The potential of HyperCard for psychological research and instruction: A general discussion and description of two research applications

In this paper, we discuss the potential of HyperCard for research and instruction in psychology. First we give a general overview of the HyperCard program; after that, we present two HyperCard stacks as sample solutions for two specific research applications. Surveyor, a self-contained survey tool, is a HyperCard-based vehicle for developing, administering, and processing tests and surveys. Queston demonstrates how HyperCard can be used as a data-management and data-analysis tool during the stages of questionnaire development. Both stacks illustrate how flexible HyperCard is and how easy it is to use it to manage, analyze, and process data, to transfer data to other programs, and to print reports. HyperCard, unlike traditional applications, gives the user a great degree of control over the way information is stored, mainipulated, and presented. Although both stacks are custom-made for specific purposes, the concepts underlying the design can be generally applied and adapted for other purposes.     

A mathematical theory of instruction: Instructor/learner interaction and instruction pacing

In this paper, a mathematical theory of instruction applicable in the educational environment is developed from concepts of psychological learning theory. Within the framework of optimization and control theory, the dynamics of the interaction between instructor and learner are modelled, and the trade-off between instruction cost and learner achievement is formulated so that optimal instruction inputs can be determined. One important aspect of the classroom environment that is characterized by the theory is the interaction between an instructor and a group of learners with various learning abilities.A basic dynamic model that relates learner achievement and instruction cost is developed from learning theory concepts. This model, which applies to the individual learner situation, is analyzed in detail to determine instruction intensity inputs that match the learner's characteristics in order to maximize an objective that measures both achievement and cost.This basic model is used as a building block to describe how individual learner achievement depends on instruction pacing. To determine optimal instruction pacing the concept of gain, which is essentially learner achievement per unit time, is introduced. In this extended model, instruction pacing is intimately related with the concept of learner aptitude. This relationship leads immediately to the consideration of instruction pacing for a group of learners with various aptitudes and thus optimal instruction pacing is determined for nonhomogenous groups.Throughout the development of the theory, hypothetical examples are presented to demonstrate many of the implications of the theory. One of the contributions of the theory is the definition of the concepts of learner aptitude and instruction pacing within a framework that structures the empirical investigation of these concepts by means of experimental research.     

Using tutoring systems to study learning: An application of HyperCard

HyperCard was used to develop a simplified tutoring system whose principles were based on a learning theory, and a genetics tutoring system was evaluated experimentally. Learning was studied by examining immediate versus delayed feedback after an error was made. Such tutoring systems aid in psychological studies of learning, because experimental variables can be easily manipulated. HyperCard provides a good vehicle for tutoring system development, since it requires no extensive programming skills.     

教学设计中的成绩表现和心流体验:基于认知负荷视角

教学设计是为优化教学效果而形成的教学实施方案。为提高学习表现,认知负荷理论认为在组织教学设计时需考虑内、外认知负荷两大因素,但少有研究关注学生在学习过程中的体验。本研究通过单词复合性操纵内在负荷,通过呈现方式操纵外在负荷,探究两类负荷对心流体验及表现的影响。结果发现,内在负荷对心流及表现均有影响,外在负荷仅在低水平组表现出对心流及表现的影响,另外内外负荷在低水平组的表现上存在交互作用。结果表明,教学设计中的内在负荷是影响心流及表现的稳定因素,外在负荷不仅受知识水平影响,其对表现的有效性还受内在负荷的调节。     

A HyperCard stack for the creation of graphically organized glossaries

Many students find it difficult to transform expository text and lectures into well-organized mental constructs. Studies show that learning of this type can be enhanced by the use of graphic organizers that depict relationships among concepts by diagramming them as a tree structure. In order to incorporate all concepts taught in a course into a single graphic organizer, a HyperCard authoring shell was developed to expedite drawing tree diagrams and linking each concept in the diagram to a definition. The authoring features of the stack and its application to an abnormal psychology course are discussed in this article.     

E-nabled for E-Learning? The Moderating Role of Personality in Determining the Optimal Degree of Learner Control in an E-Learning Environment

This paper investigates the moderating role of specific Big Five personality traits on the relationship between learner control and training performance in an e-learning environment. Specifically, we examined the role of openness to experience, conscientiousness, and extraversion. Participants completed a video-based e-learning program with either a high or low level of learner control. Results demonstrated that the personality traits of openness to experience and extraversion moderated the relationship between learner control and training performance. Specifically, training performance was higher for trainees higher in openness and extraversion when they were in an environment with high learner control versus low learner control. Conversely, for trainees lower in these traits, performance was higher with low learner control versus high learner control. Future research and practical applications are discussed.     

