Presents Michael J. Meaney as one of the winners of the American Psychological Association's Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions (2012). Michael J. Meaney has taken the phenomenon of "handling" of newborn rats and opened a new area of investigation that has given new meaning to epigenetics via his work demonstrating transgenerational…

When subjects learn to associate two sample durations with two comparison keys, do they learn to associate the keys with the short and long samples (relational hypothesis), or with the specific sample durations (absolute hypothesis)? We exposed 16 pigeons to an ABA design in which phases A and B corresponded to tasks using samples of 1 s and 4 s,…

The present study examined the effects of predatory odor (cat urine) on social novelty preference in Long-Evans rats. Adult male subjects encountered a juvenile conspecific at training, were exposed to either clean cat litter (control) or litter soiled with cat urine (predatory odor), and were tested for social novelty preference. While the…

The explorative study reported here describes youth participants in three animal science-related career development events from 2010. Variables included students' self-efficacy, task value motivation, career interests, and to what extent they utilized resources in preparation. It was concluded that all three groups were self-efficacious,…

An initiative in which therapy dogs were integrated into a school-wide reading curriculum was analyzed to determine the effect on student reading in the program's second year. Prior research on the first year of this specific program (Kirnan et al. in "Early Child Educ J" 44(6):637-651) demonstrated improvement in reading scores only for…

This study explores to what extent the SCAMPER (Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify, Put to another use, Eliminate, and Rearrange) technique combined with animal adaptation ideas learned through form and function analogy activities can help fourth graders generate creative ideas while augmenting their inventiveness. The sample consisted of 24…

The present study, aiming to develop nature culture in primary school students and to help them to become acquainted with their close environment, is a quasi-experimental study. Museum education activities were conducted with the study group which consisted of 128 fourth-grade primary school students. At the end of the study, the students gained…

Cultural transmission is often viewed as a domain-general process. However, a growing literature suggests that learnability is influenced by content and context. The idea of a learnability landscape is introduced as a way of representing the effects of interacting factors on how easily information is acquired. Extending prior work (Barrett &…

This study was designed to investigate the extent of utilizing electrical equipment in poultry production in the rural areas of Ebonyi State, Nigeria. A survey research design was adopted for the study. Three research questions guided the study. The population for the study was 46 respondents comprising 16 Extension agents and 30 Poultry farmers.…

Recent research suggests that human memory systems evolved to remember animate things better than inanimate things. In the present experiments, we examined whether these effects occur for both free recall and cued recall. In Experiment 1, we directly compared the effect of animacy on free recall and cued recall. Participants studied lists of…

Research Findings: An emerging consensus is that casual, direct contact with nature influences the development of children's biological knowledge. Here we review the existing literature on this topic, focusing on the effects of (a) rural versus urban rearing environments and (b) pet ownership and care on children's biological concepts and…

The aim of the study is to discuss and problematise notions of femininity and masculinity constructed in teaching situations among 16-year-old upper-secondary students studying science. The empirical examples originate from a teaching session with the theme of "sex and relationships". The analysis is focused on metaphors inherent in a…

Balancing habitual and deliberate forms of choice entails a comparison of their respective merits--the former being faster but inflexible, and the latter slower but more versatile. Here, we show that arbitration between these two forms of control can be derived from first principles within an Active Inference scheme. We illustrate our arguments…

There has been an increasing movement towards the introduction of inquiry based learning in undergraduate physiology laboratories. Students can however find this challenging when there is a sudden transition from traditional didactic practicals to full inquiry based activities. One reason for this could be the students' perceptions about the…

This exploratory mixed-methods study examined the influence of an on-campus canine therapy program on linguistically diverse international students' perceptions of their English language development and stress. Participants were recruited from English language support classes at a mid-size western Canadian university and were randomly selected…