Applying White Dialectics: Exploring Whiteness and Racial Identity among White College Athletes

This article seeks to synthesize and apply White racial identity theory and concomitant research to the interaction between athletic and racial identity, specifically as it relates to the experiential variations of how race impacts White athletes within the college sport environment. White dialectics, or the tensions that White Americans experience as dominant social group members, serve as the guiding theoretical framework and provide a theoretical lens through which the experience of White college athletes is examined at each distinct dialectic. Through this article, the application of White dialectics offers a theoretical foundation for developing a better understanding of how White college athletes not only make sense of their racial identity, but also understand their racialized experiences within intercollegiate athletics.     

Accelerating chronically unresponsive children to tier 3 instruction: what level of data is necessary to ensure selection accuracy?

Response-to-intervention (RTI) approaches to disability identification are meant to put an end to the so-called wait-to-fail requirement associated with IQ discrepancy. However, in an unfortunate irony, there is a group of children who wait to fail in RTI frameworks. That is, they must fail both general classroom instruction (Tier 1) and small-group intervention (Tier 2) before becoming eligible for the most intensive intervention (Tier 3). The purpose of this article was to determine how to predict accurately which at-risk children will be unresponsive to Tiers 1 and 2, thereby allowing unresponsive children to move directly from Tier 1 to Tier 3. As part of an efficacy study of a multitier RTI approach to prevention and identification of reading disabilities (RD), 129 first-grade children who were unresponsive to classroom reading instruction were randomly assigned to 14 weeks of small-group, Tier 2 intervention. Nonresponders to this instruction (n = 33) were identified using local norms on first-grade word identification fluency growth linked to a distal outcome of RD at the end of second grade. Logistic regression models were used to predict membership in responder and nonresponder groups. Predictors were entered as blocks of data from least to most difficult to obtain: universal screening data, Tier 1 response data, norm referenced tests, and Tier 2 response data. Tier 2 response data were not necessary to classify students as responders and nonresponders to Tier 2 instruction, suggesting that some children can be accurately identified as eligible for Tier 3 intervention using only Tier 1 data, thereby avoiding prolonged periods of failure to instruction.     

First-grade cognitive abilities as long-term predictors of reading comprehension and disability status

In a sample of 195 first graders selected for poor reading performance, the authors explored four cognitive predictors of later reading comprehension and reading disability (RD) status. In fall of first grade, the authors measured the children's phonological processing, rapid automatized naming (RAN), oral language comprehension, and nonverbal reasoning. Throughout first grade, they also modeled the students' reading progress by means of weekly Word Identification Fluency (WIF) tests to derive December and May intercepts. The authors assessed their reading comprehension in the spring of Grades 1-5. With the four cognitive variables and the WIF December intercept as predictors, 50.3% of the variance in fifth-grade reading comprehension was explained: 52.1% of this 50.3% was unique to the cognitive variables, 13.1% to the WIF December intercept, and 34.8% was shared. All five predictors were statistically significant. The same four cognitive variables with the May (rather than December) WIF intercept produced a model that explained 62.1% of the variance. Of this amount, the cognitive variables and May WIF intercept accounted for 34.5% and 27.7%, respectively; they shared 37.8%. All predictors in this model were statistically significant except RAN. Logistic regression analyses indicated that the accuracy with which the cognitive variables predicted end-of-fifth-grade RD status was 73.9%. The May WIF intercept contributed reliably to this prediction; the December WIF intercept did not. Results are discussed in terms of a role for cognitive abilities in identifying, classifying, and instructing students with severe reading problems.     

Smart RTI: A Next-Generation Approach to Multilevel Prevention

During the past decade, responsiveness to intervention (RTI) has become popular among many practitioners as a means of transforming schooling into a multilevel prevention system. Popularity aside, its successful implementation requires ambitious intent, a comprehensive structure, and coordinated service delivery. An effective RTI also depends on building-based personnel with specialized expertise at all levels of the prevention system. Most agree on both its potential for strengthening schooling and its heavy demand on practitioners. In this article, we describe Smart RTI, which we define as making efficient use of school resources while maximizing students' opportunities for success. In light of findings from recent research, we discuss three important features of Smart RTI: (a) multistage screening to identify risk, (b) multistage assessment to determine appropriate levels of instruction, and (c) a role for special education that supports prevention.     

