Learning, Psychology of

The purpose of this quantitative research study was to compare Chinese and
American students’ inclined level of critical thinking using the California Critical
Thinking Disposition Inventory (CCTDI) (Insight Assessment, 2013). The literature of
Paul and Elder (1996, 2000, 2005, 2010), Facione and Facione (1992, 1996) and
Brookfield (2005, 2010, 2013) and the conceptual framework in this study provided the foundation for the main research question of whether there are differences between Chinese and American students’ scores on the seven individual scales and their total score on the CCTDI. The Sample included 41 Chinese and 50 American undergraduate and graduate students at Florida Atlantic University, a regional research university located in southeast Florida. Independent t-tests concluded that there were no differences between the 41 Chinese students and the 50 American students regarding their critical thinking dispositions on each of seven scales on the CCTDI. A factorial analysis of variance measured moderator questions to determine
whether there was a difference between Chinese and American students’ CCTDI scores based on student gender, discipline of study, undergraduate or graduate status, or enrollment as an undergraduate within the United States. There were significant differences between the critical thinking dispositions of Chinese and American undergraduate and graduate students when comparing the scale of open mindedness and gender. There were also significant differences for the scale of confidence in reasoning and discipline. For the remaining questions, there were no significant differences. A Pearson’s correlation determined that there was no relationship between the length of time students had been in the United States and their scores on the CCTDI. Educational implications include that when problem-solving skills are developed in the college setting, critical thinking can be cultivated to help prepare students for work in future employment settings. Social implications include the use of critical thinking when faced with decision making in adults’ lives, as well as in their daily work. This study may be the foundation for future studies. Finally, educators may find the CCTDI helpful in positioning students’ critical thinking dispositions prior to learning or training activities.

Two experiments are presented that examined the manner in which antecedents are retrieved from memory. In Experiment 1, subjects read passages containing two antecedents, with one appearing early in a passage and one appearing late. In addition, one of the antecedents was mentioned briefly while the other was elaborated on in much greater detail. The last line of each passage required reinstatement of either the early or late antecedent. Following reinstatement, subjects were required to name either the early or the late antecedent. Reading time results showed that search time was a function of both recency and elaboration with late antecedents retrieved more quickly than early antecedents and elaborated antecedents retrieved more quickly than nonelaborated antecedents. Naming times confirmed that subjects were performing the required reinstatement; reinstated antecedents were named faster than nonreinstated antecedents. Experiment 2 demonstrated that there was no difference in the activation level of either antecedent prior to reinstatement. (Abstract shortened with permission of author.)

The effects of retinal and objective orientation on recognition of novel
stimuli were examined in a two-phase experiment. In Phase 1 novel stimuli
were presented to tilted subjects placed in either an intentional
learning condition (they were instructed to remember the stimuli) or an
incidental learning condition (they received no instruction regarding
memory). In Phase 2 the same stimuli were randomly mixed with distractor
stimuli in a recognition test. Stimuli were presented to upright
subjects in either their objectively upright orientation (the same
orientation relative to gravity as in Phase 1) or their retinally upright
orientation (the same orientation relative to subjects' tilted
retinas as in Phase 1). The instructions produced no effect on recognition.
Evidence that both retinal and objective orientation influenced
recognition was obtained in both conditions. Alternative interpretations
hypothesized that: (1) dual memory representations of Phase 1
stimuli, referenced to both retinal and objective upright, were formed
and (2) a single memory representation of Phase 1 stimuli, referenced to
an axis intermediate to retinal and objective upright, was formed.

