Alternance et orientation : vers de nouvelles formes d’adhésion à l’apprentissage salarié de niveau V

This study aims at analysing the specificities of the meaning given by apprentices in their first year of CAP (vocational training certificate, level 5) to their school guidance. This survey based on questionnaires to 353 apprentices has allowed to identify through a multi-varied analysis (descending hierarchical classification) 4 different forms of support to learning which must not be systematically linked to sociofamily background and their difficulties in their previous school history. The school guidance toward apprenticeship cannot be explained only by a lack of interest for school. It also arouses some positive forms of mobilization which testify of the way these young people try to rely on this training to give a sense to their life.     

The acquisition of scientific knowledge: the influence of methods of questioning and analysis on the interpretation of children's conceptions of the earth

Studies of children's knowledge of the Earth have led to very different conclusions: some appear to show that children construct their own, non‐scientific ‘theories’ (mental models) of the flat, hollow or dual Earth. Others indicate that many young children have some understanding of the spherical (scientific) Earth, and that their knowledge lacks the coherence of mental models. The reasons for these contrasting views were tested by interviewing French children (N = 178) aged 5–11 years and varying the different methods used in previous research, namely the types of questions (open and forced‐choice), the form of representation (two‐dimensional pictures and three‐dimensional models), and the method of analysis (the mental model theorists' coding scheme and a statistical test for associations using MANOVA). Forced‐choice questions resulted in higher proportions of scientific answers than open questions, and children appeared to have naïve mental models of the Earth only when the mental model theorists' coding scheme was used. These findings support the view that children tend to have ‘fragments’ of scientific knowledge, and that naïve mental models of the Earth are methodological artifacts. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Imagination as Expansion of Experience

This paper proposes a developmental view on imagination: from this perspective, imagination can be seen as triggered by some disrupting event, which generates a disjunction from the person’s unfolding experience of the “real” world, and as unfolding as a loop, which eventually comes back to the actual experience. Examining recent and classical theorization of imagination in psychology, the paper opposes a deficitary view of imagination to an expansive notion of imagination. The paper explores Piaget, Vygotsky, Harris and Pelaprat & Cole consider: 1) What does provoke a “rupture” or disjunction? 2) What are the psychological processes involved in the imaginary loop? 3) What nourishes such processes? 4) What are the consequences of such imaginary loop, or what does it enable doing? The paper proposes to adopt an expansive view of imagination, as Vygotsky proposed—a perspective that has been under-explored empirically since his seminal work. To stimulate such sociocultural psychology of imagination, two empirical examples are provided, one showing how children make sense of metaphor in an experimental setting, the other showing a young person using a novel met at school as symbolic resource.     

Executive functioning in normal aging: a study of action planning using the Zoo Map Test

A particularly important aspect of executive functioning involves the ability to form and carry out complex plans, that is to say planning. This study aimed to investigate planning in 18 older and 16 younger normal participants using an ecological planning subtask derived from the Behavioural Assessment of the Dysexecutive Syndrome test battery, the "Zoo Map Test." There are two trials. The first trial consists of a "high demand" version of the subtask in which the participants must plan in advance the order in which they will visit designated locations in a zoo (formulation level). In the second, or "low demand" version, the participant is simply required to follow a concrete externally imposed strategy to reach the locations to visit (execution level). The two-way ANOVAs mainly showed more difficulties in elderly adults than in younger adults, more difficulties in formulation level than in execution level, and lastly a greater difference between formulation and execution in older participants than in younger adults. These results suggest that elderly participants have some problems developing logical strategies whereas they are able to execute complex predetermined plans.     

Anticipatory and event related changes in heart rate as indicators of attention processes

The present study was concerned with the question of whether phasic event-related heart rate (HR) changes under easy intake conditions account for the association between anticipatory HR deceleration and task performance in a choice reaction time (RT) task with a fixed foreperiod. The task employed differed from simple RT tasks especially with regard to processing and attention demands. Subjects were required to determine as quickly and accurately as possible whether a probe, presented for 80 ms, was identical or not to one of two distinct memory items, presented at the onset of each trial. Reaction times as well as accuracy of responses were determined. The results of the present study were indicative of a reliable anticipatory HR deceleration which was related to latency of responses to the probe stimulus. Subjects with stronger decelerations reacted faster than subjects with diminished or missing decelerations. Furthermore a relation was found between this association and the heart rate changes to repeated presentations of a non-signal auditory stimulus under habituation conditions. Results were discussed in terms of differences in the regulation or control of attentional processes.     

Significance of heart rate deceleration in pattern recognition tasks

As strength of foreperiod heart rate (HR) deceleration in reaction time paradigms with a fixed foreperiod has been discussed in terms of activities related to differences in regulations of attentional processes, the present study was concerned with the question of whether this variable also accounts for the variance in the latency of response in two attention-demanding pattern recognition tasks, one of which involved mental rotation. Subjects were required to determine as quickly and as correctly as possible whether a two-dimensional asymmetrical shape was intrinsically identical to a previously presented visual pattern or not, regardless of its rotational position within the picture plane. The first stimulus was always in normal upright position, whereas the probe stimulus could either be rotated or presented in an upright position. The findings of the study are indicative of a reliable relation between anticipatory HR deceleration and reaction time. It was not restricted to detection and response requirements but also held true in the case of additional mental rotation requirements. Strength of anticipatory HR deceleration is therefore interpreted as an indicator of regulations of attentional processes mustered in order to facilitate or to support stimulus detection and response elicitation as well as to prime or to set up the mental structures required in mental rotation. Additional support for this assumption could be found in the analyses of HR changes at the beginning of the response interval.     

Degrading situations,affiliation and social dependency

Research is reported which shows that degrading situations (e.g. a failure on a test) increase affiliative propensity. Four studies demonstrated that this affiliative tendency of degraded subjects is independent of the potential partner's performance and independent of his/her characteristics. The partners appeared to be equally attractive whether or not they witnessed subject's failure, and whether they were individuals or a group. On the other hand, the affiliative desires of praised subjects seem to be oriented rather towards those who benefit from a similar situation. The motivation underlying affiliative behaviour is discussed with regard to social psychological literature. It is suggested that degraded subjects' affiliative behaviour arises from a search for support and that a socially degrading situation places the subject in a state of emotional dependency which is expressed by a non-directional affiliative tendency and vulnerability to social influence. ©1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms that Predict Cognitive Decline or Impairment in Cognitively Normal Middle-Aged or Older Adults: a Meta-Analysis

Neuropsychology Review - Epidemiological studies have revealed that behavioral and psychological (or non-cognitive) symptoms are risk factors for cognitive decline in older adults. This study aimed...     

Civic Education and the Good

It is argued that children need to learn about civic issues intheir education because certain virtues are required for a decently organisedsociety. It is also argued that the school has wide obligations to educate theyoung in civics because it is in their best interests. This is not seen asan encroachment on the privacy of the individual. It is explained that theschool has an obligation to impart knowledge to the young.