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Romantic partners routinely regulate each other’s emotions; this phenomenon is known as extrinsic emotion regulation. Previous research investigating emotion regulation in couples has typically examined self-report of emotion regulation from only one member of the couple. It is therefore unclear how much romantic partners agree on which emotion regulation strategies their partner uses and whether this agreement or the unique perspective of each person is the stronger predictor of relationship quality. In the current study (N=395 romantic couples), we applied a bifactor model to assess the extent to which extrinsic emotion regulation processes (expressive suppression, downward social comparison, humor, distraction, direct action, reappraisal, receptive listening, and valuing) related to relationship quality, comparing: a) the unique perspective of the regulator, b) the unique perspective of the target, and c) the shared perspective (consensus) between the target and regulator. The results indicated that it is the target’s, rather than the regulator’s perspective of emotion regulation that predicts the relationship quality of both members of the romantic couple. Overall, these findings suggest that it is not what the regulator thinks they do to regulate their romantic partner’s emotions that relates to relationship quality, but rather the target’s perceptions of the regulation attempt.

Emotionally intelligent people tend to have higher wellbeing. It is possible that their high emotional intelligence (EI) also affects the wellbeing of the people they interact with. This is particularly true in romantic relationships, where a person’s EI may play an important role in their partner’s emotional experiences. The current study (N = 407 romantic dyads) uses actor-partner interdependence models to examine the associations between EI (ability and self-rated) and wellbeing (psychological wellbeing, life satisfaction, affect). Self-rated EI showed consistent actor effects on all wellbeing variables with relatively large effects. Actor effects for ability EI were much smaller and inconsistent for males versus females. Partner effects were largely significant for self-rated, but not ability EI. The results suggest that romantic partners’ EI impacts some aspects of wellbeing and provides further empirical support for researching the dyadic effects of EI.

The study of emotional intelligence (EI) and its relationship with the dark triad has emerged as a popular research area. However, the complex nature of the dark triad and EI, including multiple measures for assessment, has led to inconsistent findings. A systematic review was conducted to focus on the multifaceted nature of the dark triad traits. Included studies must have been conducted with adult samples using standardized EI and dark triad measures. Forty-eight studies were identified; all bar one reported overall negative associations between the dark triad and EI. These associations were more complicated than expected. Further examination found these relationships significantly differed when examined at the facet level. Our results highlight that future research requires more than a one-size-fits-all approach.

Emotional intelligence (EI) abilities relate to desirable outcomes such as better well-being, academic performance, and job performance. Previous research shows that coping strategies mediate the effects of ability EI on such outcomes. Across two cross-sectional studies, we show that coping strategies mediate the relationships of ability EI with both well-being (life satisfaction, psychological well-being) and ill-being (depression, anxiety, stress). Study 1 (N = 105 first-year university students, 78% female) assessed EI with the Situational Test of Emotion Understanding (STEU) and Situation Test of Emotion Management (STEM). Avoidant coping significantly mediated the relationship of both the STEU and STEM with depression, anxiety, stress, and psychological well-being. EI was associated with lower avoidant coping, higher well-being and lower ill-being. Study 2 (N = 115 first-year university students, 67% female) assessed EI with the Mayer–Salovey–Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT). Avoidant coping mediated the relationship between EI and ill-being, but not the relationship between EI and well-being. These effects were significant for three of the four EI branches—emotion perception, understanding, and management. We discuss possible reasons why avoidant coping may be an active ingredient by which lower EI relates to lower well-being. We also discuss a possible application of our findings—that EI training programs might benefit from including content aimed at reducing avoidant coping.