Narrative Capacity,Resistance Performance,and the “Shape” of New Social Movement Networks

The current research explored two new social movement networks in the United States in order to demonstrate the impact of narrative capacity on the “shape” of an activist network. In particular, we found that activists in a network that demonstrated efficient narrative capacity described the hub organization in positive terms, while activists in a network that demonstrated poor narrative capacity held mixed perceptions about the hub. Some activists in the second network held positive perceptions about the organization, while others held negative perceptions. The observations from these two research sites led us to conceptualize activists' differing perceptions about their respective hub organizations as “distance” that they experienced from that hub. Therefore, two different star shapes emerged from our research: a symmetrical star and elongated star. Such findings demonstrate the importance for narrative capacity in the construction and maintenance of effective activist networks.     

Irony and Language Expectancy Theory: Evaluations of Expectancy Violation Outcomes

Language expectancy theory (LET) provides the basis for a study of the relationship of ironic and literal messages in terms of persuasiveness and expectedness. The experimental design was a 2 (literal vs. ironic) × 2 (compliment vs. criticism) factor design. The expectation was that literal messages would be more expected and criticisms less preferred to compliments. The results indicated that the ironic messages tended to be negative, unexpected, and attributed to the situation as opposed to the sender. Compliments were associated with fewer behavioral intentions than were criticisms. The interaction also revealed that the ironic messages were a safe middle ground between literal criticisms and compliments in terms of fostering behavioral changes.     

Narrowmobilization and Tea Party Activism: A Study of Right-Leaning Alternative Media

Past research concerning the theoretical framework of Resistance Performance (RP) has been based on observations of liberal organizations and activists. In the following essay, we engage in a qualitative content analysis of alternative media utilized by conservative “Tea Party” activists to build on the concept of RP. Overall, we discovered that the dominant theme found in much of the content focuses on “purity,” which is considerably different from past RP research that found broad themes of “human rights,” “democracy,” “be the media,” and “principles of unity” embedded within liberal alternative media content. We conclude that the theme of “purity” gives rise to narrowmobilization, which constructs very focused protest communities within right-leaning politics.     

Police Media: The Governance of Territory,Speed, and Communication

The work of the modern police apparatus is highly dependent upon media technologies. This article traces crucial developments in this history, analyzing the central role that media have played in policing practices since the advent of the modern patrol in the late eighteenth century. We trace how the governmentalized police force has used media to govern efficiently what Foucault calls the three great variables: territory, speed, and communication. In conclusion, we consider the possibilities for resistance in a time when digital police media have given rise to alarming strategies for surveilling populations, stifling dissent, and exerting control over public and private space.     

The somatic marker as a “short cut” to verbal immediacy

This study examined the relationships between the somatic‐marker hypothesis, developed by Damasio (1994) as it relates to homophily and verbal immediacy in the classroom. Damasio has hypothesized that when particular events occur in one's life, there is a “memory” of that event in the brain. As a result, when a similar event occurs, the somatic marker recreates that first event. Students were provided three different scenarios about the first day of a communication class. In the scenarios, the instructor presented information about himself. One instructor provided only autobiographical, demographic data (the control). Another provided information hozu he had had difficulty with public speaking (the selfish marker). The third provided information about how the instructor had helped someone else who had difficulty in public speaking (the altruistic marker). The results indicated that while homophily differences were not significant, there was a significant difference between the control group and the altruistic marker.     

Use of inoculation to foster resistance to credit card marketing targeting college students

Student credit card debt is a growing problem. This study explores the effectiveness of the inoculation strategy to foster resistance to credit card marketing targeting college students. In order to explore further the medical analogy on which the inoculation strategy is based, this study was the first systematically to alter the argument strength of both the counterarguments and refutations in the inoculation pretreatment message to determine whether argument strengths impact effectiveness of inoculation treatments. In addition, this investigation explored whether inoculation spreads from person to person via social channels, similar to the marketing concept of viral marketing. Results indicated that conventional inoculation treatment messages successfully inoculated college students against credit card advertisements, manifested in attitude valence and behavioral intentions, and that matching argument strength is the most effective inoculation strategy.