Constructivist Assumptions Research Articles

Interactives and Visitor Learning

Abstract Interactives—computers and other multimedia components, physical manipulatives (including whole‐body and tabletop activities), and simulations—occur in all types of museums. There is considerable interest in the nature of the learning that happens when visitors use interactives. Museum professionals have enlisted constructivist theory to support the notion that interactive elements are invaluable components of any exhibition experience, and are effective learning tools that enable active visitor engagement. Interactives are also seen as vital to sustaining institutional image and expanding institutional popularity.Despite the increasing use of interactives in exhibitions and the substantial investments being made in their design and maintenance, there is a paucity of research as to whether these constructivist assumptions are supported. There is little work exploring visitors' perceptions of specific types of interactives, or the role of interactivity in the visitor experience generally. Museum staff thus have a limited ability to make informed decisions about the level and type of interactivity that might enhance exhibition experiences.This paper describes a collaborative effort in 2001 by researchers at the Powerhouse Museum (PHM), Sydney; the Institute for Learning Innovation (the Institute), Annapolis, Maryland; and Curtin University of Technology (Curtin) and Scitech Discovery Centre (Scitech), both in Perth, Western Australia. This study investigated two aspects of interactivity: 1) visitor perceptions of interactivity in two different contexts, a museum and a science center; and 2) the types of short‐ and long‐term learning that resulted from use of interactives in these two institutions.

Inconsistencies in the Assumptions of Constructivism and Naturalism

The paper discusses the flaws in the solutions proposed by philosophical positions of constructivism and naturalism of the mind-body and mind-reality problems to which Cartesian dualism gives rise. It is argued that subscribing—explicitly or implicitly—to the assumptions of these philosophical positions by two research traditions within current academic psychology, that is, social constructionism and cognitive neuroscience, the flaws and problems that these positions inherit cease to be of merely `philosophical' interest, but become flaws in the foundations of the science of psychology. More importantly, the aim is to show how arguments in refutation of the assumptions of naturalism and constructivism in turn suggest and point to tenable alternative assumptions about the relation between mind and reality and between mind and body, which—as a matter of principle—must be taken for granted by both philosophy and psychology.

Strategic Action In A Community Environment

In this article, the author proposes a synthetic approach to the analysis of institutional effects on EU policy making by combining a rationalist theory of action with a constructivist assumption on the social environment: Actors in European integration act strategically on the basis of individual specific policy preferences but do so in a community environment that affects their strategies and the collective interaction outcome. This synthetic approach draws on the work of Erving Goffman and is based on the "sequencing" of rationalist and constructivist propositions. Furthermore, this approach will be most salient when the institutional rules in question are constitutive and legitimate and resonate with national values and norms. Following the design of controlled competition, the author argues that this sequencing better explains the EU's decision to expand to the East than either rationalist or constructivist propositions alone.

From "Grand Coalition" To Left-Right Confrontation

In this article, the authors address the rationalist-constructivist debate head on. They start by discussing a significant empirical phenomenon in contemporary EU politics: the changing pattern of political competition in the European Parliament (EP), from a "grand coalition" of the two main parties in the 1994-1999 EP, to a new structure of left-right competition in the 1999-2004 EP. The authors then illustrate how rational choice and constructivist assumptions offer competing explanations of this shift in the "culture of competition" in the EP, which in turn generate competing empirically testable hypotheses. These propositions are tested using a logistic analysis of more than 400 roll-call votes in a period from the 1994-1999 and the 1999-2004 parliament. The authors conclude that neither basic theoretical framework performs well and that the best explanation needs to incorporate assumptions from both frameworks.

Information Equals Knowledge, Searching Equals Learning, and Hyperlinking Is Good Instruction

Summary In this paper, we claim that too much Web-based instruction assumes that the World Wide Web is a vast library that can be used to convey knowledge, that searching and finding information on the Web equals learning, and that hyperlinking is good instruction. Based on constructivist assumptions, we critique these assumptions and offer instructional methods to counteract their effects.

