The two inter-linked volumes in this series are dedicated to the development of analysis and theorisation of learning and teaching in higher education. The two volumes focus on the multi-scalar ecological inter-connectedness of learners with teachers, with artefacts, with cultural patterns and resources, with places, with social activities and…

College campuses have become rich sites of hip-hop culture and knowledge production. Despite the attention that campus personnel and researchers have paid to student life, the field of higher education has often misunderstood the ways that hip-hop culture exists in college students' lives. Based upon in-depth interviews, observations of…

The design and use of a chemistry practice exam instrument that includes a measure for student mental effort is described in this paper. Use of such an instrument can beneficial to chemistry students and chemistry educators as well as chemical education researchers from both a content and cognitive science perspective. The method for calculating…

Much research has been conducted about how and when individuals allocate rewards, yet little research exists concerning the allocation of punishment. The process of allocating negative outcomes may be different from the decision making process for positive outcomes. To examine the decision making process for allocating rewards and punishment,…

In recent years, the relationship between moods and thoughts has been the focus of much theorizing and some empirical work. A study was undertaken to examine the intraindividual relationship between negative affect and negative thoughts using a Box-Jenkins time series analysis. College students (N=33) completed a measure of negative mood and…

Much research has found that information encoded according to its self-relevance is more easily recalled than information encoded according to other formats. Two experiments were conducted to examine potential moderators of the processes involved in self-relevant memory. In the first study, the hypothesis was tested that self-relevant encoding is…

Studies have shown that depressed people have a significantly higher number of irrational beliefs and cognitive distortions than nondepressed people. The purpose of this study was to identify the causal relationship among depression, irrational beliefs, and cognitive distortions through the use of cross-lagged panel correlational analysis. On two…

The role of autonomic arousal in feeling states has long been of interest to psychologists. To examine the necessity of arousal for an effective mood induction, 60 college students were instructed either to exercise vigorously (high arousal group), exercise lightly with a rest period (low arousal group), or complete a questionnaire (no arousal…

When people are asked to explain hypothetical events they tend to prefer explanations with multiple reasons (conjunctive explanations) over simple explanations. To examine this tendency, undergraduate students participated in two experiments. In the first study, students read 10 stories depicting a main character making a decision on an important…

The type of cognitive processing most beneficial to memory may depend on the structure of the material and the type of retrieval test required. Relational encoding organizes words by their relationships, while item-specific encoding processes words on an individual basis. To obtain information on these cognitive processes as they relate to the use…

Recent research has shown that when subjects are asked to make a judgment or decision based on incomplete information, they may infer or impute a value for the missing information based on their perception of the relationship between the missing and the presented information. To examine how clients evaluate and choose between therapists on the…

Recent research in achievement has focused on sex differences found in locus of standards, conceptual focus, and expectations for success. To examine the nature of sex differences and their relationship to achievement domains, 439 college students (197 females, 242 males) were asked to write an account of an achievement or failure. They then…

Previous research has indicated that Type A's have a higher need to control their environments, and respond more reactively to control loss than Type B's. To clarify the role of information processing in the control relinquishment decisions of Type A's and B's, 147 male and female college students took part in a problem solving experiment. Pairs…

Research into fluctuations in anxiety before and after a threatening event suggests that anxiety may decrease as the anticipated threat draws near. To investigate the experience of actual test anxiety (TA) compared to its anticipation and recollection, 502 college students completed 10-item alternate forms (A and B) of the State Trait Anxiety…

In recent years, the study of the self has been concentrated in the areas of self-esteem, individual differences in self-relevant cognition, and the processes of self-relevant cognition. To validate understanding of the individual difference dimensions of public and private self-consciousness and self-esteem, college students (N=101) completed the…