Self‐efficacy,goal orientation,and fear of failure as predictors of school engagement in high school students

Lack of school engagement among adolescents in this country remains a problem that can have very serious consequences including increased risk for school dropout, substance use, teenage pregnancy, and criminal activity. Clearly, identification of psychological variables (self‐variables) of individuals that facilitate or hinder adolescents' levels of school engagement would contribute greatly to the understanding of how to increase adolescents' psychological well‐being and their achievement motivation and associated school engagement. The present study examined the degree of association of three specific self‐variables (self‐efficacy, goal orientation, and fear of failure) with school engagement for high school students. The results and implications for intervention and future research are addressed. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Psychol Schs 40: 417–427, 2003.     

An investigation of a novel three-dimensional activity monitor to predict free-living energy expenditure

The aim of this study was to assess the capability of the 3dNX accelerometer to predict energy expenditure in two separate, free-living cohorts. Twenty-three adolescents and 14 young adults took a single dose of doubly labelled water and wore a 3dNX activity monitor during waking hours for a 10-day period while carrying out their normal routines. Multiple linear regression with backward elimination was used to establish the strength of the associations between various indices of energy expenditure, physical activity counts, and anthropometric variables. 3dNX output accounted for 27% and 35% of the variance in the total energy expenditure of the adolescent and young adult cohort, respectively. The explained variance increased to 78%, with a standard error of estimate of 7%, when 3dNX output was combined with body composition variables. The 3dNX accelerometer can be used to predict free-living daily energy expenditure with a standard error of estimate of 1.65 MJ in adolescents and 1.52 MJ in young adults. The inclusion of anthropometric variables reduces the error to approximately 1 MJ. Although it remains to cross-validate these models in other populations, early indications suggest that the 3dNX provides a useful method of predicting energy expenditure in free-living individuals.     

Teacher students’ dilemmas when teaching science through inquiry

Background: Inquiry-based science education (IBSE) is suitable to teach scientific contents as well as to foster scientific skills. Similar conclusions are drawn by studies with respect to scientific literacy, motivational aspects, vocabulary knowledge, conceptual understandings, critical thinking, and attitudes toward science. Nevertheless, IBSE is rarely adopted in schools. Often barriers for teachers account for this lack, with the result that even good teachers struggle to teach science as inquiry. More importantly, studies indicate that several barriers and constraints could be ascribed to problems teacher students have at the university stage.

Purpose: The purpose of this explorative investigation is to examine the problems teacher students have when teaching science through inquiry. In order to draw a holistic picture of these problems, we identified problems from three different points of view leading to the research question: What problems regarding IBSE do teacher students have from an objective, a subjective, and a self-reflective perspective?

Design &; method: Using video analysis and observation tools as well as qualitative content analysis and open questionnaires we identified problems from each perspective.

Results: The objectively stated problems comprise the lack of essential features of IBSE especially concerning ‘Supporting pupils’ own investigations’ and ‘Guiding analysis and conclusions.’ The subjectively perceived problems comprise concerns about ‘Teachers’ abilities’ and ‘Pupils’ abilities,’ ‘Differentiated instruction’ and institutional frame ‘Conditions’ while the self-reflectively noticed problems mainly comprise concerns about ‘Allowing inquiry,’ ‘Instructional Aspects,’ and ‘Pupils’ behavior.’

Conclusions: Each of the three different perspectives provides plenty of problems, partially overlapping, partially complementing one another, and partially revealing completely new problems. Consequently, teacher educators have to consider these three perspectives.     

Using clickers in nonmajors- and majors-level biology courses: student opinion, learning, and long-term retention of course material

Student response systems (clickers) are viewed positively by students and instructors in numerous studies. Evidence that clickers enhance student learning is more variable. After becoming comfortable with the technology during fall 2005-spring 2006, we compared student opinion and student achievement in two different courses taught with clickers in fall 2006. One course was an introductory biology class for nonmajors, and the other course was a 200 level genetics class for biology majors. Students in both courses had positive opinions of the clickers, although we observed some interesting differences between the two groups of students. Student performance was significantly higher on exam questions covering material taught with clickers, although the differences were more dramatic for the nonmajors biology course than the genetics course. We also compared retention of information 4 mo after the course ended, and we saw increased retention of material taught with clickers for the nonmajors course, but not for the genetics course. We discuss the implications of our results in light of differences in how the two courses were taught and differences between science majors and nonmajors.     

