In the last two decades, La Heij and colleagues have presented accounts of a number of context effects in Stroop-like word-production tasks. Roelofs (2007 this issue) criticises various aspects of our proposals, ranging from the number of processing stages assumed to details of simulation results. In this reply we first argue that we do not…

This article explores recent changes in the landscape of second language acquisition (SLA) and foreign language pedagogical (FLP) research. Firth and Wagner's (1997) proposal for the reconceptualization of SLA has been supported by SLA and FLP researchers who share the sentiment concerning the need for increased attention to social and contextual…

The ability to perform a laboratory experiment as a nonhands-on observer, such as in a distance education context, has been questioned by some educators who ponder whether distance education lab courses are as effective as those held in a physical laboratory environment. This article examines this issue and compares the performance of distance…

According to current theories in discourse research, readers monitor a series of 5 situational dimensions during narrative comprehension (Zwaan, Langston, & Graesser, 1995; Zwaan & Radvansky, 1998). These dimensions are time (e.g., the order of events), space (e.g., locations), protagonist (e.g., main character actions), causality (e.g., how one…

This empirical research study addresses the issues of new teacher development and the role of the institutional context on new teachers' instructional technology use. The study examines two first year teachers, their development during their initial year of classroom experience, and how the institutional context they entered affected their…

The issue of school leadership instability and how it affects schools and student achievement has been studied. The question of how to predict turnover of the principal remains an unknown. The purpose of this research was to search for possible relationships between certain contextual variables and principal turnover and to test the independent…

This study sought to determine the emotional effects of a major community toxic release on children in the exposed community while controlling for the potential effects of response bias. Controlling for the response bias inherent in litigated contexts is an advance over previous studies of toxic exposure in children. A randomly selected…

Listening is an important skill for all, but it is critical for musicians and those who love music. National Standard 6 calls for students to listen to, analyze, and describe a wide variety of music. This listening, analysis, and description can pose challenges for older students who are familiar with a narrow repertoire and accustomed to music as…

The present qualitative research focuses on homeless fathers living with their children in family shelters. Data were collected through semistructured, face-to-face interviews with homeless fathers (n = 9) and shelter directors (n = 3). Findings suggest that how fathers made meaning of their experiences in a homeless shelter was related to…

Within the context of behavioral economics, the ratio of response requirements to reinforcer magnitude is called "unit price." In this investigation, we yoked increases in reinforcer magnitude with increases in intervals of differential reinforcement of other behavior (DRO) to thin DRO intervals to a terminal value. (Contains 1 figure.)

Research consistently has indicated that academic achievement outcomes for most minority students, and for students from economically impoverished backgrounds, are marginal as compared with the achievement of their Asian and Caucasian classmates and of individuals with higher socio-economic status (STS). Academic engagement has been linked to…

African-American students in K-12 education experience pervasive disparities in academic outcomes across all areas of the schooling experience. Though racial disparities in education have been widely acknowledged, research must move beyond critiques of individual and student factors to analyze the educational structures and practices that create…

Until recently, qualitative research has made limited use of visual sources, particularly visual texts (drawing, painting or photographs), but also including multimodal data (video and web-based) and visual data (tables, graphs, charts, etc.). Thus, discussions of ethics and evidence in this area have lagged behind those related to textual data,…

This essay presents a case study of the modes used in training employees at a munitions plant in Ohio between 1940 and 1945. Theories of multimodal discourse and learning advanced by The New London Group (1996), Gunther Kress and Theo Van Leeuwen (2001) and Richard Mayer (2001) inform this analysis. With an unskilled labor force and many workers…

Using multimedia to create a context to teach English has its unique advantages. This paper explores the characteristics of multimedia and integrates how to use multimedia to optimize the context of English teaching as its purpose. In this paper, eight principles, specifically Systematization, Authenticity, Appropriateness, Interactivity,…