Revisiting the relationship between attributional style and academic performance

Previous research into the relationship between attributions and academic performance has produced contradictory findings that have not been resolved. The present research examines the role of specific dimensions of attributional style in predicting subsequent academic performance in a sample of pupils (N = 979) from both high- and low-achieving schools. Hierarchical regression and moderation analyses indicate that internal, stable, and global, attributional styles for positive events predict higher levels of academic performance. Global attributions for negative events were related to poorer performance across all schools. Stable attributions for negative events were related to higher levels of performance in high-achieving schools but not in low-achieving schools. Higher levels of internality for negative events were associated with higher performance only in low achieving schools

The Influence of a Nutrition Education Program on Preschool Children

A study on the influence of nutrition education experiences was conducted in the Child Development Preschool Laboratory at Southern Utah State College in Cedar City, Utah, with thirty-two preschool children. Sixteen of the children were exposed to nutrition experiences through food activities and stories. It was found that the sixteen children who were involved in the fifteen nutrition experiences significantly increased their knowledge of nutrition concepts and further modified their own personal food choices. The control group, which was not exposed to nutrition activities, made no significant change in knowledge of nutrition concepts and no modification of personal food choices. The findings also indicated that there was no significant difference between girls and boys in their ability to learn nutrition concepts. However, there appeared to be some slight sex differences in the modification of personal food choices

Demetrius Johnson and the Weep of the World: A Novel

Demetrius Johnson and the Weep of the World is a middle-grade, dark fantasy novel for readers eight to thirteen years old. The novel uses dark fantasy elements as allegory to render grief’s lived experience. The novel’s protagonist is Demetrius, a ten-year-old who has lost his mother to cancer and is struggling to cope. Demetrius’s grief emerges as the novel’s primary journey, beginning six months after Mama’s death as Demetrius and his father move to rural Virginia to live with family. Upon arrival at his grandmother’s house, Demetrius meets the novel’s antagonist—a promise-peddling inventor named Meraux the Magic Man, who claims that Dee’s mother is not gone but lost and that he has just the gadgets to find her. Using steampunk-horror details, Meraux is grief personified, imagining grief as a force that spontaneously exerts itself upon the bereaved. Demetrius takes Meraux’s bargain and is hurtled into his ashen wasteland, the World In Between, where Dee discovers the lie and magical thinking embedded in Meraux’s promise. Building upon the work of scholar Marta Bladek and writer Joan Didion, I render grief as a fantasy setting on macro and micro levels. First, grief’s spatiality is rendered as the larger invented fantasy world of the novel, the World In Between, a place where bereaved people are stuck in time, space, and grief. Secondly, the novel’s scenes are constructed as individual landscapes representing different emotional affects and atmospheres of grief. In these spaces, Demetrius discovers a multicultural band of trapped bereaved people fighting to survive. The residents of Mourning Star warn Demetrius that Meraux doesn’t just feed off grief, but that Meraux is building the Grief Eater, a machine to weep the waking world, and Demetrius is the perfect fuel. Demetrius must join the bereaved’s ranks to stop Meraux, destroy the machine, and find a way home. Through this journey, the novel develops a kaleidoscope of non-Eurocentric mourning beliefs through the characters of Ellie, Raida, Aharon, and Nii. This exploration develops a theme of grief as a unifying force, wherein the bereaved through shared experience can heal via community

Equality, diversity and prejudice in Britain: results from the 2005 National Survey

Britain is an increasingly diverse and multifaceted society. Consequently, manifestations of inequality, prejudice and discrimination are potentially becoming more varied and complex. The meaning of equality itself is a matter of considerable debate. Perceptions, attitudes, stereotypes and emotions permeate social relationships between groups, whether conflictual or harmonious. How are different groups perceived? How do images of different groups map onto prejudice? To what extent do people experience prejudice directed against themselves? There is increasing interest in whether Britain is becoming a more or less tolerant, accepting or indeed coherent society. This report describes the findings of a survey which employed social psychological methods and measures to assess a range of different aspects of prejudice towards six significant groups in British society – defined by gender, age, ethnicity, sexuality, disability and religion. The report examines the values people espouse, their experiences, and their expressions of prejudice, the extent that ‘political correctness’ may affect expressions of prejudice, the social stereotypes underpinning prejudice, whether prejudice is expressed differently towards different types of group, and the extent to which British society is perceived as a cohesive whole or as being formed of distinct and separate groups. It also explores whether prejudice is predominantly an issue of personal attitudes or whether it is rooted more in the relationships between particular social groups

