BROADCAST TELEVISION AS A CAUSE OF AGGRESSION? RECENT FINDINGS FROM A NATURALISTIC STUDY

This sub‐study is part of a longitudinal naturalistic investigation monitoring the social behaviour of young children (3‐8‐year‐olds) before and after the arrival of broadcast television in St Helena, South Atlantic.

Children's free‐play behaviour in first school playgrounds was videotaped in 1994 (pre‐tv), and in 1995 and 1996 (post‐tv), and then coded and analysed by trained observers. Findings showed no significant differences in children's behaviour either across the availability of broadcast television (i.e. CNN) or with the addition of further channels (CNN plus others).     

Why Our Theoretical Models of Integration are Inhibiting Effective Innovation

In education, as in all other fields, grassroots practitioners need people with sharp, creative minds who are able to question accepted ideologies and challenge current practice. Such innovators stimulate argument and collaboration which, in turn, lead to the development of new philosophies and to more enlightened and effective practices.

In this paper it Is argued that in special education, however, the philosophical models of integration which have been presented over the last eight years have often inadvertently inhibited, rather than promoted, the Introduction of more effective learning systems.     

Impact of combining data from multiple instruments on performance of patient-based real-time quality control

IntroductionIt is unclear what is the best strategy for applying patient-based real-time quality control (PBRTQC) algorithm in the presence of multiple instruments. This simulation study compared the error detection capability of applying PBRTQC algorithms for instruments individually and in combination using serum sodium as an example.Materials and methodsFour sets of random serum sodium measurements were generated with differing means and standard deviations to represent four simulated instruments. Moving median with winsorization was selected as the PBRTQC algorithm. The PBRTQC parameters (block size and control limits) were optimized and applied to the four simulated laboratory data sets individually and in combination.ResultsWhen the PBRTQC algorithm were individually optimized and applied to the data of the individual simulated instruments, it was able to detect bias several folds faster than when they were combined. Similarly, the individually applied algorithms had perfect error detection rates across different magnitudes of bias, whereas the error detection rates of the algorithm applied on the combined data missed smaller biases. The performance of the individually applied PBRTQC algorithm performed more consistently among the simulated instruments compared to when the data were combined.DiscussionWhile combining data from different instruments can increase the data stream and hence, increase the speed of error detection, it may widen the control limits and compromising the probability of error detection. The presence of multiple instruments in the data stream may dilute the effect of the error when it only affects a selected instrument.     

Information retrieval in the workplace: A comparison of professional search practices

Legal researchers, recruitment professionals, healthcare information professionals, and patent analysts all undertake work tasks where search forms a core part of their duties. In these instances, the search task is often complex and time-consuming and requires specialist expertise to identify relevant documents and insights within large domain-specific repositories and collections. Several studies have been made investigating the search practices of professionals such as these, but few have attempted to directly compare their professional practices and so it remains unclear to what extent insights and approaches from one domain can be applied to another. In this paper we describe the results of a survey of a purposive sample of 108 legal researchers, 64 recruitment professionals and 107 healthcare information professionals. Their responses are compared with results from a previous survey of 81 patent analysts. The survey investigated their search practices and preferences, the types of functionality they value, and their requirements for future information retrieval systems. The results reveal that these professions share many fundamental needs and face similar challenges. In particular a continuing preference to formulate queries as Boolean expressions, the need to manage, organise and re-use search strategies and results and an ambivalence toward the use of relevance ranking. The results stress the importance of recall and coverage for the healthcare and patent professionals, while precision and recency were more important to the legal and recruitment professionals. The results also highlight the need to ensure that search systems give confidence to the professional searcher and so trust, explainability and accountability remains a significant challenge when developing such systems. The findings suggest that translational research between the different areas could benefit professionals across domains.     

Executive functioning and word reading in Hong Kong Chinese children: A 1-year longitudinal perspective

This study examined the bidirectionality between kindergarten children's executive functioning (EF) and word reading across two time points. Participants were 523 Hong Kong Chinese-speaking children (mean age at Time 2 = 64.59 months; 52.9% male) and their parents. At Time 1, children were administered the measures of EF skills: inhibitory control, attention shifting, working memory and Chinese word reading. They were reassessed with these measures at Time 2 one year later. Results from the cross-lagged panel model revealed that, controlling for child age, gender and parental education levels, children's word reading at Time 1 was significantly predictive of their working memory at Time 2, but that the three EF skills at Time 1 were not predictive of word reading at Time 2. These findings underscored the role of early word reading in promoting children's working memory.     

From peripheral to full participation in a blended trade bargaining simulation

This article considers the extent and nature of student participation in a trade bargaining simulation from a community of practice perspective. This third‐year economics module included a blend of online communication (through email, online chats and online discussions) and face‐to‐face meetings, both in smaller bargaining groups and in whole class plenary meetings. Our method of analysis includes the use of Exchange Structure Analysis of text chats and face‐to‐face learning conversations, triangulated by observation, survey and interview data. The focus on community of practice enables us to offer a nuanced interpretation of differences in crude participation data derived from the online chats. Superficially, the data may suggest marginalisation of participants, but Wenger's (1988 ) notion of peripheral participation with a trajectory towards full participation reframes the disparities in terms of an active community of practice. Some members are fully engaged with the practices of trade bargaining from the early stages of the simulation, while others move towards full participation over the duration of the simulation. Our results suggest that the laboratory‐based online text chats did provide opportunities for student participation in the simulation, and that male and female students exhibited different patterns of participation in the chats.     

The Development and Validation of a Survey for Evaluating Primary Students’ Self-efficacy in STEM Activities

STEM integration has become a popular concept not only in the context of education practices but also as a way of learning. The integration of the STEM domains is evident in students’ learning experiences when engaging in STEM activities. However, there is a lack of instruments for evaluating students’ levels of self-efficacy in these activities. Therefore, the aims of this study were to develop a survey for evaluating upper primary students’ self-efficacy in STEM activities and to explore whether a student’s gender, grade, and participation in STEM activities predict his or her self-efficacy in STEM activities. A total of 844 fourth- to sixth-grade primary students participated in this study. After pilot testing, exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were conducted, the survey was found to have a single-factor structure with high reliability (Cronbach’s alpha = .90). Linear regression analysis showed that school and out-of-school participation in STEM activities significantly predicted the students’ self-efficacy in STEM activities, while grade and gender did not. The survey developed in this study provides a reliable and valid way to measure students’ self-efficacy in STEM activities. These findings also highlight the importance of encouraging students’ participation in both formal and informal STEM activities.