Pedagogical strategies for teaching literacy to ESL immigrant students: A meta‐analysis

Background. Many countries rely on immigrants for population growth and to maintain a skilled workforce. However, many such immigrants face literacy‐related barriers to success in education and in the labour force. Aims. This meta‐analysis reviews experimental and quasi‐experimental studies to examine strategies for teaching English literacy to immigrant students. Method. Following an exhaustive and systematic search for studies meeting pre‐determined inclusion criteria, two researchers independently extracted data from 26 English as a Second Language (ESL) studies involving 3,150 participants. These participants consisted of ESL immigrant students in kindergarten through grade 6 who were exposed to English literacy instructional interventions. Measured outcomes were reading and writing. Results and Conclusions. Mean effect sizes vary from small to large, depending on instructional interventions and outcome constructs. Across several different grade levels, settings, and methodological features, pedagogical strategies used in teaching ESL to immigrant students are associated with increased competence in reading and writing. Collaborative reading interventions, in which peers engage in oral interaction and cooperatively negotiate meaning and a shared understanding of texts, produced larger effects than systematic phonics instruction and multimedia‐assisted reading interventions. The results show that the pedagogical strategies examined in this meta‐analysis produced statistically significant benefits for students in all grade levels. The findings also show that students from low socio‐economic status (SES) background benefit from ESL literacy interventions. However, significant heterogeneity was found in each subset. Educators and policy makers are encouraged to consider specific school contexts when making decisions about optimal pedagogical strategies. It is possible that contextual factors as well as ESL learner characteristics may influence the effectiveness of these strategies. To ensure literacy acquisition for immigrant students whose primary language is not English, it is important to continue to research successful literacy practices in ways that better inform educators and policy makers.     

Priming infants to use pattern information in an object individuation task: the role of comparison

There is evidence that 4.5-month-olds do not always use surface pattern to individuate objects but that they can be primed to attend to pattern differences through select experiences. For example, if infants are first shown events in which the pattern of an object predicts its function (dotted containers pound and striped containers pour), they will attend to pattern differences in a subsequent individuation task. However, 4.5-month-olds must see multiple exemplars of the pound and pour events and view the dotted and striped containers together during the events. These results suggest that it is the formation of event categories, in which pattern is linked to object function, that supports pattern priming and that direct comparison of the exemplars facilitates the extraction of event categories. The present research investigated conditions that support the comparison process in 4.5-month-olds. The results revealed that the comparison process was initiated only when the dotted and striped containers were seen directly adjacent to each other; if the containers sat far apart, so that infants had to shift their gaze to compare them, event categories were not extracted. In addition, it was comparison of the two patterned containers, and not comparison of the two function events, that was critical to the formation of event categories. These results join a growing body of research indicating the importance of comparison to category formation in infants and reveal the impact of categorization and comparison processes on object individuation in infancy.     

The acceptance model of intuitive eating: a comparison of women in emerging adulthood, early adulthood, and middle adulthood

The acceptance model of intuitive eating (Avalos & Tylka, 2006) posits that body acceptance by others helps women appreciate their body and resist adopting an observer's perspective of their body, which contribute to their eating intuitively/adaptively. We extended this model by integrating body mass index (BMI) into its structure and investigating it with emerging (ages 18-25 years old, n = 318), early (ages 26-39 years old, n = 238), and middle (ages 40-65 years old, n = 245) adult women. Multiple-group analysis revealed that this model fit the data for all age groups. Body appreciation and resistance to adopt an observer's perspective mediated the body acceptance by others-intuitive eating link. Body acceptance by others mediated the social support-body appreciation and BMI-body appreciation links. Early and middle adult women had stronger negative BMI-body acceptance by others and BMI-intuitive eating relationships and a stronger positive body acceptance by others-body appreciation relationship than emerging adult women. Early adult women had a stronger positive resistance to adopt observer's perspective-body appreciation relationship than emerging and middle adult women.     

Integrating Social Comparison Theory and Self-Esteem within Objectification Theory to Predict Women’s Disordered Eating

This study integrated social comparison theory and self-esteem into the objectification theory framework to broaden our understanding of sexual objectification as it relates to body shame and disordered eating. Women (N?=?274) from a Midwestern U.S. college completed measures of sexual objectification via appearance feedback, body surveillance, body shame, body comparison, self-esteem, and disordered eating. Structural equation modeling indicated that this expanded model fit the data. Appearance feedback predicted body surveillance, body comparison, self-esteem and—unexpectedly—disordered eating. Body surveillance, body comparison, and self-esteem predicted body shame. Furthermore, hierarchical moderated regression revealed that body comparison moderated the body surveillance—disordered eating link; women who frequently monitored their body and compared it to others’ bodies reported the highest disordered eating.     

VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS COGNITION: A COMPUTATIONAL APPROACH TO SELF-UNDERSTANDING IN THREE MONOTHEIST CONTEXTS

This study considered representations of divine and human others in the self-understanding of monotheists from three religions. Self-understanding was conceptualized on the basis of semantic and episodic knowledge in narrative response data. Given the importance of social context in the formation of cognitive schemas, the project emphasized self-understanding in a comparative religious design. The sample included sixty nominated religious exemplars who responded to a structured interview. Schemas were subsequently mapped for Jews, Muslims, and Christians by comparison of self and other representations in a computational model known as latent semantic analysis (LSA). Findings indicated that representation of the divine is far removed from parents in cognitive schemas for all participants. Unlike Jews and Christians, Muslims appear to represent human others on the basis of self-understanding which principally references the divine. When considered in a computational semantic space, exemplars generally represent the self in a manner corresponding with divine and peer figures.     

From glamour-oriented idolatry to achievement-oriented idolatry: A framing experiment among adolescents in Hong Kong and Shenzhen

The present study examined the framing effect of two modes of idolatry among a sample of 1095 secondary school students in Hong Kong and Shenzhen. Two experimental conditions were set up: in the glamour frame condition, subjects were exposed to frames that enhanced perfection and mystification of idols' personal or ideological characteristics; in the achievement frame condition, subjects were exposed to frames that enhanced emulation and identification of idols' pro-social behaviours or desirable dispositional traits. The experiment selected a prominent pop music and movie star well known in Chinese societies, Andy Lau, as the target idol. Subjects showed a consistently and significantly greater desire to glorify, idealize, identify with, emulate, and attach to Andy Lau in the achievement frame condition than in the glamour frame condition. The finding suggests that an achievement frame can heighten young people's adoration of an idol by emphasizing the idol's achievement processes. This suggestion is favourable to the possibility of transforming an idol into a role model for young people to learn to pursue career success.     

The Caregiver Eating Messages Scale: Development and psychometric investigation

Certain caregiver eating messages – restriction of food intake and pressures to eat – are associated with body dissatisfaction and eating disturbances among young girls. This study explored whether these messages are also associated with body attitudes and eating behaviors of young adult women and men. The Caregiver Eating Messages Scale was developed to measure this construct. Two studies (Ns = 238, 288) indicated that it contained two factors (restrictive/critical messages and pressure to eat messages) and yielded internally consistent, stable, and valid scores. Both factors were positively related to women's BMI, and restrictive/critical messages were positively related to men's BMI. Restrictive/critical messages predicted lower perceived familial body acceptance and intuitive eating and higher perceived familial pressure to be lean and disordered eating. Restrictive/critical messages predicted participants’ body attitudes indirectly via their perceptions of their family's attitude toward their body, with one exception: restrictive/critical messages uniquely predicted men's body appreciation.     

The information content of panoramic images II: view-based navigation in nonrectangular experimental arenas

Two recent studies testing navigation of rats in swimming pools have posed problems for any account of the use of purely geometric properties of space in navigation (M. Graham, M. A. Good, A. McGregor, & J. M. Pearce, 2006; J. M. Pearce, M. A. Good, P. M. Jones, & A. McGregor, 2004). The authors simulated 1 experiment from each study in a virtual reality environment to test whether experimental results could be explained by view-based navigation. The authors recorded a reference image at the target location and then determined global panoramic image differences between this image and images taken at regularly spaced locations throughout the arena. A formal model, in which an agent attempts to minimize image differences between the reference image and current views, generated trajectories that could be compared with the search performance of rats. For both experiments, this model mimics many aspects of rat behavior. View-based navigation provides a sufficient and parsimonious explanation for a range of navigational behaviors of rats under these experimental conditions.     

Forgetting is effortful: Evidence from reaction time probes in an item-method directed forgetting task

Reaction time (RT) was measured in response to visual detection probes embedded within an item-method directed forgetting paradigm. In Experiment 1, study words were presented individually followed by an instruction to remember (R) or forget (F). Probes were presented at stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) of 1,400, 1,800, or 2,600 msec in relation to the study word or memory instruction. After the study trials, a yes-no recognition task measured retention of R and F words. Experiment 2 added a no-word control condition and no-probe catch trials. In both experiments, post-F probe RTs were longer than post-R probe RTs at early SOAs. Confirming that participants attended to the memory instructions, there was a significant directed forgetting effect, with greater recognition of R than of F words. These findings contradict the view that directed forgetting in the item-method paradigm is due to the passive decay of nonrehearsed F items; instead, they are consistent with the view that intentional forgetting in an item-method paradigm occurs via the operation of an active, potentially inhibitory, cognitive process.     

Explaining intra-individual variability in social behavior through idiographic assessment: The case of humor

Much variability in social behavior is intra-individual; people vary their actions strategically across contexts. Yet most personality assessment methods are inter-individual; they chart between-person differences in average behavioral tendencies. The present research advanced novel idiographic assessment methods to predict intra-individual variability in a behavioral domain of long-standing interest to personality psychologists: humor. Individuals participated in three assessment sessions. Personal beliefs about reasons for using humor were assessed either idiographically or with respect to a nomothetic system of humor-related reasons for action. The subjective relevance of nomothetically- and idiographically-identified reasons to everyday social situations was assessed. Subsequently, participants reported their perceived likelihood of using humor in specific social contexts. As predicted, likelihood of humor use varied substantially as a function of the relevance of situations to idiographically-identified reasons, but did not vary as a function of the relevance of situations to reasons identified nomothetically. Implications for personality and assessment are discussed.