Causal knowledge and children’s possibility judgments

Children often say that strange and improbable events, like eating pickle-flavored ice cream, are impossible. Two experiments explored whether these beliefs are explained by limits in children's causal knowledge. Participants were 423 predominantly White Canadian 4- to 7-year-olds (44% female) tested in 2020–2021. Providing children with causal information about ordinary events did not lead them to affirm that improbable events are possible, and they more often affirmed improbable events after merely learning that a similar event had occurred. However, children were most likely to affirm events if they learned how similar events happened (OR = 2.16). The findings suggest that knowledge of causal circumstances may only impact children's beliefs about the possibility after they are able to draw connections between potential events and known events.     

“I’m not the only victim…” student perceptions of exploitative supervision relation in doctoral degree

Higher Education - Drawing on a five-ethical principles framework, this study examines how the thirteen recruited doctoral students across disciplines in Hong Kong interpret the idea of and...     

Predicting first-time-in-college students’ degree completion outcomes

Higher Education - About one-third of college students drop out before finishing their degree. The majority of those remaining will take longer than 4 years to complete their degree at...     

Concentrated or Fragmented? The U.S. Market for Online Higher Education

Research in Higher Education - As the financial challenges facing the U.S higher education industry mount, colleges and universities seek new activities that can improve their financial situation....     

Quantitatively Investigating Inservice Elementary Teachers’ Nature of Science Views

Research in Science Education - Many nature of science (NOS) studies have demonstrated that teachers can improve their understandings of NOS with explicit and reflective instruction; however, the...     

The mental health of adolescents in England: How does it vary during their time at school?

The wellbeing of young people has become an important education policy issue, with suggestions that mental health problems amongst young people have increased in recent years. Experiences at school are thought to be a key factor contributing to mental ill-health amongst adolescents. Yet surprisingly, little is known about how mental health outcomes vary across school year groups, independent of the effects of age. This article contributes new evidence on this issue, drawing upon large-scale health data from England. We find substantial growth in mental health problems as young people progress through secondary school. Yet this seems to be driven by the effects of age, rather than due to movement into more senior school year groups. We consequently conclude that evidence of a direct link between school year group and young people’s mental health remains relatively weak.     

Examining the Legacy of Urban Catholic Schooling in the U.S.: A Systematic Literature Review

The Urban Review - Research conducted in the twentieth century found urban Catholic schools in the U.S. had a legacy of providing high quality educational opportunities for low-income students and...     

Untangling Trustworthiness and Uncertainty in Science

Science & Education - This article focuses on uncertainty—ways in which scientists recognize and analyze limits in their studies and conclusions. We distinguish uncertainty from...     

Language and reading impairments are associated with increased prevalence of non-right-handedness

Handedness has been studied for association with language-related disorders because of its link with language hemispheric dominance. No clear pattern has emerged, possibly because of small samples, publication bias, and heterogeneous criteria across studies. Non-right-handedness (NRH) frequency was assessed in N = 2503 cases with reading and/or language impairment and N = 4316 sex-matched controls identified from 10 distinct cohorts (age range 6–19 years old; European ethnicity) using a priori set criteria. A meta-analysis (N_cases = 1994) showed elevated NRH % in individuals with language/reading impairment compared with controls (OR = 1.21, CI = 1.06–1.39, p = .01). The association between reading/language impairments and NRH could result from shared pathways underlying brain lateralization, handedness, and cognitive functions.     

Supporting practitioners in school-based evaluations of autism spectrum disorders

Students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have vastly different educational needs. Although some students with ASD may perform well across subjects within the general education classroom, other students with ASD may need more individualized support outside of the classroom. Historically, ASD assessments in schools have primarily focused on the measurement of cornerstone behaviors of ASD such as deficits in social communication and restricted or repetitive behaviors while underestimating the focus of academic skills even though both factors are required in the evaluation process and for an eligibility classification. The purpose of this article is to provide an overview of academic assessment practices in the schools by highlighting best practices in ASD evaluation, outlining ASD academic profiles and how to identify academic skill deficits, and reviewing the available literature that comes from different formal- and function-based assessment practices that are commonly used in schools today. The authors also discuss how formal- and function-based assessments both serve a purpose and are recommended to be used in conjunction with one another to best demonstrate a student's academic profile. Practitioners are ultimately encouraged to use a multi-informant, multi-modal approach when it comes to psychoeducational evaluations for individuals with ASD as it is evident that an individualized approach is essential due to the discrepancy of academic profiles related to this disability category as well as understanding that no measure is a perfect representation of any one skill.