Conceptualizing and measuring the life space and its relation to openness to experience

The Life Space is divided into four domains that surround personality, which broadly encompass a person\u27s biological foundations, owned possessions, interactions and daily activities, and group memberships. In Study 1, a revised measure of the Life Space (the College Student Life Space Scale) was developed. Factor analysis of the items within each domain resulted in 96 meaningful and reliable factor-based scales that provided a rich description of college students\u27 personal surroundings and everyday behavior. A second-order (hierarchical) factor analysis of the first-order scales resulted in seven global Life Space dimensions. In Study 2, the first- and second-order Life Space scales were used as criterion measures to test the construct validity of Openness to Experience (Openness). Also in Study 2, cross-validated criterion-keyed Life Space scales were developed to compare individual Life Space items for high and low scoring individuals on Openness. The results of Study 1 replicated and expanded upon previous research on the structure of the Life Space. The results of Study 2 supported the construct validity or social significance of Openness. The value of a more detailed and comprehensive approach to studying personality within the context of the external systems that surround the person is discussed

National Commission on Social, Emotional, and Academic Development: A Research Agenda for the Next Generation

We know more now than we ever have about how learning happens. But there are still many questions to be answered and, too often, important insights from research aren't communicated to the very people who could use it most - the educators who work with our children on a daily basis. This research agenda for the next generation makes recommendations for a new research paradigm that bridges the divide between scholarly research and what's actionable in our classrooms, schools, and communities

Bullying Intervention in Adolescence: The Intersection of Legislation, Policies, and Behavioral Change

This article reviews current research on bullying during adolescence. The complexity of bullying behaviors during the adolescent time period are discussed and a review of the developmental literature on adolescence provides suggestions for why current bullying prevention and intervention programs are less effective for this age group. Current anti-bullying policies and legislation are reviewed under a framework of adolescent brain development and the development of consequential thinking. Suggestions for implementing social-emotional learning programming during the adolescent period are provided and a novel approach using social media is presented. In order to effectively combat bullying during this developmental period, programming must focus of positive behavioral development and restorative practices

Bullying Intervention in Adolescence: The Intersection of Legislation, Policies, and Behavioral Change

This article reviews current research on bullying during adolescence. The complexity of bullying behaviors during the adolescent time period are discussed and a review of the developmental literature on adolescence provides suggestions for why current bullying prevention and intervention programs are less effective for this age group. Current anti-bullying policies and legislation are reviewed under a framework of adolescent brain development and the development of consequential thinking. Suggestions for implementing social-emotional learning programming during the adolescent period are provided and a novel approach using social media is presented. In order to effectively combat bullying during this developmental period, programming must focus of positive behavioral development and restorative practices

Breadth of Emotion Vocabulary in Middle Schoolers

How many different emotion words can middle schoolers think of to describe major categories of emotional experiences? While most existing ability tests of emotion understanding and vocabulary are based on word recognition, the goal of this study was to assess prompted emotion word generation. Students in 5th-8th grades (N=236) were asked to list all feeling words they can think of to describe five major emotion groups (happiness, calm, sadness, anger and nervousness). They also completed an ability measure of emotion understanding, the Mayer, Salovey, Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test – Youth Version (MSCEIT-YV). When asked to generate emotion descriptors, students produced a range of responses, from specific target emotion words (e.g., joy and pleasure describing the ‘happy’ category), to descriptors of closely associated emotions (e.g., love and pride describing the ‘happy category), to non-emotion descriptors (e.g., laughing or dancing describing the ‘happy’ category). Students produced 1472 unique responses (M=27.3, SD=10.9), with target emotion responses accounting for 22.4 % of responses (M=12.23, SD=4.8). Most target emotion responses were generated for the happiness-related feelings (54 different terms), and the fewest for calm-related feelings (25 terms). Older students and girls performed better on both measures of emotion understanding. Positive correlations were found between the scores on MSCEIT-YV scale and the overall number of target emotion responses, r=.25, p\u3c.01, as well as the overall number of associated emotion responses, r=.19, p\u3c.01. This study offers an important approach to learning about emotion vocabulary by providing an insight into emotion word generation among early adolescents

Promoting Mental Health and Psychological Thriving in University Students: A Randomized Controlled Trial of Three Well-Being Interventions