Early Educational Intervention, Early Cumulative Risk, and the Early Home Environment as Predictors of Young Adult Outcomes Within a High-Risk Sample

The extent to which early educational intervention, early cumulative risk, and the early home environment were associated with young adult outcomes was investigated in a sample of 139 young adults (age 21) from high-risk families enrolled in randomized trials of early intervention. Positive effects of treatment were found for education attainment, attending college, and skilled employment; negative effects of risk were found for education attainment, graduating high school, being employed, and avoiding teen parenthood. The home mediated the effects of risk for graduating high school, but not being employed for teen parenthood. Evidence for moderated mediation was found for educational attainment; the home mediated the association between risk and educational attainment for the control group, but not the treated group.     

The utility and challenges of using ICD codes in child maltreatment research: A review of existing literature

ObjectiveThe objectives of this article are to explore the extent to which the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD) has been used in child abuse research, to describe how the ICD system has been applied, and to assess factors affecting the reliability of ICD coded data in child abuse research.MethodsPubMed, CINAHL, PsychInfo and Google Scholar were searched for peer reviewed articles written since 1989 that used ICD as the classification system to identify cases and research child abuse using health databases. Snowballing strategies were also employed by searching the bibliographies of retrieved references to identify relevant associated articles. The papers identified through the search were independently screened by two authors for inclusion, resulting in 47 studies selected for the review. Due to heterogeneity of studies meta-analysis was not performed.ResultsThis paper highlights both utility and limitations of ICD coded data. ICD codes have been widely used to conduct research into child maltreatment in health data systems. The codes appear to be used primarily to determine child maltreatment patterns within identified diagnoses or to identify child maltreatment cases for research.ConclusionsA significant impediment to the use of ICD codes in child maltreatment research is the under ascertainment of child maltreatment by using coded data alone. This is most clearly identified and, to some degree, quantified, in research where data linkage is used.Practice implicationsThe importance of improved child maltreatment identification will assist in identifying risk factors and creating programs that can prevent and treat child maltreatment and assist in meeting reporting obligations under the CRC.     

The effect of Twitter posts on students’ perceptions of instructor credibility

Greater numbers of instructors are turning to social networking sites to communicate with students. This study examined whether posting social, scholarly, or a combination of social and scholarly information to Twitter has an impact on the perceived credibility of the instructor. Participants were assigned to one of three groups: a group that viewed social tweets, one that viewed scholarly tweets, and one that viewed a combination of social and scholarly tweets. Participants were then asked questions about the instructor’s perceived credibility. Results show that participants who viewed only the social tweets rated the instructor significantly higher in perceived credibility than the group that viewed only the scholarly tweets. No other significant differences were found among the groups. These results have implications for both teaching and learning, as there is an established link between perceived instructor credibility and positive learning outcomes.     

Acute responses to sprint-interval and continuous exercise in adults with and without exercise-induced bronchoconstriction

The purpose was to compare the airway response to sprint interval exercise (SIE) and continuous exercise (CE) in active adults with exercise-induced bronchoconstriction (EIBC), and to compare ventilatory and oxygen delivery responses between adults with and without EIBC. Adults with EIBC (n = 8, 22.3 ± 3.0 years) and adults without EIBC (n = 8, 22.3 ± 3.0 years) completed a SIE (4 × 30 s sprints separated by 4.5 min of active recovery) and CE (20 min at 65% peak power output) session. Lung function was assessed at baseline, during exercise, and up to 20 min post-exercise. Ventilatory parameters and tissue saturation index (TSI) were recorded continuously throughout the sessions. The decline in forced expiratory volume in 1 s was similar following SIE (?8.6 ± 12.6%) and CE (?9.0 ± 9.3%) in adults with EIBC. There were no significant differences in any of the ventilatory parameters or in TSI during SIE or CE between those with and without EIBC. These findings suggest that SIE and CE affect airway responsiveness to a similar extent. Future research using a lower intensity CE protocol in an inactive sample of adults with EIBC is needed.