Digital co-waiting: humour, camaraderie and emotional flux during Fortnite’s Black Hole event

This study takes 36 Chinese foreign language learners as the research subjects, and examines the influence of task complexity on their interactive discourse behavior (brief feedback, collaborative contribution, cooperative co-construction) and engagement (cognitive engagement, affective engagement, social engagement) in L2 peer collaborative writing. The findings indicate that: (i)Task complexity significantly affects brief feedback and collaborative contribution, but not cooperative co-construction. Specifically, the simple task obviously generates more brief feedback and collaborative contribution; (ii) Task complexity significantly affects learners’ cognitive and affective engagement, but not social engagement. Specifically, learners obviously demonstrated higher cognitive and affective engagement in the simple task. This study demonstrated the impact of task complexity on L2 peer interaction performance in the process of cooperative writing from both macro and micro levels, with the aim of providing insights for the practice and research of foreign language interactive teaching.

Engagement in the L2 classroom is consequential for enhancing the quality of L2 learning experiences; however, the exploration of engagement in the Initiation, Response, and Feedback (IRF) cycles has received scant attention in L2 pedagogy. This study reports on research, examining engagement in Initiation, Response, and Feedback moves in the IRF cycles. Video recordings and questionnaires were used to collect data from ten EFL classes, being directed by eight teachers, with 73 learners. Using a post-interaction questionnaire and conversation analysis of classroom interactions, the analysis of the data revealed 784 triadic cycles out of which 493 moves embodied engagement. The data showed that not only do the Response and Feedback stages afford L2 learners the opportunity to deliberate on Form-focused language-related episodes (F-LREs), Lexis-focused LREs (L-LREs), and Mechanical LREs (M-LREs), but they also promote social and affective engagement. The comments on the questionnaire also revealed a deeper understanding of the participants’ affective engagement. The findings revealed that certain features of the IRF cycles and peers’ contributions encourage engagement during the IRF cycles. The results also demonstrated that scaffolding, mutuality, reciprocity, back-channeling, and commenting on preceding contributions made L2 learners socially engaged. The analysis suggests that the IRF cycles can create ad-hoc chances for engagement in L2 classroom interactions.

Despite the importance of supervisory feedback for students’ thesis writing, its effectiveness can be achieved only when the students actively engage with it. Focusing on students’ affective engagement, the review of literature revealed different patterns of engagement among students, which was caused by several factors. Studies on affective engagement with supervisory feedback within the context of thesis writing in undergraduate level were still limited. Thus, this study has been conducted with the aims to identify how EFL students engaged affectively with supervisory feedback and what might cause the engagement. Through case study that involved three participants, it has been found that all participants experienced various kinds of emotional responses, both positive and negative. What caused these responses include some problems due to participants’ expectations of supervisory feedback and their thoughts on supervisors’ expectations. Surprisingly, the participants highly appreciated and valued supervisory feedback despite their negative emotional responses and their expectations of feedback delivery. Their reliance on supervisory feedback, the value of thesis writing process, and the gratitude they had for the feedback were found out to be the factors underlying their attitudinal responses. The implications of these findings have been provided for both student writers and thesis supervisors.

This study adopts a multi-method approach to examine Thai EFL learners' cognitive and affective engagement in response to questions of varying difficulty during a speaking task. Using an engagement survey, brain waves, and semi-structured interviews, the study involved 41 Thai university students with low and intermediate English proficiency. Survey results revealed moderate engagement among low-proficiency learners and high engagement among intermediate learners. Brain waves data showed higher cognitive engagement for low-proficiency students with easier questions, while intermediate students displayed consistent engagement. Affective engagement was greater for both groups when tasks matched their comfort zones. Content analysis of interviews highlighted five engagement factors: emotional response, task familiarity, prior experiences, teacher feedback, and task relevance. The findings emphasize the need to address both cognitive and emotional demands in speaking tasks to enhance learner engagement.

