The Curriculum as a Standard of Public Education

This contribution first searches for historical and empirical evidence for whether and how curricula act or acted as a measure of public education. The problem is explicated on account of a short history of curriculum work and distinguished in a analytical, a political, programmatical and practical discourse of curriculum work. Curriculum work always underlies premises of planning, learning and effects. Three models are finally developed and brought in touch with the different discourses. Curriculum work proves to be an attempt to make publicly acceptable the empirically impossible accountability of schools.     

Should We Teach Patriotism?

This article examines a particular debate between Eamonn Callan and William Galston concerning the need for a civic education which counters the divisive pull of pluralism by uniting the citizenry in patriotic allegiance to a single national identity.The article offers a preliminary understanding of nationalism and patriotism before setting out the terms of the debate. It then critically evaluates the central idea of Callan that one might be under an obligation morally to improve one's own patriotic inheritance, pointing to the ineliminable tension between the valuation of one's own patria by its own terms and a detached critical reason.It concludes by suggesting that we are, in advance of our education, members of a particular patria and that any education must be particularistic. Finally, the danger is noted of presuming that, in each case, there is a single, determinate national tradition.     

Anger Can Help: A Transactional Model and Three Pathways of the Experience and Expression of Anger

Anger is a significant human emotion with far‐reaching implications for individuals and relationships. We propose a transactional model of anger that highlights its relational relevance and potentially positive function, in addition to problematic malformations. By evolutionary design, physical, self‐concept, or attachment threats all similarly trigger diffuse physiological arousal, psychologically experienced as anger‐emotion. Anger is first a signaling and motivational system. Anger is then formed to affirming, productive use or malformed to destructive ends. A functional, prosocial approach to anger organizes it for protective and corrective personal and relational adaptation. In our model, threat perception interacts with a person's view of self in relation to other to produce helpful or harmful anger. Inflated or collapsed views of self in relation to other produce distinct manifestations of destructive anger that are harmful to self, other, and relationship. Conversely, a balanced view of self in relation to other promotes constructive anger and catalyzes self, other, and relationship healing. Clinical use of the model to shape healing personal and relational contact with anger is explored.     

Clinical Guidelines for Working With Stepfamilies: What Family,Couple, Individual,and Child Therapists Need to Know

This article draws on four decades of research and clinical practice to delineate guidelines for evidence‐informed, clinically sound work with stepfamilies for couple, family, individual adult, and child therapists. Few clinicians receive adequate training in working with the intense and often complex dynamics created by stepfamily structure and history. This is despite the fact that stepfamilies are a fundamentally different family form that occurs world‐wide. As a result many clinicians rely on their training in first‐time family models. This is not only often unhelpful, but all too often inadvertently destructive. The article integrates a large body of increasingly sophisticated research about stepfamilies with the author's four decades of clinical practice with stepfamily relationships. It describes the ways in which stepfamilies are different from first‐time families. It delineates the dynamics of five major challenges stepfamily structure creates: (1) Insider/outsider positions are intense and they are fixed. (2) Children struggle with losses, loyalty binds, and change. (3) Issues of parenting, stepparenting, and discipline often divide the couple. (4) Stepcouples must build a new family culture while navigating previously established family cultures. (5) Ex‐spouses (other parents outside the household) are part of the family. Some available data are shared on the impact of cultural and legal differences on these challenges. A three‐level model of clinical intervention is presented: Psychoeducational, Interpersonal, and Intrapsychic/Intergenerational Family‐of‐Origin. The article describes some “easy wrong turns” for well‐meaning therapists and lists some general clinical guidelines for working with stepfamily relationships.     

The Context and Shape of Theological Education in Mozambique with Special Reference to Women

In Mozambique, a marked increase in evangelical churches was recorded in the 1980s. This brought the need for pastoral training into sharp focus, and many new Bible schools were founded in the 1980s and 1990s. Yet, the shape and context of theological education remains rather different from other African countries, as Bible schools are mostly not accredited by the government and most schools train part‐time in the evening. As of 2017, religious studies cannot be found at universities, leaving theological training firmly in the hands of the churches and mission organizations. The training of women has become increasingly important, but they also face many challenges. To shed light on these challenges, I present the results of 52 interviews with female students at various Bible schools in Mozambique, ranging from lack of family support to the fact that theological training is perceived to be only for men and full‐time/ordained ministry.     

Evaluating the Factor Structure of the MIDI Personality Scale Using Exploratory Structural Equation Modeling

This study investigated the factor structure of the 26‐item Midlife Development Inventory (MIDI) Personality Scale in a sample of 2,720 Americans. It was found that whereas confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) did not provide an acceptable fit to the data, exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM) provided an acceptable fit. The results of ESEM revealed that the a priori five‐factor structure of personality was generally consistent with the data, and all items had salient loadings on their target factors. ESEM also revealed that some of the items contributed significantly to more than one personality factor. The results are in line with previous research, and indicate that ESEM is more suitable than CFA for the study of personality traits.     

The Ability of Face Viewpoint Transformation Remains Immature at Age of 12: Evidence from Recognition of Faces with Different Familiarity in Children

Children are immature in face recognition, particularly in face configural decoding. This study examines the developmental difference of face recognition in another mechanism: viewpoint transformation processing. Adults and sixth‐grade children were instructed to match a series of one‐tone black face silhouettes to their corresponding front‐view faces. This task involves sophisticated calculation in pictorial information, precise viewpoint transformation, and most probably a 3‐D face representation. The results showed that although the performances were well above chance level in the recognition of familiar faces, for children, they were at chance level in the recognition of unfamiliar faces. The results indicate that children, at least to the age of about 12 years, are still immature in the processing of face viewpoint transformation compared to adults.     

Effects of a Danish Student‐Centered Prosocial Intervention Program Among Japanese Children

Japan and Denmark represent two different educational cultures. Where Danish students in general report high scores on self‐esteem, Japanese children report low. A student‐centered and interaction‐based prosocial intervention program that was designed according to Danish educational culture was administered to children aged 11–12 years in Japan. Questionnaires measuring the children's quality of life (QoL) and metacognitive awareness were applied. Overall, the results showed that the student‐centered intervention improved the emotional well‐being aspect of QoL among Japanese boys. In contrast, Japanese boys’ scores on the declarative knowledge of metacognitive regulation declined. The teachers’ attitudes towards the intervention program were analyzed by use of interviews. The effect of the student‐centered intervention program is discussed with respect to the educational cultures in Japan.     

Where Men Appear More Religious Than Women: Turning a Gender Lens on Religion in Israel

Past research, typically focused on Christians in Christian nations, has found that women tend to be more religious than men. This study uses original nationally representative data (N = 5,601) with strategic oversamples of minority groups to examine variation in how religion and gender intersect across ethnoreligious identities in Israel. We demonstrate that Israel diverges from the typical pattern of women appearing more religious than men. In fact, Israeli men are consistently more religious than Israeli women on commonly used measures and frequently more religious on a broader set of questions specific to Judaism and Israel. Subgroup analyses highlight the intersectional nature of gender and religion, showing that men's greater religiosity in Israel is limited to Jews, and, more specifically, nonsecular Jews. We suggest that gender gaps arise, at least in part, because religions are gendered institutions with gendered norms, expectations, and incentives, and that these norms, expectations, and incentives vary from religion to religion.