Serial position effects in social transmission of food preference

The serial position effect in Long-Evans rats was evaluated in two experiments. In Experiment 1, the effect in a group for which an interstimulus interval (ISI) was introduced between items in a list of demonstrators was compared with that in a group without an ISI. With an ISI, a recency effect was produced. In Experiment 2, a serial position effect group was compared with four groups in which either the distinctiveness or the context of the middle item was changed, relative to the items on either side of it. A von Restorff effect was produced when a rat from a different strain was used as a demonstrator in Position 2. The results for Experiment 1 are discussed in relation to interstimulus effects in monkeys and those for Experiment 2 with respect to changes in the physical properties of middle items.     

The mediating role of social relationships in the association of adolescents’ individual school self-concept and their school engagement,belonging and helplessness in school

It is well known that teachers frequently observe a decline in the scholastic motivation of many adolescent students, which in turn is often associated with a decline in students’ individual school self-concept. In contrast, less is known about the association between students’ individual school self-concept and school engagement, or the related concepts of school belonging and helplessness in school. The current study explored social relationships as mediators in the association between individual school self-concept and adolescents’ school engagement, belonging to school and helplessness in school in a large sample of 7th and 8th grade students (N?=?1088; M_Age?=?13.7) in secondary schools in Brandenburg, Germany. The results of two structural equation models showed that the teacher–student relationship mediated the association between individual school self-concept and school engagement, belonging to school and helplessness in school, respectively. In contrast, the student–student relationship did not mediate any of these associations.     

Influence of different sports on bone mass in growing girls

The aim of this study was to analyse whether there are differences in bone mass in girls playing different sports. Two hundred girls (10.6 ± 1.5 years old, Tanner stages I–III) participated in the study and were divided into groups of 40 (swimmers, soccer players, basketball players, handball players and controls). Bone mineral content and bone mineral density (BMD) (whole body and hip) were measured using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry. The degree of sexual development was determined using Tanner test, and physical activity habits were recorded through a questionnaire designed ad hoc for this research. Girls were divided by pubertal stage and the type of sport. In the prepubertal group, intertrochanteric BMD was significantly higher in both handball and soccer players compared with the control group (P < 0.05). Furthermore, in the pubertal group, total BMD, mean arms BMD, pelvis BMD, femoral neck BMD, intertrochanteric BMD and Ward’s triangle BMD were significantly higher in soccer and handball players compared with the control group (P < 0.05), and the swimmers showed significantly higher values in the mean arms BMD compared with the control group (P < 0.01). Our data suggest that sport practice during puberty, especially in activities that support the body weight, may be an important factor in achieving a high peak bone mass and improving bone health in girls.     

Anxiolytic-like effect of ejaculation upon frustration

In three experiments, we studied the consequences of ejaculation upon the frustrative or contrast response of male rats exposed to reward downshift situations (i.e., surprising changes from 32% to 4% sucrose solutions). Similar to what has been found after treatment with anxiolytic agents, consummatory suppression was partially reversed by previous ejaculations in a second postshift trial (Experiments 2 and 3), such a result not having been obtained in a first postshift trial (Experiment 1). Moreover, the effect of ejaculations upon males' behavior during a second postshift trial was transitory, disappearing when assessed during the third and fourth postshift trials (Experiment 3). These results are in accordance with both Amsel's (1958, 1992) frustration theory and Flaherty's (1996) multistage hypothesis of successive negative contrast; the diverse factors that are known to modulate contrast effects are considered, including an interpretation of the present data in terms of the anxiolytic-like effect of the ejaculation.     

Media education with the monetization of YouTube: the loss of truth as an exchange value / Educación mediática frente a la monetización en YouTube: la pérdida de la verdad como valor de cambio

Abstract

The digital age of post-truth is the ideal breeding ground for fake news and misinformation. In the world of social networks and the Internet in general, commercial interests hold primacy over the importance of the veracity of the information provided. In this study, we have carried out a quantitative and qualitative content analysis of the messages published as comments on the most popular videos about Pokémon Go published in Spanish on YouTube. The main objective of the study is to analyse not only the content of the videos but, above all, users’ reactions to the misinformation provided. The results confirm the hypothesis that misinformation is promoted by the crisis of truth as a journalistic and social value, by economic interest and by the lack of suitable media education. We conclude by advocating the need to recover truth as a journalistic and social value in the digital context, and to accept that media literacy is an essential task to be assumed by all educational agents: schools, media and social groups.     

