Watch me, watch you: ritual participation increases in-group displays and out-group monitoring in children

© 2021 The Author(s). Collective rituals serve social functions for the groups that perform them, including identifying group members and signaling group commitment. A novel social group paradigm was used in an afterschool program (N = 60 4-11-year-olds) to test the influence of participating in a ritual task on in-group displays and out-group monitoring over repeated exposures to the group. The results demonstrate that ritual participation increases in-group displays (i.e., time spent displaying materials to in-group members) and out-group monitoring (i.e., time spent looking at out-group members) compared to a control task across three time points. This study provides evidence for the processes by which rituals may influence children’s behaviors toward in- and outgroup members and discusses implications for understanding the development of ritual cognition and behavior.American Psychological Foundation Elizabeth M. Koppitz Graduate Student Fellowship and the University of Texas at Austin Continuing Graduate Fellowship to N.J.W.; Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) grant ‘Ritual, Community, and Conflict’ (REF RES-060-25-0085) to C.H.L

Teaching Through Collaboration: Flexibility and Diversity in Caregiver–Child Interaction Across Cultures

Supporting Information is available online at https://srcd.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cdev.13443#support-information-section .Teaching supports the high-fidelity transmission of knowledge and skills. This study examined similarities and differences in caregiver teaching practices in the United States and Vanuatu (N = 125 caregiver and 3- to 8-year-old child pairs) during a collaborative problem-solving task. Caregivers used diverse verbal and nonverbal teaching practices and adjusted their behaviors in response to task difficulty and child age in both populations. U.S. caregivers used practices consistent with a direct active teaching style typical of formal education, including guiding children’s participation, frequent praise, and facilitation. In contrast, Ni-Vanuatu caregivers used practices associated with informal education and divided tasks with children based on difficulty. The implications of these findings for claims about the universality and diversity of caregiver teaching are discussed.Economic and Social Research Council. Grant Number: REF RES-060-25-0085; National Science Foundation. Grant Number: 173067

Effects of explaining on children's preference for simpler hypotheses

Research suggests that the process of explaining influences causal reasoning by prompting learners to favor hypotheses that offer "good" explanations. One feature of a good explanation is its simplicity. Here, we investigate whether prompting children to generate explanations for observed effects increases the extent to which they favor causal hypotheses that offer simpler explanations, and whether this changes over the course of development. Children aged 4, 5, and 6 years observed several outcomes that could be explained by appeal to a common cause (the simple hypothesis) or two independent causes (the complex hypothesis). We varied whether children were prompted to explain each observation or, in a control condition, to report it. Children were then asked to make additional inferences for which the competing hypotheses generated different predictions. The results revealed developmental differences in the extent to which children favored simpler hypotheses as a basis for further inference in this task: 4-year-olds did not favor the simpler hypothesis in either condition; 5-year-olds favored the simpler hypothesis only when prompted to explain; and 6-year-olds favored the simpler hypothesis whether or not they explained

Arduous implementation: Does the Normalisation Process Model explain why it's so difficult to embed decision support technologies for patients in routine clinical practice

Background: decision support technologies (DSTs, also known as decision aids) help patients and professionals take part in collaborative decision-making processes. Trials have shown favorable impacts on patient knowledge, satisfaction, decisional conflict and confidence. However, they have not become routinely embedded in health care settings. Few studies have approached this issue using a theoretical framework. We explained problems of implementing DSTs using the Normalization Process Model, a conceptual model that focuses attention on how complex interventions become routinely embedded in practice.Methods: the Normalization Process Model was used as the basis of conceptual analysis of the outcomes of previous primary research and reviews. Using a virtual working environment we applied the model and its main concepts to examine: the 'workability' of DSTs in professional-patient interactions; how DSTs affect knowledge relations between their users; how DSTs impact on users' skills and performance; and the impact of DSTs on the allocation of organizational resources.Results: conceptual analysis using the Normalization Process Model provided insight on implementation problems for DSTs in routine settings. Current research focuses mainly on the interactional workability of these technologies, but factors related to divisions of labor and health care, and the organizational contexts in which DSTs are used, are poorly described and understood.Conclusion: the model successfully provided a framework for helping to identify factors that promote and inhibit the implementation of DSTs in healthcare and gave us insights into factors influencing the introduction of new technologies into contexts where negotiations are characterized by asymmetries of power and knowledge. Future research and development on the deployment of DSTs needs to take a more holistic approach and give emphasis to the structural conditions and social norms in which these technologies are enacte

Synchrony and Physiological Arousal Increase Cohesion and Cooperation in Large Naturalistic Groups

Separate research streams have identified synchrony and arousal as two factors that might contribute to the effects of human rituals on social cohesion and cooperation. But no research has manipulated these variables in the field to investigate their causal – and potentially interactive – effects on prosocial behaviour. Across four experimental sessions involving large samples of strangers, we manipulated the synchronous and physiologically arousing affordances of a group marching task within a sports stadium. We observed participants’ subsequent movement, grouping, and cooperation via a camera hidden in the stadium’s roof. Synchrony and arousal both showed main effects, predicting larger groups, tighter clustering, and more cooperative behaviour in a free-rider dilemma. However, synchrony and arousal interacted on measures of clustering and cooperation: such that synchrony only encouraged closer clustering — and encouraged greater cooperation—when paired with physiological arousal. The research has implications for understanding the nature and co-occurrence of synchrony and physiological arousal in rituals around the world. It also represents the first use of real-time spatial tracking as a precise and naturalistic method of simulating collective rituals

