A Comparative Study of Selected Personality Characteristics of Students Who Cheat and Do Not Cheat in an Academic Situation

The purpose of this study was to determine if there were significant personality differences between students who cheat in a given academic situation and students who do not cheat in the same situation. This was examined in terms of manifest needs, personality structure, and certain attitudes and values relative to the circumstances and setting in which the behavior occurred. The sample studied consisted of 64 students, classified into 8 groups, from a class of 198 students enrolled in Psychology 213, Educational Psychology, at the University of North Dakota during the spring semester of the 1965--66 academic year. The students were given the opportunity to grade their own hour examination and to report their grade on it, after it had been scored unknown to them by an IBM test scoring process. The eight groups were established according to cheating behavior, sex, and instructor. Cheaters were defined as students whose self-reported scores on an hour examination were higher by two or more points than the grade reported for them on the same examination by a Data Processing examination grading system. Non-cheaters were defined as students whose two grades, self-reported and Data Processing reported, were identical. Manifest needs, personality structure, and attitudes and values examined were measured respectively by the scales of the Edwards Personal Preference Schedule (EPPS), the Minnesota Counseling Inventory (MCI), and a Semantic Differential (SD). A three-way analysis of variance program and an IBM 1620 computer were utilized for analysis of the data. The major findings were that no significant differences between groups occurred on twenty of the scales of the instruments used -- the EPPS, MCI, and a SD. Of the scales yielding significant differences, the Achievement scale of the EPPS and the Mood scale of the MCI discriminated between cheaters and non-cheaters regardless of sex or instructor. Cheaters had a lower need for achievement as measured by the EPPS and a higher score on the Mood scale of the MCI, in the direction of pessimism. A trait psychology dichotomization of individual behavior along a cheating and non-cheating continuum is incomplete and inappropriate for considering the dynamics of moral behavior. There are two identifiable groups of students in the classroom, those who never consider cheating and those for whom cheating is an acceptable alternative depending on the situation. The discriminating variables between these groups are achievement need as measured by the EPPS and mood as measured by the MCI, non-cheaters having a higher need for achievement and a higher score (more pessimistic mood) on the M scale than cheaters

B754: Adolescent Pregnancies in Maine: A Demographic Analysis

Information concerning teenage pregnancy in Maine is limited. Published data have been incomplete and fail to provide for adequately planning specific health and/or educational programs. This research was designed to examine data pertaining to fertility patterns of women 19 years of age and younger in Maine by county, by city, by age of mother, and by birth order of child.https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/aes_bulletin/1069/thumbnail.jp

Explorations, Vol. 2, No. 1

Cover: The painting reproduced on the cover is a 22” by 30” acrylic on paper entitled Passage-10, by James Linehan, Assistant Professor of Art at the University of Maine at Orono, where he teaches painting. ©James Linehan, 1985. Articles include: Polyunsaturated Fats: are they killing us? by Linda J. Kling Where are the Dreamers: aspirations of Maine\u27s rural high school students, by Robert A. Cobb, Walter G. McIntire, and Philip A. Pratt Elsewhere in Education: a research sampler \u22Physical Education and Handicapped Children, Stephen A. Butterfield School Climate and Teacher Efficacy, Theodore Coadarci The Principal Principle, Gordon A. Donaldson, Jr. Assessing Leadership, Ronald L. Sparkes Malnutrition in Maine, by Richard A. Cook Hypertension: aging and intellect, by Merrill F. Elias and Michael Robbins From Campus to Public Schools A Ceiling on Shelter, by Peggy K. Schomaker From the Dispatch Case: Control of Cell Growth at the Level of the Genetic Code, by R.D. Blake In the Spring issue of EXPLORATIONS: The sure but silent force in American foreign policy in post World War II Japan—Harry F. Ker

Activation of an NLRP3 Inflammasome Restricts Mycobacterium kansasii Infection

Mycobacterium kansasii has emerged as an important nontuberculous mycobacterium pathogen, whose incidence and prevalence have been increasing in the last decade. M. kansasii can cause pulmonary tuberculosis clinically and radiographically indistinguishable from that caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection. Unlike the widely-studied M. tuberculosis, little is known about the innate immune response against M. kansasii infection. Although inflammasome activation plays an important role in host defense against bacterial infection, its role against atypical mycobacteria remains poorly understood. In this report, the role of inflammasome activity in THP-1 macrophages against M. kansasii infection was studied. Results indicated that viable, but not heat-killed, M. kansasii induced caspase-1-dependent IL-1β secretion in macrophages. The underlying mechanism was found to be through activation of an inflammasome containing the NLR (Nod-like receptor) family member NLRP3 and the adaptor protein ASC (apoptosis-associated speck-like protein containing a CARD). Further, potassium efflux, lysosomal acidification, ROS production and cathepsin B release played a role in M. kansasii-induced inflammasome activation. Finally, the secreted IL-1β derived from caspase-1 activation was shown to restrict intracellular M. kansasii. These findings demonstrate a biological role for the NLRP3 inflammasome in host defense against M. kansasii

