Multum in parvo: Paperbacks in speech

Women process information about support situations and messages more extensively than men, but little is known about whether these gender differences reflect underlying differences in processing ability, motivation, or both. Two studies examined information processing by men and women in both relatively less serious and more serious situations. Participants in Study 1 responded to more and less serious experimental scenarios, whereas participants in Study 2 reported on a recent bereavement situation. In both studies, the pattern of observed gender differences was most consistent with women possessing both greater ability and greater motivation to process information about support situations and messages.     

Estrategias de instrucción para el estudio de textos disciplinares en los grados intermedius

RESUMEN

El propósito de este estudio es evaluar la eficacia de la instrucción sistemática en las destrezas de estudio de textos de ciencias sociales. El grupo que siguió un entrenamiento sistemático rindió a un nivel significativamente más alto que el grupo control (sin instrucción) y que el grupo de comparación (que reproducía el método de las clases tradicionales), entre los que no hubo diferencias. También se encontraron diferencias significativas entre los grupos en el tiempo dedicado al estudio. La muestra entrenada disminuyó el tiempo de estudio sin disminuir su rendimiento. En el postest retardado, casi todos los estudiantes entrenados utilizaron algún tipo de estrategia, aunque no fuera exactamente el método de estudio en el que habían sido entrenados. En definitiva, se apoya el uso de la instrucción sistemática para enseñar un método de estudio a alumnos que presentan deficiencias en esta destreza.     

Self-monitoring during whole group reading instruction: effects among students with emotional and behavioral disabilities during summer school intervention sessions

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects that a self-monitoring strategy, plus a tactile prompting device, had upon the on-task and oral reading fluency behaviors of students with emotional and/or behavioral disabilities in the general education setting when used during whole group reading instruction. A multiple-baseline across pairs of participants design was used to evaluate the effects of the intervention. The results show that all four participants increased their on-task behavior during whole group reading instruction after being taught how to use the self-monitoring strategy, and their on-task behavior results were more similar to their peers' during the intervention condition. In addition, all students showed meaningful gains in oral reading fluency after being taught to self-monitor during whole group reading instruction when compared to baseline levels. Generalization probe data were taken during teacher-led, small group reading instruction. Although there were slight increases in performance for each of the target students after using the intervention for at least one week, these results should be interpreted with caution and should be further examined with future research.     

LGBTQ-inclusive curricula: why supportive curricula matter

There is growing attention to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning (LGBTQ) issues in schools, including efforts to address such issues through the curriculum. This study examines whether students’ perceptions of personal safety and school climate safety are stronger when curricula that include LGBTQ people are present and supportive. LGBTQ and straight middle and high school students from California (1232 students from 154 schools) participated in the 2008 Preventing School Harassment survey. They reported their experience of LGBTQ-inclusive curriculum, its level of supportiveness and perceptions of safety. Multilevel methods allowed for an examination of differences between individuals in the same school while controlling for differences between schools. LGBTQ-inclusive curricula were associated with higher reports of safety at the individual and school levels, and lower levels of bullying at the school level. The amount of support also mattered: supportive curricula were related to feeling safer and awareness of bullying at the individual and school levels. The implications of school- versus student-level results for educational policy and practices are discussed.     

Hardwired for News: Affective Intelligence and Political Attention

Research on citizens’ inattentiveness to political news has built a theoretical base for understanding political judgment in the American electorate. The research, however, has a strong cognitive orientation with surprisingly little attention to the dynamic interaction between emotional and attentional factors. To broaden our understanding of these potential emotional influences, we assessed levels of enthusiasm, anger/aversion, and anxiety in response to brief summaries of 50 news stories of diverse character and provenance selected to be representative of quotidian news. The analysis reveals dramatic variation across news stories and across subjects responding to the same story on all 3 emotional dimensions. We also examine an unexpected inverse correlation between education and level of emotional response to news.     

Human rights discourse and the development of democracy in a multi-ethnic state

This study examines the effects of the global discourse of democracy and human rights, and specifically the western emphasis on individual civil and political rights, on the multi-ethnic movement in opposition to the military regime in Burma (Myanmar). The impact of rights discourse on refugees and ethnic minorities from Burma is detailed within the context of changes in international refugee policy and the development of Burmese opposition media. The study demonstrates how narrow interpretations of human rights can act to reinforce stereotypes that create or reify inequalities among the various groups in a multi-party coalition or multi-ethnic state, and calls on political communication researchers and practitioners to attend to the varying and highly contextualized effects of such discourses on marginalized peoples whose perspectives are not normally represented in media.     

Absenteeism in Undergraduate Business Education: A Proposed Model and Exploratory Investigation*

One issue in undergraduate business education remaining underexamined is student absenteeism. In this article, the literature on undergraduate absenteeism is reviewed culminating in a proposed conceptual framework to guide future research, and an exploratory investigation of management students’ attitudes about absenteeism is conducted. Implications for research practice are discussed.     

The international student experience: three styles of adaptation

The subjective well-being of a sample of 979 international students attending a large metropolitan university in Melbourne, Australia, was investigated. A person-focussed approach was used to determine whether different ways of adapting, based on patterns of well-being, could be discerned. Cluster analysis of responses on 21 measures identified three different patterns: positive and connected (58.8% of students), unconnected and stressed (34.4%), and distressed and risk-taking (6.7%). Tests of the concurrent validity of the typology were significant. Demographic factors were not particularly helpful in distinguishing among the three patterns of well-being. The results provide universities with knowledge pertinent to provision of appropriate international student support.