Communicating Health: Political Risk Narratives in an Environmental Health Campaign

This four-year participant observation study of a “good neighbor” campaign aimed at chemical releases from a plastics plant in southwest Ohio investigates the role that health discourses play in environmental health disputes. Environmental health activists defined health, attributed illness causation, and narrated risk in ways that resisted dominant approaches to health, science, and corporate issues management. Those constructions were contested in everyday interactions with neighbors, corporate management, and regulators. The research found that neighbors’ biographical health narratives politicized risk in ways that aided the negotiation of emissions reductions, but individualized, passive, and technocratic approaches to health risks presented barriers to fully understanding the health effects of chemical emissions. The study demonstrates the need for campaign practitioners to raise critical public awareness of taken-for-granted health beliefs, and for greater involvement of academics in promoting democratic scientific methods.     

Modifying the System for Observing Fitness Instruction Time to Measure Teacher Practices Related to Physical Activity Promotion: SOFIT+

The System for Observing Fitness Instruction Time (SOFIT) is commonly used to measure variables related to physical activity during physical education (PE). However, SOFIT does not yield detailed information about teacher practices related to children’s moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA). This study describes the modification of SOFIT (referred to as SOFIT+) to measure teacher practices related to students’ MVPA during PE lessons. Teacher practices that (a) promote and (b) limit children’s MVPA were identified and operationally defined via a literature review and Delphi Method. Reliability and validity data for SOFIT+ were obtained from 20 video recorded elementary PE lessons. Validity of teacher behaviors included in SOFIT+ was established using students’ accelerometer-derived MVPA. Twenty-seven teacher practices were identified. Inter-rater agreement ranged from 75.8% to 99.1% across 724 reliability scans. Six and seven practices were independently related to girls’ and boys’ MVPA, respectively. For example, during elimination activities, boys and girls were less likely to engage in MVPA. Boys were up to 1.51 times more likely to engage in MVPA while girls were up to 2.86 times more likely to engage in MVPA when a greater number of teacher practices were observed concurrently. Findings provide preliminary reliability and validity for SOFIT+, an instrument to comprehensively measure teacher practices related to children’s MVPA during PE.     

Ethnic identity over national identity: an alternative approach to measure the effect of the World Cup on social cohesion

The purpose of this study was to examine whether a mega sport event has the potential to bring the nation together by increasing the importance of national identity and decreasing the importance of ethnic identity on the outcome of social cohesion. Instead of replicating prior work that has performed mean score comparisons of national identity, ethnic identity, and social cohesion before and after a particular event, the authors compared the variance explained (pre vs. post event) to show the aggregate influence of the two identities on social cohesion. By focusing on this reporting method, the subsequent discussion rests entirely on the practical influence of the perceptual changes that resulted from event hosting. Data for this trend analysis were collected from South African residents, pre (N?=?1749), and post (N?=?2020) the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Results indicated that while the importance of national identity on social cohesion did not increase, the importance of ethnic identity did decrease strongly, indicating that these mega sports events might cause individuals to forget about their ethnic differences as a result of these events.     

Corruption in the 1960s?: Rethinking the Origins of Unethical Olympic Bidding Tactics

Most scholarship about improprieties surrounding Olympic host city selections starts with the Salt Lake City scandal, which television reporters broke in 1998, after which more details emerged revealing similar actions by previous Olympic hosts (as well as unsuccessful bid committees). Yet, the actions of these post-Los Angeles bid committees were not new, with local newspapers from the cities bidding for Games in the 1960s regularly reporting on significant amounts of money bid committees spent in the hope of winning the Games. The actions of the candidate cities for the 1968 Olympic Games went to great lengths to secure the Games. IOC efforts to impose regulations in response to these actions failed to yield significant changes on candidate cities. These examples from the 1960s demonstrate that the bribery of Nagano, Sydney, and Salt Lake City did not start from nowhere. Instead, the IOC long had a culture of improprieties when it came to selecting Olympic host cities – albeit on a smaller scale.     

Individual and Institutional Productivity in Educational Psychology Journals from 2009 to 2014

This article examines the productivity of both individuals and institutions, indexed through an examination of five educational psychology journals (Cognition and Instruction, Contemporary Educational Psychology, Educational Psychologist, Educational Psychology Review, and Journal of Educational Psychology) from 2009 to 2014. These results are discussed relative to four previous studies (Hsieh et al. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 29, 333–343, 2004; Jones et al. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 35, 11–16, 2010; Smith et al. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 23, 173–181, 1998; Contemporary Educational Psychology, 28, 422–430, 2003). Vanderbilt University and Fred Paas replaced the University of Maryland and Richard E. Mayer as the top research institution and author, respectively. Sixteen of the top 19 researchers’ institutions were outside the USA, compared to only 10 of the top 32 during 2003–2008 and three of the top 20 during 1991–1996. Educational psychology research continues the trend of becoming more international.     

Understanding Motivation and Schooling: Where We've Been, Where We Are, and Where We Need to Go

This paper presents an interpretive summary of the progress that has been made in the study of motivation, especially as this work relates to the area of education. Motivation research has come of age with theoretical frameworks rooted in an established body of findings, and with the development of core methodologies for pursuing further knowledge. It has begun to provide a firm base for guiding educational practice. Current work is clearly in accord with mainstream psychology in that cognitive models of motivation are the predominant guides for research. Future work is likely to focus increasingly on how the meaning construction process affects engagement in tasks. Researchers should consider a wider array of research procedures and give greater attention to understanding motivation as it occurs in natural settings, especially as educational interventions are attempted. A serious deficiency in the motivation literature is that relatively little attention has been given to differences related to sociocultural backgrounds.     

What you do is less important than how you do it: the effects of learning environment on student outcomes

Learning Environments Research - Higher education has seen a shift towards promoting student-centred learning. There has also been a push for identifying the ‘best’ teaching models and...     

Using Bourdieu in practice? Urban secondary teachers’ and students’ experiences of a Bourdieusian-inspired pedagogical approach

This article discusses an attempt at a Bourdieusian-inspired form of praxis, developed and implemented in collaboration with nine London teachers, aimed at developing a socially just approach to engaging students with science. Data are discussed from nine months of classroom observations of nine secondary science classes from six inner London schools (approximately 200 students, aged 11–15), interviews and workshop data from the nine teachers and 13 discussion groups conducted with 59 students. The approach resulted in noticeable changes in practice, which were perceived by teachers and students to improve student engagement, cultivate a range of science-related dispositions and promote wider student participation and ‘voice’ in classes. Issues, limitations and possibilities for sociology of education are discussed.     

Taking stock of environmental education policy in England – the what,the where and the why

Abstract

Taking England as our case study, this paper reviews secondary school environmental education from a policy perspective. By drawing on Stevenson’s typologies for environmental improvement and Lucas’ categorisation of environmental education, we analyse national policy documents, local authority and Multi-Academy Trust policies; and individual school planning documents. Our findings suggest in these areas a general absence of environment education policy, and where identified a rhetoric towards conservative reform framed as technology solutions, where learning is about the environment, rather than for the environment. We explain how the (lack of) environmental education rhetoric is a result of global economic changes and national austerity policies, and offer insights and signposting for policy makers.