Search

Scholars and educators have acknowledged the importance of the learning environment, especially the creative learning environment, on student creativity. However, the current understanding is far from complete to paint a clear picture of how a creative learning environment can stimulate students' creative outcomes in the classroom. Drawing on Amabile's componential theory of creativity, the present research aims to test how a creative learning environment can foster undergraduate creativity through three distinct mechanisms (i.e., learning goal orientation, network ties, and knowledge sharing). A total of 431 students and their teachers from a Chinese university completed questionnaires. The results generally supported the theoretical model in which a creative learning environment is significantly associated with student creativity by enhancing students' learning goal orientation, network ties, and knowledge sharing. Implications for theory and educational practice, limitations of the present study, and suggestions for future research are discussed., Author(s): Mudan Fan [sup.1] , Wenjing Cai [sup.2] [sup.3] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.443615.1, 0000 0004 1797 7790, School of Education, Weinan Normal University, , Weinan, People's Republic of China (2) [...]

This study aimed to measure perceived psychosocial outcomes of middle school intramural participants in psychological development, social development, and school connectedness and to identify differences between gender and grade level. One hundred four middle school students were surveyed via a modified version of the Social Outcomes questionnaire. Data revealed that students perceived the highest degrees of outcomes in the areas of bonding with teammates, improving ability to work with a team, and increased feelings of belonging at school. ANOVAs and t tests showed whether there were significant differences between groups based on grade level. No differences were found based on gender. Results from this exploratory study support the importance of providing inclusive intramural programs for middle school students that enhance not only physical health, but also psychological and social health., Schools are considered one of the most critical organizations for providing youth with the opportunity for and education about the importance of physical activity (PA). The Centers for Disease Control [...]

THIS STUDY FOCUSES ON THE role of interpersonal interaction in early literacy development in one public preschool school in Bangkok, Thailand. Specifically, it explores and analyses the nature of interpersonal interaction and collaborative activities the teachers employ in teaching literacy to children. The study involves observation of 82 children in literacy activities and interviews with three teachers. Framed and analysed in Vygotsky's cultural-historical theory, the results show interpersonal activities to be related to collaborative writing, collaborative story-reading, collaborative dialogic inquiry, collaborative meaning-making and child--child partnerships. The paper concludes that raising professional knowledge of the significance of interpersonal interaction, and focused professional development which builds and maintains teacher awareness of their teaching of literacy, would enhance children's literacy development in Thailand., Introduction This study explores the role of interpersonal interaction in early literacy development in one public preschool in Bangkok, the capital city of Thailand. The literacy practices outlined in this [...]

Romantic relationships alter the selves of the individuals within them. Partners develop shared friends and activities and even overlapping self-concepts. This intertwining of selves may leave individuals' self-concepts vulnerable to change if the relationship ends. The current research examines several different types of self-concept change that could occur after a breakup and their relation to emotional distress. Across three studies, using varied methodologies, the authors examined change in both the content (Study 1a and 1b) and the structure of the self-concept, specifically, reduced self-concept clarity (Studies 1 through 3). As predicted, individuals experienced self-concept content change and reduced self-concept clarity post-breakup. Additionally, reduced clarity uniquely predicted post-breakup emotional distress.

Byline: Tina Malti (1), Marlis Buchmann (1) Keywords: Moral motivation; Socialization; Moral values; Personality characteristics Abstract: Socialization and individual differences were examined as antecedents of moral motivation in representative samples of 15-year-old adolescents (N = 1,258 54% female) and 21-year-old young adults (N = 584 53% female). The adolescents' primary caregivers (N = 1,056) also participated. The strength of moral motivation was rated by participants' responses to two hypothetical moral dilemmas in terms of action decisions, emotion attributions, and justifications. Socialization was measured by the perceived quality of friendship, parent--child relationships, and educational background. The importance attached to social justice and various personality traits were also assessed. Adolescents' moral motivation was positively associated with the quality of their parent--child relationship and the importance of social justice. Young adults' moral motivation was predicted by the perceived quality of friendships, the importance of social justice, and agreeableness. For both groups, moral motivation was greater in females. The theoretical implications of the findings for the development of moral motivation are discussed. Author Affiliation: (1) Jacobs Center for Productive Youth Development, University of Zurich, Culmannstrasse 1, 8006, Zurich, Switzerland Article History: Registration Date: 05/02/2009 Received Date: 13/08/2008 Accepted Date: 05/02/2009 Online Date: 03/03/2009

