Giftedness is typically thought of as an individual characteristic. But the development and labeling of an individual as "gifted" is always a collective process and takes place embedded within local, sociocultural, and temporal contexts. The view of giftedness as individual is deceptive and results in faulty practice, such as the…

Although the commonly accepted view is that there are such things as natural talents, more than 20 years of research suggests the opposite. What passes for talented is attributable to a combination of social and environmental factors. If the current research on this topic holds true, then there are implications not only for various theories of…

In the US, undeniable evidence shows that socioeconomic inequities explain a high proportion of individual differences in school achievement. Although not all countries show this same effect due to socioeconomic status, it is consistently found that social inequities lead to achievement gaps. These achievement gaps then manifest into trajectories…

This article provides an assessment of French media coverage of intelligence research. The analysis is based on articles published between 1992 and 2020 in French nationwide newspapers, local newspapers and science magazines. Two themes regularly appear in nationwide newspapers and science magazines: environmental effects on IQ and animal…

Mental health researchers emphasize the importance of practitioner understanding of biology-environment interplay. Accordingly, our goal of the study described in this article was to understand students' preconceptions and misconceptions about biological and environmental influences on development through investigating their conceptions of…

Many students have very robust misconceptions about natural selection, stemming from intuitive theories that form a child's earliest understandings of the natural world. For example, students often imagine that species evolve in response to environmental pressures that cause a need for change and that all individuals in the population…

Integrated river science provides decision-making life-skills for individuals and communities facing environmental change; it is a variant of critical physical geography through its socio-political dimensions. As an example, the frequency and magnitude of river flooding are amplified by climate change: society needs to understand how to cope…

To understand creativity is to recognize and develop the creative potential within oneself and others. This article examines what creativity is "not" and then what creativity "is". First, the six leading misconceptions about creativity are discussed: Creativity belongs solely to the arts; creativity is quickly recognizable;…

Objective: To assess the characteristics of campus populations who were opposed to a vape-free campus policy and examine factors associated with opposition to a vape-free campus policy among those who indicated support for a tobacco-free policy. Participants: Faculty, staff, and students (N=2210) in a Midwestern university participated. Methods:…

In the United States, rape culture is a prevalent phenomenon that has contributed to desensitization to scenes in popular media that might have been considered unacceptable in the past. This paper explores the proposal of a model (Rape Culture and Violence Legitimization Model, RCVL) to understand the factors that prompt a society's focus and…

Decades of research suggest that learning styles, or the belief that people learn better when they receive instruction in their dominant way of learning, may be one of the most pervasive myths about cognition. Nonetheless, little is known about what it means to believe in learning styles. The present investigation uses one theoretical…

Academic dishonesty in higher education is a perverse problem affecting institutions of learning in many countries across the globe. More alarmingly, numerous studies have pointed to increasing rates of cheating and plagiarism over the past few decades offering a wide array of explanations and theories for this trend. A relatively new feature of…

The study utilized African theories, literatures, framework and a qualitative method with 11 heterosexual Nigerian undergraduate university students to explore their perceptions and attitudes towards homosexuality and LGB persons. The data analysis identified six categories: (a) higher tolerance observed for lesbians than gay men among…

This paper addresses the serious and pervasive problem of the mis-identification of English Language Learners (ELLs) as Learning Disabled (LD). Recent increases in immigration make this problem all the more urgent. The paper outlines problems with current methods of differentiating between learning disabilities and language acquisition processes.…

In this study, students' misconceptions about the ozone layer were investigated, looking specifically at the effect internet-based media has on the formation of these misconceptions. Quantitative and qualitative research approaches were used to perform the research. As part of the quantitative portion of the research, the descriptive survey…