Does home internet use influence the academic performance of low-income children?

HomeNetToo is a longitudinal field study designed to examine the antecedents and consequences of home Internet use in low-income families (http://www.HomeNetToo.org). The study was done between December 2000 and June 2002. Among the consequences considered was children's academic performance. Participants were 140 children, mostly African American (83%), mostly boys (58%), and most living in single-parent households (75%) in which the median annual income was 15,000 (U.S. dollars) or less. Average age was 13.8 years. Ages ranged between 10 and 18 years, Internet use was continuously recorded, and multiple measures of academic performance were obtained during the 16-month trial. Findings indicated that children who used the Internet more had higher scores on standardized tests of reading achievement and higher grade point averages 6 months, 1 year, and 16 months later than did children who used it less. Older children used the Internet more than did younger children, but age had no effect on the nature or the academic performance benefits of Internet use. Implications for the digital "use" divide are discussed.     

The big five personality dimensions and entrepreneurial status: a meta-analytical review

In this study, the authors used meta-analytical techniques to examine the relationship between personality and entrepreneurial status. Personality variables used in previous studies were categorized according to the five-factor model of personality. Results indicate significant differences between entrepreneurs and managers on 4 personality dimensions such that entrepreneurs scored higher on Conscientiousness and Openness to Experience and lower on Neuroticism and Agreeableness. No difference was found for Extraversion. Effect sizes for each personality dimension were small, although the multivariate relationship for the full set of personality variables was moderate (R = .37). Considerable heterogeneity existed for all of the personality variables except Agreeableness, suggesting that future research should explore possible moderators of the personality-entrepreneurial status relationship.     

Language history questionnaire: A Web-based interface for bilingual research

A Web-based interface has been developed to facilitate researchers in collecting language history information online. Most researchers use their own versions of language history questionnaires for specific studies in second language acquisition. Although these versions of questionnaires all differ from one another in some respects, there is a significant amount of overlap between them. Here we identify the crucial dimensions that most investigators consider important to include in such a questionnaire. We have examined the most commonly asked questions in 41 published questionnaires, and on the basis of our analyses we propose a general L2 language history questionnaire. Subjects can enter some or all of the information on the Web, and the results are automatically generated as an RTF output file on the user’s desktop.     

Influence of age,breeding state and approach direction on sensitivity to human gaze: a field study on Azure-winged magpies

Animal Cognition - In predator–prey interactions, various factors affect the prey’s perception of risk and decision to flee. Gaze sensitivity, the ability to react to the presence,...     

The role of explanatory context for racial disparities in predicting sociopolitical attitudes during COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic placed preexisting racial health disparities in stark relief. Recent studies have already established that, among prejudiced Whites, exposure to such racial disparities reduced concern about the pandemic and support for mitigation policies (Harrel & Lieberman, 2021; Stephens-Dougan, 2022). In response to such results, one cautionary line of reasoning argues that communicating the disparity figures without explanatory context can perpetuate (or at least not undermine) myths that African Americans are more likely to contract COVID-19 due to genetic predispositions or maladaptive behavioral tendencies (Chowkwanyun & Reed, 2020). In two studies, we test the claims that (a) explanatory context mitigates the tendency to attribute racial disparities to essential racial differences and (b) that perceptions of racial disparities are attuned to specific racial inequalities in the U.S., and not merely expressions of outgroup bias. In Study 1, we found that exposure to racial disparities with explanatory context (vs. without explanatory context) did not reduce racial essentialism or stereotyping, but did promote support for healthcare equity. In Study 2, we found that black disadvantage frames (vs. white vs. Hispanic) uniquely promoted support for equitable healthcare and multicultural inclusion. Importantly, and contrary to other recent findings, exposure to black disadvantage did not preclude support for equity.     