Byline: Mary Steffel (1), Daniel M. Oppenheimer (1) Keywords: Happiness; Well-being; Methods; Surveys; Comparison standards Abstract: The present research suggests that many of the most commonly-used indicators of happiness are constructed in a manner that renders them susceptible to null or misleading findings. While few happiness indicators specify particular comparison standards, we demonstrate that people tend to evaluate their happiness relative to comparison standards and give reliably different happiness ratings based on the comparison standards they spontaneously adopt. In Study 1, participants reported that intrapersonal comparisons were a more important consideration than interpersonal comparisons in determining their happiness ratings. In Study 2, participants using a free-response format more frequently reported making intrapersonal comparisons than interpersonal comparisons when rating happiness. In both Studies 1 and 2, participants who reported using interpersonal comparisons gave higher happiness ratings than those who reported using intrapersonal comparisons. In Study 3, participants who were prompted to make interpersonal comparisons gave higher happiness ratings than those prompted to make intrapersonal comparisons. We discuss the implications of these findings for measuring subjective well-being and interpreting happiness research. Author Affiliation: (1) Department of Psychology, Princeton University, Green Hall, Princeton, NJ, 08540, USA Article History: Registration Date: 26/06/2008 Received Date: 02/04/2008 Accepted Date: 24/06/2008 Online Date: 09/07/2008

The Two-Track Model of Bereavement Questionnaire (ITBQ) was designed to assess response to loss over time. Respondents were 354 persons who completed the 70-item self-report questionnaire constructed in accordance with the Two-Track Model of Bereavement. Track I focuses on the bereaved's biopsychosocial functioning and Track II concerns the bereaved's ongoing relationship to the range of memories, images, thoughts, and feeling states associated with the deceased. Factor analysis identified 5 factors that accounted for 51% of the variance explained. In accord with the theoretical and clinical model, 3 factors were primarily associated with the relationship to the deceased (Track II) : Active Relational Grieving, Close and Positive Relationship, and Conflictual Relationship; and 2 factors with aspects of functioning (Track I): General Biopsychosocial Functioning and Traumatic Perception of the Loss. Construct and concurrent validity were examined and were found satisfactory. Differences by kinship, cause of death, gender, and time elapsed were examined across the 5 factors, the total TTBQ, and the ITG. The new measure is shown to have both construct and concurrent validity. Discussions of the results and implications for the measurement of response to loss conclude the article.

The article provides guidelines for ensuring a successful promotion. Discussion emphasizes the importance of building good relationships with one's chief executive officer, board members, peers, shareholders and analysts, direct reports, and customers.

Byline: Eileen Trzcinski (1), Elke Holst (2) Keywords: Life satisfaction; Early adulthood; Subjective well-being; Intergenerational life satisfaction Abstract: This study used a nationally representative sample of young people in Germany from the German Socio-Economic Panel to examine how demographic and socio-economic characteristics of the young persons and their parents, personality traits of the young persons, quality and quantity of relationships, the parent's level of life satisfaction, and other measures of satisfaction for the young person are related to the initial assessment of life satisfaction by the individual at the critical point of transition from adolescence to adulthood. The results indicated that consistency existed across different domains of satisfaction, specifically satisfaction with life and satisfaction with grades. A strong pattern of association was also observed between the subjective well-being of the adolescents and variables that measured different dimensions of the quality and quantity of interpersonal relationships, including relationships with parents. Author Affiliation: (1) School of Social Work, Wayne State University, 340 Thompson Home, 4756 Cass Avenue, Detroit, MI, 48202, USA (2) SOEP German Institute for Economic Research, 14191, Berlin, Germany Article History: Registration Date: 26/06/2007 Received Date: 02/06/2006 Accepted Date: 23/06/2007 Online Date: 27/07/2007

These experiments examined the cognitive processes involved in judging the quality of play of a player competing against another player and the overall interest of a competitive game as a function of the players' respective ability and motivation levels. For the quality of play of one player, a very simple information integration rule was found. Quality of play was judged almost exclusively as an additive function of the ability and motivation levels of the player. For the interest of the game, an apparently complex but fundamentally simple integration rule was found. For a game to be very interesting, players had to be both highly able and highly motivated; for a game to be somewhat interesting, each player had to be at least either highly able or highly motivated; and all other configurations corresponded to lower expected levels of interest.

The role of relationships between individuals and relationships between organizations in the Auckland boat-building district is investigated. Findings revealed that interpersonal networks can turn into inter-organizational networks, which can also be transformed into interpersonal networks, resulting in a stronger district. The balance between cooperation and competition in a district is also examined.

