Sociologics: An analytical tool for examining socioscientific discourse

Latour (1987) introduced the framework of sociologics to study the construction, accumulation, and mobilisation of knowledge in the face of controversy by means of unpredictable and heterogeneous networks. The framework centres around five questions: How are causes and effects attributed? What points (ideas) are linked to which other? What are the size and strength of these links? Who are the most legitimate spokespersons? and How are the elements in a network modified during the controversy? Latour calls the method of deriving answers to these five questions “sociologics”. Recognising the usual asymmetry of knowledge production, sociologics is concerned with how some knowledge is rendered more credible and powerful than others. The production of knowledge is considered contentious because knowledge is socially constructed in a world where discourse, politics, knowledge, and power are inextricably related. I argue that the framework of sociologics extends commonly used analytical frameworks in socioscientific research in education as, unlike many previous forms of analysis, sociologics foregrounds the social construction of knowledge (as evidenced in discourse) and highlights the contentious, complex, unpredictable, and dynamic nature of knowledge production prevalent in these issues.     

Progression in primary school children's conceptions of burning: Toward an understanding of the concept of substance

Children's conceptions of burning were explored through observation and discussion or a number of challenging phenomena. Analysis of written responses showed that children's conceptions are both specific and contextually based, and that there is little coherence in the use of any one conception across phenomena. Progression across the primary school years can be described, however, in terms of children's growing confidence with the idea of transformation of substances and the analysis relates this to a model based on changing commitments to the notion of substance defined by properties, rather than history. The conceptual trajectories described in the study are broadly consistent with previous studies of secondary school children.     

Detecting subtle yet fast skeletal muscle contractions with ultrasoft and durable graphene-based cellular materials

Human bodily movements are primarily controlled by the contractions of skeletal muscles. Unlike joint or skeletal movements that are generally performed in the large displacement range, the contractions of the skeletal muscles that underpin these movements are subtle in intensity yet high in frequency. This subtlety of movement makes it a formidable challenge to develop wearable and durable soft materials to electrically monitor such motions with high fidelity for the purpose of, for example, muscle/neuromuscular disease diagnosis. Here we report that an intrinsically fragile ultralow-density graphene-based cellular monolith sandwiched between silicone rubbers can exhibit a highly effective stress and strain transfer mechanism at its interface with the rubber, with a remarkable improvement in stretchability (>100%). In particular, this hybrid also exhibits a highly sensitive, broadband-frequency electrical response (up to 180 Hz) for a wide range of strains. By correlating the mechanical signal of muscle movements obtained from this hybrid material with electromyography, we demonstrate that the strain sensor based on this hybrid material may provide a new, soft and wearable mechanomyography approach for real-time monitoring of complex neuromuscular–skeletal interactions in a broad range of healthcare and human–machine interface applications. This work also provides a new architecture-enabled functional soft material platform for wearable electronics.     

Non-iterative Conditional Pairwise Estimation for the Rating Scale Model

We investigate two non-iterative estimation procedures for Rasch models, the pair-wise estimation procedure (PAIR) and the Eigenvector method (EVM), and identify theoretical issues with EVM for rating scale model (RSM) threshold estimation. We develop a new procedure to resolve these issues—the conditional pairwise adjacent thresholds procedure (CPAT)—and test the methods using a large number of simulated datasets to compare the estimates against known generating parameters. We find support for our hypotheses, in particular that EVM threshold estimates suffer from theoretical issues which lead to biased estimates and that CPAT represents a means of resolving these issues. These findings are both statistically significant (p < .001) and of a large effect size. We conclude that CPAT deserves serious consideration as a conditional, computationally efficient approach to Rasch parameter estimation for the RSM. CPAT has particular potential for use in contexts where computational load may be an issue, such as systems with multiple online algorithms and large test banks with sparse data designs.     

In the Service of Technocratic Managerialism? History in UK Universities

Abstract

This article discusses the conceptualisation, organisation and philosophical orientation of academic history culture in UK higher education. It problematises the extent to which a dominant history culture in UK universities implies and uncritically reproduces normative understandings about the subject; about its epistemological standing, sociopolitical functions, and the presumed cultural value of the discipline practices that students learn to perform. We suggest that current conceptions of history degree curricula are overly thin and organised around a dominant managerialist discourse of skills, personal development and learning outcomes. In a historicised world, in which history-focused behaviour has a crucial, ideological, affirmatory role, and in which historical narratives have a privileged cognitive function, we argue that it is critical for university history students to be able to deconstruct the processes by which history legitimises itself, and reinforces matrices of power in our societies. The positioning of history in higher education as a form of technocratic managerialism closes down spaces in which students can explore the potential of historical practices as a means of engaging with issues of current sociopolitical and ethical concern. We ask in this article, is this what we want an academic history culture to do?