Non-cognitive Processes Research Articles

The Impact of Preschool Education Experience on Multidimensional Non-Cognitive Abilities and Personality Development of Adolescents

The topic’s relevance is based on solving the problems of the influence of preschool education experience on the multidimensional non-cognitive abilities and personality development of adolescents. The purpose of the article was to analyse the problems of the formation of multidimensional non-cognitive processes, substantiating and determining the non-cognitive abilities of preschool children: highly developed personality, giftedness, intelligence, soft skills and conducting an experiment using the basic survey of the 2013-2014 school years conducted by the Chinese Expert Research on Education (CEPS) at Renmin University (China). The methodological approach of the research was based on the methods of analysis, synthesis, comparison, generalisation of literary sources on the problem of researching the formation of multidimensional non-cognitive abilities, graphic methods for visual illustration and comparison of the results of the ascertaining and formative stages of the research. The content of the main concepts of “abilities” and “non-cognitive abilities” is determined, and their features and features are revealed. The identified non-cognitive abilities and their indicators, as well as the methods of their formation, can be used as methodical material for universities and for the personal development of individual preschool education specialists in near and far foreign countries.

The causal effect of education and cognitive performance on risk for suicide attempt: A combined instrumental variable and co-relative approach in a Swedish national cohort

BackgroundThe aim of this study was to clarify the possible causal associations between education phenotypes and non-fatal suicide attempts. In particular, we evaluated the roles of academic achievement (school grades), cognitive performance (IQ), and educational attainment (education level). MethodsBased on longitudinal Swedish registry data, we included 2,335,763 individuals (48.7% female) with available school grades, 1,448,438 men with IQ measures, and 4,352,989 individuals (48.4% female) with available data on education level. We combined two different approaches to aid in causal inference: 1) instrumental variables analysis, using month of birth as an instrument related to education but not suicide attempt, to control for measured and unmeasured confounders, and 2) co-relative analysis, comparing pairs of different genetic relatedness (cousins, half, and full siblings) to control for genetic and environmental influences. ResultsHigh education was associated with reduced risk of suicide attempt. Instrumental variable analysis indicated evidence of a likely causal association between higher school grades and lower risk of suicide attempts (HR = 0.71). Co-relative analyses supported the causality between the three predictors and suicide attempt risk (school grades, HR = 0.80, IQ, HR = 0.83, education level, HR = 0.76). Finally, we examined the specificity of education phenotypes and found that both cognitive (IQ) and non-cognitive (school grades, education level) processes were involved in suicide attempt risk. LimitationsIQ was only available in men, limiting the generalizability of this analysis in women. ConclusionsEfforts to support causal associations in psychiatric research are needed to offer better intervention. Programs improving education during adolescence would decrease suicide attempt risk.

Forever yuck: Oculomotor avoidance of disgusting stimuli resists habituation.

Disgust is an adaptation forged under the selective pressure of pathogens. Yet disgust may cause problems in contemporary societies because of its propensity for "false positives" and resistance to corrective information. Here, we investigate whether disgust, as revealed by oculomotor avoidance, might be reduced through the noncognitive process of habituation. In each of three experiments, we repeatedly exposed participants to the same pair of images, one disgusting and one neutral, and recorded gaze. Experiment 1 (N = 104) found no decline in oculomotor avoidance of the disgusting image after 24 prolonged exposures. Experiment 2 (N = 99) replicated this effect and demonstrated its uniqueness to disgust. In Experiment 3 (N = 93), we provided a gaze-contingent reward to ensure perceptual contact with the disgusting image. Participants looked almost exclusively at the disgusting image for 5 min but resumed baseline levels of oculomotor avoidance once the reward ceased. These findings underscore the challenge of reducing disgust. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Computational modeling reveals strategic and developmental differences in the behavioral impact of reward across adolescence.