Using HyperCard and Apple events in a network environment: Collecting data from simultaneous experimental sessions

HyperCard is a useful tool available to teachers and researchers who have access to Macintosh computers. Version 2.1 of HyperCard, in conjunction with the Macintosh Operating System 7, includes some significant new capabilities for users with multiple computers in a network, as is common in many teaching laboratories. This paper describes a HyperCard stack that allows users who wish to run HyperCard-based experiments on several computers simultaneously to conveniently retrieve experimental data from those remote computers onto one program, and to perform several other useful tasks in a computer network.     

A comparison of instruction formats for administering a computerized behavioral test

Shaping and fading techniques were employed to replace written instructions used in computerized behavioral tests. Apple Macintosh computers and HyperCard with Pascal extensions were chosen as the development environment to implement the new techniques. Initial Findings demonstrate the effectiveness and relative efficiency of shaping techniques to teach correct performance on the Symbol-Digit Test.     

“心灵鸡汤”对温度知觉、他人评价和自我评价的影响

本研究基于具身认知观点和概念隐喻理论,采用三个实验探讨了 “心灵鸡汤”对环境温度的感知觉影响、对陌生他人人品评价的影响以及对自我人格特质评定的影响。结果发现,“心灵鸡汤”的阅读能有效提高个体对环境温度的评定,且不存在性别差异;阅读“心灵鸡汤”后倾向于对陌生人的人品有更高的积极评定;“心灵鸡汤”对自我评定不存在显著影响。     

Locke’s Children? Rousseau and the Beans (Beings?) of the Colonial Learner

Rousseau’s story about Emile having his first moral lesson in property rights by planting beans in a garden plot has educationally been discussed from various perspectives. What remains unexplored in such readings, however, is the connection of the theory of the natural learner with the Lockean rationalization of appropriation of land through cultivation. We will show that this connection forms the subtext of the ‘beans’ episode and grounds the rich and complex textual operations that give to the episode a strong political character. The aim is to unearth the common, colonial cause that the ideas of the natural learner, property as original relation to land and contractuality may make in Locke-inspired, early modern pedagogy and to explore the ambivalences in Rousseau’s text that are thus created.     

A multimedia HyperCard stack for the computerized investigation of chromesthetic associations

Most researchers investigating the perceptual similarities between visual and auditory stimuli have used different presentation methods for the two stimulus modalities. In contrast, a HyperCard stack has been developed which provides an integrated, fully computerized method for examining the chromesthetic associations of auditory stimuli (both pure tones and musical excerpts) and visual stimuli (48 colored rectangles). Advantages of the stack include control over the presentation of stimuli, control for order effects, a user-friendly interface, limited opportunities for demand characteristics or procedural errors, and simplified data compilation. The multimedia capabilities of HyperCard make it an excellent platform for cross-modal research.     

The most efficient sequence of study depends on the type of test

Across three experiments featuring naturalistic concepts (psychology concepts) and naïve learners, we extend previous research showing an effect of the sequence of study on learning outcomes, by demonstrating that the sequence of examples during study changes the representation the learner creates of the study materials. We compared participants' performance in test tasks requiring different representations and evaluated which sequence yields better learning in which type of tests. We found that interleaved study, in which examples from different concepts are mixed, leads to the creation of relatively interrelated concepts that are represented by contrast to each other and based on discriminating properties. Conversely, blocked study, in which several examples of the same concept are presented together, leads to the creation of relatively isolated concepts that are represented in terms of their central and characteristic properties. These results argue for the integrated investigation of the benefits of different sequences of study as depending on the characteristics of the study and testing situation.     

THE EFFECTIVENESS AND TRANSFER VALUE OF TWO METHODS OF CONCEPT LEARNING

WERDELIN, I., BONDESSON, E. & LARSSON, G.-B. The effectiveness and transfer value of two methods of concept learning. Scand. J. Psychol. , 1971, 12, 198–204.–Two methods of learning are compared as to their effectiveness and transfer value, the "direction method", where principles are presented and exemplified, and the "discovery method", where the learner discovers the principles from examples. In an experiment with 12a pupils in grade five it was found that the direction method was superior to the discovery method in these learning situations, that the methods are differently effective with different materials, and that experience with one of the methods may transfer to the ability to learn new materials with either method. The connections between concept, method and previous experience are very complex, however.     

EQUIVALENCE CLASS FORMATION: A METHOD FOR TEACHING STATISTICAL INTERACTIONS

Many students struggle with statistical concepts such as interaction. In an experimental group, participants took a paper‐and‐pencil test and then were given training to establish equivalent classes containing four different statistical interactions. All participants formed the equivalence classes and showed maintenance when probes contained novel negative exemplars. Thereafter, participants took a second paper‐and‐pencil test. Participants in the control group received two versions of the paper‐and‐pencil test without equivalence‐based instruction. All participants in the experimental group showed increased paper‐and‐pencil test scores after forming the interaction‐indicative equivalence classes. Class‐indicative responding also generalized to novel exemplars and the novel question format used in the paper‐and‐pencil test. Test scores did not change with repetition for control group participants. Implications for behavioral diagnostics and teaching technology are discussed.     