Emotion regulation strategies have been characterized as adaptive or maladaptive; however, the ability to switch strategies to best suit the situation (regulatory flexibility and adaptability) underlies effective emotion regulation. Emotional intelligence may be a key capacity that enables flexible emotion regulation. We use experience sampling data from 165 participants to test whether emotional intelligence abilities (emotion understanding and management) predict variability in four emotion regulation strategies. Results show that both the emotion understanding and emotion management branches of emotional intelligence significantly relate to between-strategy variability (with moderate effect sizes), but only emotion understanding significantly predicts within-strategy variability. These findings support the hypothesis that emotional intelligence is an important predictor of the ability to flexibly vary emotion regulation depending on the situation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Attachment styles form during childhood emotional experiences. These experiences may be shaped by emotion-related traits such as how children interpret and regulate their own and others' emotions. These emotion-related traits appear in many emotional intelligence (EI) models, such that EI may relate to attachment styles. We conduct a meta-analysis to estimate the association between EI and attachment styles (26 studies, N = 6914). We include only non-clinical adult samples and validated psychometric assessments. We examine EI type as a moderator, comparing ability EI versus EI rating-scales using subgroups analysis and meta-regression. We find that lower anxious attachment is significantly associated with EI rating-scales (r = −0.25, k = 26) and ability EI (r = −0.16, k = 45), lower avoidant attachment is significantly associated with EI rating-scales (r = −0.36, k = 21) and ability EI (r = −0.21, k = 40), but secure attachment is significantly associated with EI rating-scales only (r = 0.31, k = 30). EI type significantly moderated the EI/avoidant attachment association only (β = −0.14, p = .01). We discuss possible mechanisms by which EI could influence early development of attachment styles (and vice-versa) while acknowledging that the causal direction underlying EI/attachment associations is unclear.

Peer assessment has been the subject of considerable research interest over the last three decades, with numerous educational researchers advocating for the integration of peer assessment into schools and instructional practice. Research synthesis in this area has, however, largely relied on narrative reviews to evaluate the efficacy of peer assessment. Here, we present a meta-analysis (54 studies, k = 141) of experimental and quasi-experimental studies that evaluated the effect of peer assessment on academic performance in primary, secondary, or tertiary students across subjects and domains. An overall small to medium effect of peer assessment on academic performance was found (g = 0.31, p < .001). The results suggest that peer assessment improves academic performance compared with no assessment (g = 0.31, p = .004) and teacher assessment (g = 0.28, p = .007), but was not significantly different in its effect from self-assessment (g = 0.23, p = .209). Additionally, meta-regressions examined the moderating effects of several feedback and educational characteristics (e.g., online vs offline, frequency, education level). Results suggested that the effectiveness of peer assessment was remarkably robust across a wide range of contexts. These findings provide support for peer assessment as a formative practice and suggest several implications for the implementation of peer assessment into the classroom.

This applied experimental research tested the effectiveness of a universal, student-focused intervention (‘Memory Mates’), specifically focused on supporting students to use attention and working memory strategies within academic contexts, unlike computer-based programs. Memory Mates is presented in the form of icons and explanations, with the strategies embedded within the classroom. Analyses compared the impact of the intervention over 8 months in three schools with three control schools, comprising 13 Year 4 primary school classes. The intervention group students showed a significant improvement in mathematics and spelling; however, there was no differential effect on reading comprehension or academic engagement. Based on the present results, it is contended that implementing Memory Mates within classroom contexts demonstrated promising potential as a new approach to supporting academic progress.

Understanding how people rate their confidence is critical for the characterization of a wide range of perceptual, memory, motor and cognitive processes. To enable the continued exploration of these processes, we created a large database of confidence studies spanning a broad set of paradigms, participant populations and fields of study. The data from each study are structured in a common, easy-to-use format that can be easily imported and analysed using multiple software packages. Each dataset is accompanied by an explanation regarding the nature of the collected data. At the time of publication, the Confidence Database (which is available at ) contained 145 datasets with data from more than 8,700 participants and almost 4 million trials. The database will remain open for new submissions indefinitely and is expected to continue to grow. Here we show the usefulness of this large collection of datasets in four different analyses that provide precise estimations of several foundational confidence-related effects., NIH National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)