Gender, urbanicity, and ability

This paper presents the results of an analysis of the relative contributions of gender and urbanicity in explaining variability among high school students on six measures of academic achievement and cognitive functioning. When adjustments for·SES were made, gender and urbanicity independently accounted for little variance on these measures. The High School and Beyond data base (1980)(1981)(1982) was utilized. Implications for rural educators and future research are suggested. Psychologists have long investigated differences between males and females on such variables as aptitude, academic achievement, and personality (8, 9,11). While gender differences have been declining over recent decades (3, 7), their magnitude has been found to vary by site and context (4). Interestingly, urbanicity is a context variable that remains to be examined in this regard. That is, does the magnitude of gender differences on various ability measures depend on whether subjects are from urban, suburban, or rural contexts? The present study was designed to address this question. Specifically, we examined the relative contributions of gender and context in explaining variability among high school students on measures of vocabulary, reading comprehension, mathematics, perceptual discrimination, paired-associate memory, and spatial reasoning. Method We employed the High School and Beyond (HSB) data base, a nationally representative sample of high school seniors in 1980 (10), HSB subjects were drawn from the 11,995 students who composed the 1980 senior cohort and participated in the 1982 follow-up study. The N for these analyses varied from 9,849 to 10,064, depending on the variables involved. We conducted all analyses with a modified HSB sampling weight in effect. For each subject, the HSB weight for the 1980 senior cohort, BYWT, was divided by the mean BYWT for these subjects to create the modified weight. This modified weight corrects for oversampling while preserving the sample size. For these weighted data, 48.4% of the students were male and 51.6% were female. Regarding context, 20.0%, 49.4%, and 30.6% of these students were attending urban, suburban, and rural schools, respectively. The ability measures are briefly described here. For more detailed discussion of these measures and their psychometric properties, see Heyns and Hilton (6). Vocabulary, which had 27 items, measured vocabulary through a synonym format. Reading was a 20-item test of reading comprehension. Mathematics had 33 items that called for quantitative comparisons. Mosaic Comparisons, an 89-item test, assessed the speed and accuracy with which one makes perceptual discriminations. PictureNumber was a paired-associate memory test containing 15 items. Finally, Visualization comprised 16 items asking one to visualize the shape a flat surface would assume if folded in a specified manner. Results Our discussion below focused on the magnitude of the results, rather than their statistical significance. Indeed, with Ns ranging from 9,849 to 10,064, even trivial correlations or mean differences can be statistically significant. Means, standard deviations, and intercorrelations are presented in To assess the relative contributions of gender and context for explaining variability in each of the six ability measures, we performed on each measure a two (gender) by three (context) analysis of covariance where socioeconomic status (SES) served as the covariate. Instead of merely examining the statistical significance of each variance component, we determined the proportion of the total sum of squares in each measure that wa

Continent-wide tree fecundity driven by indirect climate effects

Indirect climate effects on tree fecundity that come through variation in size and growth (climate-condition interactions) are not currently part of models used to predict future forests. Trends in species abundances predicted from meta-analyses and species distribution models will be misleading if they depend on the conditions of individuals. Here we find from a synthesis of tree species in North America that climate-condition interactions dominate responses through two pathways, i) effects of growth that depend on climate, and ii) effects of climate that depend on tree size. Because tree fecundity first increases and then declines with size, climate change that stimulates growth promotes a shift of small trees to more fecund sizes, but the opposite can be true for large sizes. Change the depresses growth also affects fecundity. We find a biogeographic divide, with these interactions reducing fecundity in the West and increasing it in the East. Continental-scale responses of these forests are thus driven largely by indirect effects, recommending management for climate change that considers multiple demographic rates.ISSN:2041-172

Continent-wide tree fecundity driven by indirect climate effects.

Indirect climate effects on tree fecundity that come through variation in size and growth (climate-condition interactions) are not currently part of models used to predict future forests. Trends in species abundances predicted from meta-analyses and species distribution models will be misleading if they depend on the conditions of individuals. Here we find from a synthesis of tree species in North America that climate-condition interactions dominate responses through two pathways, i) effects of growth that depend on climate, and ii) effects of climate that depend on tree size. Because tree fecundity first increases and then declines with size, climate change that stimulates growth promotes a shift of small trees to more fecund sizes, but the opposite can be true for large sizes. Change the depresses growth also affects fecundity. We find a biogeographic divide, with these interactions reducing fecundity in the West and increasing it in the East. Continental-scale responses of these forests are thus driven largely by indirect effects, recommending management for climate change that considers multiple demographic rates