Parenting style: influence on gifted children psychological adjustment

Este trabajo se centra en las influencias positivas y negativas de la práctica educativa que los padres ejercen sobre el desarrollo de los niños con altas capacidades. El resultado de este estudio teórico muestra que las familias cuyas características esenciales están basadas en una dinámica de funcionamiento en la que priman la armonía y la coherencia se asocian tanto al desarrollo óptimo intelectual y de la autoestima como al adecuado funcionamiento emocional e intelectual. En contraste, las familias en las que la falta de coherencia y la existencia de una dinámica de funcionamiento caracterizada por bajos niveles de comunicación, afecto y control del comportamiento se asocian a la aparición de comportamientos de riesgo. De acuerdo con la literatura existente, las prácticas educativas más efectivas para el ajuste y bienestar de niños y adolescentes son las autoritativas. En el caso de los niños con altas capacidades, la mayoría de los padres se muestran acordes con estas prácticas de crianza aunque en algunos casos se han encontrado diferencias en las pautas de actuación de madres y padres. Los determinantes parentales que potencian el ajuste positivo de los hijos con altas capacidades son: nivel intelectual, nivel educativo y rendimiento académico alto, y en ausencia de estas características, interés de los padres hacia la educación y el aprendizaje.This paper focused on influence of parenting practice on gifted children´s development. The result of this study showed that harmony and coherent families are associated both to self-stem, effective intellectual development and social and emotional functioning. In contrast, family discord relates to risk behaviour. According to literature, the most effective parenting practice for children development is authoritative, In gifted children case, most of the parents showed educative patterns framed in the authoritative parenting style although in some cases it was found differences between mother and father. Parents determinants making possible positive adjustement in their gifted children are: high intellectual level, high school achievement and high level of school performance. In absence of this, parent´s high interest on education and learning act as a substitute of these last cognitive and educational characteristics.peerReviewe

First order transitions by conduction calorimetry: Application to deuterated potassium dihydrogen phosphate ferroelastic crystal under uniaxial pressure

The specific heat c and the heat power W exchanged by a Deuterated Potassium Dihydrogen Phosphate ferroelectric-ferroelastic crystal have been measured simultaneously for both decreasing and increasing temperature at a low constant rate (0.06 K/h) between 175 and 240 K. The measurements were carried out under controlled uniaxial stresses of 0.3 and 4.5±0.1 bar applied to face (110). At Tt=207.9 K, a first order transition is produced with anomalous specific heat behavior in the interval where the transition heat appears. This anomalous behavior is explained in terms of the temperature variation of the heat power during the transition. During cooling, the transition occurs with coexistence of phases, while during heating it seems that metastable states are reached. Excluding data affected by the transition heat, the specific heat behavior agrees with the predictions of a 2-4-6 Landau potential in the range of 4–15 K below Tt while logarithmic behavior is obtained in the range from Tt to 1 K below Tt. Data obtained under 0.3 and 4.5 bar uniaxial stresses exhibit the same behavior.Dirección General de Investigación Científica y Técnica. Gobierno de España-PB91-60

Parenting style: influence on gifted children psychological adjustment

Este trabajo se centra en las influencias positivas y negativas de la práctica educativa que los padres ejercen sobre el desarrollo de los niños con altas capacidades. El resultado de este estudio teórico muestra que las familias cuyas características esenciales están basadas en una dinámica de funcionamiento en la que priman la armonía y la coherencia se asocian tanto al desarrollo óptimo intelectual y de la autoestima como al adecuado funcionamiento emocional e intelectual. En contraste, las familias en las que la falta de coherencia y la existencia de una dinámica de funcionamiento caracterizada por bajos niveles de comunicación, afecto y control del comportamiento se asocian a la aparición de comportamientos de riesgo. De acuerdo con la literatura existente, las prácticas educativas más efectivas para el ajuste y bienestar de niños y adolescentes son las autoritativas. En el caso de los niños con altas capacidades, la mayoría de los padres se muestran acordes con estas prácticas de crianza aunque en algunos casos se han encontrado diferencias en las pautas de actuación de madres y padres. Los determinantes parentales que potencian el ajuste positivo de los hijos con altas capacidades son: nivel intelectual, nivel educativo y rendimiento académico alto, y en ausencia de estas características, interés de los padres hacia la educación y el aprendizaje.This paper focused on influence of parenting practice on gifted children´s development. The result of this study showed that harmony and coherent families are associated both to self-stem, effective intellectual development and social and emotional functioning. In contrast, family discord relates to risk behaviour. According to literature, the most effective parenting practice for children development is authoritative, In gifted children case, most of the parents showed educative patterns framed in the authoritative parenting style although in some cases it was found differences between mother and father. Parents determinants making possible positive adjustement in their gifted children are: high intellectual level, high school achievement and high level of school performance. In absence of this, parent´s high interest on education and learning act as a substitute of these last cognitive and educational characteristics.peerReviewe

Scoring rules and abnormally low bids criteria in construction tenders: a taxonomic review

