Young adults and everyday-life information: The role of news media

There is a paucity of research examining the everyday-life information seeking of young people, especially investigating the role that the news media has in providing information to young people for use in their everyday lives. A qualitative, interpretivist approach is adopted, involving 34 students, ages 18 to 25, from an Australian university. First, 20 students were interviewed about their news seeking (including topics and sources). Then 14 students participated in verbal protocol analysis, which involved a series of tasks concerning online and print newspapers. Lastly, students were interviewed about how they sought everyday-life information and whether they thought that they had incidentally acquired or encountered information on everyday-life topics in online or print newspapers in the recent past. Findings indicated that, contrary to expectations, traditional print media still played a role for young people, and social media were perceived as important for communication with friends, rather than for news gathering. Purposeful information seeking was more likely to occur online, but both print and online newspapers retained an incidental role in providing information to students for their everyday lives. Participants used a range of media to suit their particular needs and purposes. Thus, access to a wide variety of sources is important for everyday-life information seeking (ELIS) by young people.     

Cognitions,Emotions, and Applications: Participants' Experiences of Learning about Strengths in an Academic Library

This study examined academic library employees' experiences during “strengths education,” a process of learning about individual strengths during a positive psychology intervention. Participants took the Clifton StrengthsFinder test, attended a workshop, and then were interviewed about what they considered to be the effects of the strengths training. The focus of the qualitative analysis was the interviewees' statements about the intrapersonal and interpersonal effects of learning about their strengths. We categorized and coded these statements as cognitions formed, emotions experienced, and applications envisioned. Our findings raise interesting implications for job satisfaction and employee self-esteem, especially during times of change.     

Social standards in public speaking instruction

EARTHTALK: COMMUNICATION EMPOWERMENT FOR ENVIRONMENTAL ACTION. Edited by Star A. Muir and Thomas L. Veenendall. Westport, CT: Praeger, 1996; pp. xviii + 233. $59.00.

ECOSPEAK: RHETORIC AND ENVIRONMENTAL POLITICS IN AMERICA. By M. Jimmie Kffling‐sworth and Jacqueline S. Palmer. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1992; pp. xii + 312. $34.95.

GREEN CULTURE: RHETORICAL ANALYSES OF ENVIRONMENTAL DISCOURSE. Edited by Carl G. Herndl and Stuart C. Brown. Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 1996; pp. xii + 303. $45.00; paper $21.95.

IN THE NATURE OF THINGS: LANGUAGE, POLITICS, AND THE ENVIRONMENT. Edited by Jane Bennett and William Chaloupka. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1993; pp. xvi + 275. $47.95; paper $18.95.

PLANNING AS PERSUASIVE STORYTELLING: THE RHETORICAL CONSTRUCTION OF CHICAGO'S ELECTRIC FUTURE. By James A. Throgmorton. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1996; pp. xxiii + 313. $61.00; paper $19.95.

THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMAGINATION: THOREAU, NATURE WRITING, AND THE FORMATION OF AMERICAN CULTURE. By Lawrence Buell. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1995; pp. xii + 586. $36.50; paper $ 16.95.     

'Mental Model' Comparison of Automated and Human Scoring

'Mental models' used by automated scoring for the simulation divisions of the computerized Architect Registration Examination are contrasted with those used by experienced human graders. Candidate solutions (N = 3613) received both automated and human holistic scores. Quantitative analyses suggest high correspondence between automated and human scores; thereby suggesting similar mental models are implemented. Solutions with discrepancies between automated and human scores were selected for qualitative analysis. The human graders were reconvened to review the human scores and to investigate the source of score discrepancies in light of rationales provided by the automated scoring process. After review, slightly more than half of the score discrepancies were reduced or eliminated. Six sources of discrepancy between original human scores and automated scores were identified: subjective criteria; objective criteria; tolerances/ weighting; details; examinee task interpretation; and unjustified. The tendency of the human graders to be compelled by automated score rationales varied by the nature of original score discrepancy. We determine that, while the automated scores are based on a mental model consistent with that of expert graders, there remain some important differences, both intentional and incidental, which distinguish between human and automated scoring. We conclude that automated scoring has the potential to enhance the validity evidence of scores in addition to improving efficiency.     

Objectivity as standardization in data-scientific education policy,technology and governance

ABSTRACT

New data-driven technologies appear to promise a new era of accuracy and objectivity in scientifically-informed educational policy and governance. The data-scientific objectivity sought by education policy, however, is the result of practices of standardization and quantification deployed to settle controversies about the definition and measurement of human qualities by rendering them as categories and numbers. Focusing on the emerging policy agenda of ‘social and emotional learning and skills,’ this paper examines the practices of ‘objectivity-making’ underpinning this new field. Objectivity-making depends on three translations of (1) scientific expertise into standardized and enumerable definitions, (2) standardization into measurement technologies, and (3) the data produced through measurement technologies into objective policy-relevant knowledge, which consolidates a market in SEL technologies. The paper sheds light on knowledge-making practices in the era of big data and policy science, and their enduring reliance on the precarious construction of objectivity as a key legitimator of policy-relevant scientific knowledge and ‘evidence-based’ education governance.