Adverse childhood experiences and internalizing symptoms: the moderating role of neural responses to threat

This work describes the design of real-time dance-based interaction with a humanoid robot, where the robot seeks to promote physical activity in children by taking on multiple roles as a dance partner. It acts as a leader by initiating dances but can also act as a follower by mimicking a child’s dance movements. Dances in the leader role are produced by a sequence-to-sequence (S2S) Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) network trained on children’s music videos taken from YouTube. On the other hand, a music orchestration platform is implemented to generate background music in the follower mode as the robot mimics the child’s poses. In doing so, we also incorporated the largely unexplored paradigm of learning-by-teaching by including multiple robot roles that allow the child to both learn from and teach to the robot. Our work is among the first to implement a largely autonomous, real-time full-body dance interaction with a bipedal humanoid robot that also explores the impact of the robot roles on child engagement. Importantly, we also incorporated in our design formal constructs taken from autism therapy, such as the least-to-most prompting hierarchy, reinforcements for positive behaviors, and a time delay to make behavioral observations. We implemented a multimodal child engagement model that encompasses both affective engagement (displayed through eye gaze focus and facial expressions) as well as task engagement (determined by the level of physical activity) to determine child engagement states. We then conducted a virtual exploratory user study to evaluate the impact of mixed robot roles on user engagement and found no statistically significant difference in the children’s engagement in single-role and multiple-role interactions. While the children were observed to respond positively to both robot behaviors, they preferred the music-driven leader role over the movement-driven follower role, a result that can partly be attributed to the virtual nature of the study. Our findings support the utility of such a platform in practicing physical activity but indicate that further research is necessary to fully explore the impact of each robot role.

The present study investigated Pakistani English as a foreign language (EFL) students’ affective engagement with teachers’ corrective feedback (CF) on their oral presentations. Fifty undergraduate students studying English language courses from three different universities participated in the study. The research first explored students’ views on CF-related practices, including timing (immediate vs. delayed), mode (public vs. private), and focus (language accuracy vs. content and delivery). Second, students’ individual and contextual factors were examined, particularly regarding speaking skills, feedback expectations, and attitudes toward error correction. Third, the study analyzed how these factors shaped students’ emotional responses to CF in emotionally laden speaking skill tasks. Data from open-ended questionnaires, classroom observations, semi-structured interviews, stimulated recalls and reflected accounts revealed that while students sometimes ignored teachers’oral and written comments, they held a positive attitude for corrective feedback and expressed appreciation for its role in their language learning and communication skills development. The feedback process elicited a spectrum of distinct emotional responses, ranging from feelings of encouragement and motivation to moments of apprehension, discomfort or self-consciousness, which varied across individuals. It is also observed that students with better proficiency were more appreciative of feedback provided. The findings of the paper offer valuable pedagogical implications for English as a foreign language (EFL) instruction, particularly for oral performances and tasks. The findings suggest that teachers can play a pivotal role in shaping the emotional climate of feedback encounters, helping students transform potentially negative emotional reactions into constructive learning opportunities. By fostering an atmosphere of respect, encouragement, and mutual trust, EFL teachers can enhance students’ willingness to receive and act on corrective feedback, thereby maximizing the affective and cognitive benefits of the feedback process. In short, the study highlights the need for feedback approaches that balance accuracy-focused instruction with strategies that protect learners’ confidence in oral performance settings.

Chinese and Indian students represent over half of all international students in the United States. This study explores the study abroad journey of Chinese and Indian international students by connecting their pre-consumption decision-making factors, service experience, and post-consumption consumer marketing engagement (CME) behaviors. The results show that consumer decision-making factors and service experiences have more influence on Chinese international students’ post-acquisition CME than on Indian international students. The prestige and value of a U.S. degree have a positive impact on CME of both Chinese and Indian international students but in different ways. Interestingly, the influence factor inhibits the interactive, persuasive and benevolent aspects of CME behaviors among Chinese international students, while it positively impacts the persuasive aspect of CME among Indian international students, that is, their effort to spread good word of mouth about the U.S. University and their willingness to recommend the university to people in their home country. Besides, international student satisfaction with social opportunities encourages them to promote positive interactive and affective engagement with host universities. Finally, satisfaction with campus quality promotes interactive, cognitive and persuasive aspects of CME. Implications and limitations of the study conclude the paper.

