Constant and variable irrelevant cues during intra- and extradimensional transfer

Experiment I compared constant (CI), variable-between (VBI), and variable-within (WVI) irrelevant cues during an extradimensional (ED) shift discrimination. Performance was better for CI than for VBI and better for VBI than for VWI. Experiment II combined CI, VBI, and VWI cues with ED or intradimensional (ID) shifts. Irrelevant-cue conditions did not affect ID performance but did affect ED performance. The typical superiority of ID, as compared to ED, shifts was observed in the VWI condition but not in the CI condition. Implications for mediating-response (i.e., attention or observing-response) theories were indicated.     

Toward Cultural/Ecological Perspectives on Schooling and Achievement in African- and Asian-American Children

The review acknowledges that research on the family and its contribution to achievement in ethnic minority children is important. Past research and theorizing suggest the need for new directions, however. For example, research in educational achievement predicts educational failure for African-American students and educational success for Asian-American students. Little differentiation is made either among African-Americans or among Asian-Americans of different cultural, language, immigration, and economic backgrounds. The theory and design of research on family and educational achievement have been influenced by prevailing societal stereotypes. Research and policy implications of this review include the need to move toward cultural/ecological theories of achievement socialization and development.     

Characteristics of SAT Quantitative Items Showing Improvement After Coaching Among Black Students From Low-Income Families: An Exploratory Study

The present exploratory investigation is an extension of a 1985 study that evaluated a Scholastic Aptitude Test preparation program involving black urban students. The present study was conducted to determine if there are identifiable characteristics of quantitative items associated with a susceptibility to coaching. Items showing p-value improvements of. 10 after coaching were compared with items not showing such improvements; comparisons were made in terms of the content, type. format, level of cognitive requirement, and position of the items. Items showing improvement were found across content areas, formats, and type. Findings are discussed in relation to the usefulness and improvement of well-designed supplemental instructional programs that have the potential to affect criterion performance in mathematics     

SOCIAL AND PERSONALITY CHARACTERISTICS OF GIFTED STUDENTS

This study aimed at investigating the relationship between intellectual, social, personal and personality variables of academically gifted secondary school students. A total of 297 tenth grade boys and girls were identified on the basis of three main criteria: 1. Academic achievement with special emphasis on Arabic language, science and math scores; 2. Behavioural traits; 3. General mental ability and general adjustment. Data related to socioeconomic status and personal characteristics were also collected. Results of the analysis of variance showed that there were significant differences between gifted and nongifted groups in general mental ability, achievement, general adjustment, behavioural traits, personal and social variables, in favour of the former.     

Teachers' Views about What to do about Sustainable Development

In its various guises the political and economic implications of the spectrum of ideas labelled ‘sustainable development’ have been widely discussed in the media. This research engaged secondary school teachers in the debate concerning the implications for education of the concept of sustainable development. Underpinning this pilot research project is the assumption that teachers, as generally informed citizens, have been sensitised to some of the issues raised in the public domain. Teachers in both the USA and Scotland were interviewed to ascertain the extent to which they had begun to make connections between what they have heard and read informally about sustainable development and their responsibilities as teachers. The objective of this research was to determine the impact of this informal ‘environmental’ education on teaching practice.     

Virtual Processes and Quantum Tunnelling as Fictions

In this paper it is argued that virtual processes are dispensable fictions. The argument proceeds by a comparison with the phenomenon of quantum tunnelling. Building on an analysis of Lévy-Leblond and Balibar, it is argued that, although the phenomenon known as quantum tunnelling certainly occurs and is at the basis of many paradigmatic quantum effects, the implied conceptualization of it as a free particle burrowing through a potential barrier is flawed. An alpha particle, for example, does not exist as a free particle inside a uranium nucleus and then ??burrow through?? the massive potential barrier of the repulsive Coulomb potential: rather, it can be interpreted as existing in a bound state which gives it a corresponding (absolutely tiny, but) finite probability of appearing on the other side of the barrier. If the part of the state function representing the transmission through the barrier is conceived as representing a particle trajectory, the particle will have imaginary momentum and negative kinetic energy. A similar analysis then applies to virtual processes. For example, if (as in Hawking??s conception of black hole radiation) one imagines a pair of particles created at the Schwarzschild radius, one of which drops into the black hole, at its creation that particle will have imaginary momentum and negative kinetic energy; so will the pion that is imagined as mediating the nuclear exchange force on the standard model. In each case, it is argued, the phenomenon can be understood in terms of a finite probability of transmission predicted by quantum theory, without appealing to particle trajectories. The idea that a particle ??penetrates?? a barrier that it does not have the energy to surmount, or that a pair of particles is ??virtually?? produced one on either side of the Schwarzschild radius, in defiance of energy conservation, should be discarded as unphysical.