EPISTEMIC ASSUMPTIONS: UNDERSTANDING SELF AND THE WORLD (A NOTE ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN IDENTITY STYLE, WORLD VIEW, AND CONSTRUCTIVIST ASSUMPTIONS USING AN AUSTRALIAN SAMPLE)

Berzonsky (1994) has investigated the role that personal epistemological assumptions play in the construction and revision of self-identity.He developed the Constructivist Assumption Scale (CAS) to measure the constructivist assumptions of persons, relating this to identity style as measured by the Identity Style Inventory, 3rd edition. Botella and Gallifa (1995) have outlined a constructivist model of epistemic development moving from positivism to constructivism (measured by the CAS), and preferred worldviews moving from mechanism to organicism (measured by the Organicism-Mechanism Paradigm Inventory). This study investigated the relationship between identity style, preferred worldview, and level of constructivist assumptions. Results indicate a significant positive relationship between the constructivist assumptions and people having an information-oriented, self-identity style, and significant negative relationships between the constructivist assumptions and preferred worldview for individuals with a normative oriented identity style. Age was significantly related to worldview, but not to the constructivist assumptions of the individuals. The theoretical implications of these findings are discussed, including whether people have different epistemic assumptions when describing self versus those used when describing the world. An additional measure is suggested which may relate findings to Kelly's (1991) notions of aggressiveness and hostility.

EPISTEMIC ASSUMPTIONS: UNDERSTANDING SELF AND THE WORLD (A NOTE ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN IDENTITY STYLE, WORLD VIEW, AND CONSTRUCTIVIST ASSUMPTIONS USING AN AUSTRALIAN SAMPLE)

Berzonsky (1994) has investigated the role that personal epistemological assumptions play in the construction and revision of self-identity.He developed the Constructivist Assumption Scale (CAS) to measure the constructivist assumptions of persons, relating this to identity style as measured by the Identity Style Inventory, 3rd edition. Botella and Gallifa (1995) have outlined a constructivist model of epistemic development moving from positivism to constructivism (measured by the CAS), and preferred worldviews moving from mechanism to organicism (measured by the Organicism-Mechanism Paradigm Inventory). This study investigated the relationship between identity style, preferred worldview, and level of constructivist assumptions. Results indicate a significant positive relationship between the constructivist assumptions and people having an information-oriented, self-identity style, and significant negative relationships between the constructivist assumptions and preferred worldview for individuals with a normative oriented identity style. Age was significantly related to worldview, but not to the constructivist assumptions of the individuals. The theoretical implications of these findings are discussed, including whether people have different epistemic assumptions when describing self versus those used when describing the world. An additional measure is suggested which may relate findings to Kelly's (1991) notions of aggressiveness and hostility.

Lernförderung bei Jugendlichen. Grundsätzliche Überlegungen und Prinzipien der Umsetzung

In the first part of the article, some fundamental considerations with respect to training of learning competencies and some principles of implementation are presented. To start, relations and differences between learning, intelligence, and thinking are discussed. Arguments supporting biological determination of intelligence are contrasted to those in favor of cognitive modifiability. Subsequently, DELV (understanding one's own learning processes), a metacognitive program for adolescents and adults, is presented. DELV starts from the constructivist assumption that learning strategies cannot be taught like school subjects, but have to be discovered by the students themselves. Some didactic rules are formulated that help teachers to arrange an optimal environment for exploration and discussion of individual strategies.

Alfabetização e fracasso escolar: problematizando alguns pressupostos da concepção construtivista

O objetivo deste artigo é contribuir com elementos para o debate das questões relativas à alfabetização e ao fracasso escolar das crianças de baixa renda. Parte-se de resultados de uma pesquisa que examina algumas teses que, tendo como uma das suas bases conceituais a teoria construtivista de Emília Ferreiro e Ana Teberosky, vêm norteando as políticas públicas de alfabetização em nosso país desde a década de 1980. Levaram-se também em conta dados de pesquisas anteriores que estudaram a presença dos materiais escritos na cultura popular. Os pressupostos construtivistas acerca do desenvolvimento cognitivo das crianças das camadas populares e suas relações com o texto escrito foram analisados a partir de uma linha de pensamento da História Cultural, que vê a leitura e a escrita como práticas culturais, ou seja, como forma de expressão do indivíduo na sociedade. As conclusões a que se chegou são: não há marginalidade cultural no sentido de não participação na cultura escrita, pois numa sociedade letrada as práticas de escrita se impõem de diferentes maneiras nas formas de existência social, definindo relações sociais. As relações das crianças de camadas populares com o texto escrito só podem ser compreendidas em toda sua complexidade dentro do contexto e da diversidade das formas culturais da sua produção.