Teaching methods that are effective with some students, fail with other students, because students perceive and process information differently. The personal preference by which one perceives and processes new material is called one's learning style. Using the Dunn and Dunn Learning Style Inventory assessment instrument, the learning style perceptual preference of 262 seventh grade students from a large, urban, middle school in southeast Florida were identified. This research investigated the effects of teaching mathematics to the preferred perceptual preference of these students in terms of academic achievement. Four teachers were trained in the Dunn and Dunn learning style teaching model to acquaint them with the experimental treatment used in this study. A pretest-posttest design was used to observe the mean gain in achievement scores on a 25-element assessment between students taught using a traditional teaching format and those taught in the learning style treatment approach. All students in the experimental group were first introduced to new mathematics material with a global story and taught in their primary learning style perceptual preference: (a) auditory, (b) tactile, (c) kinesthetic, or (d) visual. The material was reinforced through their secondary preference and a creative, student-constructed project was shared with the classmates. Several two-way factorial analyses of variance were used to study the treatment effect on the dependent variable. Neither the main effect for treatment nor the interactions between treatment and demographic variables (race, gender, learning styles) were significant at the.05 level. Within the context of this study, teaching through a student's perceptual learning style preference does not appear to be significantly more effective than teaching in a traditional manner.

This researcher conducted an investigation concerning the effects of learning-style responsive versus traditional staff development on community college professors' achievement in and attitudes toward alternative instructional strategies. This study involved 84 faculty from three community colleges in Florida. Participants were voluntary and experienced both a learning-style responsive workshop and a traditional workshop through a counter balanced, reversed measures design. Objectives for each workshop focused on one learning-style method, thereby exposing participants to content about learning styles while using learning-style strategies to deliver the material. The average participant was a Caucasian female between the ages of 40-49 years old who taught in the Arts and Sciences. The Productivity Environmental Preference Survey (PEPS) (Dunn, Dunn and Price, 1979, 1980, 1990, 1996) was used as the self-report instrument to identify the participants' learning-styles. The Semantic Differential Scale (SDS) (Pizzo, 1981) was used to assess the participants' attitudes toward the two instructional approaches in contrast with each other. A researcher-developed instrument called The T-Hart Achievement Test (THART) served as a pre- and posttest assessment consisting of multiple-choice questions based on the objectives of the staff development workshop. Each group reported a statistically more positive attitude following the learning-styles experimental workshop regardless of the method used. This finding supported the hypothesis that participants receiving staff development through their learning-style preference evidence significantly higher attitudinal test scores than participants receiving traditional staff development. There was no statistical difference in the knowledge or achievement on treatment concepts and practices learned by participants when the Programmed Learning Sequence (PLS) method was used. There was, however, a statistically significant difference in the achievement of the community college faculty when Learning-Style Small Group Techniques (SGT) were applied. This finding supports the experimental hypothesis that participants receiving learning-style responsive staff development will evidence significantly higher mastery of knowledge of workshop concepts and practices as measured by achievement-test scores than participants receiving traditional staff development. There was also a statistical difference in achievement by age when using the Small Group Techniques (SGT) learning-style method than when using the Programmed Learning Sequence (PLS) strategy.

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of the self-paced postinformative feedback interval (PIFI) and task complexity on concept identification. Eight independent groups of learners served in a factorial design which combined four PIFI durations (self-paced - 15 sec) and two levels of task complexity (2 and 4 irrelevant stimulus dimensions). Instructions and tasks were presented to 64 subjects via microcomputers. The criterion performance of 16 consecutively correct stimulus identifications as well as total number of trials and total time to criterion were recorded by the computer program. Factorial analyses of variance, a priori tests, Newman-Keuls' pairwise comparisons, and one-way analyses of variance were used to statistically determine significant differences among the means of the groups studied. Results of all statistical analyses were considered significant at the .05 level. Results indicated that there was no significant difference in terms of total trials or total time to criterion between the self-paced PIFI condition and the combined data for the three fixed PIFI conditions. For the low complexity task, the 8-second PIFI condition required significantly fewer trials to criterion than self-paced PIFI. For the higher complexity task, the self-paced PIFI condition required significantly less total time to criterion than 15-second fixed PIFI. Results also indicated that self-paced PIFI durations for initial trials were significantly longer than those of final trials for performances at both levels of task complexity. Findings were interpreted as demonstrating a need for absorption time during PIFIs which may not be adequately provided in a totally self-paced environment. Thus, a reduction in the efficiency inherent in the self-paced mode, stemming from the gradual decrease in PIFI durations as problem solution is approached, is experience.

