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This paper reports the results from a second-order action research process, accompanying a continuing professional development (CPD), the "Pedagogy and Subject Didactics Programme" (PFL). PFL is a 2-year-postgraduate university course that focuses primarily on subject didactics, action research methods and peer group learning. This study accompanied PFL 2015-2017 with 20 graduates. The main objectives of the evaluation were to verify and maintain a good quality of the input and the possibility to bring this input into the daily work of teachers. Through the formative process orientation, we as program administrators were enabled to integrate many insights directly into the further development of the course. The described process shows how and to what extent PFL could be positively shaped by feedback from teachers and our reflection on it. In this way we were able to meet the needs of the participants without losing sight of PFL's goal. Targeted interventions enabled us to achieve most of the two main objectives of the study.

Copyright of Electronic Journal of Research in Educational Psychology is the property of Editorial of the University of Almeria (Spain) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The purpose of this article is to describe how Lesson Study as second-order action research can be applied and how we planned to evaluate and improve course design, learners' progress, team members' roles and learning objectives of a 2-year university course for English as a Second Language teachers. The article describes the concept of a Lesson Study conducted in a course for teachers with a minimum of 3 years of teaching experience, rather than for students or undergraduates as in traditional concepts of the Lesson Study approach. PFL ('Pedagogy and Subject Didactics Programme') is a 2-year programme consisting of three seminars and five groups meetings in which the participants focus on the reflection of their professional practice in their specific school situation. All participants are required to plan, carry out and document their own action research project. The team provides input on action research and current topics in language teaching and learning, and advises participants. The methodology follows a mixed-method approach based on action research methodologies including questionnaires, interviews and observations. Analyses are conducted qualitatively and quantitatively. The article presents the concept of the project but not yet findings at this stage due to curriculum development and approval issues.

Scaling up educational innovations is a complex endeavour. It often fails or is only successful to a limited extent. More knowledge is therefore needed about the factors that lead to successful scaling up and about the challenges in doing so. The factors fostering the scaling up of educational innovations depend on the level where innovations are expected-at the teachers', schools', regional or at the national level. There is a lack of knowledge about these factors and their interconnectedness, in particular regarding large initiatives aiming at innovations at some or even at all of these levels. This paper reports a meta-study building on several existing empirical studies, theoretical considerations and complementing new studies related to the multi-layered nationwide initiative IMST (Innovations Make Schools Top) in Austria. The meta-study synthesises findings and considerations regarding IMST and aims to analyse and identify relevant fostering factors and challenges. The diffusion of innovation (DOI) theory and the self-determination theory (SDT) are used as lenses on the complex topic of scaling up of educational innovations. The meta-study highlights the particular relevance of the factors need for competence (referring to SDT) as well as relative advantage and trialability (both referring to DOI) in scaling up the initiative. As major challenges, we highlight the interconnection between individual and organisational learning, the balance between a bottom-up and top-down strategy and the need to further build up resources in subject didactics in Austria. Finally, we sketch ideas how to further develop IMST.

Over the past few years, more attention has been paid to jingle and jangle fallacies in psychological science. Jingle fallacies arise when two or more distinct psychological phenomena are erroneously labeled with the same term, while jangle fallacies occur when different terms are used to describe the same phenomenon. Jingle and jangle fallacies emerge due to the vague linkage between psychological theories and their practical implementation in empirical studies, compounded by variations in study designs, methodologies, and applying different statistical procedures' algorithms. Despite progress in organizing scientific findings via systematic reviews and meta-analyses, effective strategies to prevent these fallacies are still lacking. This paper explores the integration of several approaches with the potential to identify and mitigate jingle and jangle fallacies within psychological science. Essentially, organizing studies according to their specifications, which include theoretical background, methods, study designs, and results, alongside a combinatorial algorithm and flexible inclusion criteria, may indeed represent a feasible approach. A jinglefallacy detector arises when identical specifications lead to disparate outcomes, whereas jangle-fallacy indicators could operate on the premise that varying specifications consistently yield overrandomly similar results. We discuss the role of advanced computational technologies, such as Natural Language Processing (NLP), in identifying these fallacies. In conclusion, addressing jingle and jangle fallacies requires a comprehensive approach that considers all levels and phases of psychological science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lo's variation theory is a learning and teaching theory based on Marton's phenomenographic approach and is one of the most important backbones of learning studies. The proponents of variation theory demarcate their approach from constructivist learning approaches, stressing constructivism as philosophical framework, but not as learning theory. At the same time, the phenomenographic approach emphasizes the importance of Piaget's work about the cognitive development, which should be considered when talking about learning and teaching. We argue that -- from a theoretical point of view -- Piaget's theory of how cognitive schemata are developed and how variation theory proposes that learning can be fostered entails many similarities which are not apparent at first glance. We demonstrate the similarities and differences using a teaching example from an English as second language classroom and show the implications for practical instructional work. Finally, we discuss concrete suggestions how variation theory could benefit even more from Piaget's theory.

