Social Justice in Sport and Exercise Psychology: A Position Statement

ABSTRACT

There are varied approaches that have been used in sport for development (SFD) projects. This article is focused on the move by sport and exercise psychology researchers toward community-based SFD projects where marginalized groups are centralized. The authors have chosen two of their projects to exemplify different approaches to SFD. An initial project with an Aboriginal community is critically examined to reveal cultural missteps that perpetuated cultural colonization–something antithetical to community capacity building. The second project is then considered because of its closer alignment with cultural praxis and community capacity building. This second project focuses on the initial developments of a YMCA physical activity project designed to meet the needs of forced immigrants (a self-titled name developed by the refugee community members) and the staff who work with them. We culminate with five postulates proposed for SFD project teams derived from our vantage in sport and exercise psychology, where community engagement and eventual self-governance are imperatives.     

2003年奥斯卡之最

“Writers.directors,actors-if we’re stuck here tonightand we run out of food,that’s the order of whom we eat.-Steve Martin,cracking a joke so funny even Harrison FordsmiledBiggest Rationalization(合理化):The producers ofche OscarS decided that the telecast should still go on despite thewar in Iraq.Okay,but we’re warning you:If the producers ofAccording to Jim try to use that excuse,we’re not buying It.Least True Rumor:That Miramax dropped fliers overBeverly Hills urging Academy members to surrender and voteMartin Scorsese for Best Director.Even Less True:Although Saddam Hussein remainsunaccounted for,there is absolutely no truth to the rumor thathis moustache was last seen trying to escape by passing itselt offas Salma Hayek’s Frida-brow.     

Consequences of school grading systems on adolescent health: evidence from a Swedish school reform

ABSTRACT

Education reforms that entail increased emphasis on high-stakes testing, assessment and grading have spread across education systems in recent decades. Critics have argued that these policies could have consequences for stress, identity, self-esteem and the overall health of pupils. However, these potentially negative consequences have rarely been investigated in a systematic and rigorous way. In this study we use a major education reform in Sweden, which introduced grades and increased the use of testing for pupils in the 6^th and 7^th school year (aged 12 to 13 years), to study the consequences of grading and assessment for health outcomes. Using data from the Health Behaviours of School-Aged Children Survey, we find that the reform increased school-related stress and reduced the academic self-esteem of pupils in the 7^th school year. This, in turn, had an indirect effect on psychosomatic symptoms and life satisfaction for these pupils. Moreover, the negative effects of the reform were generally stronger for girls, thereby widening the already troubling gender differences in health. We conclude that accountability reforms aimed at increased use of testing, assessment and grading can potentially have negative side effects on pupils’ health.     

Education of deaf children and the politics of recognition

The ideological basis for education of deaf children has changed during the last few decades. In Norway, the new curriculum is emphasizing bilingual and bicultural ideas. In many ways, this can be regarded as an example of what Charles Taylor calls the "politics of recognition." Taking an excerpt of an interview with a deaf student as a point of departure, this article discusses problems when heavily emphasizing a cultural approach.     

Masculinity, Femininity, and Sex Role Attitudes in Early Adolescence: Exploring Gender Intensification

This longitudinal study of 200 young adolescent girls and boys (mean age 11.6 years in sixth grade) investigated the hypothesis that differences in masculinity, femininity, and sex role attitudes would intensify across the sixth, seventh, and eighth grades (between 11 and 13 years of age) and that pubertal timing (early, on time, late) would play a role in this intensification. Analyses revealed that sex differences in masculinity and sex role attitudes increased across grades, but not sex differences in femininity. Pubertal timing was not associated with this gender divergence, although the evidence is equivocal for boys. The results provide support for gender intensification, but the role of pubertal timing may not be as strong as previously supposed.     

The demand for higher education in The Netherlands, 1950–1999

This paper investigates the role of economic factors in the university enrollment decision for the post-war period in The Netherlands. We include those factors standing at the heart of the idea that education is an investment. The econometric results suggest that students are not responsive to tuition fees, but financial support (the sum of loans and grants), the college premium on future labor market earnings, and the alternative wage are important in the enrollment decision.     

Educating and training out of poverty? Adult provision and the informal sector in fishing communities,South Africa

This paper looks at access to adult education and vocational education and training (VET) provision in fishing communities in the Western Cape, South Africa. Fishing communities are being disadvantaged due to geographical and socio-political marginalisation, and the predominance of informal sector employment in the context of worldwide marine resource depletion. Neither public nor private provision is adequately serving rural areas or the informal sector in this context. Using the sustainable livelihoods approach as a tool of analysis, this paper argues that a more cross-sectoral approach is needed to tackle equity and poverty concerns in adult education and training provision.     

Gender Difference in Verbal Performance: a Meta-analysis of United States State Performance Assessments

A comprehensive, statistical review of gender differences in verbal performance has not been conducted in several decades and the majority of previous work on this topic used published studies that often include small, non-representative samples. The introduction of national legislation in US public schools required schools to assess and publicly report verbal performance, thus providing verbal assessment data for millions of American students. The current study presents a meta-analysis of gender differences in US state verbal assessments. Data were collected from the departments of education in 16 states representing more than 10 million US students in grades 3 through 11. Results indicated a small gender difference favoring females for overall verbal performance (d?=?0.29). However, when type of assessment was considered, the female advantages in reading (d?=?0.19) and language arts (d?=?0.29) were smaller than in writing performance (d?=?0.45). The small gender differences in verbal performance increased in a linear pattern from grades 3 to 8 and then remained steady in high school.     

Strategic aspects of children’s numerosity judgement

A previous study (Luwel, Verschaffel, Onghena, & De Corte, 2000) revealed that 2^nd and 6^th graders use at least 3 different kinds of strategies for determining different numerosities of blocks presented in square grids: (a) an addition strategy by means of which (groups of) blocks are counted (and added), (b) a subtraction strategy in which the number of empty squares is subtracted from the total number of blocks in the grid (i.e. the anchor), and (c) an estimation strategy, whereby the number of blocks is determined in a quick but imprecise way. Although 6^th as well as 2^nd graders used the clever subtraction strategy, the majority of 2^nd graders had serious trouble with the correct determination of the anchor, resulting in huge numerosity judgement errors. Since this finding seriously complicated the testing of a number of hypotheses in that study, we replicated the above study but presented the children information about the grid size. This manipulation led to a substantial increase in the proportion of appropriate subtraction strategy users and made it possible to investigate the effect of several subject and task variables on the frequency, accuracy, and adaptiveness with which the different strategies were applied. Results are discussed in terms of the conceptual framework of Lemaire and Siegler (1995) regarding strategic change.