Research and development of print materials at the Children's Television Workshop

The mission of research within The Magazine Group of the Children's Television Workshop is fourfold: (a) to ensure that each editorial product is comprehensible to and developmentally appropriate for its intended target audience, (b) to conduct formative and summative evaluations of editorial material for the Group's editors, (c) to keep all staff members of The Magazine Group apprised of the latest academic research in child development and education, and (d) to serve as an in-house advertising and market-research arm for the publisher. This article provides case studies of how research serves each of these functions and concludes with observations on how to optimize the effectiveness of print materials for children, parents, and elementary school teachers.     

AN INTERVENTION TO REDUCE FEAR OF FALLING AND ENHANCE ACTIVITY: WHO IS MOST LIKELY TO BENEFIT?

The reasons for sources of inactivity among older adults can be both physical and psychological. Fear of falling is a common psychological source of restricted activity. The efficacy of a group intervention to reduce fear of falling and associated activity restriction was established in a randomized controlled trial by the authors and their colleagues. The objective of this analysis was to investigate who was most likely to benefit from this intervention. Data from baseline and 12-month follow-up were used to identify predictors in change of two targeted attitudes - fear of falling and ability to manage falls - that were considered to precede change in activity level. The predictors of the two outcomes were similar. Subjects who reported less physical and social dysfunction, more concerns about falling, and greater self-efficacy in doing something about their concerns were most likely to benefit from the intervention. Men were more likely than women to achieve greater ability to manage falls. These findings can be used to target the intervention to persons in greatest need or to modify the intervention to better meet the needs of others.     

The Association between Physical Activity Behavior and Commonly Reported Barriers in a Worksite Population

Recent experiments on the ski simulator produced ambiguous results and raised unanswered questions concerning the true nature of “novice” behavior and the occurrence of behavioral changes during learning. The aim of the present experiment was to analyze the evolving behavior of three beginners during six practice sessions on a ski simulator. The position of the apparatus platform was recorded as time series and used for constructing dynamical models, including stiffness and damping functions. The results showed that novices tended to exploit a Rayleigh damping behavior during the first trials and then transition toward a van der Pol damping. These results replicate previous observations by Nourrit, Delignières, Caillou, Deschamps, and Lauriot (2003) and suggest the transition to the expert behavior could arise early in practice, when the task is of moderate difficulty. The discussion focuses on the properties of the observed learning dynamics and proposes a global conceptualization for acquiring complex motor skills.     

Readability and Basic Course Hybrid Textbooks in Human Communication: A Disparity of Reading Difficulty

Parents play a pivotal role in the gender development and sex-typing of children. It is important to discover whether gender role communication differences exist based on the sex of the child or parent. The present study aimed to discover differences in gender role messages communicated between mother-daughter, mother-son, father-daughter, and father-son dyads. Participants (n = 630) completed a modified version of Bem's Sex Role Inventory. Two key results were discovered: mothers communicate significantly more feminine messages to children, regardless of child sex; and the modified BSRI identifies respondents as weak vs. strong gender identity rather than masculine, feminine, androgynous, or undifferentiated.     

The Teacher's other Role

Given that many high school students come to school unmotivated to learn, the purpose of this article is to examine various motivational constructs and to determine if educators are incorporating the most effective motivational strategies. In fact, adolescents vary from adults physically, cognitively, emotionally, and physiologically and, therefore, they generally differ in their perceptions on the effectiveness of a variety of motivational practices. Students are more likely to attribute their own motivation to their intrinsic desire to learn or as a result of the goals they adopt. Teachers, on the other hand, believe students are more likely to be motivated as a result of the teachers’ actions. Teachers do not always recognize which motivational constructs are the most effective, demonstrating the value of pre-service and in-service programs that stress student motivation. If educators wish to maximize student academic achievement, they must understand how to motivate students successfully.     

The Negativism of Corporal Punishment

Educators and policymakers often believe that immigrant children perform better in school if they and their families culturally assimilate and assume the characteristics prevalent in the dominant mainstream society. Therefore, ethnic retention (i.e., immigrant families and people of color embracing their own ethnic values, artifacts, and practices) is frequently thought to be a major factor leading to academic underachievement. However, based on empirical evidence, ethnic retention is actually predictive of higher academic achievement among children from immigrant families. For blacks, although the academic benefits of cultural retention seems credible, the matter is more complex given the longer history of social oppression collectively experienced in the community. In this article, the author discusses the classroom and policy implications of these empirical findings.     

The State of Media Literacy: A Rejoinder

Based on the uses and gratifications framework, this study examined associations between motivations for using Facebook among college students, their concern for impression management, Facebook intensity, and psychological outcomes including sense of belonging and satisfaction with campus life. Using data from an online survey (N = 246), the study found that four motivations—entertainment, relationship maintenance, self-expression, and communication—together with impression management, were significantly associated with Facebook intensity. However, the impacts of Facebook intensity on psychological consequences were relatively limited. Theoretical implications of the study were discussed.