Training family therapists in observational skills

A study was conducted to develop procedures for training observational skills using concepts derived from structural family therapy. Experienced family therapists provided operational definitions of key concepts in family interaction, and videotaped segments of interactions were prepared which exemplified the concepts. A group of trainee family therapists was compared with a group of experienced therapists in the way they applied the concepts to interaction sequences in therapeutic sessions. In demonstrating that inexperienced trainees can be instructed relatively rapidly to identify and use structural concepts, the results suggested that this analytical approach to the training of family therapists shows considerable promise.     

教学心理学情感维度上的一种教材处理策略——心理匹配

在教学心理学领域中,人们往往习惯于从认知维度探索教材的优化处理策略,缺乏情感维度上的相应研究。奥苏贝尔虽提出意义学习的两个内在先决条件：一是学习者有同化新材料的认知结构;二是学习者有意义学习的心向．但他本人也仅从影响学生认知结构的角度,提出教材的认知处理策略──先行组织者策略．而未从影响学生心向的角度．提出教材的情感处理策略。鉴此,本文从情感维度上提出教材处理的心理匹配策略．以冀与认知策略一起共同优化处理教材、呈现教学内容环节,并阐明心理匹配策略的内涵、机制、作用和种类。     

Retreats for intramental thinking in collaborative online learning

Much online learning nowadays depends upon the creation of a generic, quality online educational experience, with a particular emphasis on collaborative conversations. In this discursive piece, drawing upon published scholarship and our facilitation and evaluation of learning in technology-mediated environments, we propose an enrichment to the pedagogy of such approaches, referred to as learner retreats. Such metaphorical spaces recognise the need for a ‘quiet, safe place’ for the private (internal) reflective thinking of each learner, as a foil to the shared collaborative dialogues in the external world of the online community. This ‘headspace’, with a specific focus on private thinking, is where community learners may probe and enhance current group thinking through reflection and self-regulatory activities. Guidelines are provided for tutors wishing to optimise the use and impact of such personal retreats, promoting deep individual learning and development within the educational experience of online learning communities.     

School learner behavioural management: context and practices in a South African school setting

This study explored context and qualities of learner behavioural management with high school students in a historically disadvantaged South African urban school setting. Participants were a convenience sample of seven teachers (females = 3, and males = 4) mean teaching experience = 14 years; SD = 9.0738 years). They responded to an open-ended interview on influences on learner behavioural management and preferred management styles. The data was thematically analysed. Findings reported poor implementation of school code of conduct and lack of parental involvement to lower the learner management. Teachers reported the use of an autocratic management style which could potentially undermine long-term learner development and growth.     

A PRESCRIPTION FOR GENERATING A NEW PARADIGM IN THE CONTEXT OF SCIENCE AND THEOLOGY

Abstract. Many centers are now active in the study of the interaction between science on the one hand and theology on the other. Suggestions are made as to how such study might be furthered. The central proposal in this paper is based on the author's experience in founding and, over many years, operating the Neurosciences Research Program (NRP). The "faculty" of this group were highly competent in many fields of science and were able to deal with many of the major issues. It is here further suggested that if an NRP-like organization were established, capable of productively interacting with both science and theology, it might well generate new concepts and possibly a new paradigm in this context.     

Capability and Learning to Choose

The Capability Approach (henceforth CA) is in the first place an approach to the evaluation of individual well-being and social welfare. Many disciplines refer to the CA, first and foremost welfare economics, development studies and political philosophy. Educational theory was not among the first disciplines that took notice of the CA, but has a rising interest in it. This paper argues that the CA would also profit from looking into educational theory. The first part of the paper shows why and where educational theory—or more precisely: a theory of learning—is missing in the CA. This is done in three steps: the first section gives a brief overview of the core concepts of Sen’s CA. Section “Capability and Choosing” focuses on the role of choosing in the CA. It states the views of Sen and Nussbaum on choosing and shows the shortcomings in their appreciation of choosing. In consequence, the third section derives some demands on a theory of learning in the CA. The second part of the paper presents Dewey’s educational theory on experience as a possible starting point when looking for a learning theory that lends itself to the integration in the CA. Section “Opportunity of Choosing, Experience and Education” introduces Dewey’s conception of experience, freedom of the learner, conditions of experience and education. Section “Capability and Experience” discusses how Dewey’s concepts fit into the CA. On the first glance, there are three points in which the CA and Dewey’s concepts match: the importance of freedom for human life, the role of participation in education and the need to take internal and external factors as well as their interaction into account in assessing choice situations. This establishes a basis for linking both theories. Yet, more research is needed to explore the issue further. Section “Conclusion and Outlook” concludes and sketches the lines for future research.