This study aimed to address the decline in mental health on U.S. university campuses by examining the effects of three interventions. University students suffer from high levels of anxiety, depression, and suicide. Counseling centers on university campuses are struggling to meet increased demand. The cost to students and universities could be buffered by offering preventative, psychoeducational, and skill-building training programs that promote mental health and psychological thriving. To date, the research literature has not yielded systematically evaluated and recommendable preventative mental health and well-being programs for university students. In a registered, randomized controlled trial, 131 university students were either placed in a non-intervention control group (N = 47) or received training in one of three 30-hour, eight-week semester-long well-being programs: SKY Campus Happiness (“SKY”; N = 29), Foundations of Emotional Intelligence (“EI”; N = 21) or Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (“MBSR”; N = 34). Compared to the control group and controlling for variance of baseline measurements and multiple comparisons, SKY Campus Happiness showed the greatest impact, benefiting six outcomes: depression, stress, mental health, mindfulness, positive affect and social connectedness. EI benefited one outcome: mindfulness. The MBSR group showed no change. Delivering SKY or EI to university students may be a cost-effective and efficient way to proactively and preventatively address mental health for university students and reduce the financial strain on universities

Promoting Mental Health and Psychological Thriving in University Students: A Randomized Controlled Trial of Three Well-Being Interventions.

This study aimed to address the decline in mental health on U.S. university campuses by examining the effects of three interventions. University students suffer from high levels of anxiety, depression, and suicide. Counseling centers on university campuses are struggling to meet increased demand. The cost to students and universities could be buffered by offering preventative, psychoeducational, and skill-building training programs that promote mental health and psychological thriving. To date, the research literature has not yielded systematically evaluated and recommendable preventative mental health and well-being programs for university students. In a registered, randomized controlled trial, 131 university students were either placed in a non-intervention control group (N = 47) or received training in one of three 30-hour, eight-week semester-long well-being programs: SKY Campus Happiness ("SKY"; N = 29), Foundations of Emotional Intelligence ("EI"; N = 21) or Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction ("MBSR"; N = 34). Compared to the control group and controlling for variance of baseline measurements and multiple comparisons, SKY Campus Happiness showed the greatest impact, benefiting six outcomes: depression, stress, mental health, mindfulness, positive affect and social connectedness. EI benefited one outcome: mindfulness. The MBSR group showed no change. Delivering SKY or EI to university students may be a cost-effective and efficient way to proactively and preventatively address mental health for university students and reduce the financial strain on universities

Breadth of emotion vocabulary in early adolescence

Studies of emotion vocabulary and understanding typically focus on early childhood. Yet, emotion abilities continue to develop into adolescence, making it an important and underinvestigated area of research. This study presents evidence that adolescents’ emotion vocabulary undergoes active development, becomes more broad and sophisticated, varies by gender, and is not captured adequately by recognition-based approaches. Adolescents were asked to generate emotion words for five emotion categories—happy, relaxed, angry, sad, and nervous. Responses included emotion words (e.g., joyous) and nonemotion terms such as metaphors (e.g., boiling), social experiences (e.g., underappreciated), and personality traits (e.g., shy). Girls generated significantly more responses than boys. Older adolescents generated significantly more emotion words (e.g., describing someone who is happy as joyful, exuberant or ecstatic), while younger adolescents produced more nonemotion responses (e.g., describing someone who is happy as smiley, friendly, or full of life). Students’ grade, total number of responses they produced, and performance on the recognition test of emotion understanding predicted their emotion vocabulary

Enhancing Teacher Effectiveness in Spain: A Pilot Study of The RULER Approach to Social and Emotional Learning

This study examined the effects of an evidence-based social and emotional learning (SEL) program, The RULER Approach to Social and Emotional Learning (RULER), on teacher self reports of engagement, teacher-student interactions, and burnout. Participants were 47 teachers from 19 public schools in Spain who either volunteered for training on RULER (n = 24) or eLearning (n = 23). Multivariate Analysis of Covariance (MANCOVA) was conducted separately for each outcome. Teachers in the RULER as compared to eLearning group had significantly higher scores on many outcomes even after controlling for gender, age, trait affect, and personality, as well as pre-test scores on all outcomes. These findings extend the literature on the effectiveness of SEL programs for the improvement of teacher practices; they also advance our understanding of possible mechanisms for promoting high-quality professional development

Intended persistence:Comparing academic and creative challenges in high school

How do high school students approach academic and creative challenges? This study compares the content of academic and creative challenges for 190 high school students, and examines students’ intentions to persist. Students reported experiencing academic and creative challenges in different areas: academic challenges were described primarily in math/science and English, with themes related to time management and striving to improve, while creative challenges were described overwhelmingly in art and music and concerned problem solving difficulties. Students reported more interest and intention to persist in the creative than academic challenges. Interest was the strongest predictor of persistence across both academic and creative challenges. The divergent perceptions of creative and academic challenges suggest that capitalizing on the creative elements of academic assignments could boost student interest and subsequent persistence