Explaining the Third Reich: Swedish students' causal reasoning about the Nazi seizure of power in Germany

The topic of this study is how Swedish students aged 15–16 use causal reasoning in history when given a high-stakes task about explaining a historically significant event, the rise of the Nazi regime in Germany. The study is based on student texts from the Swedish national test in history. The student texts are mainly analysed with regards to how many, and what kinds of, causal factors are used by the students. The study finds that while most students are able to combine agents and situational factors in their explanations, the explanations show a recurring theme of combining a generic sense of economic crisis with Hitler and the German people as the important agents, to the detriment of other causes that could open up for different interpretations of why the Nazi regime came to power. To counteract this, the study suggests increased emphasis on some contextual factors in teaching practices.     

Reactions to College Withdrawal,

Problems in validly determining reasons for withdrawal from college are reviewed. This study examines the reasons given by several different subgroups of withdrawals, hopefully circumventing some of these problems. Questionnaires were sent to 1135 students (and to their parents) who had withdrawn from three liberal-arts colleges. Different subgroups of withdrawals reported quite different reasons for leaving. Academic dismissals reported more severe problems (both academic and personal) than did voluntary withdrawals (who ranked second) and transfers (who had fewest problems). Students who withdrew during a semester did so for very different reasons than did end-of-the-year withdrawals. Few differences were associated with class standing (i.e., freshman, sophomore, etc.) at the time of withdrawal. Implications of the results are briefly discussed.     

Framing robot arms control

The development of autonomous, robotic weaponry is progressing rapidly. Many observers agree that banning the initiation of lethal activity by autonomous weapons is a worthy goal. Some disagree with this goal, on the grounds that robots may equal and exceed the ethical conduct of human soldiers on the battlefield. Those who seek arms-control agreements limiting the use of military robots face practical difficulties. One such difficulty concerns defining the notion of an autonomous action by a robot. Another challenge concerns how to verify and monitor the capabilities of rapidly changing technologies. In this article we describe concepts from our previous work about autonomy and ethics for robots and apply them to military robots and robot arms control. We conclude with a proposal for a first step toward limiting the deployment of autonomous weapons capable of initiating lethal force.     

Does intensity really matter regarding aerobic exercise reductions in wave reflection and central hemodynamics? Commentary on "The effect of acute aerobic exercise on central arterial stiffness,wave reflections,and hemodynamics in adults with diabetes: A randomized cross-over design"by Way et al.

We read with great interest the study by Way et al.1 pub-lished in this journal, which described and compared the acute changes in central arterial stiffness (A...     

Predicting freshman persistence and voluntary dropout decisions: A replication

This paper describes the results of a replication of a study testing the predictive validity of a 34-item instrument designed to assess the fundamental constructs of Tinto's model of college student attrition. A design, variables, and analytical procedures virtually identical to those of the original study (done at a large independent university) were used, and this research was conducted at a large public university. The five-factor structure, found in the original study to underlie the 34 items, was replicated almost exactly. As in the earlier work, the Institutional and Goal Commitment Scale was a significant predictor of attendance behavior even after controlling for a variety of students' precollege characteristics. Potential institutional differences in faculty members' influence on retention were identified. A cross-validation classification procedure suggests the five factors are reasonably stable predictors of attrition.An earlier version of this paper was presented to the annual conference of the American Educational Research Association, Boston, April 1980.     

Historical thinking about sources in the context of a standards-based curriculum: a Swedish case

The increased interest in basing teaching on disciplinary thinking has had a profound impact on the syllabus for history in Sweden. Within this context, we examine how students demonstrate one aspect of disciplinary thinking in history, namely reasoning about historical sources. The material used is written answers to an assignment about historical sources in the national test in history for year 6. The analysis shows that many students are able to show at least some aspects of disciplinary thinking about sources, though the vast majority has problems with contextualising the source in the assignment. One explanation put forth is that the syllabus is not yet fully enacted in teaching practices.     

Physical Activity,Cardiovascular Fitness,and Adiposity in Children

Abstract

With cardiovascular fitness (CVF) as the dependent variable, relationships with habitual level of physical activity, age, gender, and body mass index (BMI) were investigated in a sample of 93 high adiposity and 93 low adiposity children, ages 8 to 13. A physical activity score (PAS) was computed for each child from a 2-day observation period. A physical working capacity index from cycle ergometry (PWC₁₇₀) was the measure of CVF. Low and high adiposity samples were classified by a median split (42.9 mm) on the sum of three skinfold measures (tricep, suprailiac, subscapula). For the high adiposity sample, PAS, age, BMI, and gender were significant and the overall model was significant (p < .001), accounting for 38 % of variance in PWC₁₇₀. In the low adiposity sample, gender (p < .04) was significantly related to CVF, but the overall model was not significant (p < .35). PAS, thus, was a significant predictor of CVF among the high adiposity children, but not the low adiposity children. Mechanisms that may account for this difference include greater work for equal activity among the obese, a ceiling effect on CVF among the low adiposity children, or differences in hormonal or metabolic factors mediating the activity-CVF relationship.     

Open admissions does not kill colleges

This article establishes an understanding of social cohesion in general and discusses organizations and activities that are known to promote social cohesion before introducing organizations that claim to work toward social cohesion as one of their main priorities. The Council of Europe's Directorate General of Social Cohesion represents a political organization seeking to promote social cohesion. The Jaboya Project and Field Band Foundation are social organizations with social cohesion as a priority. Although these organizations are likely to contribute to it, they cannot achieve social cohesion directly; rather, they work toward establishing conditions that are favorable to building social cohesion and anticipate the probable long-term effects of their work.