Growth mindset and reading proficiency of ESL learners: examining the role of students’ socioeconomic status using PISA 2018 Philippine data

European Journal of Psychology of Education - The growth mindset, or the belief that intelligence can be increased with effort, has been shown to be positively associated with improved learning...     

Factors related to a college student's career optimism and their perception of career services

A student's expectation for a positive outcome for their future career development is referred to as career optimism. Career Services, a common university department, utilizes the social cognitive career theory (SCCT) to understand how students form career interests and make educational and vocational choices. Then Career Services can assist students in finding a career that matches their interests. We hypothesize that students' perception of the assistance provided by the Career Services department when the SCCT is applied, impacts the student's career optimism. In addition, we hypothesize, and results support, that different factors, such as a student's chosen major, impact student perception of Career Services and career optimism.     

Relationship of executive functioning and memory to autism symptomology and adaptive functioning: Implications for reducing future underemployment

Understanding the relationship between executive functioning and its connection to working memory and adaptive functioning can inform planning and employment efforts. This study explored the relationship between memory and adaptive functioning with a sample of Autistic youths/young adults. Participant mean age was 21.3 (SD = 3.0). Of the 22 participants, 17 were male, and 19 white, non-Hispanic/Latina/o/x. All but one lived with their parent(s). Participants were administered a full battery assessing cognitive ability (WAIS-IV), memory and executive functioning (WMS-IV and DKEFS), autism symptomatology (ADOS-II), and adaptive functioning (SIB-R). A multivariate lasso regression model was used. Memory, especially as measured on the WMS-IV, was found to be significantly related to adaptive functioning and autism symptomatology. There appears to be continuing evidence that memory is highly related to adaptive functioning and autism symptomatology. Interventions involving auditory and immediate memory could be helpful in promoting more mutually effective social interactions necessary for positive employment outcomes.     

Designing learning environments to promote competent lay engagement with science

An important goal of science education is promoting scientific literacy—the competence to interact with science as laypeople to solve problems and make decisions in their personal and community lives. This is made more challenging in an age of increasing science denialism. In this article, we discuss how to design learning environments for science education that can help students attain scientific literacy. We argue that science curricula should encompass lessons with two distinguishable foci. One focus engages students in understanding the reliability of science. The second focus engages students as laypeople interacting with science in the public sphere. We discuss these two curricular foci, presenting examples from our own work on designing and implementing instruction with the first focus.     

Understanding how student-constructed stop-motion animations promote mechanistic reasoning: A theoretical framework and empirical evidence

Previous studies have documented the promising results from student-constructed representations, including stop-motion animation (SMA), in supporting mechanistic reasoning (MR), which is considered an essential thinking skill in science education. Our current study presents theoretically and empirically how student-constructed SMA contributes to promoting MR. As a theoretical perspective, we propose a framework hypothesizing the link between elements of MR and the construction nature of SMA, that is, chunking and sequencing. We then examined the extent to which this framework was consistent with a multiple-case study in the domain of static electricity involving five secondary school students constructing and using their own SMA creation for reasoning. In addition, students' reasoning in pre- and postconstruction of an SMA was examined. Our empirical findings confirmed our framework by showing that all students identified the basic elements of MR, that is, entities and activities of entities, when engaging in chunking and sequencing. Chunking played a role in facilitating students to identify entities responsible for electrostatic phenomena, and sequencing seemed to elicit students to specify activities of these entities. The analysis of students' reasoning in pre- and postconstruction of SMA found that student-generated SMA has a potential effect on students' retention of the use of MR. Implications for instruction with SMA construction to support MR are discussed.     

Observer design for constrained nonlinear systems with application to secure communication

In this paper, a constrained regularized least square (RLS) state estimator is developed for deterministic discrete-time nonlinear dynamical systems subject to a set of equality and/or inequality constraints. The stability of the estimation error is rigorously analyzed. The proposed estimator is then used to handle the important problem of secure communication. At the transmitting end, the output of the constrained unified chaotic system is used as a chaotic mask to achieve a satisfactory and typical secure communication scheme. The encrypted data signal is injected into the transmitter and simultaneously transmitted to the receiver through a public channel. At the receiving end, the constrained RLS estimator is used to reconstruct the states of the constrained unified chaotic system. Simulation results are presented to show the impact of the imposed constraints on the waveform and the pattern of the generated chaotic signal as well as the ability of the proposed estimator to synchronize the actual and estimated states of the constrained unified chaotic system. Moreover, the proposed estimator is applied to recover discrete signals such as digital images where computer simulation results are provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed estimation scheme.     

Stabilization of positive constrained T–S fuzzy systems: Application to a Buck converter

This paper deals with the problem of constrained stability and tracking of Takagi–Sugeno (T–S) fuzzy positive systems. Linear programming (LP) is used to insert the constraints in the design phase while imposing positivity in closed-loop. The theoretical results are applied to the buck DC–DC converter which is widely used in the photovoltaic generators. Based on the simulation results success of the method is shown for this application.     

A new industry creation and originality: Insight from the funding sources of university patents

Scientific breakthroughs coming from universities can contribute to the emergence of new industries, such as in the case of biotechnology. Obviously, not all research conducted in universities leads to a radical change from existing technological trajectories. Patents and patent dynamics have long been recognized as critical in understanding the emergence of new technologies and industries. Specifically, patent citations provide insight into the originality of a discovery that has received patent protection. Yet while a large body of literature addresses the impact of patent originality on various firm performance measures, we address the question of what conditions drive patent originality in the process of knowledge creation within the university. Using data on patented cancer research, we examine how research context – as reflected by the funding source for each scientist – is associated with patent originality. We find that when university scientists are partly funded by their own university, they have a higher propensity to generate more original patents. By contrast, university scientists funded either by industry or other non-university organizations have a lower propensity to generate more original patents. The significance of our findings in the cancer research setting call for further research on this question in other research fields.     

Finite-time sliding mode flow control design via reduced model for a connection-oriented communication network

This paper addresses the flow control design of a connection-oriented communication network from the robust control theory perspective. Network is modelled as a nth order discrete system whose first order model is obtained using the two-time scale property associated with the process. The proposed scheme is characterised by an equivalent control based discrete sliding mode design for the first order model which is applied to nth order systems through aggregation. Besides its design simplicity, the proposed method exhibits finite time convergence property for the states while applied to the full order system emulating the characteristics of terminal sliding mode in a certain way. Simulation results via Matlab and ns-2 validate the efficacy of the proposed algorithm as an effective flow controller for connection-oriented networks.