Confirmatory factor analysis of the Competitive State Anxiety Inventory-2

The aim of this study was to evaluate the factor structure ofthe Competitive State Anxiety Inventory-2 (CSAI-2) using confirmatory factor analysis. Volunteer participants (n= 1213) completed the CSAI-2 approximately 1 h before competition and the data were analysed in two samples. The hypothesized model showed poor fit indices in both samples independently (Robust Comparative Fit Index: sample A=0.82, sample B =0.84) and simultaneously (Comparative FitIndex = 0.83), suggesting that the factor structure proposed by Martens et al. is flawed. Our findings suggest that a limitation of the Cognitive Anxiety scale derives from phrasing items around the word ‘concerned’ rather than ‘worried’. We suggest that being concerned about an impending performance does not necessarily mean that an athlete is experiencing negative thoughts, but that the athlete is acknowledging the importance and difficulty of the challenge and is attempting to mobilize resources to cope. The present results question the use of the CSAI-2 as a valid measure of competitive state anxiety.     

Global Trends in Lifelong Learning and the Response of the Universities

The argument of this article is that higher education is forced to respond to the dominant social pressures of the day, especially the demands of advanced capitalism. Globalisation has produced an international division of labour with more knowledge-based workers in the West. Higher education in those countries has, consequently, endeavoured to respond to the demands of these workers in innovative ways and these changes point the direction that higher education elsewhere might have to go. However, some countries will not have sufficient knowledge-based workers to force changes in the higher education system and market-orientated Western universities will fill that gap through new means of delivery. Where universities are not responding to the needs of the international division of labour, transnational companies are taking the initiative in creating their own universities.     

Thinking Critically About Critical Thinking: an unskilled inquiry into Quinn and McPeck

Victor Quinn advocates teaching critical thinking as a curriculum subject. He has accused Professor John E. McPeck, a vehement critic of such proposals, not only of being wrong but also of being in need of such a critical thinking course himself. In this paper we examine the five supposed critical thinking weaknesses of which McPeck is accused and consider what Quinn's arguments tell us about critical thinking, its skills, its priorities and its claims to subject status.