Individual Learning Abilities Research Articles

Anterior insular thickness predicts speech sound learning ability in bilinguals

A previous fMRI study of novel speech sound learning, tied to the methods and results presented here, identified groups of advanced and novice learners and related their classification to neural activity. To complement those results and better elucidate the role of the entire neural system in speech learning, the current study analyzed the neuroanatomical data with the goals of 1) uncovering the regions of interest (ROIs) that predicted speech learning performance in a sample of monolingual and bilingual adults, and 2) examining if the relationship between cortical thickness from selected ROIs and individual learning ability depends on language group. The ROIs selected were brain regions well-established in the literature as areas associated with language and speech processing (i.e., Transverse Superior Temporal Gyrus, anterior insula and posterior insula, all bilaterally). High-resolution brain scans (T1-weighted) were acquired from 23 Spanish-English bilinguals and 20 English monolingual adults. The thickness of the left anterior insula significantly predicted speech sound learning ability in bilinguals but not monolinguals. These results suggest that aptitude for learning a new language is associated with variations in the cortical thickness of the left anterior insula in bilinguals. These findings may provide insight into the higher order mechanisms involved in speech perception and advance our understanding of the unique strategies employed by the bilingual brain during language learning.

A Study on the Relationship between Customer Participation and Employee Service Innovation Behavior

The research object of this paper is the 320 first line employees of the major commercial banks in Guangxi. This article uses the literature reading method and the questionnaire survey to explore the relationship between customer participation and employee service innovation behavior. The research results show that three dimensions of customer participation have a extraordinary positive correlation to employee service innovation behavior, which are information provision, interpersonal interaction and cooperative behavior; Individual learning ability has positive moderating effect on the relationship between interpersonal interaction and employee service innovation behavior, has weak positive moderating effect on information provision and employee service innovation behavior, has no positive moderating effect on cooperative behavior and employee service innovation behavior. The empirical study of this paper improves the understanding of employee service innovation, deepen the micro level of employee service innovation behavior, and guide the direction of commercial banks to strengthen employee service innovation behavior.

Designing and Practice of a College English Teaching Platform Based on Artificial Intelligence

College English is one of the basic core courses for all college students in China. The course involves many difficult concepts and grammatical structures, so it is difficult to most of the students. The starting point in any teaching program is to determine whether teaching is needed to specify what that teaching should accomplish. So the students’ need is of vital importance to the success of college English teaching. Traditional college English teaching does not take into account students’ individual learning abilities and feedbacks, which would cause students to grasp the key knowledge not enough, and then make students lose their interest in English. The purpose of this paper is to establish a college English teaching platform, and using artificial intelligence to find the needs of college students and know about mastering knowledge of students. The platform can adjust the teaching schedule and contents through artificial intelligence algorithm. Statistical data of several years show that the average score of students who used the platform to learn college English is far higher than those students who didn’t use the platform. Hence, the platform can improve students’ autonomous learning and English abilities.

Autonomous learning ability training of college students in Tianjin from the perspective of habitus and field

The 21st century is the era of competition for talents which requires talents to acquire independent innovation consciousness and innovation ability. Study by Bass, American educational psychologist, shows that before the 1960s, knowledge learned before university graduation can be used until retirement, but in the 21st century, this figure is reduced to 25%. That is, today, 75% of knowledge and skills needed for a career after college students’ graduation from university needs to be acquired from the big class of society. Availability of the knowledge and skills is closely related to a person’s autonomous learning ability. Thus, to improve autonomous learning ability is an inevitable requirement for social development. To train college students’ autonomous learning ability is an important content and task of teaching, also an important means for colleges to improve effectiveness of teaching. Autonomous learning ability not only becomes one of overall qualities that college students should have in colleges and universities, but also becomes an indispensable capability in their its subsequent development in life after graduation. Thus, improving current undergraduate education model from the perspective of strengthening college students’ autonomous learning ability can not only make up in insufficient ability training among today’s college students in China’s basic education system, but also facilitate upgrading of college students’ individual autonomous learning ability, with a view on college students’ good career development and overall quality upgrading of college graduates.