The authors draw upon social, personality, and health psychology to propose and test a self-and-socialbonds model of health. The model contends that lower self-esteem predicts health problems and that poor-quality social bonds explain this association. In Study 1, lower self-esteem prospectively predicted reports of health problems 2 months later, and this association was explained by subjective reports of poor social bonds. Study 2 replicated the results of Study 1 but used a longitudinal design with 6 waves of data collection, assessed self-reports of concrete bealth-related behaviors (i.e., number of visits to the doctor and classes missed due to illness), and measured both subjective and objective indicators of quality of social bonds (i.e., interpersonal stress and number of friends). In addition, Study 2 showed that poor-quality social bonds predicted acute drops in self-esteem over time, which in turn predicted acute decreases in quality of social bonds and, consequently, acute increases in health problems. In both studies, alternative explanations to the model were tested. Keywords: self-esteem, health, social relationships

The harmful effects of alcohol consumption are not necessarily limited to the amounts consumed. Drinking in binges is a specific feature of Russian alcohol consumption that may be of importance even for explaining the current mortality crisis. Based on interviews conducted with a stratified random sample of 1190 Muscovites in 2004, this paper examines binge drinking in relation to the respondents' economic situation and social relations. Consistent with prior research, this study provides further evidence for a negative relationship between educational level and binge drinking. Our results also indicate a strong but complex link between economic strain and binge drinking. The odds ratios for binge drinking of men experiencing manifold economic problems were almost twice as high compared to those for men with few economic problems. However, the opposite seemed to be true for women. Being married or cohabiting seemed to have a strong protective effect on binge drinking among women compared to being single, while it seemed to have no effect at all among men. Women having regular contact with friends also had more than twice the odds for binge drinking compared to those with little contact with friends, while again no effect was found among men. Gender roles and the behavioural differences embedded in these, may explain the difference. The different effects of economic hardship on binge drinking may also constitute an important factor when explaining the large mortality difference between men and women in Russia. Keywords: Alcohol; Binge drinking; Gender; Moscow; Russia; Poverty; Social relations

Social interaction is a central feature of people's life and engages a variety of cognitive resources. Thus, social interaction should facilitate general cognitive functioning. Previous studies suggest such a link, but they used special populations (e.g., elderly with cognitive impairment), measured social interaction indirectly (e.g., via marital status), and only assessed effects of extended interaction in correlational designs. Here the relation between mental functioning and direct indicators of social interaction was examined in a younger and healthier population. Study i using survey methodology found a positive relationship between social interaction, assessed via amount of actual social contact, and cognitive functioning in people from three age groups including younger adults. Study 2 using an experimental design found that a small amount of social interaction (10 min) can facilitate cognitive performance. The findings are discussed in the context of the benefits social relationships have for so many aspects of people's lives. Keywords: cognitive performance; socializing; mental exercise; social intelligence; executive function; group living

Job stress of 332 educational audiologists, measured on the Maslach Burnout Inventory, was obtained. 84% of the sample rated their overall job burnout as lower than norms for educational personnel. Mean differences were significant among those participants working in rural, suburban, and urban areas. Participants in rural areas had a significantly higher mean on Emotional Exhaustion and a lower mean on Personal Accomplishment. Correlations between scores on Emotional Exhaustion and Social Interactions (r=-.36) and Personal Accomplishment and Social Interactions (r=.44) were significant but not strong. As predicted, job burnout for these educational audiologists is similar to that in other descriptive studies of sampled helping professions.

In this study the relationship between followers' mental boundaries and sources of work motivation for a sample of 382 government employees was tested. Participants' mean age was 46 yr.; 53% were women and 42% had earned bachelors' degrees. Analysis gave a significant positive but weak correlation of .11 between followers' mental boundaries and self-concept internal motivation. Other correlations were not significant. More complex models and research designs are required to generalize findings.

Our first goal is to link empirical measures of three theoretical explanations of marital status differences to the variation in male and female standardized suicide difference coefficients SSDCs in 12 developed countries, circa 1960. We include predictors of Durkheim's social integration hypothesis, Gibbs and Martin's concept of marital status integration, and norms on suicide acceptability. All three are significantly related to variation in male and female SSDCs. The second goal is to examine how our empirical indicators impact age-specific differences in the male minus female SSDC--differences that vary by age in all 12 of our study populations. The strongest predictor of these differences is the male minus female difference in the percent married.

The impact of dyadic ties and interpersonal trust on referrals and investment decisions of venture capitalists in the Chinese and Russian contexts is studied. Results conclude that the effect seems to be similar but the way it affect differs in China and Russia due to institutional, social, and cultural differences.

