A comparative analysis of the goal orientation and test anxiety of high school students with and without private tutors

The purpose of the study was to find out whether the goal orientation and test anxiety of high school students engaged in shadow education will be different from those whose only source of learning is that of mainstream education. A total of 387 high school students participated in this comparative research. They completed the Patterns of Adaptive Learning Scales and the Test Anxiety Inventory and results show that high school students without exposure to shadow education are more mastery-oriented while those with those with private tutors are more performance-oriented. In terms of test anxiety, it appears that those engaged in shadow education are more anxious about the testing process as compared to those without private tutors. Specifically, significant differences between the two groups were observed in their mastery orientation, level of emotionality and total test anxiety

In vitro interactions between probiotic bacteria and milk proteins probed by atomic force microscopy

International audienceInteractions between microbial cells and milk proteins are important for cell location into dairy matrices. In this study, interactions between two probiotic strains, Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG and Lactobacillus rhamnosus GR-1, and milk proteins (micellar casein, native and denatured whey proteins) were studied. The bacterial surface characterization was realized with X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) to evaluate surface composition (in terms of proteins, polysaccharides and lipid-like compounds) and electrophoretic mobility that provide information on surface charge of both bacteria and proteins along the 3-7 pH range. In addition, atomic force microscopy (AFM) enabled the identification of specific interactions between bacteria and whey proteins, in contrast to the observed nonspecific interactions with micellar casein. These specific events appeared to be more important for the GG strain than for the GR-1 strain, showing that matrix interaction is strain-specific. Furthermore, our study highlighted that in addition to the nature of the strains, many other factors influence the bacterial interaction with dairy matrix including the nature of the proteins and the pH of the media