Studies of reward effects on behavior in adolescence typically rely on performance metrics that confound myriad cognitive and non-cognitive processes, making it challenging to determine which process is impacted by reward. The present longitudinal study applied the diffusion decision model to a reward task to isolate the influence of reward on response caution from influences of processing and motor speed. Participants completed three annual assessments from early to middle adolescence (N=387, 55% female, Mage =12.1 at Wave 1; Mage =13.1 at Wave 2, Mage =14.1 at Wave 3) and three annual assessments in late adolescence (Mages =17.8, 18.9, 19.9). At each assessment, participants completed a two-choice reaction time task under conditions of no-reward and a block in which points were awarded for speeded accuracy. Reward reduced response caution at all waves, as expected, but had a greater impact as teens moved from early to middle adolescence. Simulations to identify optimal response caution showed that teens were overly cautious in early adolescence but became too focused on speed over accuracy by middle adolescence. By late adolescence, participants adopted response styles that maximized reward. Further, response style was associated with both internalizing and externalizing symptoms in early-to-middle adolescence, providing evidence for the construct validity of a diffusion model approach in this developmental period.

Melatonin salvages lead-induced neuro-cognitive shutdown, anxiety, and depressive-like symptoms via oxido-inflammatory and cholinergic mechanisms.

IntroductionLead is the most used nonphysiological neurotoxic heavy metal in the world that has been indicated to interfere with the cognitive and noncognitive processes via numerous mechanisms. The neuroprotective effect of melatonin is well known, but the effect of its interaction with lead in the brain remains inconclusive.ObjectiveTo assess the therapeutic role of melatonin on cognitive deficit, anxiety and depressive‐like symptoms in matured male Wistar rats exposed to a subchronic lead chloride (PbCl2).MethodsTwenty male Wistar rats were blindly randomized into four groups (n = 5/group): group 1 to 4 underwent intragastric administration of physiological saline (10 ml/kg; vehicle), PbCl2 (50 mg/kg), melatonin (10 mg/kg) and PbCl2 + melatonin respectively for a period of 4 weeks during which neurobehavioral data were extracted, followed by neurochemical and histopathological evaluations.ResultsExposure to PbCl2 reduced cognitive performance by increasing the escape latency and average proximity to the platform zone border, decreasing average path length in the platform zone, cognitive score, and time spent in probing. It raised the thigmotaxis percentage, time spent in rearing, number of pellet‐like feces, and time spent in the dark compartment of a bright/dark box which are predictors of anxiety. It also induced depressive‐like behavior as immobility time was enhanced. PbCl2 deranged neurochemicals; malondialdehyde, interlukin‐1β, and tumor necrotic factor‐α were increased while superoxide dismutase and acetylcholinesterase were decreased without remarkable alteration in reduced glutathione and nitric oxide. Administration of PbCl2 further disrupted neuronal settings of hippocampal proper and dentate gyrus. In contrast, the supplementation of melatonin reversed all the neurological consequences of PbCl2 neurotoxicity by eliciting its properties against oxidative and nonoxidative action of PbCl2.ConclusionThese findings suggest that melatonin down‐regulates neurotoxicant interplays in the brain systems. Therefore, this study suggests the use of melatonin as an adjuvant therapy in neuropathological disorders/dysfunctions.

HODNOTENIE KVALITY PRIMARNEHO VZDELAVANIA TESTOVANIM 5 Z POHLADU UCITELOV

Quality requirements in all areas of education and in all types of schools are one of the basic attributes on which the future of nations, states and humanity depends. The quality of education as a service of a publicly funded society is therefore subject to monitoring by government institutions. Evaluating the quality of a school means finding out data on pre-agreed aspects of school life, the processes that take place in it. In 2015, an innovated state educational program was introduced in primary education. It brought changes especially in the educational standards of individual subjects, where is the attention to performance standards. The content of the curriculum does not become the goal of education, but a means to achieve the goal, which is a competent student. National testing also tries to bring this change in the understanding of content closer to the creation of test tasks. Students tests results cannot be the only and most important measure of a school's quality. Students, parents and teachers need to focus on non-cognitive processes at school. The introduction of testing of 5th grade students was not accepted by teachers with an understanding of effort to increase the quality of education. The aim of the paper is to compare the opinions of teachers from 2017 with the opinions of teachers in 2020 and to find out whether there has been a change in the acceptance of testing of 5th grade students as a tool for measuring the quality of education after primary education.

Examining Psychological Self-Sufficiency Among Low-Income Jobseekers with Mental Health Barriers.