Exploration, Explanation, and Parent–Child Interaction in Museums

Young children develop causal knowledge through everyday family conversations and activities. Children's museums are an informative setting for studying the social context of causal learning because family members engage together in everyday scientific thinking as they play in museums. In this multisite collaborative project, we investigate children's developing causal thinking in the context of family interaction at museum exhibits. We focus on explaining and exploring as two fundamental collaborative processes in parent–child interaction, investigating how families explain and explore in open-ended collaboration at gear exhibits in three children's museums in Providence, RI, San Jose, CA, and Austin, TX. Our main research questions examined (a) how open-ended family exploration and explanation relate to one another to form a dynamic for children's learning; (b) how that dynamic differs for families using different interaction styles, and relates to contextual factors such as families' science background, and (c) how that dynamic predicts children's independent causal thinking when given more structured tasks. We summarize findings on exploring, explaining, and parent–child interaction (PCI) styles. We then present findings on how these measures related to one another, and finally how that dynamic predicts children's causal thinking. In studying children's exploring we described two types of behaviors of importance for causal thinking: (a) Systematic Exploration: Connecting gears to form a gear machine followed by spinning the gear machine. (b) Resolute Behavior: Problem-solving behaviors, in which children attempted to connect or spin a particular set of gears, hit an obstacle, and then persisted to succeed (as opposed to moving on to another behavior). Older children engaged in both behaviors more than younger children, and the proportion of these behaviors were correlated with one another. Parents and children talked to each other while interacting with the exhibits. We coded causal language, as well as other types of utterances. Parents' causal language predicted children's causal language, independent of age. The proportion of parents' causal language also predicted the proportion of children's systematic exploration. Resolute behavior on the part of children did not correlate with parents' causal language, but did correlate with children's own talk about actions and the exhibit. We next considered who set goals for the play in a more holistic measure of parent–child interaction style, identifying dyads as parent-directed, child-directed, or jointly-directed in their interaction with one another. Children in different parent–child interaction styles engaged in different amounts of systematic exploration and had parents who engaged in different amounts of causal language. Resolute behavior and the language related to children engaging in such troubleshooting, seemed more consistent across the three parent–child interaction styles. Using general linear mixed modeling, we considered relations within sequences of action and talk. We found that the timing of parents' causal language was crucial to whether children engaged in systematic exploration. Parents' causal talk was a predictor of children's systematic exploration only if it occurred prior to the act of spinning the gears (while children were building gear machines). We did not observe an effect of causal language when it occurred concurrently with or after children's spinning. Similarly, children's talk about their actions and the exhibit predicted their resolute behavior, but only when the talk occurred while the child was encountering the problem. No effects were found for models where the talk happened concurrently or after resolving the problem. Finally, we considered how explaining and exploring related to children's causal thinking. We analyzed measures of children's causal thinking about gears and a free play measure with a novel set of gears. Principal component analysis revealed a latent factor of causal thinking in these measures. Structural equation modeling examined how parents' background in science related to children's systematic exploration, parents' causal language, and parent–child interaction style, and then how those factors predicted children's causal thinking. In a full model, with children's age and gender included, children's systematic exploration related to children's causal thinking. Overall, these data demonstrate that children's systematic exploration and parents' causal explanation are best studied in relation to one another, because both contributed to children's learning while playing at a museum exhibit. Children engaged in systematic exploration, which supported their causal thinking. Parents' causal talk supported children's exploration when it was presented at certain times during the interaction. In contrast, children's persistence in problem solving was less sensitive to parents' talk or interaction style, and more related to children's own language, which may act as a form of self-explanation. We discuss the findings in light of ongoing approaches to promote the benefit of parent–child interaction during play for children's learning and problem solving. We also examine the implications of these findings for formal and informal learning settings, and for theoretical integration of constructivist and sociocultural approaches in the study of children's causal thinking.National Science Foundation under Grants 1420259, 1420241, and 1420548

Coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering imaging of lipids in cancer metastasis

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Lipid-rich tumours have been associated with increased cancer metastasis and aggressive clinical behaviours. Nonetheless, pathologists cannot classify lipid-rich tumours as a clinically distinctive form of carcinoma due to a lack of mechanistic understanding on the roles of lipids in cancer development.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS) microscopy is employed to study cancer cell behaviours in excess lipid environments <it>in vivo </it>and <it>in vitro</it>. The impacts of a high fat diet on cancer development are evaluated in a Balb/c mice cancer model. Intravital flow cytometry and histology are employed to enumerate cancer cell escape to the bloodstream and metastasis to lung tissues, respectively. Cancer cell motility and tissue invasion capability are also evaluated in excess lipid environments.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>CARS imaging reveals intracellular lipid accumulation is induced by excess free fatty acids (FFAs). Excess FFAs incorporation onto cancer cell membrane induces membrane phase separation, reduces cell-cell contact, increases surface adhesion, and promotes tissue invasion. Increased plasma FFAs level and visceral adiposity are associated with early rise in circulating tumour cells and increased lung metastasis. Furthermore, CARS imaging reveals FFAs-induced lipid accumulation in primary, circulating, and metastasized cancer cells.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Lipid-rich tumours are linked to cancer metastasis through FFAs-induced physical perturbations on cancer cell membrane. Most importantly, the revelation of lipid-rich circulating tumour cells suggests possible development of CARS intravital flow cytometry for label-free detection of early-stage cancer metastasis.</p