Cognitive differences between orang-utan species: a test of the cultural intelligence hypothesis.

Cultural species can - or even prefer to - learn their skills from conspecifics. According to the cultural intelligence hypothesis, selection on underlying mechanisms not only improves this social learning ability but also the asocial (individual) learning ability. Thus, species with systematically richer opportunities to socially acquire knowledge and skills should over time evolve to become more intelligent. We experimentally compared the problem-solving ability of Sumatran orang-utans (Pongo abelii), which are sociable in the wild, with that of the closely related, but more solitary Bornean orang-utans (P. pygmaeus), under the homogeneous environmental conditions provided by zoos. Our results revealed that Sumatrans showed superior innate problem-solving skills to Borneans, and also showed greater inhibition and a more cautious and less rough exploration style. This pattern is consistent with the cultural intelligence hypothesis, which predicts that the more sociable of two sister species experienced stronger selection on cognitive mechanisms underlying learning.

Stimulation of dopamine D₁ receptor improves learning capacity in cooperating cleaner fish.

Accurate contextual decision-making strategies are important in social environments. Specific areas in the brain are tasked to process these complex interactions and generate correct follow-up responses. The dorsolateral and dorsomedial parts of the telencephalon in the teleost fish brain are neural substrates modulated by the neurotransmitter dopamine (DA), and are part of an important neural circuitry that drives animal behaviour from the most basic actions such as learning to search for food, to properly choosing partners and managing decisions based on context. The Indo-Pacific cleaner wrasse Labroides dimidiatus is a highly social teleost fish species with a complex network of interactions with its 'client' reef fish. We asked if changes in DA signalling would affect individual learning ability by presenting cleaner fish two ecologically different tasks that simulated a natural situation requiring accurate decision-making. We demonstrate that there is an involvement of the DA system and D1 receptor pathways on cleaners' natural abilities to learn both tasks. Our results add significantly to the growing literature on the physiological mechanisms that underlie and facilitate the expression of cooperative abilities.

Towards systemic and individualized brain markers for learning difficulties

Towards systemic and individualized brain markers for learning difficulties

Rich-to-poor diaspora ventures: how do they survive?

This paper develops a first conceptual understanding of motivations and success/survival factors of 'rich-to-poor diaspora entrepreneurship (DE)' by focusing on an individual's cultural intelligence and learning ability. Rich-to-poor DE addresses entrepreneurial activities conducted in developing or emerging countries by diasporans originated from developed ones. Despite the growing research interest in the phenomena of DE and its increasing importance for societies and economies, previous researchers have almost solely focused on entrepreneurship by diasporans whose country of origin is an emerging or developing one ('poor-to-rich DE'). This type of DE has been considered to be driven mainly by necessity, an outcome of the lack of financial and economic alternatives in the home country. Evidence from business practice, however, shows the existence and significance of rich-to-poor DE, which is assumed to be more opportunity-driven. The aim of this paper is to clarify the difference between rich-to-poor DE and poor-to-rich DE, and to develop research propositions regarding motivations and success/survival factors of the rich-to-poor type employing cultural intelligence theory (Earley, 2002) and learning theory.

The Effects of Individual Learning Ability on Education Performance and Job Performance of Learners in Lifelong Education

The Effects of Individual Learning Ability on Education Performance and Job Performance of Learners in Lifelong Education

The Ecology of Social Learning in Animals and its Link with Intelligence.

Classical ethology and behavioral ecology did not pay much attention to learning. However, studies of social learning in nature reviewed here reveal the near-ubiquity of reliance on social information for skill acquisition by developing birds and mammals. This conclusion strengthens the plausibility of the cultural intelligence hypothesis for the evolution of intelligence, which assumes that selection on social learning abilities automatically improves individual learning ability. Thus, intelligent species will generally be cultural species. Direct tests of the cultural intelligence hypothesis require good estimates of the amount and kind of social learning taking place in nature in a broad variety of species. These estimates are lacking so far. Here, we start the process of developing a functional classification of social learning, in the form of the social learning spectrum, which should help to predict the mechanisms of social learning involved. Once validated, the categories can be used to estimate the cognitive demands of social learning in the wild.