The study is to investigate psychological self-sufficiency-the force within someone that activates cognitive and non-cognitive process of shifting perceived barriers into hope actions-as it relates to economic self-sufficiency among jobseekers with mental health barriers. Among a sample of 2455 low-income jobseekers in job readiness programs at six community-based agencies in Chicago, a subsample of 424 who self-identified as having mental illness barriers are selected to analyze the relationships between employment hope, employment barriers, and economic self-sufficiency using structural equation modeling. Results indicate that employment hope mediates the path between perceived employment barriers and economic self-sufficiency. The study further highlights the positive effects of employment barriers on employment hope among jobseekers with perceived mental illnesses. The findings support growing evidence that psychological self-sufficiency is positively associated with gaining economic self-sufficiency in workforce development programs.

Innovation in solitary bees is driven by exploration, shyness and activity levels.

Behavioural innovation and problem solving are widely considered to be important mechanisms by which animals respond to novel environmental challenges, including those induced by human activities. Despite their functional and ecological relevance, much of our current understanding of these processes comes from studies in vertebrates. Understanding of these processes in invertebrates has lagged behind partly because they are not perceived to have the cognitive machinery required. This perception is, however, challenged by recent evidence demonstrating sophisticated cognitive capabilities in insects despite their small brains. Here, we studied innovation, defined as the capacity to solve a new task, of a solitary bee (Osmia cornuta) in the laboratory by exposing naive individuals to an obstacle removal task. We also studied the underlying cognitive and non-cognitive mechanisms through a battery of experimental tests designed to measure associative learning, exploration, shyness and activity levels. We found that solitary bees can innovate, with 11 of 29 individuals (38%) being able to solve a new task consisting of lifting a lid to reach a reward. However, the propensity to innovate was uncorrelated with the measured learning capacity, but increased with exploration, boldness and activity. These results provide solid evidence that non-social insects can solve new tasks, and highlight the importance of interpreting innovation in the light of non-cognitive processes.

What multimodal data can tell us about the students’ regulation of their learning process?

• New data-capturing devices allow researchers trace a range of cognitive and noncognitive processes. • We discuss and demonstrate how by data triangulating it is possible to study a number of features of regulated learning. • It is concluded that multimodal data can indicate critical features of regulated learning in collaboration.

A Bayesian race model for response times under cyclic stimulus discriminability

Response time (RT) data from psychology experiments are often used to validate theories of how the brain processes information and how long it takes a person to make a decision. When an RT results from a task involving two or more possible responses, the cognitive process that determines the RT may be modeled as the first-passage time of underlying competing (racing) processes with each process describing accumulation of information in favor of one of the responses. In one popular model the racers are assumed to be Gaussian diffusions. Their first-passage times are inverse Gaussian random variables and the resulting RT has a min-inverse Gaussian distribution. The RT data analyzed in this paper were collected in an experiment requiring people to perform a two-choice task in response to a regularly repeating sequence of stimuli. Starting from a min-inverse Gaussian likelihood for the RTs we build a Bayesian hierarchy for the rates and thresholds of the racing diffusions. The analysis allows us to characterize patterns in a person’s sequence of responses on the basis of features of the person’s diffusion rates (the “footprint” of the stimuli) and a person’s gradual changes in speed as trends in the diffusion thresholds. Last, we propose that a small fraction of RTs arise from distinct, noncognitive processes that are included as components of a mixture model. In the absence of sharp prior information, the inclusion of these mixture components is accomplished via a two-stage, empirical Bayes approach. The resulting framework may be generalized readily to RTs collected under a variety of experimental designs.

What's in Your File Folder? Part 3: Differentiation and Integration in Logic (and Illogic)

AbstractIn this third installment of his series on key, underappreciated ideas in Ayn Rand's epistemology, the author discusses the nature of differentiation and integration as the functional essence of consciousness and applies that insight to various cognitive and noncognitive processes of awareness, with a special emphasis on logic and illogic. He offers an extended analysis of the fallacies of “Frozen Abstraction” and “False Alternative,” as well as critiques of a long-standing Objectivist conflation of falsity and contradiction and a relatively more recent Objectivist error, the fallacy of “genuine awareness.”