The importance of working memory to classroom functioning and academic outcomes has led to the development of many interventions designed to enhance students’ working memory. In this article we briefly review the evidence for the relative effectiveness of classroom and computerised working memory interventions in bringing about measurable and sustainable benefits to students’ working memory, classroom engagement, and academic performance. Although there is considerable evidence that working memory is significantly linked to academic achievement, virtually no research has been undertaken within the classroom context, nor has the research had an intervention focus, nor has any research involved students themselves. Although there is a large amount of research on computerised working memory training programs, the evidence confirms that such programs rarely provide transferable or sustainable benefits to students’ working memory, classroom functioning, or academic performance. Positive evidence is provided for one classroom intervention specifically designed for personal and independent use by students, with their teachers’ support. Recommendations for classroom practice and directions for further research combining classrooms and computer interventions are discussed.

Schools and universities devote considerable time and resources to developing students' social and emotional skills, such as emotional intelligence (EI). The goals of such programs are partly for personal development but partly to increase academic performance. The current meta-analysis examines the degree to which student EI is associated with academic performance. We found an overall effect of ρ = .20 using robust variance estimation (N = 42,529, k = 1,246 from 158 citations). The association is significantly stronger for ability EI (ρ = .24, k = 50) compared with self-rated (ρ = .12, k = 33) or mixed EI (ρ = .19, k = 90). Ability, self-rated, and mixed EI explained an additional 1.7%, 0.7%, and 2.3% of the variance, respectively, after controlling for intelligence and big five personality. Understanding and management branches of ability EI explained an additional 3.9% and 3.6%, respectively. Relative importance analysis suggests that EI is the third most important predictor for all three streams, after intelligence and conscientiousness. Moderators of the effect differed across the three EI streams. Ability EI was a stronger predictor of performance in humanities than science. Self-rated EI was a stronger predictor of grades than standardized test scores. We propose that three mechanisms underlie the EI/academic performance link: (a) regulating academic emotions, (b) building social relationships at school, and (c) academic content overlap with EI. Different streams of EI may affect performance through different mechanisms. We note some limitations, including the lack of evidence for a causal direction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Schools and universities devote considerable time and resources to developing students’ social and emotional skills such as emotional intelligence (EI). The goals of such programs are partly for personal development but partly to increase academic performance. The current meta-analysis examines the degree to which student EI is associated with academic performance. We found an overall effect of ρ = .20 using robust variance estimation (N = 42,529, k = 1,246 from 158 citations). The association is significantly stronger for ability EI (ρ = .24, k = 50) compared to self-rated (ρ = .12, k = 33) or mixed EI (ρ = .19, k = 90). Ability, self-rated and mixed EI explained an additional 1.7%, 0.7% and 2.3% of the variance respectively, after controlling for intelligence and big five personality. Understanding and management branches of ability EI explained an additional 3.9% and 3.6% respectively. Relative importance analysis suggests that EI is the third most important predictor for all three streams, after intelligence and conscientiousness. Moderators of the effect differed across the three EI streams. Ability EI was a stronger predictor of performance in humanities than science. Self-rated EI was a stronger predictor of grades than standardized test scores. We propose that three mechanisms underlie the EI/academic performance link: (a) regulating academic emotions, (b) building social relationships at school, and (c) academic content overlap with EI. Different streams of EI may affect performance through different mechanisms. We note some limitations, including the lack of evidence for a causal direction.

Judgments of learning (JOLs) are a one of the most commonly used measures of meta-memory. There is mixed evidence that eliciting JOLs while participants are studying material influences their subsequent recall. A majority of studies have found that cues used in making the JOL (e.g. pair relatedness) determine the effect of JOLs on recall. Here, in three experiments JOL reactivity is examined in the presence of a salient, yet uninformative cue - font size. The results show that, when there are restrictions on study time, if font size is made salient, then eliciting JOLs impairs future recall. It is argued that JOLs prompt participants to evaluate salient cues in the learning environment in order to evaluate whether they will affect future recall. This increased processing of salient cues can impair recall if it comes at the expense of processing less salient but more informative cues. Implications for understanding JOL reactivity and the use of JOLs in metacognitive research are discussed.

