The Potential of Serious Games as Mental Health Treatment

Abstract Video games deserve to be readily recognized as a means of assisting people in healthcare settings. This paper proposes a simple taxonomy for serious games that function as mental health treatment: 1) Informative Game Playing; 2) Therapeutic Game Designing; and 3) Therapeutic Game Playing. These three categories are explained and examples of games from each category are included, as well as corresponding research when applicable. The process of elaborating on this taxonomy elucidates the capabilities of serious games and also emphasizes areas for design improvement as well as further clinical research. Several controversies and unresolved issues surrounding video game research are discussed. Keywords: video game, art therapy, serious game, gamification, mental health, mental disorder, treatment, games for health, games for chang

Challenges and Issues in the Evaluation of Teaching Quality:How Does it Affect Teachers' Professional Practice? A UK Perspective

Evaluation of the quality of higher education is undertaken for the purposes of ensuring accountability, accreditation, and improvement, all of which are highly relevant to veterinary teaching institutions in the current economic climate. If evaluation is to drive change, it needs to be able to influence teaching practice. This article reviews the literature relating to evaluation of teaching quality in higher education with a particular focus on teachers' professional practice. Student evaluation and peer observation of teaching are discussed as examples of widely used evaluation processes. These approaches clearly have the potential to influence teachers' practice. Institutions should strive to ensure the development of a supportive culture that prioritizes teaching quality while being aware of any potential consequences related to cost, faculty time, or negative emotional responses that might result from the use of different evaluation methods. </jats:p

The Language of Luxury, the Luxury of Language

As a common part of everyday speech, the meaning of the word ‘luxury’ has been eroded and devalued over time. Nonetheless, it continues to have impact as an element of luxury branding through its deployment across various media, due to its historical associations with wealth, exclusivity and status. Accordingly, the word  ‘luxury’, has been employed/deployed both historically and in contemporary contexts, as part of an economic system, including its use in advertising campaigns, point of sale and in everyday parlance, to denote ideas of intrinsic value (whether existent or not). Meanwhile as this short article proposes, beyond these pragmatic applications, language itself might be thought of as a form of  ‘luxury’; something with a worth that surpasses any functional need: something excess or surplus; something unnecessary, but desirable. This notion of luxury can be found in language as a medium, one which we often use indiscriminately, and without regard for its beauty, scarcity and true value. Contemplating the various affordances of language, and the economies of language, where ‘economy’ is not posed as a financial system, but as a way of thinking and acting within any system, allows us to see languages’ intrinsic worth. Via five separate thought experiments/examples, ranging from Oulipo-like games of linguistic restraint, through Fahrenheit 451, and finally to the ways in which technologies are rendering language as a luxury. In the end this article proposes that we might think of the luxury of language itself, as something which is far from excess or shallow, but possessing intrinsic value; returning us to the true meaning of the term ‘luxury’, which we have (arguably), forgotten

Speech perception & language change in old & middle English

An analysis of* methods and models in historical ling¬ uistics: specifically, the utilization of speech perception methodology with respect to the evolution of the structure which in modern English denotes progressive aspect

The Entelechial Thinker in Space: ‘Worlds within Worlds’ in Durrell, Flaubert, and Carroll

This thesis argues that the interior space of each individual mind has infinite potentiality to do or create x new reality in one’s life via possible worlds. I use Lawrence Durrell’s short story “Zero” (1939), Gustave Flaubert’s “Un coeur simple” (1877), and Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) as literary representations of how readers outside of the literary text share an unbreakable bond with universal space. I discuss the infinite potentiality of the finite being, and the experiential data in the process of entelechy, or epistemological maturation of the mind. I bring Leibniz’s theory of the continuum of infinitesimals and Henri Bergson’s metaphysics of duration and consciousness into the argument to advance the premise that the only limiting factor on the mind’s ability to shape its own actual world environment via possible-world ideation is the mind itself

Factors Affecting the Accuracy of Eyewitness Identification

In lieu of an abstract, below is the article\u27s first paragraph. We\u27ve all experienced, at one time or another, our own memories failing us at times, and this may have been due to a number of factors. Perhaps the issue at hand was not important to us at the time, and therefore we devoted little attention to it. But imagine being in the scenario Wells (1993) suggests in the following passage: Suppose that you were an eyewitness to a crime. Perhaps it was a theft, a burglary, a mugging, a drive-by shooting, or a robbery. You might or might not have known that a crime was being committed at the time; perhaps you saw someone exit a building that exploded a short time later. Perhaps you were the victim or perhaps you were a bystander. Regardless of the circumstances, there exists some memory trace, however strong or weak, that could have important consequences for the course of justice. Because you have seen the culprit, the police ask you to give a description. Later, perhaps only hours or perhaps months later, you are called to the police station to attempt an identification of the culprit. You are then shown a lineup or a photo spread and asked to indicate whether the person you saw on that fateful occasion is one of the people standing or pictured before you on this day. (p. 553) Many factors influence the accuracy of recall and identity of a face, some of which we have little to no control over. Given the right conditions, these factors will influence how one\u27s memory recalls the specific features that make one face distinct from another

The Effects of Purposeful Physical Activity on Student Concentration in a Montessori Children’s House

The purpose of this action research was to determine the impact of purposeful gross-motor movements on student concentration in a Montessori Children’s House. The intervention took place over a period of eight weeks in a private Montessori school in a “Children’s House” of 20 primary aged children (ages 2.5 to 6). Data was collected using hourly observations of the concentration levels of the class as a whole prior to and after implementation; tally sheets reflecting daily use of movement materials, daily reflective journals, and interviews with the children. Results show concentration levels were positively affected by the use of the movement materials. Although there was not much change observed, the intervention appeared to help concentration levels remain more consistent throughout the work period. Further research might include the effects of movement materials on comprehension and decreasing undesirable classroom behaviors