Out-of-field teaching is viewed as inferior to subject-specific instruction, but its impact on student outcomes varies depending on the criteria used for evaluation. The present study investigated the consequences of out-of-field teaching in science on different student outcomes on an international scale. Analyses were based on the sixth cycle of PISA data, using a subsample of N = 128,438 students (51% girls) and N = 27,819 teachers (44% women) from 4,037 schools in 18 countries. Results show that higher specialised science teachers rates in schools were linked to improved scientific literacy and students enjoyment. Science teachers with specialised science training in a school were associated with higher science competencies in students, while the impact on the enjoyment of science was smaller. However, the share of specialised teachers was not associated with students' self-efficacy or perceived teaching practices. The findings suggest that specialised teachers are critical in positively influencing students' literacy and enjoyment. Moreover, it informs policymakers and school administrators about the need to prioritise hiring specialised science teachers to improve the overall quality of science education. Further research is needed to understand how specialised teachers affect student outcomes and to identify other factors impacting science literacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adolescents typically exhibit a marked decline in academic intrinsic motivation throughout their school careers. Following self-determination theory, it is hypothesised that traditional school environments insufficiently satisfy three basic psychological needs of youths during maturation, namely the needs for autonomy, competence and relatedness. As a consequence, insufficient need satisfaction might account for the decline in intrinsic academic motivation during adolescence. This hypothesis was tested in an accelerated longitudinal cohort design on N = 600 students (286 girls) between 11 and 16 years of age. The results showed that students exhibited a marked decline in intrinsic motivation during adolescence. Moreover, differences in need satisfaction predicted the decline in motivations. These results support the notion that an adequate satisfaction of three basic psychological needs in school is crucial for the maintenance of intrinsic academic motivation during adolescence.

The book review discusses the textbook "Educational Psychology: A Textbook", edited by Christiane Spiel, Thomas Götz, Petra Wagner, Marko Lüftenegger, and Barbara Schober. The book provides an overview of educational psychology and is aimed at scientists, educators, students, and practicing psychologists who want to engage with psychological aspects of education. It contains current theories and research findings from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland and is divided into different parts that deal with educational careers, tasks, and levels of action. The book presents a structural model of educational psychology that systematically categorizes psychological actions in the field of education. It is noted that the model is not universally valid and that certain topics are neglected in research. Educational psychology is considered as part of use-inspired basic research and is seen as an important advancement in structuring research findings. [Extracted from the article]

The Brief COPE (Coping Orientation to Problems Experienced) is a frequently used questionnaire assessing 14 theoretically derived coping mechanisms, but psychometric research has suggested inconsistent results concerning its factor structure. The aim of this study was to investigate primary and secondary order factor structures of the Brief COPE during the COVID-19 pandemic by testing 11 different models by confirmatory factor analyses and to assess differences between sex, age groups, and relationship status. Altogether, 529 respondents from Austria and Germany participated in a web-based survey. Results supported the originally hypothesized 14-factor structure but did not support previously described higher-order structures. However, bass-ackwards analyses suggested systematic overlap between different factors, which might have contributed to different factor solutions in previous research. Measurement invariance across sex, age groups, and relationship status could be confirmed. Findings suggest that cultural and situational aspects as well as the functional level should be considered in research on theoretical framing of coping behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This manuscript contributes to a future definition of objectivity by bringing together recent statements in epistemology and methodology. It outlines how improved objectivity can be achieved by systematically incorporating multiple perspectives, thereby improving the validity of science. The more result-biasing perspectives are known, the more a phenomenon of interest can be disentangled from these perspectives. Approaches that call for the integration of perspective into objectivity at the epistemological level or that systematically incorporate different perspectives at the statistical level already exist and are brought together in the manuscript. Recent developments in research methodology, such as transparency, reproducibility of research processes, pre-registration of studies, or free access to raw data, analysis strategies, and syntax, promote the explication of perspectives because they make the entire research process visible. How the explication of perspectives can be done practically is outlined in the manuscript. As a result, future research programs can be organized in such a way that meta-analyses and meta-meta-analyses can be conducted not only backward but forward and prospectively as a regular and thus well-prepared part of objectification and validation processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including curriculum development, action research in education and learning theories.

This paper discusses theoretical and epistemological problems concerning validity of psychological science in the context of latent constructs. I consider the use of latent constructs as one reason for the replicability crisis. At the moment, there exist different constructs describing the same psychological phenomena side by side, and different psychological phenomena that are reflected by the same latent construct. Hagger called them déjà-variables, which lead to a decreasing validity of measurements and inhibit a deeper understanding of psychological phenomena. To overcome this problem, I suggest a shift of theoretical and epistemological perspective on latent constructs. One main point is the explicit consideration of latent constructs as mental representations, which change objects and are changed by objects via assimilative and accommodative processes. The explicit orientation toward assimilation and accommodation allows the control of normally automatized processes that influence our understanding of psychological phenomena and their corresponding latent constructs. I argue that assimilation and accommodation are part of our research practice anyway and cause the mentioned problems. For example, taking a measurement is an assimilative process, and thus a high measurement error should lead to an increase of accommodative processes. Taking into account these considerations, I suggest consequences for research practices, for individual researchers and for the philosophy of science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper investigates different approaches of transcendence in the sense of spiritual experience as predictors for general psychological resilience. This issue is based on the theoretical assumption that resilience does play a role for physical health. Furthermore, there is a lack of empirical evidence about the extent to which spirituality does play a role for resilience. As potential predictors for resilience, ego transcendence, spiritual transcendence, and meaning in life were measured in a sample of 265 people. The main result of a multiple regression analysis is that, in the subsample with people below 29 years, only one rather secular scale that is associated with ego transcendence predicts resilience, whereas for the older subsample of 29 years and above, spiritual transcendence gains both a positive (oneness and timelessness) and a negative (spiritual insight) relevance to psychological resilience. On the one hand, these results concur with previous studies that also found age-related differences. On the other hand, it is surprising that the MOS spiritual insight predicts psychological resilience negatively, the effect is increasing with age. One possible explanation concerns wisdom research. Here, an adaptive way of dealing with the age-related loss of control is assumed to be relevant to successful aging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including the development of teacher trainees' goal orientation during two years pre-service training in Germany, the application of the assumption of the self-determination theory to investigate teacher motivation, and a study on teacher motivation as well as its supporting and inhibiting conditions in the context of two large-scale school innovation projects in Germany.

Copyright of Journal for Educational Research Online / Journal für Bildungsforschung Online is the property of Waxmann Verlag GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)