The effects of newcomer proactive behaviours on socialization outcomes: A meta-analysis

Organizational researchers and practitioners have shown increasing interest in how newcomer proactivity contributes to socialization. This meta-analysis synthesizes the existing empirical research that examines the relationships between frequently performed newcomer proactive behaviours (sensemaking, relationship building, positive framing and job change negotiation) and proximal and distal socialization outcomes. Proximal outcomes include role clarity, task mastery and social integration; distal outcomes include job performance, job satisfaction, organizational commitment and turnover intention. Based on 45 independent samples (N = 11,508), proactive behaviours were found to be generally beneficial for newcomer socialization. Relative weight analyses identified positive framing as the strongest predictor of five of the seven reviewed outcomes while relationship building accounted for the greatest part of the variance in social integration. Job change negotiation was the weakest predictor of socialization outcomes. The study also explored the impact of boundary conditions, including culture, study design and sample type, on the magnitude of these effects. The paper concludes by discussing the theoretical and practical implications of these findings, along with the study's limitations and suggestions for future research.     

Reproductive Health CHOICES for Young Adults with Sickle Cell Disease or Trait: Randomized Controlled Trial Outcomes over Two Years

Interventions to assist reproductive health decision-making in populations affected by sickle cell disease (SCD) or trait (SCT) lack proven efficacy over time. Our aim was to compare effects of CHOICES, a Web-based multimedia education program on implementing informed reproductive plans, and usual care education (e-Book) on reproductive knowledge, intention, and behavior over 24 months. We randomized 234 participants with SCD (n?=?138) or SCT (n?=?96) (age 18–35 years, 35 % male, 94 % African American) to CHOICES and e-Book groups. Participants completed a sickle cell-specific reproductive measure before and four times after the intervention (6, 12, 18 and 24 months). Compared to the e-Book group the CHOICES group had significantly more improvement in knowledge over time (p?=?.004) but not intention (p?=?.18) or behavior (p?=?.69). At baseline, 114 (48.7 %) participants reported having partners who would not put the couple at risk for their children inheriting SCD. Of the 116 (49.6 %) at-risk participants, a higher poroportion of those who were in the CHOICES group chose partners that reduced their risk by the last visit than the e-Book group (p?=?.04). Study findings provide important insights for designing a national trial of the CHOICES intervention focusing on subjects whose partner status puts them at risk for having a child with SCD.     

Chinese–English bilinguals processing temporal–spatial metaphor

The conceptual projection of time onto the domain of space constitutes one of the most challenging issues in the cognitive embodied theories. In Chinese, spatial order (e.g., “大树前”/da shu qian/, in front of a tree) shares the same terms with temporal sequence (三月前”, /san yue qian/, before March). In comparison, English natives use different sets of prepositions to describe spatial and temporal relationship, i.e., “before” to express temporal sequencing and “in front of” to express spatial order. The linguistic variations regarding the specific lexical encodings indicate that some flexibility might be available in how space–time parallelisms are formulated across different languages. In the present study, ERP (Event-related potentials) data were collected when Chinese–English bilinguals processed temporal ordering and spatial sequencing in both their first language (L1) Chinese (Experiment 1) and the second language (L2) English (Experiment 2). It was found that, despite the different lexical encodings, early sensorimotor simulation plays a role in temporal sequencing processing in both L1 Chinese and L2 English. The findings well support the embodied theory that conceptual knowledge is grounded in sensory-motor systems (Gallese and Lakoff, Cogn Neuropsychol 22:455–479, 2005). Additionally, in both languages, neural representations during comprehending temporal sequencing and spatial ordering are different. The time–spatial relationship is asymmetric, in that space schema could be imported into temporal sequence processing but not vice versa. These findings support the weak view of the Metaphoric Mapping Theory.     

Freedom Reconsidered: Heteronomy,Open Subjectivity,and the ‘Gift of Teaching’

This paper analyzes the entanglement of the modern concepts of freedom, autonomy, and the modern notion of the subject and how a passion for and insistence on freedom has undermined the reconstruction of human subjectivity in Heidegger and Foucault, and how such passion has also limited the educational effort at addressing the problems brought to education by the modern notion of the subject. Drawing on Levinas, it suggests that a new understanding of freedom as heteronomy will allow us to envision an open subjectivity that is essential for education. Particularly, it looks at Gert Biesta’s recent campaigns for “subjectification” and “the gift of teaching” to analyze the underlying contradictions caused by the entanglement of freedom and subjectivity.