Conflict Resolution in Preschool Social Interactions

Conflict has frequently been hypothesized to play an important role in development, and yet, until recently, little empirical work has been conducted on preschoolers' social conflicts. The aim of this study was to investigate the types of social issues that produce conflicts, the extent to which children respond positively to protests from others, and how conflicts are resolved. Children were observed in two contexts: semi-structured peer groups in which adults did not intervene, and school-time free-play. The results showed that even when adults do not intervene, children are often responsive to protests from others and resolve conflicts on their own. Differences were also observed for the types of issues that generate conflicts in the two settings and the types of conflicts that children respond to most often. These results indicate that children's conflicts are not solely negative or aggressive and that children's social interactions and their social contexts are multi-dimensional. The findings point to interpersonal aspects of settings, such as the differential role of adults and peers, and to contextual features of settings, such as free-play and sustained play, that should be considered by teachers and parents when structuring social interactive opportunities for young children.     

Supporting Programming and Learning-to-Program with an Integrated CAD and Scaffolding Workbench*

Programming is a complex cognitive task for students, because of the difficulty of finding the appropriate elements (the “decomposition” problem) and integrating them correctly into a whole (the “composition” problem). Programming is also hard to learn, because so much of the thinking behind a program is implicit and the process of programming is long and complicated. Our approach is to integrate a computer-aided design tool (CAD) with scaffolding to create a single, cohesive, and coherent workbench for the entire process. Our workbench is called the GPCeditor. We have evaluated its use by high-school students. Our results suggest that students program well in the GPCeditor, they learn good programming practices, and that the learning is occurring through use of the GPCeditor.     

Child maltreatment as a risk factor for opioid dependence: Comparison of family characteristics and type and severity of child maltreatment with a matched control group

ObjectiveTo examine the prevalence, characteristics and risk factors for child maltreatment among opioid-dependent persons compared to a community sample of similar social disadvantage.MethodThe study employed a case-control design. Cases had a history of opioid pharmacotherapy. Controls were frequency matched to cases with regard to age, sex and unemployment and were restricted to those with a lifetime opioid use of less than five times. The interview covered child maltreatment, family environment, drug use and psychiatric history.ResultsThis study found a high prevalence of child maltreatment among both cases and controls. Despite the elevated prevalence among controls, opioid-dependent males had a higher prevalence of physical and emotional abuse; female cases had a higher prevalence and greater severity of sexual abuse. The prevalence of neglect was similar for both groups. Early parental separation was more prevalent among female cases compared to female controls; otherwise the prevalence of the risk factors was comparable for both groups. The risk factors significantly associated with child maltreatment were also similar for both cases and controls.ConclusionsGiven the documented association between child maltreatment and adult mental disorder, child maltreatment may be an important antecedent of current psychological distress in persons presenting to treatment for opioid dependence. Apart from a possible association between early parental separation and sexual abuse among female cases, the increased prevalence of child maltreatment associated with opioid dependence did not appear to be related to differences in early childhood risk factors considered in this paper. Other risk factors may be more pertinent for those with opioid dependence.Practice implicationsThe high prevalence of child maltreatment among the opioid-dependent sample has implications for the assessment and treatment of clients presenting with opioid dependence. Assessment of child maltreatment history could help inform the development of individual treatment plans to better address those factors contributing to the development and maintenance of opioid dependence. Specifically, management of co-morbid mental disorder associated with child maltreatment could be the focus of relapse prevention programmes and also have a positive influence on treatment retention.     

Improving Measurement for Graduate Admissions

In this study we examined alternative item types and section configurations for improving the discriminant and convergent validity of the GRE General Test. A computer-based test of reasoning items and a generating-explanations measure was administered to a sample of 388 examinees who previously had taken the General Test. Confirmatory factor analyses indicated that three dimensions of reasoning—verbal, analytical, and quantitative—and a fourth dimension of verbal fluency based on the generating-explanations task could be distinguished. Notably, generating explanations was as distinct from new variations of reasoning items as it was from verbal and quantitative reasoning. In the full sample, this differentiation was evident in relation to such external criteria as undergraduate grade point average (UGPA), self-reported accomplishments, and a measure of ideational fluency, with generating explanations relating uniquely to aesthetic and linguistic accomplishments and to ideational fluency. For the subset of participants with undergraduate majors in the humanities and social sciences, generating explanations added to the relationship with UGPA over that contributed by the General Test.     

Explaining Privacy Control on Instagram and Twitter: The Roles of Narcissism and Self-Esteem

A growing body of research examines the relationships between psychological traits and privacy behaviors on Social Networking Sites (SNSs) to understand why users control information about themselves. This study investigates how narcissism and self-esteem can explain tendencies to control privacy on two widely used platforms: Instagram and Twitter. Data from an online survey (n = 510) are analyzed using linear mixed models. The exhibitionism component of narcissism tends to be associated with less privacy control on SNSs, i.e., profiles that are publicly accessible. Conversely, the superiority component of narcissism and self-esteem are associated with more privacy control. Across platforms, as self-esteem increases, the likelihood of having public settings on Instagram is significantly lower than on Twitter. The findings are discussed in the context of the different affordances that the two platforms present users with. The results indicate that privacy behaviors may be tied to relatively stable personality traits, suggesting that even as technologies and social norms with regard to privacy change, behaviors that limit the number of people to which individuals disclose personal information may remain the same.     

Standardized test outcomes for students engaged in inquiry‐based science curricula in the context of urban reform

Considerable effort has been made over the past decade to address the needs of learners in large urban districts through scaleable reform initiatives. We examine the effects of a multifaceted scaling reform that focuses on supporting standards based science teaching in urban middle schools. The effort was one component of a systemic reform effort in the Detroit Public Schools, and was centered on highly specified and developed project‐based inquiry science units supported by aligned professional development and learning technologies. Two cohorts of 7th and 8th graders that participated in the project units are compared with the remainder of the district population, using results from the high‐stakes state standardized test in science. Both the initial and scaled up cohorts show increases in science content understanding and process skills over their peers, and significantly higher pass rates on the statewide test. The relative gains occur up to a year and a half after participation in the curriculum, and show little attenuation with in the second cohort when scaling occurred and the number of teachers involved increased. The effect of participation in units at different grade levels is independent and cumulative, with higher levels of participation associated with similarly higher achievement scores. Examination of results by gender reveals that the curriculum effort succeeds in reducing the gender gap in achievement experienced by urban African‐American boys. These findings demonstrate that standards‐based, inquiry science curriculum can lead to standardized achievement test gains in historically underserved urban students, when the curriculum is highly specified, developed, and aligned with professional development and administrative support. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 45: 922–939, 2008