Human Classification of Context-Related Vocalizations Emitted by Familiar And Unfamiliar Domestic Cats: An Exploratory Study

ABSTRACTPrevious research has shown that human classification of contextspecific domestic cat “meow” vocalizations is relatively poor, although improves with experience and/or general affinity to cats. To investigate whether such classification further improves when recipients (humans) of the vocalizations reside with the vocalizing animal (cat), cat owners (n=10) were asked to listen to eight audio recordings of a single meow (4 from their own cat and 4 from an unfamiliar cat) produced during one of four possible contexts, and identify the context in which each meow was emitted. Contexts comprised food preparation, food-withholding, negotiating a barrier, and attention solicitation. In addition, participants were asked to rate 20 meow vocalizations (produced by unfamiliar cats in the four contexts) on scales measuring pleasantness and urgency, in order to investigate whether participants reached consensus on the emotional content of the vocalizations. Successful identification of both the context and the hypothesized emotional content of the vocalization would comprise the first steps in our understanding of whether human-directed cat “meow” vocalizations are fully advantageous. Forty percent of the participants identified the correct contexts at a level greater than chance when the vocalizations belonged to their own cat. However, no participants performed above chance when vocalizations belonged to an unfamiliar cat. Participants’ urgency ratings were not significantly influenced by the context in which the vocalization was produced. Pleasantness ratings, however, were significantly higher for the context of negotiating a barrier in comparison with attention solicitation. These results suggest that the domestic cat, as a species, does not have a context-specific repertoire of human-directed vocalizations. Successful context classification of cat meows however, was possible for some owners. Whether such success was due to individual learning ability or recognition of hypothesized emotional content of the call requires further investigation.

P300 correlates with learning & memory abilities and fluid intelligence.

BackgroundEducational psychology research has linked fluid intelligence with learning and memory abilities and neuroimaging studies have specifically associated fluid intelligence with event related potentials (ERPs). The objective of this study is to find the relationship of ERPs with learning and memory recall and predict the memory recall score using P300 (P3) component.MethodA sample of thirty-four healthy subjects between twenty and thirty years of age was selected to perform three tasks: (1) Raven’s Advanced Progressive Matrices (RAPM) test to assess fluid intelligence; (2) learning and memory task to assess learning ability and memory recall; and (3) the visual oddball task to assess brain-evoked potentials. These subjects were divided into High Ability (HA) and Low Ability (LA) groups based on their RAPM scores. A multiple regression analysis was used to predict the learning & memory recall and fluid intelligence using P3 amplitude and latency.ResultsBehavioral results demonstrated that the HA group learned and recalled 10.89 % more information than did the LA group. ERP results clearly showed that the P3 amplitude of the HA group was relatively larger than that observed in the LA group for both the central and parietal regions of the cerebrum; particularly during the 300–400 ms time window. In addition, a shorter latency for the P3 component was observed at Pz site for the HA group compared to the LA group. These findings agree with previous educational psychology and neuroimaging studies which reported an association between ERPs and fluid intelligence as well as learning performance.ConclusionThese results also suggest that the P3 component is associated with individual differences in learning and memory recall and further indicate that P3 amplitude might be used as a supporting factor in standard psychometric tests to assess an individual’s learning & memory recall ability; particularly in educational institutions to aid in the predictability of academic skills.

A Case Study of Applying Learning Analytics in General Mathematics Class

The researcher hope to extend the cafe management period and aims to draw more active participation through various methods and use more tools of communication with the students to receive continuous feedback not only during exam period but during the semester. As mentioned in the debate, the class will be supplemented to help not only the teacher but also the students, in line with the purpose of learning analytics, and the researcher confirmed that by analyzing the learners’ learning activities and styles using Naver Cafe’s analysis tools, the quality of the individual learning abilities can be enhanced. In the future, this research could be useful as a case study of using learning analytics and hopefully learning analysis tools will be used more widely in education and that this research can be extended into more fields.