Generic log files and algorithms developed for educational multiplayer games

There is potential for online multiplayer educational games to play a vital role to measure cognitive and social abilities among students. Educational games can be developed to capture student responses or actions, both shared and unshared, within the game environment. This paper presents a data capturing process in online games with a focus on the structural components required to measure sufficiently. The first part of this paper introduces a suggested structure of the log files and the second part describes generic algorithms used to extract information from the log files to indicate any observable cognitive and non-cognitive processes of the students. The term generic algorithm refers the common applicability of the algorithms to log files across games and students to provide researchers with rich and meaningful data about student behaviours. A considerable number of generic algorithms were developed to extract salient student behaviour from student activity log files, including intent to achieve efficiency in both present and future development of such complex educational endeavours.

International Service-Learning: Rethinking the Role of Emotions

Existing research on international service-learning (ISL) only implicitly alludes to emotions or considers emotions as a limited vehicle through which the more important work of learning occurs. This study set out to shift this focus on emotions to show how emotions are an integral part of the overall ISL experience. The aim was to understand how an ISL internship was an emotional experience for the student participants through the lens of noncognitive process theory of emotions. This was a qualitative case study of the experiences of 10 university students who engaged in an ISL internship in East Africa. Data collection instruments included preinternship surveys and emotional mind maps, postinternship surveys, and interviews. The study demonstrated that ISL can be a highly charged, emotional experience for student participants. The author argues that emotional responses are not simply a limited catalyst through which learning and transformation transpires, but constitutes forms of understanding in and of themselves. This points to the need for ISL researchers and practitioners to shift their preconceptions about the value of emotions in learning and transformation processes and attend to the emotional dimensions of ISL in their research and the implementation of these programs.

Mentoring Matters: Racial Ethnic Minority Undergraduates’ Cultural Fit, Mentorship, and College and Life Satisfaction

This study examined the degree to which cultural fit (cultural congruity in combination with perception of the university environment) and the dimensional noncognitive processes of mentoring predicted college satisfaction and life satisfaction for 238 racial and ethnic minority undergraduates from two university contexts. Group differences as well as differences in strength of relationships emerged by site and mentor status. Perception of the university environment was the strongest positive predictor of college satisfaction, whereas cultural congruity was the strongest predictor of life satisfaction. Limitations, future research directions, and implications of the study’s findings are discussed.

Obesity prevention at the point of purchase.

The point of purchase is when people may make poor and impulsive decisions about what and how much to buy and consume. Because point of purchase strategies frequently work through non-cognitive processes, people are often unable to recognize and resist them. Because people lack insight into how marketing practices interfere with their ability to routinely eat healthy, balanced diets, public health entities should protect consumers from potentially harmful point of purchase strategies. We describe four point of purchase policy options including standardized portion sizes; standards for meals that are sold as a bundle, e.g. 'combo meals'; placement and marketing restrictions on highly processed low-nutrient foods; and explicit warning labels. Adoption of such policies could contribute significantly to the prevention of obesity and diet-related chronic diseases. We also discuss how the policies could be implemented, along with who might favour or oppose them. Many of the policies can be implemented locally, while preserving consumer choice.

Using neuroscience to improve ad impact: How new research tools can advance cultural marketing

Advances in neuroscience and neuromarketing research finally allow us to assess non-cognitive processes, such as emotions, that have long been suspected to be crucial drivers of advertising effects. As we are experiencing rapid changes in technology, media usage, shopping options, consumer behaviour, and society, effective, fact-based decisions on marketing strategies are becoming more important and also more difficult. As a result, we need better, more precise tools that allow us to bring science-based evidence to our decision making. This paper reviews these new tools, the evidence for their effectiveness, and demonstrates how they can be — and why they should be — employed to improve marketing and advertising to multi-cultural and multi-lingual consumers in the USA and other countries.

Effects of an Injected Placebo on Endurance Running Performance.