Understanding how people rate their confidence is critical for characterizing a wide range of perceptual, memory, motor, and cognitive processes. However, as in many other fields, progress has been slowed by the difficulty of collecting new data and the unavailability of existing data. To address this issue, we created a large database of confidence studies spanning a broad set of paradigms, participant populations, and fields of study. The data from each study are structured in a common, easy-to-use format that can be easily imported and analyzed in multiple software packages. Each dataset is further accompanied by an explanation regarding the nature of the collected data. At the time of publication, the Confidence Database (available at osf.io/s46pr) contained 145 datasets with data from over 8,700 participants and almost 4 million trials. The database will remain open for new submissions indefinitely and is expected to continue to grow. We show the usefulness of this large collection of datasets in four different analyses that provide precise estimation for several foundational confidence-related effects and lead to new findings that depend on the availability of large quantity of data. This Confidence Database will continue to enable new discoveries and can serve as a blueprint for similar databases in related fields.

The role of phonics instruction in early reading development has been the subject of significant conjecture. Recently, England implemented a phonics screening check to assess the phonetic decoding of 6‐year‐old students, to ensure that all students master this foundational literacy skill and attain adequate phonemic awareness in the early years of primary schooling. Students who fail this check are obliged to retake the assessment the following year. In this article, we compare the performance of students who initially pass this check (pass) and students who fail the original assessment but pass the retaken assessment (fail–pass), with students who fail both the original and retaken assessments (fail–fail). Using data from the Key Stage 1 assessment of reading and the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), we examined the reading comprehension performance of these students approximately 1 and 4 years after their first phonics screening. The results suggested that fail–pass students performed substantially better than fail–fail students, even after performance on the initial phonics check was controlled for. While fail–pass students do not appear to entirely catch up with pass students in reading comprehension, their relatively better performance underscores the importance of intervening for those students who are identified as having problems with phonetic decoding to increase their likelihood of success at reading comprehension in later schooling.

Confidence ratings (CR) are often used to evaluate the metacognitive processes that occur during reasoning and problem solving. Typically CR are elicited with the assumption that they do not affect participants’ underlying cognitive processes. However, recent evidence suggests that eliciting CR can cause changes in cognitive performance. What is not yet clear, are the metacognitive pathways by which CR affect overall performance in older individuals. In order to better understand the mechanisms driving reactivity to CR, we evaluated the impact of eliciting CR in an older sample (N = 89) on two aspects of the metacognitive framework - monitoring and control. Participants first rated their prospective confidence before performing the Latin Square Task either with or without confidence ratings. Participants subsequently self-appraised their performance. We found evidence that eliciting CR leads to poorer metacognitive monitoring. In addition, we found that participants with high initial prospective self-confidence who perform CR adopt a more immediate performance-orientated control strategy, which improves short-term performance but has no effect on overall performance in a timed Latin Square Task.

Age related cognitive decline comes at a significant economic, social, and health cost. Interventions that prevent or slow cognitive decline and encourage positive ageing have potential to produce significant societal benefits and are a rapidly growing enterprise. Currently little is known about how individual difference factors influence adherence to the training regimes and training outcomes. The aim of the present study was to identify the personality and metacognitive beliefs that predict individuals' adherence to a regular training regime and the likelihood that they discontinue training. A sample of 831 older Australians drawn from registered users of a commercial brain training program, performed a range of personality and non-cognitive measures, specifically: need for cognition, implicit theories of intelligence, mastery beliefs, memory self-concept, and big-5 personality factors. The training frequency and performance of participants was tracked over an 18-month period. The results suggest that, within a sample of existing brain trainers, openness to experience, need for cognition, and age predicted training discontinuation. Furthermore, a regression analysis indicated that openness to experience, implicit theories of intelligence, and age influenced game performance. Implications of such findings for the effective design and application of cognitive training for encouraging positive ageing are discussed.

