Bringing text display digital radio to consumers with hearing loss

Radio is migrating to digital transmission, expanding its offerings to include captioning for individuals with hearing loss. Text display radio requires a large amount of word throughput with minimal screen display area, making good user interface design crucial to its success. In two experiments, we presented hearing, hard-of-hearing, and deaf consumers with National Public Radio stories converted to text and examined their preferences for and reactions to midsized and small radio text displays. We focused on physical display attributes such as text color, font style, line length, and scrolling type as well as emergency alert messages and emergency prompts for drivers, announcer identification schemes, and synchronization of audio and text. Results suggest that midsized, Global Positioning System (GPS)-style displays were well liked, synchronization of audio and text was important to comprehension and retrieval of story details, identification of announcers was served best with a combination of name change in parenthesis and color change, and a mixture of color and flashing symbols was preferred for emergency alerting.     

Erratum to: Effect of Current Electricity Simulation Supported Learning on the Conceptual Understanding of Elementary and Secondary Teachers

This study examined the impact of computer simulation and supported science learning on a teacher’s understanding and conceptual knowledge of current electricity. Pre/Post tests were used to measure the teachers’ concept attainment. Overall, there was a significant and large knowledge difference effect from Pre to Post test. Two interesting interactions were observed during the data analysis. The first was the difference between Elementary and Secondary teachers. Both groups had significant gains, with large effect sizes, but the Elementary teachers (Pre-Mean = 3.70, Post-Mean = 7.51) started lower and ended higher exhibiting a significantly larger gain than the Secondary teachers (Pre-Mean = 4.96, Post-Mean = 6.71). The second interaction was the impact of gender. Both groups showed significant gains, with large effect sizes, but females (Pre-Mean = 3.90, Post-Mean = 7.21) gained significantly more than males (Pre-Mean = 5.13, Post-Mean = 7.01). These results confirm that computer simulation supported science learning can have a positive effect on concept attainment in teachers.     

Frontier man: A Festschrift tribute to Andy Hargreaves

Throughout his career, Andy Hargreaves has continuously pushed the boundaries of knowledge and practice in the field of educational change. He has broken new ground so often that I have come to think of him as a “frontier man.” Andy has also been a generous mentor to colleagues and students enhancing the level of scholarship and expertise in his field. His pioneering work around the culture of teaching and school change has resulted in brilliant treatises that have prompted reflection and action among educators over the years. In this tribute, I reflect on Andy’s work over the 25 years that I have known and collaborated with him as a friend and colleague highlighting his contributions to the field of educational change as a researcher, writer, teacher, and a highly respected consultant.     

Interactions of numerical and temporal stimulus characteristics on the control of response location by brief flashes of light

Pigeons pecked on three keys, responses to one of which could be reinforced after 3 flashes of the houselight, to a second key after 6, and to a third key after 12. The flashes were arranged according to variable-interval schedules. Response allocation among the keys was a function of the number of flashes. When flashes were omitted, transitions occurred very late. Increasing flash duration produced a leftward shift in the transitions along a number axis. Increasing reinforcement probability produced a leftward shift, and decreasing reinforcement probability produced a rightward shift. Intermixing different flash rates within sessions separated allocations: Faster flash rates shifted the functions sooner in real time, but later in terms of flash count, and conversely for slower flash rates. A model of control by fading memories of number and time was proposed.     

Public school size and Hispanic student achievement in Texas: a 5-year analysis

In this study, the researchers examined 5 years of Texas statewide data concerning elementary school size and Hispanic student performance on three state-mandated assessments in reading, mathematics, and writing. For each year of data analyzed here, student data from more than 1,200 elementary schools. After collapsing elementary schools into three sizes (i.e., very small <400 students; small 400–799 students; and large 800–1,199 students), multivariate statistical procedures revealed the presence of statistically significant differences in Hispanic student performance in reading, mathematics, and writing across all 5 years of data analyzed. In almost every analysis, Hispanic students in large elementary schools outperformed Hispanic students in very small elementary schools in reading, mathematics, and in writing. As such, our findings are in disagreement with other studies. Implications are discussed.     

Facing multiculturalism’s challenges in Korean education and society

Multicultural policy in South Korea faces variants of challenges endemic to multiculturalism. These challenges are “dilemmas of difference,” “variable terms of inclusion,” and “legitimacy.” In Korea, these challenges arise in a setting in which ethnic diversity is of relatively recent origin, an ideology of ethnic homogeneity is prevalent, and official multicultural policy is limited in its reach to those who are designated as “multicultural families,” that is families in which one spouse is Korean and the other an immigrant, usually the wife, and their offspring. The exclusion of migrant workers and their families from Korea’s multicultural framework poses a core contradiction in Korean multicultural policies. This contradiction must be resolved if multiculturalism in education and other spheres is to promote equality and provide a foundation for national integration on terms that are equitable to the diverse constituents of Korean society. Inevitably, this will require a redefinition of what it means to “be Korean.” Even if multicultural policies fall short in their immediate effects on those toward whom they are directed, multiculturalism represents a significant shift in the discourse of Korean identity and will be terrain on which the status of diverse groups in Korea will be contested.     

Child sexual abuse and bulimic symptomatology: relevance of specific abuse variables

OBJECTIVE: This study examined specific aspects of child sexual abuse in relation to symptom severity among hospitalized patients diagnosed with bulimia nervosa. METHOD: Participants were 45 hospitalized bulimic women who reported a history of child sexual abuse. Structured interviews were conducted in order to obtain detailed information regarding specific features of the abusive event(s). Participants also completed instruments that measured depression and eating pathology. RESULTS: There were no significant differences in severity of depression or eating disturbance among women reporting differing abusive experiences including intrafamilial versus extrafamilial abuse, abuse with or without the use of physical force, one versus multiple incidents, early abuse versus abuse occurring after age 14, contact versus noncontact abuse, disclosed versus undisclosed, and combined physical/sexual abuse versus sexual abuse alone. CONCLUSION: The specific characteristics of child sexual abuse are not related to the level of symptomatology for hospitalized bulimic patients. This study suggests that differences in the nature of the abuse may not be as important as the fact that the abuse occurred in the first place.