Committed to learn: student engagement and care in higher education

Efforts to evaluate and improve student engagement have been pervasive in higher education over recent years. Critics argue, however, that troubling affinities are evident between student engagement efforts and a neoliberal agenda which emphasises accountability through performativity. Neoliberalism manifests in policies that focus on the economic benefit to individuals of higher education, rather than the broader social or intrinsic benefits. In this conceptual article, we draw on the work of Martin Heidegger and Nel Noddings in arguing that efforts aimed at promoting engagement and commitment to learn by students should include developing a capacity to care about others and things. Through the lens of care, our aim is to extend current notions of what engagement of students in their learning might look like. Challenging and supporting students entail encouraging them to take a stand on what they are learning and who they are becoming. This enriched conceptualisation has the potential to re-orient student engagement away from a narrow neoliberal agenda, while enabling students to realise the full benefits a higher education can provide.     

Embodying skilful performance: Co-constituting body and world in biotechnology

This article offers a philosophical-empirical account of embodied skilful performance in the practice of plant biotechnology. Drawing on the work of Merleau-Ponty and others, we elaborate how skilful performance emerges from and through reciprocal relations encompassing the body-in-the-world and the world-in-the-body. The contribution of this article lies in offering an account of skilful performance that is attentive to a perceiving, motile, feeling body entwined with world. In genetically modifying plants, scientists direct their senses of touch and vision to manipulating plant materials and matter, ‘reading’ subtle changes in tissue cultures, plantlets and so on. In rhythmic movements, they extend their bodies through skilful use of complex equipment, while calling on ‘intuition’ to guide their work. Skilful performance, then, relies on our lived body that is not merely a physical object among other objects, nor a passive instrument for the mind, but dynamic and inescapably entwined with people and things in a world in flux. Bringing to the fore how perceiving, motile, feeling bodies are implicated in skilful performance has significant implications for education and workplace training.     

‘A strategy of distinction’ unfolds: unsettling the undergraduate outbound mobility experience

Although short-term mobility programmes are increasingly promoted to university students as sources of competitive advantage, there is little research on academic learnings arising from these initiatives. A ‘field analysis’ of outbound mobility is undertaken to identify convergences and disjunctures between institutional discourses, staff perceptions and student experiences at one Australian university where outbound mobility is actively promoted as a ‘strategy of distinction’. Self-reported ‘personal transformations’ commonly associated with the mobility experience are interrogated in favour of alternative constructions of self–other relationships. An argument is made for greater institutional effort to enable students to make critical connections with ‘other-ness’ both in and out of place.     

The longitudinal effect of the Aprender a Convivir (learning to live together) programme in childhood: the development of social competence / Efecto longitudinal del programa Aprender a Convivir en la infancia: desarrollo de la competencia social

Abstract

In the context of a changing society, strategies are required to eradicate the phenomenon of antisocial behaviour. The Aprender a Convivir universal prevention programme tries to provide such a response. This study attempts to test the effectiveness of the programme through a quasi-experimental long-term study carried out over three years in some nursery schools. Of the students who participated in this study (N = 784), those from the experimental group showed significant increases in social competence compared to the control group, and behavioural problems decreased, albeit not in any significant way. To draw conclusions about the effectiveness of the programme, further improvements are proposed to the design of the study.     

Adivinanzas and Dichos: Preparing Prospective Educators to Teach Science by Incorporating Culturally Responsive Tools

Culturally relevant science pedagogy is seldom discussed in terms of infusion of literary resources, such as adivinanzas and dichos in the design of instruction. In this study, the authors narrate how a science methods course was infused with the use of culturally responsive tools to purposefully connect to the elementary science curriculum. Results indicate that prospective Latino teachers found multiple opportunities to address specific science objectives with adivinanzas and expressed the advantages of using these culturally responsive tools to introduce and summarize science concepts as they implemented lessons during field experience.