The importance of social worlds: an investigation of peer relationships [Wider Benefits of Learning Research Report No. 29]

In the following report, we investigate the developing social worlds in late primary school, exploring the patterns in children’s general peer relationships, their closer and more significant friendships and bullying behaviours. Using cluster analysis, we identify unique groups of children characterized not only by their experiences of bullying and victimization, but the support and satisfaction they receive from their friendships and interactions between the ages of 8 and 10. We also expand past research by examining how children’s early development (ages 3 to 4) may predict their later designation as bullies and/or victims, and whether peer clusters relate to children’s contemporaneous and later adjustment

Fluid surface behavior in low gravity. Center discretionary fund no. 83-21

Measurements of rotating equilibrium bubble shapes in the low-gravity environment of a free-falling aircraft are presented. Emphasis is placed on bubbles which intersect the container boundaries. These data are compared with theoretical profiles derived from Laplace's formula and are in good agreement with the measurements. Two types of instability are explored. The first occurs when the baffle spacing is too large for the bubble to intersect both the top and bottom boundaries. The second occurs when the hydrostatic pressure beneath a displaced free surface does not compensate for pressure change due to capillary forces. The interface shape depends on the contact angle, the radius of intersection with container, and the parameter F which is a measure of the relative importance of centrifugal force to surface tension. For isolated bubbles, F has a maximum value of 1/2. A further increase in F causes the bubble to break contact with the axis of rotation. For large values of F, the bubble becomes more cylindrical and the capillary rise occurs over a thinner layer so that the small radius of curvature can generate enough pressure drop to balance the increased hydrostatic contribution

The relationship of intrinsic, extrinsic, and quest religious orientations to Jungian psychological type among churchgoers in England and Wales

Employing the New Indices of Religious Orientation (NIRO), this study examines the theory that different religious orientations are related to individual differences in psychological type as developed by Carl Jung and operationalized by the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Data provided by 481 weekly churchgoing Christians who completed the MBTI and the NIRO demonstrated that quest religious orientation scores were higher among intuitives than among sensers, but were unrelated to introversion and extraversion, thinking and feeling, or judging and perceiving; that intrinsic religious orientation scores were higher among extraverts than introverts, higher among sensers than intuitives and higher among feelers than thinkers, but unrelated to judging and perceiving; and that extrinsic religious orientation scores were unrelated to any of the four components of psychological type. The findings relating to Jungian psychological type differences are applied in order to elucidate the psychological significance of extrinsic, intrinsic, and quest orientations to religion

Indirect effects of primary prey population dynamics on alternative prey

We develop a theory of generalist predation showing how alternative prey species are affected by changes in both mean abundance and variability (coefficient of variation) of their predator's primary prey. The theory is motivated by the indirect effects of cyclic rodent populations on ground-breeding birds, and developed through progressive analytic simplifications of an empirically-based model. It applies nonetheless to many other systems where primary prey have fast life-histories and can become locally superabundant, which facilitates impact on alternative prey species. In contrast to classic apparent competition theory based on symmetric interactions, our results suggest that predator effects on alternative prey should generally decrease with mean primary prey abundance, and increase with primary prey variability (low to high CV) - unless predators have strong aggregative responses, in which case these results can be reversed. Approximations of models including predator dynamics (general numerical response with possible delays) confirm these results but further suggest that negative temporal correlation between predator and primary prey is harmful to alternative prey. We find in general that predator numerical responses are crucial to predict the response of ecosystems to changes in key prey species exhibiting outbreaks, and extend the apparent competition/mutualism theory to asymmetric interactions

Her Time, His Time, or the Maid's Time: An Analysis of the Demand for Domestic Work

This paper analyzes households' demand for time inputs to domestic services, modeling simultaneously the decision to purchase services in the market and the time spent on weekend and weekday days by each partner on routine household chores. By focusing on cleaning, laundry, and ironing, we reduce the likelihood that preferences matter and increase the overlap with market services. Particular emphasis is placed on estimating the effects of prices, as captured by own and partner wages and the market price for domestic services. We exploit time-diary data for Great Britain and France, relying on cross-country comparisons to generalize our findings. The results indicate that prices strongly influence market purchases, and that maid service is a closer substitute for household time on weekends than weekdays, but is also correlated with 'her' weekday time. More generally, we find that women's wages have a stronger association with the inputs to domestic work than any other price measure.time use, domestic work, gender

Growth or decline in the Church of England during the decade of Evangelism: did the Churchmanship of the Bishop matter?

The Decade of Evangelism occupied the attention of the Church of England throughout the 1990s. The present study employs the statistics routinely published by the Church of England in order to assess two matters: the extent to which these statistics suggest that the 43 individual dioceses finished the decade in a stronger or weaker position than they had entered it and the extent to which, according to these statistics, the performance of dioceses led by bishops shaped in the Evangelical tradition differed from the performance of dioceses led by bishops shaped in the Catholic tradition. The data demonstrated that the majority of dioceses were performing less effectively at the end of the decade than at the beginning, in terms of a range of membership statistics, and that the rate of decline varied considerably from one diocese to another. The only exception to the trend was provided by the diocese of London, which experienced some growth. The data also demonstrated that little depended on the churchmanship of the diocesan bishop in shaping diocesan outcomes on the performance indicators employed in the study

GFFC experiment progress

Vibration, out-gas, and acoustic tests performed on the Geophysical Fluid Flow Cell (GFFC) instrument are reported. The slope of the 59 experiments to be performed by GFFC is outlined. Spacelab 3 crew training on the operation of the GFFC instrument is mentioned