Equivariant Degenerations of Plane Curve Orbits

In a series of papers, Aluffi and Faber computed the degree of the $GL_3$ orbit closure of an arbitrary plane curve. We attempt to generalize this to the equivariant setting by studying how orbits degenerate under some natural specializations, yielding a fairly complete picture in the case of plane quartics.Comment: 33 pages, comments welcom

EFFECTS OF COLLABORATION AND ISOMORPHIC MODELS ON TRANSFER: AN L2 WRITING INVESTIGATION

How can feedback become a productive resource for students? Much of the research investigating the role of feedback in second language (L2) writing has set out to find an answer to this question. Based on the principle that feedback is given to students as a means of providing useful information to improve their writing (Bitchener, 2008, 2009; Hanaoka & Izumi, 2012), the discussion on feedback includes the idea that learners will transfer knowledge from feedback to improve subsequent writing (Hyland, 1998; Storch & Wigglesworth, 2010). When learners apply feedback to their subsequent writing, they are using collected knowledge, which is the essence of learning transfer (Schwartz, Bransford, & Sears, 2005). Unfortunately, no method of writing feedback has been deemed the frontrunner for improving learner texts (Ferris & Roberts, 2001; Hyland & Hyland, 2006; Storch & Wigglesworth, 2010) or for helping learners transfer writing knowledge across writing situations (James, 2006a,b, 2008, 2009, 2010). While this outlook may seem bleak for writing instructors, recent research provides evidence for presenting learners with expert models as a fruitful way of offering feedback

Repression and relief: Mood and cardiovascular changes following threat, thinking about threat, and threat removal for repressors and nonrepressors

Do persons who typically deny their feelings of anxiety also deny relief when a threatening situation ends? Can such persons create relief in themselves by reconsidering the threat and their resources to cope with the threat? The present study sought to answer these questions and to explore more generally the experiential and cardiovascular nature of emotional relief that emerges from coping with the presence of a threat and then realizing that a threat is no longer present. Preselected in terms of whether or not they typically deny feelings of anxiety ( repressive coping style ), 141 college students participated in two series of manipulations designed to be threatening and then non-threatening. In one series of manipulations, students took a bogus Psychological Sensitivity Test, received computerized feedback that they failed the test, participated in a writing task in which they either wrote about their test performance (experimental condition) or wrote about a typical day in their lives (control condition), and then received feedback that their first test evaluation was incorrect and they had actually passed the test. In the second series of manipulations, students were informed that they had been randomly selected for a (bogus) security check, in which their research credits would be revoked if they did not properly identify themselves on an ambiguous identification task--a task which all subjects did, in fact, pass. During both series of manipulations, heart rate and blood pressure were recorded, and after each manipulation, self-reported mood was assessed. I predicted that, compared to nonrepressors, repressors would exhibit less cardiovascular relaxation while writing about their failure and they would report less relief after success on the bogus test and after passing the security check. As it turned out, repressors\u27 and nonrepressors\u27 cardiovascular responses during the experimental writing task were not significantly different from each other or from cardiovascular activity during the control task. In contrast to nonrepressors, repressors reported more relief following success and (nonsignificantly) less relief after passing the security check. These and other findings suggest that the security check may have been more effective than the test evaluations at eliciting anxiety and relief

Delving Too Greedily: Analyzing Prejudice Against Tolkien\u27s Dwarves as Historical Bias

Tolkien\u27s writings are imbued with the perspectives of their narrators and within them, the narrators\u27 biases. This is most evident in the bias against the dwarves, particularly in the third age. Dismissing testimonials from neutral sources and dwarves alike, scholars have continuously inaccurately treated the anti-dwarf bias as a criticism of the Dwarves’ relationship with nature. The criticisms levelled by scholars have led to the dwarves being dismissed as particularly environmentally destructive, a direct contradiction to how the dwarves interact with natural spaces and how they construct their own. Consequently, a more nuanced reading of the dwarves lends itself to the dismantling of the negative prejudices and stereotypes levied against the Dwarves and offers them a more just treatment in their own history