological state independently predicted academic and self-regulatory self-efficacy, with mastery experience proving the strongest predictor. Mastery experience and social persuasions predicted girls’ academic and self-regulatory self-efficacy, whereas mastery and vicarious experiences predicted these self-beliefs for boys. African American students’ mastery experiences and social persuasions predicted their academic self-efficacy. Mastery experience did not predict the self-efficacy beliefs of low-achieving students. Findings support and refine the theoretical tenets of Bandura’s social cognitive theory.