Lessons of Loss: A Guide to Coping

Loss As a Meaning-Making Journey Lessons of Loss: A Guide to Coping Robert A. Neimeyer. New York: McGraw-Hill (www. mcgraw-hill.com). 1998, 214 pp., $30.59 (softcover). Robert Neimeyer is not only known as one of the most prominent and prolific scholars in constructivist psychology and psychotherapy, but is also recognized as a leading thinker in the field of bereavement and loss. In addition to having published numerous book chapters and articles on death, loss, and suicide, he is the editor of the respected international journal, Death Studies, author of the Death Anxiety Handbook (Neimeyer, 1997) and coeditor (with Hannelore Wass) of Dying: Facing the Facts (Wass & Neimeyer, 1994). Aptly titled, Lessons of Loss: A Guide to Coping, provides readers with many of the significant "lessons" Neimeyer has garnered through his years of dedicated research, writing, and clinical work. The book also lays new conceptual ground as Neimeyer brings constructivist assumptions and principles to bear on the field of bereavement and loss. The book is organized into three broad sections. In Part I, "For Those Who Grieve," Neimeyer provides an overview of some of the general contours of bereavement with special attention given to the unique challenges associated with relationship loss (through either death or divorce), job loss, the tasks and challenges of mourning, and the social and cultural contexts of coping with loss. In each of these areas, he offers numerous practical guidelines (e.g., "When Should You Reach Out for Help?"; "Adapting to Loss: Ten Practical Steps"; and "Do's and Don'ts When Reaching Out to a Mourner") and uses brief vignettes to illustrate the significant issues and themes covered. While primarily designed for persons who may have experienced a recent loss, the material in Part I is also relevant to professionals who are looking for informative summaries of key issues and research or for supportive readings to give to bereaved clients. In Part II of the book, "For Those Who Help," Neimeyer more fully attends to theoretical issues by elaborating on a conceptual model of grieving as process of meaning reconstruction. Based on a constructivist epistemology of clinical practice, this model views meaning making as the core process of the grief experience and challenges traditional stage-based theories of grief that are based on the assumption bereaved persons privately and passively negotiate a universal sequence of stages, tasks, and symptoms in reaction to a loss. By way of contrast, Neimeyer suggests that people-rather than being passive reactors-be active in facing the challenges of loss. From this perspective, grieving is something people do, not something that is done to them. Furthermore, rather than viewing the grief process in normative, stage-based terms, a meaning-making model draws attention to the diverse and variegated ways in which humans both personally and socially construct viable ways to make sense of loss. This attention to both idiographic and cultural dimensions of meaning-making makes it less likely that a person who deviates from something called "normal" grieving will be pathologized. Neimeyer's meaningmaking model also takes a very different approach to understanding the role of grief-related emotions. That is, rather than viewing the constellations of emotions that may be associated with grief (depression, anxiety, guilt, hostility, etc.) as merely symptoms that need to be treated and overcome, a constructivist, meaning-making approach underscores the functional value of persons' feelings, suggesting that feelings "should be understood as signals of the state of our meaning making efforts in the wake of challenges to the adequacy of our constructions" (p. …

The role of concrete materials in constructing mathematical meaning

The emphasis on concretisation in primary school mathematics is largely derived from orthodox and neo-Piagetian theory. Such theory builds on the constructivist assumptions that mathematical knowledge, like all knowledge, is not directly absorbed by the learner from the teacher but is actively constructed by each individual learner. The realisation that for learning to be effective, it had to be active, manifested itself in a veritable explosion of ‘activity methods’ and ‘learning by doing’ in the belief that unless children were physically acting on concrete materials they could not be learning. But the available evidence suggests that concrete materials have effects on learners which are different from what teachers intended. There is therefore a pressing need to develop pedagogical practices which overtake the limitations of concrete materials and allow mathematical meaning to be constructed.

