On mathematical understanding: perspectives of experienced Chinese mathematics teachers

Researchers have long debated the meaning of mathematical understanding and ways to achieve mathematical understanding. This study investigated experienced Chinese mathematics teachers’ views about mathematical understanding. It was found that these mathematics teachers embrace the view that understanding is a web of connections, which is a result of continuous connection making. However, in contrast to the popular view which separates understanding into conceptual and procedural, Chinese teachers prefer to view understanding in terms of concepts and procedures. They place more stress on the process of concept development, which is viewed as a source of students’ failures in transfer. To achieve mathematical understanding, the Chinese teachers emphasize strategies such as reinventing a concept, verbalizing a concept, and using examples and comparisons for analogical reasoning. These findings draw on the perspective of classroom practitioners to inform the long-debated issue of the meaning of mathematical understanding and ways to achieve mathematical understanding.     

Designing a machine to learn about the ethics of robotics: the N-reasons platform

We can learn about human ethics from machines. We discuss the design of a working machine for making ethical decisions, the N-Reasons platform, applied to the ethics of robots. This N-Reasons platform builds on web based surveys and experiments, to enable participants to make better ethical decisions. Their decisions are better than our existing surveys in three ways. First, they are social decisions supported by reasons. Second, these results are based on weaker premises, as no exogenous expertise (aside from that provided by the participants) is needed to seed the survey. Third, N-Reasons is designed to support experiments so we can learn how to improve the platform. We sketch experimental results that show the platform is a success as well as pointing to ways it can be improved.     

Effect of Vitamin E on sP-Selectin Levels in Pre-Eclampsia

P-selectin, a cell adhesion molecule is elevated in many inflammatory conditions including preeclampsia which is characterized by generalized endothelial dysfunction and vasoconstriction presumably due to free radicals or mediators released by defective placentation. Vitamin E has been documented to protect cell membranes from oxidative damage and also decrease platelet aggregation. The role of vitamin E in pre-eclampsia is contradictory and hence the study was undertaken. Soluble P-selectin was measured by ELISA and Vitamin-E levels in plasma was estimated spectrofluorometrically. In our study the effect of supplementation of 400 IU/day of Vitamin E (a-tocopheryl acetate) to patients of pre-eclampsia showed significant decreased levels of soluble P-selectin by 2nd week as compared to patients given placebo (P = 0.005). In this short period of study no direct correlations were observed between Vitamin E or P-selectin levels with blood pressure as well as with proteinuria. Future studies may focus on the effect of a-tocopheryl acetate or the phosphate form of Vitamin-E, recently proposed to be the more active form on other inflammatory markers like IL-6, an important stimuli of P-selectin release in pre-eclampsia.     

Participation,financial support and the marginal student

This paper examines differences between the decision-making of marginal and nonmarginal students about participation in higher education (HE). We distinguish between two kinds of marginality: being ‘borderline’ on account of prior achievements in school and being ‘unsure’ after taking prior achievement into account. We identify a significant minority of students in their final year of schooling who are unsure about participation in higher education even though they have prior school achievements typical of entrants to HE. Being ‘unsure’ is found to be unrelated to socioeconomic background, but it is associated with significantly different attitudes towards the potential benefits and risks of participation, different levels of knowledge about financial support that is available and different approaches to information search about participation in HE.

The Vestiges of Childhood Interparental Conflict: Adolescent Sensitization to Recent Interparental Conflict

This study examined whether childhood interparental conflict moderated the mediational pathway involving adolescent exposure to interparental conflict, their negative emotional reactivity to family conflict, and their psychological problems in a sample of 235 children (M_age = 6 years). Significant moderated-mediation findings indicated that the mediational path among Wave 4 interparental conflict during adolescence, change in youth negative reactivity (Waves 4–5), and their psychological problems (Waves 4–6) was significant for teens who experienced low, rather than high, levels of childhood interparental conflict (Waves 1–3). Supporting the stress sensitization model, analyses showed that adolescents exposed to high interparental conflict during childhood evidenced greater increases in negative reactivity than their peers when recent parental conflicts were mild.     

Three Walks Through Fictional Fens: Multidisciplinary Perspectives on <Emphasis Type="Italic">Gaffer Samson’s Luck</Emphasis>

The paper discusses the children’s novel Gaffer Samson’s Luck (1984), by Jill Paton Walsh, from three different perspectives; those of a cultural geographer, a literary scholar and an English teacher. It is part of a larger research project on children’s perception of their place-related identities through reading and writing. The novel is used as a case study to develop a multidisciplinary approach, drawing upon theories of literature and reading, and a conceptualisation of space in cultural geography. Employing ideas from different disciplines, the paper offers an original interpretation of the text as well as innovative analytical tools for future research and for classroom application.     

A Critical Review of Line Graphs in Behavior Analytic Journals

Visual displays such as graphs have played an instrumental role in psychology. One discipline relies almost exclusively on graphs in both applied and basic settings, behavior analysis. The most common graphic used in behavior analysis falls under the category of time series. The line graph represents the most frequently used display for visual analysis and subsequent interpretation and communication of experimental findings. Behavior analysis, like the rest of psychology, has opted to use non-standard line graphs. Therefore, the degree to which graphical quality occurs remains unknown. The current article surveys the essential structure and quality features of line graphs in behavioral journals. Four thousand three hundred and thirteen graphs from 11 journals served as the sample. Results of the survey indicate a high degree of deviation from standards of graph construction and proper labeling. A discussion of the problems associated with graphing errors, future directions for graphing in the field of behavior analysis, and the need for standards adopted for line graphs follows.