Arginine vasotocin modulates associative learning in a mutualistic cleaner fish

Social environmental complexity induces structural and biochemical changes in animals’ brains, which are linked to the improvement of animals’ learning abilities. The nonapeptides from the arginine vasopressin (AVP) family (arginine vasotocin, AVT, in non-mammals) play a significant role in the regulation of social behavior, particularly in the formation of social memories and individual recognition. Moreover, the role of AVT in the regulation of interspecific interactions has only recently started to be addressed in the context of cleaner fish mutualisms and learning. Variance in the distribution of AVP receptor expression, which is linked to distinct neural systems (related to the dorsolateral and the dorsomedial telencephalon), is known to be implicated in differences in individual learning processes. Here we asked if the associative learning performance of the Indo-Pacific bluestreak cleaner wrasse (Labroides dimidiatus) is regulated by AVT. We tested the influence of AVT upon the cleaners’ ability to solve two different problems (cue and place discrimination tasks) that in principle differ in ecological relevance and are associated with two different memory systems. We found that AVT affected the learning competence of cleaners differently between tasks, as individual performance showed distinct response selectivity to AVT dosage levels. However, only in the ecologically relevant task was their learning response improved by blocking AVT via treatment with the antagonist Manning compound. Our findings demonstrate that AVT pathways, which are implicated in the regulation of interspecific behavior (i.e., a cleaner’s willingness to seek interactions with clients), are also linked to individual learning ability in the context of mutualistic behavior, and in tune with socio-ecological demands.

Both associative learning and speed–accuracy trade-off occur in the southern monarch butterfly when visiting flowers

I examined the ability of the southern monarch butterfly (Danaus erippus) to associate colours with rewards, the consistency of individual learning abilities, and the potential trade-off between foraging speed and accuracy. To assess associative colour learning and individual learning abilities, I offered individual butterflies artificial flowers of two similarly preferred colours, orange and yellow. One colour of flower was rewarding (aqueous sucrose) and the other was non-rewarding (water); two groups of butterflies received reciprocal treatments. A second phase was employed to assess whether learning scores remained similar within individuals when aqueous sodium chloride (NaCl) was offered instead of water. In both phases, butterflies associated rewards with specific colours, regardless of the colour. No individual consistency in learning skills was detected. To examine whether southern monarchs trade off foraging speed with accuracy, butterflies were offered a flower array of three colours: one rewarding (orange) and two distractors (yellow and red). A second phase was employed to detect whether increasing the penalty of choosing an unrewarding colour by offering aqueous quinine hemisulphate instead of water increased attention levels. In both phases, butterflies chose rewarding flowers more often than unrewarding flowers. Butterflies that made correct choices varied greatly in their response times; the few individuals that made incorrect choices displayed exploratory flights of short duration, from 1 to 4 sec. Individuals that rapidly selected incorrect flowers in phase one were different from those that made incorrect choices in phase two. Butterflies vary in their cognitive abilities but do not show individual constancy in their learning skills or the speed at which they choose flowers. This study provides additional evidence that large-sized and long-lived butterfly species have good learning abilities. A pattern consistent with a speed–accuracy trade-off occurs when southern monarchs choose incorrect, unrewarding flowers.

Procedural Learning in Children With Developmental Coordination, Reading, and Attention Disorders.

The aim is to assess repetition-based learning of procedures in children with developmental coordination disorder (DCD), reading disorder (RD) and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Participants included 187 children, studied in 4 groups: (a) DCD comorbid with RD and ADHD (DCD+RD+ADHD) (n = 30); (b) RD comorbid with ADHD (RD+ADHD) (n = 48); (c) ADHD (n = 19); and typically developing children (control group) (n = 90). Two procedural learning tasks were used: Assembly learning and Mirror drawing. Children were tested on 4 occasions for each task: 3 trials were consecutive and the fourth trial was performed after an interference task. Task performance by DCD+RD+ADHD children improved with training (P < .05); however, the improvement was significantly lower than that achieved by the other groups (RD+ADHD, ADHD and controls) (P < .05). In conclusion, children with DCD+RD+ADHD improve in their use of cognitive-motor procedures over a short training period. Aims of intervention in DCD+RD+ADHD should be based on individual learning abilities.

