When faced with challenging thinking tasks accompanied by a feeling of uncertainty, people often prefer to opt out (e.g., replying "I don't know", seeking advice) over giving low-confidence responses. In professions with high-stakes decisions (e.g., judges, medical practitioners), opting out is generally seen as preferable to making…

The purpose of this article is to provide a theoretical account of the experience of stuttering that incorporates previous explanations and recent experimental findings. According to this account, stuttering-like disfluencies emerge during early childhood from excessive detection of cognitive conflict due to subtle limitations in speech and…

Research has recognized that people regulate their emotions not only for seeking pleasurable experiences but also for receiving instrumental gains. We draw on the theoretical framework of instrumental emotion regulation (IER; Tamir, 2005, 2009) to shed new light on the relationships among creativity, emotion, and psychological well-being. We…

Multitouch experiment instructions (MEIs), implemented as interactive eBooks, are learning tools for pupils that offer various digital support tools and enable pupils to individualize their learning. They may be applied to contexts such as inquiry-based experiments in school laboratories, which involve highly demanding cognitive processes and…

We discuss four ways in which emotion may relate to cognitive load during learning. One perspective describes emotions as extraneous cognitive load, competing for the limited resources of working memory by requiring the processing of task-extra or task-irrelevant information. Another perspective shows that encoding, storage, and retrieval of…

Appreciating autistic neurodiversity is important when supporting autistic people who experience distress. Specifically, use of a profiling model can reveal less visible autistic differences, including strengths and abilities. Binary logistic regressions showed that the likelihood of extreme distress responses could be interpreted based on…

The Big Five-Factor personality traits are examined in the present review. Individual characteristics and personality types may contribute differently to choices of learning strategies and overall cognitive performance. The purpose of this paper is twofold: (1) to provide a brief overview of consistent research findings on personality constructs…

Although mastering the art of learning how to learn is considered one of the most important skills for young people, few teens know the basics of how to best learn something. And teachers rarely receive training in how to helps students become successful learners. The author describes seven well-supported techniques for learning anything that…

An important element of the classroom assessment event and student performance occurs when students are wrong, which is often denigrated in our success-oriented secondary schools where only being right is valued and reinforced. This article argues that being wrong (sometimes) is an essential experience that enhances learning and motivation.…

Purpose: In a classroom, the teacher and other students play an important role in regulating individual and group learning. However, the sudden shift to remote and online learning, as a result of social isolation during COVID-19, has created a social disconnect, making these immediate regulatory supports less accessible. A need was identified for…

The understanding, expression, and regulation of emotion have been identified as core to everyday communication and psychosocial adjustment in children. The aim of this paper is to review and to compare current clinical and empirical knowledge on emotion recognition, reciprocity, and expression deficits in children diagnosed with autism spectrum…

The complex group work environment can be overwhelming and anxiety provoking, particularly for novice group leaders. Effectively accessing and managing one's own emotions are tasks central to effective group leadership and should be primary learning objectives of group workers in training. This article provides an overview of Gross's…

Psychological science has much to contribute to enhancing teaching and learning in the classroom. Teaching and learning, in turn, are intricately linked to social and behavioral factors of human development, including cognition, motivation, social interaction, and communication. Psychological science also contributes to effective instruction;…

Self-regulation is the ability to control one's thoughts, actions, and emotions. When children are better able to follow directions or control impulses they are better prepared for school and for life. Sesame Workshop has and continues to create rich, meaningful content that places self-regulation skills and the strategies needed for school…

Executive functions enable children to pay attention, follow instructions, apply what they have learned, have those "aha!" moments in which they grasp how multiple facts interrelate, think of creative solutions, obey social norms such as waiting their turn and not butting in line or jumping out of their seat, mentally construct a plan,…