“Why am I here?”: A phenomenological exploration of first-generation college student experiences in STEM majors within a predominantly white institution

First-generation college students (FGCSs) are a growing population in undergraduate education. Research on FGCS primarily focuses on the challenges and barriers they encounter in college. While important, this literature offers a limited view of FGCS as learners. Moreover, minimal literature has examined these students' lived experiences within sciences, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). This study explores the learning experiences of FGCS (N = 17) in undergraduate STEM programs at a mid-sized, private, predominantly white institution. Guided by the frameworks of intersectionality and social cognitive career theory, the researchers utilized a qualitative, phenomenological research methodology to hear the perspectives of FGCS to and to identify problematic higher educational structures in STEM. Findings point to an elitist stance underlying STEM programs based in general disciplinary norms that restricted FGCS access to STEM majors and careers across social, academic, and professional elements of the academic experience. FGCS who were multiply minoritized based upon race, gender, and social class experienced the compounding of marginalization, and academic success and persistence came at a personal cost. Students also reported relying predominantly on personal strengths and motivations to overcome elitism in STEM rather than on institutional supports. Findings also highlight the variation in the first-generation experience and identify the unique barriers FGCS encounter within STEM fields. Implications for dismantling inequitable structures for higher education in STEM attending to the social, academic, and professional inclusion of FGCS.     

TV's distorted vision of poverty

Avoiding almost entirely the depiction of poverty during prime‐time broadcasts, television networks present a sentimentalized vision of economic deprivation that omits or minimizes hardship while idealizing the supposed benefits of a spartan way of life. Much happier than the harried members of middle‐ and upper‐income groups, poor and working people on television seldom strive against their economic fates or against the system. Conclusions are based on a monitoring of prime‐time entertainment broadcast by the three commercial networks during “ratings month.”     

Environmental‐Scale Map Use in Middle Childhood: Links to Spatial Skills,Strategies, and Gender

Researchers have shown that young children solve mapping tasks in small spaces, but have rarely tested children's performance in large, unfamiliar environments. In the current research, children (9–10 years; N = 40) explored an unfamiliar campus and marked flags' locations on a map. As hypothesized, better performance was predicted by higher spatial‐test scores, greater spontaneous use of map–space coordinating strategies, and participant sex (favoring boys). Data supported some but not all hypotheses about the roles of specific spatial skills for mapping performance. Data patterns were similar on a computer mapping task that displayed environmental‐scale videos of walks through a park. Patterns of children's mapping errors suggested both idiosyncratic and common mapping strategies that should be addressed in future research and educational interventions.     

Critiquing the school community: a qualitative study of children's conceptualizations of their school 1

Schools are traditionally seen as responsible for the educational outcomes of our children. However, schools also play an important role in the development of aspects such as self‐efficacy, participation, competence and self‐determination. As schools are often run as societies rather than communities, they offer little opportunity for these attributes (self‐efficacy, participation, competence and self‐determination) to develop. Forty‐six children aged from nine to 12 years were interviewed to ascertain their conceptualizations of the school community. The children define their school in terms of people, places for activities and interaction, a place for safety, cooperation, influence and functionality. The responses closely align to the adult conceptualizations of sense of community as purported by McMillan and Chavis (1986 McMillan, D.W. and Chavis, D.M. 1986. Sense of community: a definition and theory. Journal of Community Psychology, 14: 6–23. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). Implications of this research suggest that children can and should have an integral role in designing a curriculum and systems relevant to the school context if we are at all concerned with their psychological wellness.     

Personal Motivation Gone Awry: Burnout in Competitive Athletes

How individuals define themselves has considerable implications within the realms of sport. Considering the large proportion of African Americans participating in high profile college sports, matters of identity likely become quite relevant. This article addresses issues related to athletic and racial identity contextualized in the sport domain. The potential relationship between athletic identity (Brewer, Van Raalte, &; Linder, 1993) and the conceptualization of African American racial identity are explored. The framework of the Multidimensional Model of Racial Identity (MMRI; Sellers, Smith, Shelton, Rowley, &; Chavous, 1998) is used to investigate the potentially varied perceptions of African American collegiate student athletes' racial identities. Specifically, the salience and centrality of athletic identity, in addition, the roles that the multiple ideologies of the MMRI may play in sport are discussed. Directions for future research of the intersection of race and sport are forwarded.     