In the global construction context, the best value or most economically advantageous tender is becoming a widespread approach for contractor selection, as an alternative to other traditional awarding criteria such as the lowest price. In these multi-attribute tenders, the owner or auctioneer solicits proposals containing both a price bid and additional technical features. Once the proposals are received, each bidder’s price bid is given an economic score according to a scoring rule, generally called an economic scoring formula (ESF) and a technical score according to pre-specified criteria. Eventually, the contract is awarded to the bidder with the highest weighted overall score (economic + technical). However, economic scoring formula selection by auctioneers is invariably and paradoxically a highly intuitive process in practice, involving few theoretical or empirical considerations, despite having been considered traditionally and mistakenly as objective, due to its mathematical nature. This paper provides a taxonomic classification of a wide variety of ESFs and abnormally low bids criteria (ALBC) gathered in several countries with different tendering approaches. Practical implications concern the optimal design of price scoring rules in construction contract tenders, as well as future analyses of the effects of the ESF and ALBC on competitive bidding behaviour

Making the most of pre-class assignments

When teaching a course, the lecturer or teaching instructor may need that students read some material before coming to the next face-to-face session. Counting on students that have done their assignments and that have done them well, allows the lecturer to make quicker and deeper progress in the contact session. It also raises motivation and allows devoting more time to hands-on practice rather than lecturing, the latter being a method that has proven to reach very low retention levels among students. However, getting the students to read and work on their assignments is easier said than done, and many lecturers feel compelled to set in-class tests and quizzes in order to lure the students to fulfil their homework tasks. However, in-class tests and quizzes are also time-expensive, both inside and outside the classroom, and they are not exempt of other disadvantages. In this paper, we will go over some methods that Teaching and Learning research has found to promote high levels of student understanding and retention, but that are generally too time-consuming to implement them on a regular basis. Also, drawing on the authors’ experience and other research studies, we will present some alternative methods that are almost as effective as the former but require significantly lower time resources

Economic scoring formulae in multi-Attribute construction auctions

Copyright © 2017 ISEC Press. Public tendering implies the free concurrence and competition of bidding companies that certify their solvency, so that those companies proposing the most attractive bid, both technically and economically, are awarded the contracts and carry them out according to the same terms and conditions that they proposed. Generally, there is high competition in public tendering, both concerning the number of bidders (constantly increasing), as well as the profit margin (constantly decreasing). On the other side, handling the procurement process, there is a contracting authority that spends public money while trying to fulfill a particular socio-economic objective. This paper will take the contracting authority's (auctioneer's) point of view which is in charge of devising and implementing the awarding criteria, as well as choosing the best bidder. Particularly, this paper will focus on some aspects of the Economic Scoring Formula (ESF) design. The ESF constitutes a set of mathematical expressions that transform the economic bids submitted by the bidders into scores, so that, eventually, the bidders can be ranked and the best one selected. We will conclude that, despite apparently simple, how ESF are configured eventually have profound consequences on bidding behavior and some bidding results, like a higher or lower bid dispersion

Explaining the Bayes' theorem graphically

The Bayes’ theorem on conditional probabilities is normally presented to students in introductory courses/modules on Statistics and Probability. This because most STEM students will make use of conditional probabilities in their professional lives with or without noticing. However, maybe because of the unfamiliar notation or because of the variety of ways in which this theorem can be formulated, most students have trouble understanding it. Moreover, when it comes to practical applications and problem exercises, most students (who have generally memorised its manifold ways of rearranging the conditional probabilities formula along with a few applications) struggle even more to come up with correct solutions. By means of a completely graphical approach, this paper presents an alternative way of explaining the Bayes’ theorem to STEM students. By means of diagrams and schematics the students can see the conditional probabilities represented as areas in a square. Simple geometric operations with these areas (additions and multiplications mostly) allow them, not just to understand this theorem far quicker, but to apply it confidently in almost any possible problem configuration. Overall, this paper offers an alternative or complementary way of explaining this important theorem more clearly to students that take probability courses by conveying it graphically instead of with the traditional mathematical formulae. Through a representative case study, this paper deals provides first-hand evidence about how confusing to understand the Bayes’ theorem might be at first even in simple problems, and how the understanding of this theorem is dramatically improved when presenting it graphically

Be prepared for your next 30-second T&L conversation

Many relevant bits of our social and professional interactions happen within a few seconds after starting conversations with someone else. Additionally, within the academia, lecturers are frequently exposed to student’s complaints or alternative points of view which may challenge the way Teaching and Learning (T&L) is being managed. However, students may not speak up when they are asked for feedback, but in out-of-context situations instead. At that moment, the (unprepared) lecturer needs to come up with a good answer. No postponement is allowed and, generally, this lecturer will just have around 30 seconds to go over his/her major points in a clear and comprehensible manner. This paper reviews the reasons why some innovative teaching methods generally cause some level of discomfort among the students. Examples about the usual complaints that they raise are also analysed. Finally, a series of short dialogues involving both peers and students as locutors and exemplifying how these conversations generally evolve are included. By means of these short dialogues the reader can better prepare him/herself for key T&L-related difficult conversations. Anticipating these conversations is relevant because they involve delicate issues about the way the instructor approaches innovative teaching and how the students perceive them. Therefore, this paper provides reflections and additional tools for new lecturers who try to implement T&L innovations and that have to deal with some opposition among the students