This study sought to determine the effects of two types of advance organizers on the learning and retention of an aeronautical concept, and the interaction of both advance organizers across the learner variable of Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA). The 126 subjects selected for testing consisted of students enrolled in the Aircraft Turbine Engine Theory course at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Daytona Beach, Florida. Students were randomly assigned to one of three experimental groups within four intact class sections. The treatment instrument was two different modes of "The Bernoulli Principle of Energy Conservation in a Moving Fluid." The experimental treatment was administered at the beginning of the sixth week of a 14 week course. The first group read a verbal advance organizer; the second examined a graphic organizer; and the third received a placebo. Following the treatments, the subjects began a six hour block of instruction, Aircraft Turbine Compressor Theory, which extended over two weeks. Following the instruction, a learning test was administered to each intact class section. Seven weeks later, a delayed retention test was administered. A statistical analysis of the results indicated that: (1) the advance organizer in verbal or graphic form was an effective approach to learning and retention of an aeronautical concept; (2) the verbal advance organizer tended to be more effective than the graphic in both learning and retention; and (3) the graphic advance organizer was most effective in the retention of material by those students who had exhibited a lower standand of over-all performance (CGPA) in the past.

The primary purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of a synergistic research model in teaching fifth graders how to do research. The secondary purpose was to determine if achievement means of the treatment group in an open research and development school were comparable to achievement means of the treatment group in a traditional school. Four fifth grade teachers in the research and development school, two teachers in the traditional school, and their 167 fifth grade students comprised three experimental and three control groups. The researcher conducted two three hour workshops on two consecutive days in the classrooms of the three experimental groups. Specific, behaviorally defined skills of the synergistic research process were demonstrated by the researcher as they were practiced and developed by the teachers and students. One experimental and one control group in the research and development school were pretested on "A Test of Knowledge, Comprehension and Application of Selected Research Competencies," constructed by the researcher. Experimental teachers used the synergistic model in teaching their students how to do research during the last nine week period of the school year. Experimental and control groups were posttested using a different form of the instrument. The Solomon Four Group and Posttest Only Control Group Designs were used to generate 2 x 2 factorial analyses of variance utilizing the SPSS MANOVA Program. It was found that treatment groups in both the traditional and research and development schools achieved significantly higher posttest scores than the control groups. It was further concluded that the achievement means of the treatment group in the traditional school were comparable to the achievement means of the treatment group in the research and development school.

Activation of the representations of the two languages in bilingual memory has been shown to affect recognition during initial word comprehension (e.g., Dijkstra & Van Heuven, 2002). This study investigated whether the activation of semantic (i.e., meaning) and lexical (i.e., form) representations of words in a bilingual's two languages affects word recognition after the first stages of word comprehension. False recognition of words in one language that were similar in meaning and/or form to words studied in the other language was an indication of these effects. This study further investigated whether false recognition based on meaning and/or form is modulated by bilingual language proficiency.

The purpose of this study was to assess the goal intent and achievement of university students, during the Fall 2011 semester, at Blue Wave University, a high research activity public institution in the southeast United States. This study merged theories of motivation to measure goal setting and goal attainment to examine if students who chose to participate in a learning community program set goals at different levels than the students who chose not to join a learning community program. This study investigated if there was a difference in motivation, by studying goal intent and goal achievement of Freshman Learning Community participants, Living- Learning community participants, or non-learning community participants at Blue Wave University. . Moderation analyses concluded that none the seven contextual variables (choice of college, ethnicity, gender, high school grade point average, living on-campus, SAT score, and ACT score) moderated the difference in the level of change from goal intent to goal achievement in this study.