Children's Memory and Metaphorical Interpretation

Assumptions of constructivism, information-processing, and fuzzy-trace theory were tested in two experiments on memory and comprehension of metaphors with 6- and 9-year-old children. In the first experiment, verbatim memory for metaphors was compared with misrecognition of the gist of metaphorical meaning. In the second experiment, children judged metaphorical meaning, including alternative perceptual and psychological interpretations. We found that (a) children misrecognized the gist of metaphorical interpretations, especially after a delay, much like they do for literal gist (e.g., true inferences); (b) contrary to both constructivism and information-processing theory, misrecognizing metaphorical gist was independent of memory for the metaphor itself; (c) true psychological interpretations were misrecognized and judged acceptable more often than any other type at all ages; and (d) contrary to the idea that literal or perceptual interpretations are suppressed to achieve psychological interpretations, acc...

A constructivist approach to the development of personal epistemic assumptions and worldviews

Abstract We discuss a constructivist model of epistemic development based on the notion of increased complexity. This model proposes that as cognitive complexity increases by means of cycles of validation and invalidation, personal epistemic assumptions shift from positivism to constructivism, and preferred worldviews shift from mechanism to organicism—as defined by Pepper's (1942) taxonomy of world hypotheses. We report two studies in which we found, as predicted, a significant relationship among overall cognitive complexity, constructivist epistemic assumptions, and an organicist worldview. However, our attempt to discriminate the effects of the two theoretical dimensions of cognitive complexity (differentiation and integration) was not successful. Our data also indicate a dichotomy of ways of knowing: One is characterized by cognitive simplicity, objectvist epistemic assumptions, and a mechanistic/formistic worldview; the other is characterized by cognitive complexity, constructivist epistemic assumpti...

Individual differences in self-construction: The role of constructivist epistemological assumptions

Abstract The role that personal epistemological assumptions play in the construction and revision of self-identity was examined in three studies. Study 1 was an initial effort to develop and validate a scale to assess constructivist epistemic assumptions. As hypothesized, personal constructivist assumptions were associated with the use of an informational, scientific approach to identity issues. In Study 2, scores on a revised constructivist scale were found to be related to problem-focused personal coping and an informational orientation to identity. In addition to replicating this finding, the results of Study 3 revealed that constructivist epistemological assumptions were associated with contextual and organismic worldviews. The results are discussed in terms of a social-cognitive process view of self-construction.

POSTSTRUCTURALISM IN FAMILY THERAPY: INTERROGATING THE NARRATIVE/CONVERSATINAL MODE

The narrative/conversational mode of family therapy, based in constructivism and Batesonian cybernetics, has lately associated itself with the poststructuralism of Foucault and Derrida. The narrative/conversational models of White and Epston (1990) and de Shazer (1991) draw only selectively from Foucault and Derrida's ideas and so perpetuate the constructivist neglect of social context and power. Disregarded aspects of Foucault and Derrida's work do contribute to an under‐standing of social context and power. Poststructuralism is a dubious prop for constructivist assumptions: its true merit is in its capacity to illuminate the political/cultural context of our practice, including family therapy as a social institution.

The sense-making theory: Reviewing the interests of a user-centered approach to information seeking and use

The sense-making theory of Brenda Dervin, based on constructivist assumptions on human information seeking and use, is reviewed. The study focuses on the epistemic and practical interests of the theory, discussing them in relation to the interests of the traditional intermediary-centered approach. The interests of the theory are reviewed by analyzing its conceptions of information, information seeking and use, structure, and action. In addition, the assumptions of the theory are assessed in the context of the recent developments of social science and methodology. Finally, the paradigmatic demands of the theory for the study of information seeking and use are considered. Sense-making theory, having its strongest roots in communication research, is a programmatic research effort suggesting user-centered ideas for the conceptualization of information seeking and use. The theoretical assumptions of the theory based on the metaphors of situation-gap-uses/helps has been validated in numerous empirical studies. As to LIS research at large, the major contribution of the present theory seems to be the inspiring critique addressed to the limitations of the traditional intermediary-centered approach.

