Teaching Mathematics for Spatial Justice: An Investigation of the Lottery

This article explores integrating place-based education with critical mathematics toward teaching mathematics for spatial justice. Local Lotto, a curricular module with associated digital tools, was designed to investigate the lottery as a critical spatial phenomenon and piloted in urban high schools. This article describes findings from the second iteration in a remedial class in a low-income neighborhood. The research questions consider how the spatial focus supported the learning of mathematics and provided opportunities for students to think critically about the lottery using that mathematics. Findings include student interest in and engagement with the theme of the lottery familiar from outside of school with associated social justice implications. Students used mathematics and spatial evidence, at various levels of spatial scale, to support arguments about the lottery with greater success at narrower levels of scale. Suggestions about further innovations to scaffold place in a “critical pedagogy of place” in mathematics are provided.     

Poignancy: mixed emotional experience in the face of meaningful endings

The experience of mixed emotions increases with age. Socioemotional selectivity theory suggests that mixed emotions are associated with shifting time horizons. Theoretically, perceived constraints on future time increase appreciation for life, which, in turn, elicits positive emotions such as happiness. Yet, the very same temporal constraints heighten awareness that these positive experiences come to an end, thus yielding mixed emotional states. In 2 studies, the authors examined the link between the awareness of anticipated endings and mixed emotional experience. In Study 1, participants repeatedly imagined being in a meaningful location. Participants in the experimental condition imagined being in the meaningful location for the final time. Only participants who imagined "last times" at meaningful locations experienced more mixed emotions. In Study 2, college seniors reported their emotions on graduation day. Mixed emotions were higher when participants were reminded of the ending that they were experiencing. Findings suggest that poignancy is an emotional experience associated with meaningful endings.     

Baseline reinforcement rate and resurgence of destructive behavior

Concepts from behavioral momentum theory, along with some empirical findings, suggest that the rate of baseline reinforcement may contribute to the relapse of severe destructive behavior. With seven children who engaged in destructive behavior, we tested this hypothesis in the context of functional communication training by comparing the effects of different baseline reinforcement rates on resurgence during a treatment challenge (i.e., extinction). We observed convincing resurgence of destructive behavior in four of seven participants, and we observed more resurgence in the condition associated with high‐rate baseline reinforcement (i.e., variable‐interval 2 s in Experiment 1 or fixed‐ratio 1 in Experiment 2) compared to a low‐rate baseline reinforcement condition. We discuss the implications of these results relative to schedules of reinforcement in the treatment of destructive behavior and strategies to mitigate resurgence in clinical settings.     

On the Psychological Function of Nationalistic “Whitelash”

A noticeable feature of the political discourse accompanying the rise of nationalism in white‐majority countries is that white people fare worse than other ethnic groups in their societies. However, it is unclear based on the extant literature why group‐based relative deprivation (GRD) would correlate with majority‐group nationalism. Here, we propose that the psychological function of nationalism for majority‐group members lies in its ability to assuage the negative feelings arising from GRD. Accordingly, in a New Zealand national probability sample (N = 15,607), we found that GRD among whites was negatively associated with well‐being. However, we also found an opposing indirect association mediated by nationalism. GRD was associated with higher nationalism, which was in turn associated with higher well‐being. These findings suggest that endorsing beliefs about national superiority is one way a nation’s dominant ethnic group can cope with the negative psychological consequences of perceiving that their group is deprived.     

Aims and Exclusivity

If belief has an aim by being a (quasi) intentional activity, then it ought to be the case that the aim of belief can be weighed against other aims one might have. However, this is not so with the putative truth aim of belief: from the first‐person perspective, one can only be motivated by truth considerations in deliberation over what to believe (exclusivity). From this perspective then, the aim cannot be weighed. This problem is captured by David Owens's Exclusivity Objection to belief having an aim (2003). Conor McHugh (2012; 2013) has responded to this problem by denying the phenomenon of exclusivity and replacing it with something weaker: demandingness. If deliberation over what to believe is characterised by demandingness and not exclusivity, this allows for the requisite weighing of the truth aim. I argue against such a move by suggesting that where non‐evidential considerations play a role in affecting what we believe, these considerations merely change the standards required for believing in a particular context, they do not provide non‐evidential reasons for forming or withholding belief, which are considered as such from the deliberative perspective. Exclusivity thus remains, and so too does Owens's objection.     

The Emotional Foundation of Political Cognition: The Impact of Extrinsic Anxiety on the Formation of Political Tolerance Judgments

Common sense recognizes emotion's ability to influence judgments. We argue that affective processes, in addition to generating feeling states, also influence how political cognition is manifested. Drawing on the theory of affective intelligence, we examine the role that anxiety plays in how and when people rely on predispositions and when they rely on contemporaneous information in making political tolerance judgments. We report on two experimental studies to test our arguments. In the first study we find that extrinsic anxiety generates a resistance response among subjects who hold a strong predisposition and a receptive response among those who do not. In the second study we present subjects with explicit "frames" exposing them to a pro- or anti-free speech message. We find that extrinsic anxiety enhances responsiveness to frames while an absence of anxiety diminishes the impact of these frames. Taken together these results show that affective processes shape how people make political judgments.     

Further Operationalization of Intra‐Team Communication in Sports: An Updated Version of the Scale of Effective Communication in Team Sports (SECTS‐2)

Sullivan & Feltz (2003 ) offered a preliminary multidimensional measure of communication in team sports, the Scale for Effective Communication in Team Sports (SECTS). The current research attempted to further the development and support for the psychometric properties and validity of the measure. In one study, 350 athletes completed an updated version of the SECTS. Confirmatory factor analyses showed good support for the 4‐factor structure. Correlations to team cohesion offer construct validity for the scale. A second study, with an independent sample (N = 79), revealed that team performance was negatively related to the communication of Distinctiveness at the team level. This updated version of the SECTS represents a parsimonious, valid, and reliable operational definition of sports‐specific effective team communication.