How can we use computational analysis and visualization of content and interactions on social media network to write histories? Traditionally, historical timelines of social and political upheavals give us only distant views of the events, and singular interpretation of a person constructing the timeline. However, using social media as our source, we can potentially present many thousands of individual views of the events. We can also include representation of the everyday life next to the accounts of the exceptional events. This paper explores these ideas using a particular case study - images shared by people in Kiev on Instagram during 2014 Ukranian Revolution. Using Instagram public API we collected 13208 geo-coded images shared by 6165 Instagram users in the central part of Kiev during February 17-22, 2014. We used open source and our own custom software tools to analyze the images along with upload dates and times, geo locations, and tags, and visualize them in different ways.

In this paper, I examine the role of emotional contagion in our affective engagement with narrative fiction film, focusing in particular on how spectator responses based on emotional contagion differ from those based on more sophisticated emotional processes. I begin by explaining emotional contagion and the processes involved in it. Next, I consider how film elicits emotional contagion. I then argue that emotional contagion responses are unique and should be clearly distinguished from responses based on other emotional processes, such as empathy. Finally, I explain why contagion responses are a significant feature of spectators engagement with narrative fiction film.

This study examines audience responses to the European virtual idol Noonoouri using an audience reception approach. While Japanese virtual idols have been widely studied, audience reception in European contexts remains underexplored. Using Python-assisted sentiment analysis combined with qualitative thematic analysis of YouTube comments, the study investigates how audiences evaluate Noonoouri’s music and digital persona regarding creativity, legitimacy, and cultural context in European mainstream music. Findings reveal predominantly negative responses, with scepticism regarding emotional expressiveness, originality, and impacts on human creativity, alongside occasional recognition of technical innovation. Audience interpretations clustered into three frameworks: ‘Emotional Authenticity and Affective Engagement’, ‘Authorship, Labour Ethics, and Creativity’, and ‘Cultural Value and European Mainstream Integration’. The results show that virtual idol reception cannot be understood through technical criteria alone; audiences actively negotiate cultural, ethical, and authenticity meanings, providing insight into how legitimacy is constructed for AI-generated music and virtual idols in European popular music contexts.

This article focuses on the Japanese contemporary film Small, Slow but Steady and explores how deaf people experience sound physically, through the body. Among contemporary Japanese films that challenge ableist views of deafness, Small, Slow but Steady bridges the gap between hearing and deafness by portraying its deaf protagonist, Keiko, in relation to sound and bodily sensation. The film emphasizes her personal journey, illustrating how she engages with sound in a unique, embodied way. It often magnifies ordinary background noises, transforming them into heightened sensory moments that evoke emotional responses. Sound becomes a fluid boundary that highlights both the differences and interactions between hearing and deaf people. I adopt a phenomenological approach that emphasizes the perceptual qualities of sound. To be specific, I delve deep into film theories concerning sound, with particular attention to its material aspects—such as the concept of “haptic sound” as discussed by Laura Marks. Sound is portrayed as deeply intertwined with the senses of touch, sight, and taste. By manipulating sound to engage multiple senses—like touch, sight, and even taste—the film creates a deeply immersive experience. This integration of sound and tactile perception effectively conveys emotion and enhances the spectators’ affective engagement.

