SPECIFIC COGNITIVE PREDICTORS OF EARLY MATH PROBLEM SOLVING

Development of early math skill depends on a prerequisite level of cognitive development. Identification of specific cognitive skills that are important for math development may not only inform instructional approaches but also inform assessment approaches to identifying children with specific learning problems in math. This study investigated the specific cognitive correlates of math problem solving across early grade levels (1–4) while controlling for basic calculation skills. As expected, basic calculation skill was a significant predictor of math problem solving across the entire sample. However, the addition of cognitive measures almost doubled the variance explained (R² = .61). Additionally, only select cognitive variables contributed to the prediction of math problem solving, and these variables change in importance as children develop higher‐level math skills. Results are discussed within a developmental model, which emphasizes the increasing importance of abstract code representations required in higher levels of math performance.     

How students reason about matter flows and accumulations in complex biological phenomena: An emerging learning progression for mass balance

In recent years, there has been a strong push to transform STEM education at K-12 and collegiate levels to help students learn to think like scientists. One aspect of this transformation involves redesigning instruction and curricula around fundamental scientific ideas that serve as conceptual scaffolds students can use to build cohesive knowledge structures. In this study, we investigated how students use mass balance reasoning as a conceptual scaffold to gain a deeper understanding of how matter moves through biological systems. Our aim was to lay the groundwork for a mass balance learning progression in physiology. We drew on a general models framework from biology and a covariational reasoning framework from math education to interpret students' mass balance ideas. We used a constant comparative method to identify students' reasoning patterns from 73 interviews conducted with undergraduate biology students. We helped validate the reasoning patterns identified with >8000 written responses collected from students at multiple institutions. From our analyses, we identified two related progress variables that describe key elements of students' performances: the first describes how students identify and use matter flows in biology phenomena; the second characterizes how students use net rate-of-change to predict how matter accumulates in, or disperses from, a compartment. We also present a case study of how we used our emerging mass balance learning progression to inform instructional practices to support students' mass balance reasoning. Our progress variables describe one way students engage in three dimensional learning by showing how student performances associated with the practice of mathematical thinking reveal their understanding of the core concept of matter flows as governed by the crosscutting concept of matter conservation. Though our work is situated in physiology, it extends previous work in climate change education and is applicable to other scientific fields, such as physics, engineering, and geochemistry.     

Small Circles: Mobile Telephony and the Cultivation of the Private Sphere

This article examines how we use mobile telephony to maintain our physically and socially closest social circle. The analysis is based on traffic data gathered from Norway using approximately 24 million calls and texts made by private individuals. Previous research has shown that our temporal and spatial movement is highly predictable and that the majority of calls and text messages are sent to only four to six different persons. This article extends this research by examining both tie strength and the distance between the interlocutors in urban and rural settings. The findings show that even as information and communication technologies (ICTs) potentially put the world at our fingertips, the mobile phone is an instrument of a more limited geographical and social sphere. Approximately two-thirds of our calls/texts go to strong ties that are within a 25-km radius.     

A two-stage proxy variable approach to estimating movie box office receipts

This paper advances the ongoing discussion of methods for predicting movie box office revenues with two contributions to the methodology and an out-of-sample test of the model. The first innovation is the development of a two-stage model using publicly available pre-release indicators to predict (1) initial week and (2) subsequent run box office revenues. To incorporate the experience-good nature of movies, the second stage is estimated by incorporating a proxy variable for box office success during the first week relative to predicted first week success. The second contribution is an empirical test of De Vany and Walls’ (J Econ Dyn Control 28:1035–1057, 2004) finding that the distribution of movie revenues has “heavy tails” and follows a non-Gaussian stable distribution with infinite variance. We estimate the two-stage model of a movie’s box office success on all general release movies in 1 year with both the Gaussian and stable distribution with heavy tails and infinite variance and find no evidence for the stable distribution in either stage of the estimation. This two-stage model is validated by comparing all general release movies in 3 future years (out-of-sample data) to the model’s predictions.     