This article accounts for two puzzling paradoxes. The first paradox is the simultaneous absence and presence of attitude polarization--the fact that global attitude polarization is relatively rare, even though pundits describe it as common. The second paradox is the simultaneous presence and absence of social polarization--the fact that while individuals experience attitude homogeneity in their interpersonal networks, their networks are characterized by attitude heterogeneity. These paradoxes give rise to numerous scholarly arguments. By developing a formal model of interpersonal influence over attitudes in a context where individuals hold simultaneous positions on multiple issues, we show why these arguments are not mutually exclusive and how they meaningfully refer to the same social setting. The results from this model provide a single parsimonious account for both paradoxes. The framework we develop may be generalized to a wider array of problems, including classic problems in collective action.

Objectives. Negative social exchanges detract considerably from older adults' emotional health, but little is known about the specific factors that make some older adults more vulnerable than others to such exchanges. This study examined whether stressful life experiences compound the impact of negative social exchanges on emotional distress. We examined both linear and nonlinear models of the joint effects of negative social exchanges and stressful life experiences. Methods. In-person interviews took place with a representative sample of 916 noninstitutionalized older adults. We examined linear and nonlinear models for three classes of stressful life experiences (relationship losses, disruptive events, and functional impairment). Results. Regression analyses that included first-order and second-order interaction temps revealed a linear pattern for loss events and functional impairment, and a nonlinear pattern for disruptive events. Discussion. This study suggests that negative social exchanges and stressful life experiences jointly affect emotional distress, but the particular nature of the joint effects varies by type and level of stressor. Negative social exchanges appear to have more severe effects in the context of some stressors but less severe effects in the context of other stressors.

An analysis of the life stories of three generations of women within a family headed by a holocaust survivor is presented. The relationships of the women in these three generations, both with significant others and with each other is examined, the processes of development and changes in these relationships over 12 years is traced and the social and methodological implications of the study are discussed.

The development and implementation of the multilevel sample design for the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey, a study of children, adults, families, and neighborhoods in Los Angeles County is described. The results provide important guideposts for the future studies of neighborhoods and their effects on adults and children.

Organizational researchers have given considerable attention to the construct of leader-member exchange (LMX). Numerous studies have empirically supported the negative correlations between LMX relationships and unwanted individual outcomes, including stress. However, in the present study, the authors investigated whether the relationship is best represented as linear or curvilinear. The authors tested their research hypothesis in two organizational samples of 120 and 402 employees, respectively, and found support for the nonlinear relationship in both samples. The authors described strengths, limitations, practical implications, and directions for future research. Key words: leadership, relationship quality, stress and coping, LEADER-MEMBER EXCHANGE (LMX) THEORY -- often organizational researchers have described the relationship between supervisors and subordinates in terms of it. Researchers have given to that relationship considerable attention (Gerstner & [...]

In this study we investigated whether social relationship is a stronger determinant of life satisfaction in older women than in older men, and whether this is more obvious in widowed than in married persons, in a representative sample of Chinese individuals aged 60 or older in Hong Kong (N = 1,616). We tested the moderating effect of gender and widowhood by means of a multigroup analysis in structural equation modeling that incorporated other major predictors of life satisfaction. Consistent with predictions, relatedness was much more important for women than for men. Furthermore, relatedness was the most important determinant of life satisfaction in women, regardless of marital status, but it was only a moderate predictor in married men, and even an irrelevant factor in widowers. We discuss the results in terms of how gender roles shape relationship goals, and thus how men and women evaluate life satisfaction differently in the context of relationship with others.

Purpose: We examined whether the presence of a spouse and the frequency of interaction with children, relatives, and friends significantly influence the risk of dying in late life. We assessed these effects separately by gender, controlling for self-reported health. In addition, we examined whether interaction with the co-twin has a different impact on mortality for identical and fraternal twins. Design and Methods: The data set consists of 2,147 Danish twins aged 75 years and older, who were followed prospectively from 1995 to 2001. We modeled the effect of social ties on mortality by using event history analysis. Results: Survival is extended by having a spouse and close ties with friends and the co-twin. However, contact frequency with friends and the co-twin is significant, respectively, only for women and identical twins. Implications: Investigating social relations sheds light on the life span of individuals older than 75 years of age. We stress the importance of social relations beyond the presence of the spouse for survival even at very old ages. Key Words: Social relations, Elderly twins, Survival times

The application of a rational choice model of community consultation to the Living Murray debate over water resources in the Murray-Darling Basin of Australia is discussed. The benefits of community consultation include access to information for the policy maker and wider community acceptance of the policy.

An attempt is made to reveal the experiences and voices of young male street prostitutes in Israel and provide a stage for the voice of this marginal group to be heard. The results highlight the lack of meaningful interpersonal relationships in the lives of these young men and practical recommendations are made to inform youth workers assisting this high-risk population.