BackgroundDepression, a prevalent mental health condition, affects millions worldwide. Many face significant barriers to accessing effective therapy. Metaverse has become a promising platform for addressing these challenges. Its 3D virtual environments allow users to engage through customizable avatars, supporting the elicitation of therapy-related emotions, an essential component of therapeutic interventions.ObjectiveThis pilot study investigates the potential of the Metaverse to elicit therapy-related emotional responses in individuals experiencing depression. The objectives are to assess emotional arousal, mental workload (MWL), and affective engagement during an emotional elicitation task in a Metaverse environment and compare them with those observed in a similar real-world setting.MethodsWe conducted a between-subjects experiment involving 28 participants: 14 had self-reported depression symptoms; 14 had minimal or no depression. Participants were assigned to a real-world environment or a Metaverse environment. Second Life (SL), a persistent 3D virtual world that utilizes human-like avatars for navigation, was the Metaverse environment. A desktop computer represented the real-world setting. Participants watched emotion-eliciting video clips to evoke amusement, anger, disgust, fear, and sadness. They reported their emotional arousal using the 16-item self-report inventory, MWL using the NASA Task Load Index, and emotional engagement using the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule.ResultsRegardless of the environment, participants with self-reported depression symptoms reported significantly higher amusement (F1,24=4.882, P=.04; self-reported depression: mean 5.00, SD 2.481; minimal or no depression: mean 3.07, SD 1.940), anger (F1,24=7.067, P=.01; self-reported depression: mean 4.79, SD 2.190; minimal or no depression: mean 2.71, SD 1.899), sadness (F1,24=4.353, P=.048; self-reported depression: mean 5.21, SD 2.293; minimal or no depression: mean 3.50, SD 1.912), and perceived performance (F1,24=4.939, P=.04; self-reported depression: mean 91.07, SD 90.302; minimal or no depression: mean 31.07, SD 36.278) than those with minimal or no depression. Participants with minimal or no depression reported lower perceived effort in the SL environment than in the real-world setting (SL: mean 40.71, SD 38.016; real world: mean 158.571, SD 120.411; P=.02), indicating Metaverse’s potential to alleviate cognitive stress during emotionally eliciting tasks. There were no significant differences in perceived MWL or emotional engagement between the real-world and Metaverse settings.ConclusionsIndividuals with self-reported depression symptoms exhibited heightened emotional responses across environmental settings, indicating the Metaverse may potentially elicit emotional arousal comparable to that in traditional settings. Participants with minimal or no depression symptoms reported lower perceived effort in the Metaverse, suggesting that virtual environments may reduce cognitive strain during emotionally evocative tasks. The lack of significant differences in emotional arousal, overall MWL, or emotional engagement across environments tentatively suggests that the Metaverse may deliver emotional experiences like those of real-world contexts. Collectively, this provides preliminary evidence that screen-based Metaverse platforms can elicit emotional responses like those commonly engaged during therapeutic depression interventions.

This study recognizes the crucial influence of student engagement on academic achievement, especially in mathematics, and addresses the need for a reliable, valid measurement tool. It therefore focused on the development and validation of a Mathematics Learners' Engagement Scale tailored to the Nigerian secondary school context. It employed a survey approach using a total of 540 students selected from 9 local government areas in all three senatorial districts of a Nigerian state. The scale was adapted from established engagement scales. After pilot testing, exploratory factor analysis with varimax rotation identified five distinct engagement dimensions: Affective, Interest, Behavioural, Cognitive, and Social Engagement, corresponding to students’ emotional responses, subject interest, active participation, use of cognitive strategies, and social interaction, respectively. Reliability analysis demonstrated strong internal consistency, with Cronbach’s alpha values above .70 for all factors. Discriminant validity using the square root of average variance extracted (AVE) confirmed two components exceeding the .50 threshold. The results confirmed that Nigerian students demonstrate similar engagement dimensions consistent with international studies, emphasizing the importance of cognitive and affective engagement in mathematics learning. This validated Mathematics Learners' Engagement Scale provides a valuable tool for educators and researchers to assess and improve student engagement, which may ultimately enhance mathematics outcomes of secondary school students in Nigeria and other comparable settings.

This study aimed to measure the extent of meaningful learning achieved by students during general chemistry laboratory activities. A descriptive quantitative design was employed with 126 participants, consisting of 51 Chemistry Education and 75 Biology Education students. Data were collected using the Meaningful Learning in the Laboratory Inventory (MLLIv2), which evaluates affective, cognitive, and affective–cognitive aspects. The data were analyzed and categorized into five levels from “very poor” to “very good.” The results showed that most students were in the “very good” category (81–100%) across all aspects, with smaller proportions in the “good” category (61–80%). No students were classified as “fair,” “poor,” or “very poor.” Chemistry Education students achieved slightly higher averages (affective = 91%, cognitive = 93%, affective–cognitive = 91%, overall = 92%) compared to Biology Education students (affective = 85%, cognitive = 89%, affective–cognitive = 89%, overall = 88%). These findings indicate that the laboratory effectively fostered meaningful learning by integrating cognitive understanding with affective engagement. The results also emphasize that meaningful learning is shaped not only by conceptual mastery but also by students’ emotional responses and their ability to connect laboratory experiences with academic and professional goals.