Cut points of the Actigraph GT9X for moderate and vigorous intensity physical activity at four different wear locations

ABSTRACT

Accelerometer cut points are an important consideration for distinguishing the intensity of activity into categories such as moderate and vigorous. It is well-established in the literature that these cut points depend on a variety of factors, including age group, device, and wear location. The Actigraph GT9X is a newer model accelerometer that is used for physical activity research, but existing cut points for this device are limited since it is a newer device. Furthermore, there is not existing data on cut points for the GT9X at the ankle or foot locations, which offers some potential benefit for activities that do not involve arm and/or core motion. A total of N = 44 adults completed a four-stage treadmill protocol while wearing Actigraph GT9X sensors at four different locations: foot, ankle, wrist, and hip. Metabolic Equivalent of Task (MET) levels assessed by indirect calorimetry along with Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves were used to establish cut points for moderate and vigorous intensity for each wear location of the GT9X. Area under the ROC curves indicated high discrimination accuracy for each case.     

Human biochemical genetics： an insight into inborn errors of metabolism

Inborn errors of metabolism （IEM） include a broad spectrum of defects of various gene products that affect intermediary metabolism in the body. Studying the molecular and biochemical mechanisms of those inherited disorder, systematically summarizing the disease phenotype and natural history, providing diagnostic rationale and methodology and treatment strategy comprise the context of human biochemical genetics. This session focused on： （1） manifestations of representative metabolic disorders; （2） the emergent technology and application of newborn screening of metabolic disorders using tandem mass spectrometry; （3） principles of managing IEM; （4） the concept of carrier testing aiming prevention. Early detection of patients with IEM allows early intervention and more options for treatment.     

Reading expressively and understanding thoroughly: An examination of prosody in adults with low literacy skills

The purpose of the current study was to explore the relationship between prosody, which is the expressive quality of reading out loud, and reading comprehension in adults with low literacy skills compared to skilled readers. All participants read a passage orally, and we extracted prosodic measures from the recordings. We examined pitch changes and how long readers paused at various points while reading. Finally, for the adults with low literacy skills, we collected information on decoding, word recognition, and reading comprehension. We found several interesting results. First, adults with low literacy skills paused longer than skilled readers and paused at a substantially greater number of punctuation marks. Second, while adults with low literacy skills do mark the end of declarative sentences with a pitch declination similar to skilled readers, their readings of questions lack a change in pitch. Third, decoding and word recognition skills were related to pauses while reading; readers with lower skills made longer and more frequent and inappropriate pauses. Finally, pausing measures explained a significant amount of variance in reading comprehension among the adults with low literacy skills.     

Counselor Educators' Experiences Preparing Preservice School Counselors: A Phenomenological Study

The authors conducted a phenomenological study to explore the experiences of 32 school counselor educators preparing preservice school counselors. Analysis of data from 3 focus groups revealed 3 themes: breadth versus depth, balancing specialties and professor partiality, and preparation versus practice. These results highlight the need for collaboration across counseling specialties at the preservice level.     

Spaces of emergent memory: Detroit’s 8 Mile wall and public memories of civil rights injustice

This article introduces emergent memory, a conceptual extension to rhetorics of public memory, to describe memory’s genesis in sites built without commemorative commitments. Examining Detroit’s “8 Mile Wall,” a site built to reinforce segregated housing, this project argues the rhetorical tenets of emergent memory present in this space. As a relic of segregated history, the wall symbolically recalls the city’s controversial past, but has recently been the subject of a local mural project to redefine the wall’s purpose. Some consider this a step toward reclamation, as it visually repositions the disturbing remnant. For others, the murals simply cannot overwrite troubling memories of the city’s discriminatory history. This essay uses emergent memory to describe how the wall’s complicated mnemonic legacy simultaneously harkens to a difficult history and how the mural additions use that same legacy to convey an optimistic future for Detroit and those marked by this urban space.