This study aims to quantify the magnitude of the placebo effect of an injected placebo ("OxyRBX") purporting to have effects similar to those of recombinant human erythropoietin on endurance running performance in "real-world" field-based head-to-head competition settings. Fifteen endurance-trained club-level men (mean ± SD: age, 27.5 ± 6.8 yr; body mass index, 22.9 ± 2.0 kg·m) with 10-km personal-best record times of 39.3 ± 4.4 min completed a randomized cross-over study of 3-km races before and after 7-d "control" and "placebo" phases. During the placebo phase, participants self-administered subcutaneous saline injections daily, believing it to be OxyRBX, with no intervention during the control phase. At the start and end of each 7-d phase, 3-km running performance was assessed. Qualitative assessments of participants' perceptions and experiences were recorded throughout and during semistructured interviews on completion. Race time improved significantly more in response to placebo intervention (9.73 ± 1.96 s faster, P = 0.0005) than in response to control (1.82 ± 1.94 s faster, P = 0.41; Pinteraction = 0.02). In response to placebo, participants reported reductions in physical effort, increased potential motivation, and improved recovery. Beliefs and congruence between positive expectations of the effects of placebo and perceptions of physical change during training also appeared to impact on competitive performance. Compared to control, the injected placebo improved 3-km race time by 1.2%. This change is of clear sporting relevance but is smaller than the performance improvement elicited by recombinant human erythropoietin administration. Qualitative data suggest that placebo may have improved performance by both reducing perception of effort and increasing potential motivation, in accord with the psychobiological model for exercise performance, and that cognitive and noncognitive processes appear to have influenced placebo response.

Multiscale Enaction Model (MEM): the case of complexity and "context-sensitivity" in vision.

I review the data on human visual perception that reveal the critical role played by non-visual contextual factors influencing visual activity. The global perspective that progressively emerges reveals that vision is sensitive to multiple couplings with other systems whose nature and levels of abstraction in science are highly variable. Contrary to some views where vision is immersed in modular hard-wired modules, rather independent from higher-level or other non-cognitive processes, converging data gathered in this article suggest that visual perception can be theorized in the larger context of biological, physical, and social systems with which it is coupled, and through which it is enacted. Therefore, any attempt to model complexity and multiscale couplings, or to develop a complex synthesis in the fields of mind, brain, and behavior, shall involve a systematic empirical study of both connectedness between systems or subsystems, and the embodied, multiscale and flexible teleology of subsystems. The conceptual model (Multiscale Enaction Model [MEM]) that is introduced in this paper finally relates empirical evidence gathered from psychology to biocomputational data concerning the human brain. Both psychological and biocomputational descriptions of MEM are proposed in order to help fill in the gap between scales of scientific analysis and to provide an account for both the autopoiesis-driven search for information, and emerging perception.

Overcoming Obstacles and Academic Hope: An Examination of Factors Promoting Effective Academic Success Strategies

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the underlying non-cognitive processes and institutional factors that allowed first-year students to enact effective strategies for attaining academic success and persisting despite obstacles. The varying levels of academic preparation and unique obstacles faced by the student participants allowed for us to employ a constant comparative approach in analyzing the results. A core story of hopeful thinking emerged which interacted with four major themes including: a) generating alternative pathways when encountering obstacles to social and academic integration, b) goal setting and planning, c) active use of peer and academic supports, and d) experiencing a positive institutional context. While this study confirms research about what factors predict the success of students coping with difficult transitions, it also provides new insights. Results suggest that academic hope is an important theoretical framework to guide future research and practice in the area of student retention.

Expectancy-value and cognitive process outcomes in mathematics learning: a structural equation analysis

Existing research has yielded evidence to indicate that the expectancy-value theoretical model predicts students' learning in various achievement contexts. Achievement values and self-efficacy expectations, for example, have been found to exert positive effects on cognitive process and academic achievement outcomes. We tested a conceptual model that depicted the interrelations between the non-cognitive (task value, self-efficacy) and cognitive (deep-learning approach, reflective-thinking) processes of learning, and academic achievement outcomes in mathematics. University students (n = 289) were administered a number of Likert-scale inventories and LISREL 8.80 was used to test various a priori and a posteriori models. Structural equation modeling yielded some important findings: (1) the positive temporally displaced effects of prior academic achievement, self-efficacy expectations and task value on achievement in mathematics, (2) the positive relations between self-efficacy expectations and task values and cognitive process outcomes and (3) the possible mediating role of self-efficacy expectations and task value between prior academic achievement and deep learning, reflective-thinking practice and academic achievement. Overall, our research investigation has provided empirical groundings for further advancement into this area of students' learning.