Intergenerational exchange: undergraduate researchers’ learning and listening enhanced through older adults’ entertainment preferences

The purpose of this qualitative study was to provide an intergenerational exchange as undergraduate students taking an introductory Psychology of Aging course, interviewed and watched films with older adult participants (N = 13) residing in an assisted living community. The undergraduate researchers (N = 10) conducted and transcribed interviews, wrote about their perceptions of interviews and film viewing with older adults, and their instructor interviewed assisted living staff (N = 2) creating an assessment of participants, researchers, and staff. Researchers listened and learned from older adult’s words, thereby improving researchers’ understanding that older adults preferred in-person discussions over film viewing. Researchers learned from older adults’ words, as they began to understand that sexual content in today’s films may reduce entertainment viewing for youth and older adults. Older adults described television remotes and phones with frustration and researchers felt angst for their frustration. Findings suggested understanding and meaning for participants and researchers in this service learning intergenerational exchange generated through undergraduate research.     

Teacher Factors and Special Class Referral Decisions

Using questionnaire data an examination was made of the personal and professional characteristics of 127 regular class (Grade 2‐5) teachers, all of whom had a child in their class whom they believed to be mildly retarded and not coping academically as well as socially in school. Of this group, 53 had referred the child to school psychological services while the remainder had not done so at the time of the study. A set of 28 variables derived from the questionnaire data was subjected to multiple regression analysis in order to examine the predictability of teachers’ referral decisions. Nine significant predictors were identified which together accounted for 35 percent of the variation in referral decisions. Inter‐group contrasts on these measures revealed that referring teachers were more likely to have made previous referrals, had better access to psychologists, were more confident of their ability to identify children who would qualify for special class admission, believed their school policy to b e more encouraging of referrals, were more likely to have made use of special programs, and received more frequent visits from psychologists. Results are discussed in terms of identifying “unserved mildly retarded” children in regular classes.     

Differential trace conditioning to temporal compounds

Rats were reinforced for responding following the presentation of a light-tone temporal compound, each component having a .5-sec duration separated by a .5-sec empty interval. For different groups, nonreinforced presentations of the compound in the reverse order and either or both of the components separately were included in each session. Results indicated a progressive increase in difficulty as the number of nonreinforced events increased, with behavior being strongly affected by the first component of the compound. Nevertheless, differential performance under the most demanding conditions demonstrate the rat’s ability to acquire a temporal compound discrimination, which suggests an interpretation based on interacting stimulus traces.     

Student Workers: Essential Partners in the Twenty-First Century Academic Library

This article describes a case study that best illustrates the value of student workers in university libraries, focusing particularly on how this kind of creative endeavor benefits everyone involved—the library, the students, the faculty, and at the end of the project: the university community.     

Gender differences in the strength of association between motivation,competency beliefs and reading skill

Background:?There is concern in the education community regarding gender differences in reading, as girls regularly outperform boys. There is also concern about the consequences of low motivation for children's engagement in reading and learning. An important question is whether boys' motivation is more closely linked to their attainment compared with girls.

Purpose:?The aim of the study was to examine how closely children's reading skill correlates with their intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and competency beliefs. There was a particular focus on gender.

Sample:?There were 492 children (240 boys) aged 7–11 in this study from four primary schools in England, UK.

Design and methods:?Children completed a reading comprehension assessment and a questionnaire examining intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and competency beliefs relating to reading and schoolwork. For analysis, children were split into a younger (age 7–8) and older (age 9–11) age group.

Results:?In both the younger and older groups, the boys' competency beliefs in reading and intrinsic motivation for reading and schoolwork were significantly more closely associated with their level of reading skill, in comparison with the girls.

Conclusions:?The closer reciprocal relationship between boys' intrinsic motivation, competency beliefs and reading skill could be interpreted in at least two ways. Firstly, boys' motivation and beliefs in their ability may be more dependent on their success in reading. Alternatively, boys' motivation and competency beliefs may play a more significant role in the effort they put into reading.     

Indicators of exemplary programs in instructional design and technology: faculty and student perspectives

This exploratory study investigated what faculty and current students in Instructional Design and Technology (IDT) programs perceive as indicators of an exemplary program. We surveyed a sample of the faculty and students and asked them to identify the most important indicators of an exemplary program and rank their own programs according to those indicators. We contacted programs from 11 different countries, though the majority of contacted programs were from the United States of America. We coded and analyzed the respondents’ 941 indicator statements and created 35 thematic indicators. The frequency and percentage of occurrence of these themes across the programs for both faculty and students were analyzed. Their mean rating of their programs for each theme was also calculated. The paper presents the results of this analysis and examines the differences across students/faculty and program types. The findings of this survey, albeit limited due to the low response rate, could benefit IDT programs in terms of performance improvement and assist students by offering criteria by which they can select a graduate program.     

Early childhood language gains,kindergarten readiness,and Grade 3 reading achievement

In this preregistered study, we used latent change score models to address two research aims: (1) whether preschool-aged children's language gains, over a year of early childhood education, were associated with later performance on state-mandated, literacy-focused kindergarten readiness and Grade 3 reading achievement assessments, and (2) whether gains in language, a more complex skill, predicted these outcomes after controlling for more basic emergent literacy skills. There were 724 participating children (mean = 57 months; 51% male; 76% White, 12% Black, 6% multiple races, and 5% Hispanic or Latino). We found that language gains significantly predicted kindergarten readiness when estimated in isolation (effect = 0.24 SDs, p < .001), but not when gains in letter knowledge and phonological awareness were also included.