Information Literacy and the Transition from High School to College

What expectations should college librarians have concerning the information literacy skills of incoming freshmen? This has been a recurring question among college librarians for years. The complementary question for high school librarians is: what do colleges expect freshmen to know in order to be effective researchers? AASL and ACRL have published information literacy standards, and have worked cooperatively to encourage communication between high school and college librarians. Have these efforts been successful? In this article, the authors share information about their research study exploring whether a gap exists between high school and college expectations related to information literacy. The authors conducted a study of Catholic high school librarians in Minnesota and neighboring states during the 2009‐10 school year. They conducted a survey and interviews with the librarians and gathered information about the reference resources available (print and online) and the information literacy skills of high school students, especially seniors. The hypotheses of the study include: Larger schools (over 500 enrollment) are more likely to have: 1) a full‐time media specialist able to develop collections and programs; 2) more comprehensive reference collections and more online resources; 3) a formal curriculum for information literacy instruction; and 4) students receiving a formal curriculum will rank higher in information literacy skill levels. The researchers found that the size of the student body is not the critical factor for a successful IL program. Regardless of the size of the school or library staff, the key factor for success according to the data is the integration of the librarian and IL concepts into a few key core courses. The interviews revealed that it is important for the librarian to have general knowledge of what is taught in various classes, as well as knowledge of specific assignments with a research component. It is evident from the librarians’ comments that it is crucial for the librarian to have a flexible schedule in order to accommodate working with students and teachers. Librarians in the study reported much higher interaction rates with the students when computers and other technologies, including special software and smartboards, are located in an adjacent lab or in the library itself

Developmental considerations in children’s song exposure: A commentary on Verosky (2022)

In this commentary, I discuss Verosky’s article, “Essen as a Corpus of Early Musical Experience” from my position as a developmental psychologist. I consider how Verosky’s findings connect to what is known about early cognitive development, discuss how the corpus fits into efforts to characterize early environments, and raise questions for future study

Body sway predicts romantic interest in speed dating

Social bonding is fundamental to human society, and romantic interest involves an important type of bonding. Speed dating research paradigms offer both high external validity and experimental control for studying romantic interest in real-world settings. While previous studies focused on the effect of social and personality factors on romantic interest, the role of non-verbal interaction has been little studied in initial romantic interest, despite being commonly viewed as a crucial factor. The present study investigated whether romantic interest can be predicted by non-verbal dyadic interactive body sway, and enhanced by movement-promoting (‘groovy’) background music. Participants’ body sway trajectories were recorded during speed dating. Directional (predictive) body sway coupling, but not body sway similarity, predicted interest in a long-term relationship above and beyond rated physical attractiveness. In addition, presence of groovy background music promoted interest in meeting a dating partner again. Overall, we demonstrate that romantic interest is reflected by non-verbal body sway in dyads in a real-world dating setting. This novel approach could potentially be applied to investigate non-verbal aspects of social bonding in other dynamic interpersonal interactions such as between infants and parents and in non-verbal populations including those with communication disorders.Peer reviewe

Quantifying sources of variability in infancy research using the infant-directed-speech preference

Psychological scientists have become increasingly concerned with issues related to methodology and replicability, and infancy researchers in particular face specific challenges related to replicability: For example, high-powered studies are difficult to conduct, testing conditions vary across labs, and different labs have access to different infant populations. Addressing these concerns, we report on a large-scale, multisite study aimed at (a) assessing the overall replicability of a single theoretically important phenomenon and (b) examining methodological, cultural, and developmental moderators. We focus on infants’ preference for infant-directed speech (IDS) over adult-directed speech (ADS). Stimuli of mothers speaking to their infants and to an adult in North American English were created using seminaturalistic laboratory-based audio recordings. Infants’ relative preference for IDS and ADS was assessed across 67 laboratories in North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia using the three common methods for measuring infants’ discrimination (head-turn preference, central fixation, and eye tracking). The overall meta-analytic effect size (Cohen’s d) was 0.35, 95% confidence interval = [0.29, 0.42], which was reliably above zero but smaller than the meta-analytic mean computed from previous literature (0.67). The IDS preference was significantly stronger in older children, in those children for whom the stimuli matched their native language and dialect, and in data from labs using the head-turn preference procedure. Together, these findings replicate the IDS preference but suggest that its magnitude is modulated by development, native-language experience, and testing procedure. (This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 798658.

Quantifying Sources of Variability in Infancy Research Using the Infant-Directed-Speech Preference

Psychological scientists have become increasingly concerned with issues related to methodology and replicability, and infancy researchers in particular face specific challenges related to replicability: For example, high-powered studies are difficult to conduct, testing conditions vary across labs, and different labs have access to different infant populations. Addressing these concerns, we report on a large-scale, multisite study aimed at (a) assessing the overall replicability of a single theoretically important phenomenon and (b) examining methodological, cultural, and developmental moderators. We focus on infants’ preference for infant-directed speech (IDS) over adult-directed speech (ADS). Stimuli of mothers speaking to their infants and to an adult in North American English were created using seminaturalistic laboratory-based audio recordings. Infants’ relative preference for IDS and ADS was assessed across 67 laboratories in North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia using the three common methods for measuring infants’ discrimination (head-turn preference, central fixation, and eye tracking). The overall meta-analytic effect size (Cohen’s d) was 0.35, 95% confidence interval = [0.29, 0.42], which was reliably above zero but smaller than the meta-analytic mean computed from previous literature (0.67). The IDS preference was significantly stronger in older children, in those children for whom the stimuli matched their native language and dialect, and in data from labs using the head-turn preference procedure. Together, these findings replicate the IDS preference but suggest that its magnitude is modulated by development, native-language experience, and testing procedure

Life in the Slow Lane: An Autoethnography of Identity Development Following Disability in Young Adulthood

The purpose of this manuscript is to view, through an autoethnographic lens, the role of adult education, distance education, and assistive technology on identity changes that take place when becoming disabled in young adulthood within the context of internal and external forces on the development of identity. Constructs were used to delineate the evolutionary sense of one’s identity which includes: (1) once formed, one’s sense of identity is relatively stable; (2) environmental variables and constraints will create shifts in identity; and (3) internal drives, abilities, and motivations play an important role in the evolution of identity. Each of these constructs was then examined at different levels of identity that included one’s Public Identity, Private Identity, Personal Identity, and Self Identity. Information was gathered through a number of personal narratives and historical documents that could then be viewed through the lens of the constructs above. By examining these constructs, findings indicated that successfully rebuilding identity after acquiring a serious disability was greatly influenced by strong supports and opportunities available and the internal capacity to make use of them. There was no one specific support that was the only catalyst in this rebuilding. Instead, the complete network of support including adult education, distance education, social supports, and family support was at the heart of successfully rebuilding identity.Minnesota Department of Vocational RehabilitationNorth Dakota State Board of Higher Educatio