Social science research in the 1990s: The contribution of constructivism

Abstract Social science research in this decade has not made the progress we expected of it. Our findings still diverge, generalization from these findings remains restricted, and the many questions vital to achieving a better society continue to be unanswered. In the next decade, social science research may be able to benefit from constructivism. In this article I explore some of the constructivist assumptions about people. These include their subjectivity and purpose, the central role of meaning for them, and how that meaning can be both unique and shared. I also examine some constructivist assumptions about social science. These assumptions enable us as social scientists to understand better the constructivist nature of ourselves as researchers, our research participants, and our research interactions. These assumptions also have implications for the types of data collection methods we choose to use, as well as for data analysis. An example of each is provided. The application of these assumptions seem...

Normative Reflexions on Constructivist Approaches to Science and Technology

Systematic and fundamental thinking on normative, or normatively relevant, questions is virtually absent in the highly influential constructivist studies of science and technology. This paper is an attempt at changing this situation. After reviewing and assessing the role of normativity and reflexivity, in so far as it has been acknowledged within constructivism, a number of `normative reflexions' are presented. Three general approaches—social constructivism, ethnography and actor-network theory—are analyzed in detail. The main themes of these analytical and critical reflexions are: `missing issues', `locality', `relativism', `the winner's perspective', and `technoscientific success'. It turns out that constructivist views concerning these themes have a number of normatively questionable consequences. These consequences can be avoided if certain constructivist assumptions, which are empirically unwarranted or unnecessary anyway, are rejected. Instead, some constructive alternatives are proposed for a social study of science and technology that is both empirically adequate and normatively satisfactory.

Which Data-Collection Methods are Appropriate for A Constructive Psychology?

Abstract The implications of some assumptions of personal construct psychology far research methodology are considered here. When four available models of data collection are examined, one proves to be the most appropriate for constructivists. The sequential stages of this model are identified, and the extent to which current data-collection methods include these stages is discussed. These constructivist assumptions also have implications for the criteria by which these methods are evaluated.

Rejoinder to George

Alexander George ('Reply to Weir on Dummett and Intuitionism', Mind, I987, pp. 404-6) raises two objections to my criticisms of Michael Dummett in part II of my 'Dummett on Meaning and Classical Logic', Mind, I986, pp. 465-77. The second criticism concerns my doubts as to the legitimacy of the intuitionist claim that it is decidable, of an arbitrary construction, whether or not it is an intuitionist proof of an arbitrary sentence. (I was not, as George seems to suggest, concerned with the problem, for a fixed sentence, of the decidability of proofhood for it.) The problem arises out of the intuitionist insistence that our store of axioms and rules of proof is not fixed once and for all but can always be extended by the 'intuiting' of new axioms and methods of proof. As George points out, I was mistaken to focus on the transformations figuring in the account of provability for conditionals and universal generalizations: the intuitionists recognize no restriction on the type of sentence for which new methods of proof may become available. However the problem is especially salient there since it thereby impinges on the intuitionist account of the logical constants: particularly, as Dummett notes (Truth and Other Enigmas, London, Duckworth, I978, bottom of the paragraph p. 242), the conditional, since we explain its meaning in terms of operations on proofs of antecedents and it seems we have no effective means of generating each one of these. George denies that intuitionists are faced with a problem here on the grounds that all acceptable extensions of the proof relation preserve the property of decidability. 'Although we may come to admit more and more constructions as proofs of a given sentence, it will always remain a decidable matter whether a given construction is a proof of that sentence or not' (p. 405; as remarked, he focuses on an overly restrictive form of the problem). My doubts remain. We have to ask whether the addition of new proof methods entails a change in meaning in the sentences affected by the addition. Dummett appears to think it does (cf. Elements of Intuitionism, Oxford, 1977, pp. 401-3). But then the doctrine that the methods of proof for a given language are not fixed is only trivially true; it is true of the sentences considered as uninterpreted formulae, something no one would deny. It is not true of the propositions expressed in the language at a given time. Alternatively, an ever-growing body of proof methods may be applicable to a fixed set of propositions, enabling more and more to be decided. But then it seems plausible to require of one who understands all these propositions that they be able to tell of any putative new method, applied to a sentence expressing one of these propositions, whether it is indeed a proof or not. Plausible, that is, on constructivist assumptions about the relation between meaning and proof. Thus the motivation for requiring the proof relation to be decidable. But in this second case, what matters is not whether it is decidable whether something is currently a proof of a sentence, but whether