Socioeconomic Disparities in Language Input Are Associated With Children's Language-Related Brain Structure and Reading Skills

The mechanisms underlying socioeconomic disparities in children's reading skills are not well understood. This study examined associations among socioeconomic background, home linguistic input, brain structure, and reading skills in 5-to-9-year-old children (N = 94). Naturalistic home audio recordings and high-resolution, T1-weighted MRI scans were acquired. Children who experienced more adult–child conversational turns or adult words had greater left perisylvian cortical surface area. Language input mediated the association between parental education and left perisylvian cortical surface area. Language input was indirectly associated with children's reading skills via left perisylvian surface area. Left perisylvian surface area mediated the association between parental education and children's reading skills. Language experience may thus partially explain socioeconomic disparities in language-supporting brain structure and in turn reading skills.     

Family relationships and perfectionism in middle‐school students

Several authors have suggested that perfectionism develops in the context of a person's family of origin. However, there are few empirical studies that address the relationship between family variables and perfectionism. This study examined the relationship between family variables and multidimensional perfectionism among a sample of 253 middle‐school students. The results indicated that adaptive perfectionism was correlated with numerous positive family variables, and adaptive perfectionists tended to have more balanced, cohesive, adaptable families, with a greater perception of parental nurturance than either maladaptive perfectionists or nonperfectionists. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Problem-based learning supported by semantic techniques

Problem-based learning has been applied over the last three decades to a diverse range of learning environments. In this educational approach, different problems are posed to the learners so that they can develop different solutions while learning about the problem domain. When applied to conceptual modelling, and particularly to Qualitative Reasoning, the solutions to problems are models that represent the behaviour of a dynamic system. The learner's task then is to bridge the gap between their initial model, as their first attempt to represent the system, and the target models that provide solutions to that problem. We propose the use of semantic technologies and resources to help in bridging that gap by providing links to terminology and formal definitions, and matching techniques to allow learners to benefit from existing models.     

On Mathematical Visualization and the Place Where We Live

This paper is a case study of how a high school student, whom we call Karen, used a computer-based tool, the Contour Analyzer, to create graphs of height vs. distance and slope vs. distance for a flat board that she positioned with different slants and orientations. With the Contour Analyzer one can generate, on a computer screen, graphs representing functions of height and slope vs. distance corresponding to a line traced along the surface of a real object. Karen was interviewed for three one-hour sessions in an individual teaching experiment. In this paper, our focus is on how Karen came to recognize by visual inspection the mathematical behavior of the slope vs. distance function corresponding to contours traced on a flat board. Karen strove to organize her visual experience by distinguishing which aspects of the board are to be noticed and which ones are to be ignored, as well as by determining the point of view that one should adopt in order to see the variation of slope along an object. We have found it inspiring to use Winnicott's (1971) ideas about transitional objects to examine the role of the graphing instrument for Karen. This theoretical background helped us to articulate a perspective on mathematical visualization that goes beyond the dualism between internal and external representations frequently assumed in the literature, and focuses on the lived-in space that Karen experienced which encompassed at once physical attributes of the tool and human possibilities of action.This revised version was published online in September 2005 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

The neurobiological basis of reading

The results from studies using positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in adults have largely revealed the involvement of left-hemisphere perisylvian areas in the reading process, including extrastriate visual cortex, inferior parietal regions, superior temporal gyrus, and inferior frontal cortex. Although the recruitment of these regions varies with the particular reading-related task, general networks of regions seem to be uniquely associated with different components of the reading process. For example, visual word form processing is associated with occipital and occipitotemporal sites, whereas reading-relevant phonological processing has been associated with superior temporal, occipitotemporal and inferior frontal sites of the left hemisphere. Such findings are evaluated in light of the technical and experimental limitations encountered in functional brain imaging studies, and the implications for pediatric studies are discussed.     

Multidimensional Perfectionism,Coping, and Depression: Differential Prediction of Depression Symptoms by Perfectionism Type

Perfectionism has consistently been implicated as a significant contributor to negative outcomes, including depression, in college student populations. This study examined the relationship between multidimensional perfectionism, coping, and depression in a sample of 405 undergraduate students. Maladaptive perfectionists, adaptive perfectionists, and nonperfectionist college students differed significantly on levels of depression and exhibited different patterns of coping. Avoidant coping mediated the relationship between both adaptive and maladaptive perfectionism and depression.