Assessment of symptoms in adult survivors of incest: a factor analytic study of the Responses to Childhood Incest Questionnaire

Although research has established the long-term damaging effects of incest, these efforts have suffered from the lack of valid, standardized assessment instruments. The present study reports on the construction and factor validation of the Response to Childhood Incest Questionnaire (RCIQ), a self-report instrument that assesses a range of commonly reported symptoms experienced by adult survivors of incest. A clinical population of 104 adult women who had experienced childhood or adolescent incest completed the RCIQ. A factor analysis of the RCIQ items revealed seven factors which corresponded to hypothesized stress response themes experienced by survivors of traumatic events. These factors include vulnerability and isolation, fear and anxiety, anger and betrayal, reaction to the abuser, sadness and loss, and powerlessness. In addition, four factors corresponded to the diagnostic criteria for post-traumatic stress disorder: intrusive thoughts, avoidance and intrusive emotions, detachment, and emotional control and numbness. The usefulness of the RCIQ as a pre- and post-treatment measure and the need for further research is discussed.     

Children’s sibling relationships and gendered practices: talk,activity and dealing with change

This article addresses children’s sibling relationships as a site of social learning involving the (re)production of femininity and masculinity, drawing on in‐depth qualitative interviews with children aged 8–12. We begin by noting the lack of focus on gender in the majority of previous work on siblings. After introducing our own study, we look at the ways in which children understood their siblings in relation to themselves, highlighting points of closeness and division, and pointing to class distinctions around individuality and collectivity. We then explore how ‘talk’ and ‘activity’ are key gendered features of children’s relationships with their sisters and brothers, revealing versions of femininity and masculinity, and interplays of power. Finally, we consider how these gendered features of sibling practices have implications for children’s ability to deal with change in relationships with their sisters and brothers, especially living apart from each other, and we return to class as a feature of their understandings.     

Factors that influence teachers learning to do interviews to understand students' mathematical understandings

Understanding students' understanding of mathematical ideas can inform mathematics teaching, and task-based interviews are one way in which teachers can learn more about their students' understandings. The CIME project was designed to empower mathematics teachers to use interviews to understand their students' mathematical understandings as well as to prepare teachers to use technology-intensive curricula. This study examined the influences on three high school mathematics teachers as they learned to use task-based interviews to understand students' mathematical understandings. The areas of teacher knowledge and conceptions that influenced the teachers we studied were: teachers' mathematical understandings and knowledge of technology and the perceived importance of curriculum topics; teachers' views of knowing mathematics; teachers' perceptions of students' characteristics and needs; and teachers' perceptions of interviewing and the role of questioning in interviews. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Using Sociocultural Theory to Understand the Relationship between Teacher Change and a Science-based Professional Education Program

This paper focuses on a model of teacher change based on a study of a science discipline-based professional education program and on an understanding of teacher change in terms of an agency| structure dialectic. Professional education programs should expand teachers' capacity to act in a range of fields. Conducted over one year, this study used socio-cultural theory to examine the role of cultural schema and resources in the enactment of new pedagogical structures by two teachers who demonstrated widely variable responses to their experience of a professional chemistry education program. Hermeneutic and phenomenological methods of study supported the examination of teacher actions and narratives as sources of data. The analyses of these data sources resulted in greater understanding of the relationship between schema, resources and structure and the relationship between structure and teacher agency. Structures are dynamic and if a teacher uses a resource such as an inquiry-based instruction protocol without the attendant cultural schema such as the value of questioning then the structure that is implemented will be different from that the teacher experienced in the professional education program. This understanding supported an explanation of teacher change in terms of teacher agency that constituted our learning from the study and resulted in changes to aspects of the professional education program.