Developing a national barometer of prejudice and discrimination in Britain

This is the first national survey of prejudice for over a decade. It measures prejudice and discrimination in Britain experienced by people with a wide range of protected characteristics: age, disability, race, sex, religion or belief, sexual orientation, pregnancy and maternity, and gender reassignment. Our report demonstrates the value of using a national survey of this type to measure prejudice and discrimination in Britain and to set out a benchmark for future surveys. The purpose of this research is to help establish a national ‘barometer’ for monitoring changes in the attitudes and experiences of the general population. We were commissioned by the Equality and Human Rights Commission to design and run a national survey of prejudice, using a consistent set of measures across a range of protected characteristics. We surveyed 2,853 adults in Britain using the NatCen Panel surveys and carried out an additional survey to target minority groups that may otherwise not be well represented in the survey. Our approach provides new insights into the form and prevalence of prejudice and discrimination in Britain. Measuring these issues in a consistent way across protected characteristics groups and across England, Scotland and Wales, gives us a uniquely recent and comparable overview. It enables us to look across a range of measures to paint a meaningful picture of the prejudice affecting a particular protected characteristic, rather than looking at individual measures on their own. Although it does not yet provide a picture of prejudice and discrimination for all protected characteristics – which would require a larger and further-developed survey – it sets out a workable model for a future national instrument for monitoring these issues in Britain. This report provides an overview of what we have found out about people’s experiences and expressions of prejudice in Britain

Developing a national barometer of prejudice and discrimination in Britain

This is the first national survey of prejudice in Britain for over a decade. It measures prejudice and discrimination experienced by people with a wide range of protected characteristics. The aim of this report is to demonstrate the value of using a national survey of this type to measure people’s experiences of prejudice in Britain, as well as people’s attitudes towards others. It also aims to set a benchmark for future surveys. The research was designed by Professor Dominic Abrams and Dr Hannah Swift from the Centre for the Study of Group Processes, University of Kent, and Professor Diane Houston from Birkbeck, University of London. It was conducted by the National Centre for Social Research

Predictors of placement from a juvenile detention facility

The purpose of this project was to determine whether certain personal, socioeconomic, and court-related factors are significantly related to the differential placement of delinquent and dependent children from the detention facility at the Donald E. Long Home. A stratified random sample was composed of 173 placements of children who were held in detention after a preliminary hearing. The review of literature revealed that little systematic. Information is known regarding the placement process as it is related to differential placement of children from a detention facility. A code sheet was developed for recording the information in the children’s records maintained by the court. Fourteen variables were ultimately selected for analysis of their relationship to differential placement. These variables were subjected to three statistical approaches; a descriptive analysis of the random sample, testing of the significance of each variable to the alternatives in placement by either Chi square or analyses of variance, and testing of several variables in combination by discriminant function. This study was limited by the fact that only demographic variables were tested. Although three individual variables were found to have a high degree of significance in relation to placement, the data as produced within the scope of this research project does not provide an effective placement profile. The need for additional research in the area of the differential placement process is clearly indicated. Suggestions are made for future research

Combining motherhood and work: effects of dual identity and identity conflict on well-being

This study investigated whether having a dual identity as both a mother and an employed person constitutes a threat to well-being, or whether it is a positive resource. The study focused on indices of life satisfaction and self-esteem. A convenience sample of 208 mothers were exposed to a manipulation of identity conflict, whereby we manipulated whether working mothers perceived their identities as a mother and an employed person to be in conflict with each other or not. It was hypothesized that generally having multiple identities (as an employee and a mother) would be positively associated with well-being, that perceived identity conflict would have a negative impact on well-being, and that identity conflict would exacerbate the negative effects of identity-related stressors on well-being. Results supported these predictions. The applied implication is that policies that enable mothers to work will be conducive to maternal well-being, but that the policies must minimize conflict between demands associated with employment and parental responsibilities

NON-PHARMACEUTICAL TREATMENT OF DEPRESSION USING A MULTIMODAL APPROACH

One hundred forty-one individuals suffering from chronic depression, unresponsive to previous drug therapy, were treated with a 44-hour program of education, Cranial Electrical Stimulation (CES), Brain Wave Synchronization (BWS), musical conditioning, and a mentally programmed quartz or glass "crystal" randomly assigned with therapists and patients blinded to the crystal's composition. Eighty· four percent of the depressed patients were improved at the end of two weeks of therapy, apparently as a result of the multimodal therapy and group interaction. The results at three months follow-up suggest a positive subtle energy effect of quartz: 70% of the depressed patients who received quartz remained improved, while only 31.5% of the depressed patients receiving glass remained improved. These differences are highly statistically significant. It appears that mentally "programmed" quartz may offer a significant reinforcement to allow patients better long-term recovery than would occur with placebo (glass). The cost effectiveness of such a therapeutic approach is significant. Other therapists are encouraged to replicate these studies