The role of the athletes’ entourage on attitudes to doping

ABSTRACT

The present study investigated athletes’ and coaches’ beliefs about the role of athletes’ entourage in deterring or promoting doping. Competitive athletes and coaches in Greece and Australia took part in semi-structured interviews. Our analysis of the interviews produced five main themes: coach influence, peer influence, doping stance, doping stigma, and entourage’s culture. Overall, coaches and peers having a close and trusty relationship with the athletes were considered most influential with respect to doping-related decisions. The majority of the athletes held a strong anti-doping stance but could not articulate why they held this position. This inability could be ascribed to the stigmatization of doping which led to lack of knowledge and anti-doping education. Finally, an anti-doping culture in the athletes’ environment was considered central to an anti-doping stance. The study findings provide valuable information towards a comprehensive understanding of the role athletes’ entourage can play in shaping athletes’ attitudes and decision for doping.     

Attitudes of Volunteer Coaches toward Significant Youth Sport Issues

A questionnaire consisting of 20 positive and negative statements frequently made about youth sports was completed by 423 nonschool youth sport coaches from Illinois and Missouri. The coaches indicated to what degree they agreed with the statements for the sport in general, and for the particular program in which they coached. Coaches from eight sports were sampled: baseball/softball, basketball, football, gymnastics, hockey, soccer, swimming, and wrestling. The results revealed that coaches have generally favorable attitudes toward youth sports, supporting the value of participation for the well-being of children. One exception to the coaches' generally favorable attitudes was their moderate agreement that too much emphasis is placed on winning. It also was found that the coaches' 20 specific agreement ratings could be reduced to 4 interpretable factors—“positive attitudes,” “negative facets of youth sports programs,” “negative consequences for participants,” and “equipment and facilities not adequate.” Factor scores computed for these factors were found to differ as a function of sport coached and the coach's education, formal training, coaching experience, sex, occupation, and community size. In a second section of the survey, the coaches rated the importance of including various technical and sport science topics in coaching clinics and workshops.     

Predicting shifts in generalization gradients with perceptrons

Perceptron models have been used extensively to model perceptual learning and the effects of discrimination training on generalization, as well as to explore natural classification mechanisms. Here, we assess the ability of existing models to account for the time course of generalization shifts that occur when individuals learn to distinguish sounds. A set of simulations demonstrates that commonly used single-layer and multilayer perceptron networks do not predict transitory shifts in generalization over the course of training but that such dynamics can be accounted for when the output functions of these networks are modified to mimic the properties of cortical tuning curves. The simulations further suggest that prudent selection of stimuli and training criteria can allow for more precise predictions of learning-related shifts in generalization gradients in behavioral experiments. In particular, the simulations predict that individuals will show maximal peak shift after different numbers of trials, that easier contrasts will lead to slower development of shifted peaks, and that whether generalization shifts persist or dissipate will depend on which stimulus dimensions individuals use to distinguish stimuli and how those dimensions are neurally encoded.     

Toward an understanding of library patron wayfinding: Observing patrons' entry routes in a public library

The public library facility design literature identifies the importance of understanding patron wayfinding behavior and designing around it, and this research is a first step toward answering that call. Unobtrusive observation is conducted of library patrons' initial wayfinding behavior from the two entrances of a medium-sized public library in south Florida. Although more than 100 entry routes are observed during this study, less than a quarter of those routes are taken by over 75% of observed patrons as they enter the facility, indicating that certain entry routes are extremely popular. Library personnel can use geographic information systems (GIS) to map the most popular routes. Then they can use information about which entry routes are most popular to increase the level of wayfinding ease in the entry areas of the facility and to strategically market library materials and services along highly-trafficked entry routes.