Following the action in action learning: towards ethnomethodological studies of (critical) action learning

Action learning is a pedagogical practice that helps participants learn by talking about their workplace action with fellow participants (‘comrades in adversity’) in their action learning set. This paper raises questions about the action in action learning, such as: how do members of an action learning set learn from and through each other? How do they learn through their developing conversation and interaction?

To answer such questions, I argue that, ‘ethnomethodology’ (the study of ‘member's methods’ or ‘folk methods’ for doing any kind of practical action) is useful for showing the intricacy of the practical learning process in action learning, as in learning in action, more generally. The paper illustrates the conversational and interactional work of members doing things and learning together in action (for example discovering things in science and in board meetings); and argues that this approach may also be used to study action learning in practice.     

Therapists in a Foreign Land: Acculturation, Language Proficiency and Counseling Self-Efficacy among Foreign-Born Therapists Practicing in the United States

Immigration and acculturation can have profound effects on counselors’ sense of self and interactions with others. Yet the influence of being an immigrant on a therapist’s use of self during actual clinical encounters has received very little empirical attention, even though the number of foreign-born counselors is steadily increasing in the U.S. In order to fill this gap we conducted a web-based survey study to examine the associations between acculturation, language proficiency, and clinician’s self-efficacy in a sample of 258 foreign-born counselors and providers currently practicing in the U.S. Results suggest that perceived prejudice and not the level of acculturation is significantly associated with levels of clinical self-efficacy, suggesting that the attitudes and behaviors of the host community play a much bigger role in the acculturation of immigrant therapists than previously assumed.     

The Deep-Time Digital Earth program: data-driven discovery in geosciences

Current barriers hindering data-driven discoveries in deep-time Earth (DE) include: substantial volumes of DE data are not digitized; many DE databases do not adhere to FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable) principles; we lack a systematic knowledge graph for DE; existing DE databases are geographically heterogeneous; a significant fraction of DE data is not in open-access formats; tailored tools are needed. These challenges motivate the Deep-Time Digital Earth (DDE) program initiated by the International Union of Geological Sciences and developed in cooperation with national geological surveys, professional associations, academic institutions and scientists around the world. DDE’s mission is to build on previous research to develop a systematic DE knowledge graph, a FAIR data infrastructure that links existing databases and makes dark data visible, and tailored tools for DE data, which are universally accessible. DDE aims to harmonize DE data, share global geoscience knowledge and facilitate data-driven discovery in the understanding of Earth''s evolution.     

Infant Attachment Security and Early Childhood Behavioral Inhibition Interact to Predict Adolescent Social Anxiety Symptoms

Insecure attachment and behavioral inhibition (BI) increase risk for internalizing problems, but few longitudinal studies have examined their interaction in predicting adolescent anxiety. This study included 165 adolescents (ages 14–17 years) selected based on their reactivity to novelty at 4 months. Infant attachment was assessed with the Strange Situation. Multimethod BI assessments were conducted across childhood. Adolescents and their parents independently reported on anxiety. The interaction of attachment and BI significantly predicted adolescent anxiety symptoms, such that BI and anxiety were only associated among adolescents with histories of insecure attachment. Exploratory analyses revealed that this effect was driven by insecure‐resistant attachment and that the association between BI and social anxiety was significant only for insecure males. Clinical implications are discussed.     

BASES Position Statement on Guidelines for Resistance Exercise in Young People

Abstract

Despite the performance concerns of dehydration in other sports, there are currently no data on the effects of rapid weight-loss on the physical and cognitive performance of jockeys in a sport-specific context. In a randomised crossover design, eight Great Britain (GB) male licensed jockeys were assessed for chest strength, leg strength, simulated riding performance (assessed by maximum pushing frequency on a mechanical riding simulator during the final two furlongs of a simulated 2 mile race) and simple reaction time after performing 45 min of exercise, during which euhydration was maintained (Control trial) or induced 2% dehydration (Rapid Weight-Loss trial). Reductions in both chest (–13.8 ± 3.03% vs. 0.62 ± 1.04%) and leg strength (–4.8 ± 4.8% vs. –0.56 ± 2.5%) were greater in Rapid Weight-Loss compared with Control (P < 0.01 and P = 0.04, respectively). Similarly, reductions in simulated riding performance were also greater (P = 0.05) in Rapid Weight-Loss (–2.8 ± 4.0%) compared with Control (–0.07 ± 1.5%), whereas there were no significant changes (P = 0.14) in simple reaction time. We conclude that a 2% reduction in body mass, as achieved by 45 min of moderate-intensity exercise undertaken in a sweatsuit (a common method of inducing acute dehydration by jockeys), significantly impairs maximum pushing frequency during a simulated race. In addition, the observed reductions in strength may also increase the occupational hazards associated with race riding.     

The Young Child's Pictorial Representation of the Human Figure

This study investigated reasons for the omission of the torso typical in most young children's drawings of the human figure. Do they have an incomplete mental image of the human figure; if so will the torso be omitted from a manikin task too? As the head is normally drawn first, is the torso simply forgotten; if so will children include it if they are asked to draw the torso first? Eighty tadpole‐drawers (aged between 2 years 7 months and 5 years) were randomly allocated to a drawing or a manikin condition; they were further subdivided into a head‐first or torso‐first condition. Significantly more children produced a conventional figure when they constructed a manikin compared with those who were asked to draw; the order of body parts (head‐first vs torso‐first) had no significant effect. These results suggest that young children omit the torso from their human figures because they have yet to devise a way of drawing it, perhaps because it is a relatively unimportant item; there is little evidence that they have simply forgotten it or that their mental model for the human figure is incomplete.