Personal Storytelling as a Medium of Socialization in Chinese and American Families

The goal of this study was to determine how personal storytelling functions as a socializing practice within the family context in middle-class Taiwanese and middle-class European American families. The data consist of more than 200 naturally occurring stories in which the past experiences of the focal child, aged 2,6, were narrated. These stories were analyzed at 3 levels: content, function, and structure. Findings converged across these analytic levels, indicating that personal storytelling served overlapping yet distinct socializing functions in the 2 cultural cases. In keeping with the high value placed on didactic narrative within the Confucian tradition, Chinese families were more likely to use personal storytelling to convey moral and social standards. European American families did not treat stories of young children's past experiences as a didactic resource but instead employed stories as a medium of entertainment and affirmation. These findings suggest not only that personal storytelling operates as a routine socializing practice in widely different cultures but also that it is already functionally differentiated by 2,6.     

Higher education recruitment in the United States: a chronology of significant literature

ABSTRACT

Given the absence of a chronology of the historical philosophies, perspectives, and practices of recruitment within the higher education institutions in the United States, the authors have assembled an overview of the material on recruitment strategies and ideologies of American higher education institutions. Literature from and about the past aids in illuminating the current context while helping to navigate the future of higher education recruitment. The authors have identified five general periods: prior to 1920, 1921 to the end of the Second World War, the post-War decade, mid-1950s through the 1970s, and 1980s to the present. Documentation for each period varies significantly in quality and amount, with the densest data found for the two later periods. Future researchers may explore how recruitment practices and language encourage or discourage under-represented populations in higher education. Further research in other areas of educational recruitment is also suggested.     

Windows into the mind

As faculty, our goals for students are often tacit, hidden not only from students but from ourselves as well. We present a conceptual framework for considering teaching goals – what we want our students to achieve – that encourages us to think more broadly about what we mean by achieving in our knowledge domains. This framework includes declarative knowledge (“knowing that”), procedural knowledge (“knowing how”), schematic knowledge (“knowing why”) and strategic knowledge (“knowing when, where and how our knowledge applies”). We link the framework to a variety of assessment methods and focus on assessing the structure of declarative knowledge – knowledge structure. From prior research, we know that experts and knowledgeable students have extensive, well-structured, declarative knowledge; not so novices. We then present two different techniques for assessing knowledge structure – cognitive and concept maps, and a combination of the two – and provide evidence on their technical quality. We show that these maps provide a window into the structure of students declarative knowledge not otherwise tapped by typical pencil-and-paper tests. These maps provide us with new teaching goals and new evidence on student learning.Based on an invited address, Facoltá di Ingegneria dell’Universitá degli Studi di Ancona, June 27, 2000. This research was supported, in part, by the Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (Grant R117G10027), and by the National Science Foundation (Nos. ESI 95-96080). The opinions expressed here represent those of the authors and not necessarily those of the funding agency.     

Conservatism and the Underidentification of Students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders in Special Education

Underidentification of students with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD; emotional disturbance or ED in federal language) is a critical issue, perhaps explainable in part by causal attributions of problem behavior associated with conservatism. Conservatism in 58 counties in the state of California was measured by finding the percentage of voters in the county voting in favor or Proposition 8, a state constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, under the assumption that opposition to gay marriage is an indicator of conservatism. We conducted a series of hierarchical regression analyses in which conservatism, ethnicity, free/reduced lunch, and suspension/expulsion were used to explain county rates of ED, intellectual disability, and learning disability identification. The model for county identification of ED accounted for 45% of the variance from county to county, with conservatism being the strongest predictor (β = ?0.78, p < 0.001). More conservative counties had lower rates of ED identification. Other variables may contribute to under-identification, but causal attributions associated with conservatism may play a significant role.     

Examining Sexuality Education Preferences Among Youth at Risk for Poor Sexual Health Outcomes Based on Social Determinants of Health Factors

ABSTRACT

At-risk adolescents may experience Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) that lead to higher rates of risky sexual behavior, including increased risk of pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. These SDoH may include components such as unstable family structures, incomplete education, and poverty. Targeting at-risk youth for sexuality education is one way to work toward decreasing sexual health disparities. However, preferences for sexuality education approaches may differ among at-risk youth by additional factors including sex and sexual orientation. The purpose of this study was to describe sexuality education preferences among at-risk youth and how sexuality education preferences differ based on sex and sexual orientation in an at-risk sample of high school-aged youth in Texas. Results indicate sexuality education preferences differ based on sex and sexual orientation when examined by sexual health topics and methods of delivery. Implications of this study indicate including at-risk youth in sexual health programs may be a way to target those at-risk of adverse SDoH, but these groups also have specific preferences for sexuality education.     

The relationship between dominance and spawning inHerotilapia multispinosa (Pisces: Cichlidae)

The outcomes of fights between all possible pairs of same-sexed individuals were used to infer the within-sex dominance rank of six male and six femaleHerotilapia multispinosa. The resulting dominance hierarchies were compared with the order in which all 12 fish spawned when placed together in a large aquarium. Two replications of dominance rank assessment and spawning order were carried out. The spawning order of females was highly correlated with their dominance rank in both replications. Males spawned in a similar order in both replications but did not form a stable dominance hierarchy as inferred from the outcomes of fights. It is suggested that this finding may be due to the importance of site attachment in the agonistic behavior of maleH. multispinosa.