Impact of Online Education in Making Global Learning Accessible

In the midst of the rising integration of online education or e-learning into academic courses, there is strong need for realistic course of action and recommendations to make the improvement possible and release of pedagogically efficient e-learning environments. The objective of this paper is to make clear the educational advantages that take place while supplementing learning by means of online device. This article also suggested that the use of technology in our educational system in teaching and learning will allow educators to plan for courses and programs that will facilitate learning by distant students in the same way as campus based students as well as for each individual student's learning ability, and it offered some background that are essential to advance the objective of making education and learning accessible to all without necessarily disrupting their other daily activities as the learning is done at their own appointed time, place and pace. It concluded with considerations of how the staff responsibility will, of necessity, revolutionize as a consequence of these advances in our understanding of using technology to improve learning outcomes. This is intended at answering basic questions on the subject of the nature as well as scope of online education, taking into consideration the state of e-learning in Nigeria today.

Endogenous fMRI default mode network fluctuations both positively and negatively correlate with individual transfer of learning.

Endogenous fMRI default mode network fluctuations both positively and negatively correlate with individual transfer of learning.

Student reflections on multimodal course content delivery

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to illustrate a for-credit information literacy course redesign that used a flexible multimodal framework to address individual student learning preferences, personal differences and abilities as well as teaching preferences.Design/methodology/approach– Students taking the course were surveyed as to their preferences for content delivery. A qualitative analysis of student reflections was conducted to determine the efficacy of maintaining multiple course formats and to solicit feedback for course improvements.Findings– Results show that students were definitive in their preferences for how they access course materials and that enough students used each format to justify maintaining both. Findings also showed students’ appreciation for being given options.Research limitations/implications– Content delivery modes are changing rapidly. Future studies should explore the efficacy of other modes of delivery.Practical implications– As technology and students’ familiarity with course delivery modes change, how we deliver content to students will also change. The key to reaching students in an effective manner is flexibility.Originality/value– Exploring why and how students choose to learn provides valuable feedback into how we should or should not deliver course content. Learning what works, and providing multiple options, will increase the likelihood of success for a diverse student body.

Goats excel at learning and remembering a highly novel cognitive task

IntroductionThe computational demands of sociality (maintaining group cohesion, reducing conflict) and ecological problems (extractive foraging, memorizing resource locations) are the main drivers proposed to explain the evolution cognition. Different predictions follow, about whether animals would preferentially learn new tasks socially or not, but the prevalent view today is that intelligent species should excel at social learning. However, the predictions were originally used to explain primate cognition, and studies of species with relatively smaller brains are rare. By contrast, domestication has often led to a decrease in brain size, which could affect cognition. In domestic animals, the relaxed selection pressures compared to a wild environment could have led to reduced social and physical cognition. Goats possess several features commonly associated with advanced cognition, such as successful colonization of new environments and complex fission-fusion societies. Here, we assessed goat social and physical cognition as well as long-term memory of a complex two-step foraging task (food box cognitive challenge), in order to investigate some of the main selection pressures thought to affect the evolution of ungulate cognition.ResultsThe majority of trained goats (9/12) successfully learned the task quickly; on average, within 12 trials. After intervals of up to 10 months, they solved the task within two minutes, indicating excellent long-term memory. The goats did not learn the task faster after observing a demonstrator than if they did not have that opportunity. This indicates that they learned through individual rather than social learning.ConclusionsThe individual learning abilities and long-term memory of goats highlighted in our study suggest that domestication has not affected goat physical cognition. However, these cognitive abilities contrast with the apparent lack of social learning, suggesting that relatively intelligent species do not always preferentially learn socially. We propose that goat cognition, and maybe more generally ungulate cognition, is mainly driven by the need to forage efficiently in harsh environments and feed on plants that are difficult to access and to process, more than by the computational demands of sociality. Our results could also explain why goats are so successful at colonizing new environments.