Confidence ratings (CR) are one of the most frequently used measures in psychological research. However, recent evidence has suggested that eliciting CR from participants may result in changes to cognitive performance, so called reactivity. Here, we examine whether reactivity to CR can be better explained by added task-relevant introspection, or, alternatively, the unintentional priming of confidence-related beliefs. First, we compare participants' performance in a group making CR with a group making a task-irrelevant control rating, and a second group who made the same task-irrelevant rating, but with the word 'confident' included in the rating's wording. The results suggest that reactivity is driven by the presentation of the word 'confident', and reactivity does not require task-relevant introspection. Additionally, we show that rephrasing CR to remove the word 'confident' neutralises reactivity. This suggests that reactivity may represent a significant problem for researchers using CR, but rephrasing CR may remedy these concerns in relatively simple fashion.

Peer assessment has been the subject of considerable research interest over the last three decades, with numerous educational researchers advocating for the integration of peer assessment into schools and instructional practice. Research synthesis in this area has, however, largely relied on narrative reviews to evaluate the efficacy of peer assessment. Here we present a meta-analysis (54 studies, k = 141) of experimental and quasi-experimental studies that evaluated the effect of peer assessment on academic performance in primary, secondary, or tertiary students across subjects and domains. An overall small to medium effect of peer assessment on academic performance was found (g = 0.31, p < .001). The results suggest that peer assessment improves academic performance compared with no assessment (g = 0.31, p < .001) and teacher assessment (g = 0.28, p = .007), but was not significantly different in its effect from self-assessment (g = 0.23, p = .209). Additionally, meta-regressions examined the moderating effects of several feedback and educational characteristics (e.g. online vs offline, frequency, education level etc.). Results suggested that the effectiveness of peer assessment was remarkably robust across a wide range of contexts. These findings provide support for peer assessment as a formative practice and suggest several implications for the implementation of peer assessment into the classroom.

Judgements of learning (JoL) are often used in memory research as a means for assessing an individual's metacognitive beliefs about their learning. JoL have been shown to reliably predict performance as well as learning behaviours and decisions . Participants may, however, modify their behaviour in response to performing JoL. There has, however, been little consensus as to the reliability and direction of the effect. We report on a meta-analyses that assesses the evidence that memory performance is reactive to JoL. The results indicate that overall providing JoL does not have a significant effect on memory performance (g = 0.054, 95% CI -0.027 to 0.135). However, sub-groups analysis showed that this effect depends on the nature of the stimuli to be recalled, with moderate positive reactivity observed for related word pairs (g = 0.323, 95% CI 0.083 to 0.563) and word lists (g = 0.384, 95% CI 0.146 to 0.622) but no reactivity when pairs were unrelated or a mixture of related and unrelated pairs. These results indicate that researchers should be aware that eliciting JoL may well influence participants' underlying encoding processes, especially when using related word pairs or word lists.

Confidence ratings (CR) have often been integrated into reasoning and intelligence tasks as a means for assessing meta-reasoning processes. Although it is often assumed that eliciting these judgements throughout reasoning tasks has no effect on the underlying performance outcomes, this is yet to be established empirically. The current study examines whether eliciting CR from participants during a fluid-reasoning task influences their performance and how this effect is moderated by their initial self-confidence in their own reasoning abilities. In a first experiment, we found that participants performing CR during Raven's Progressive Matrices significantly outperformed a control group who did not provide ratings. Additionally, a second experiment demonstrated that CR only facilitated performance in participants who have a high level of initial self-confidence in their reasoning ability, whereas they were detrimental to participants low in self-confidence.

The 21st century has heralded many changes to the nature of work, and to contemporary workplaces. These changes demand workers who can adapt and thrive in dynamic environments and roles. It is the role of educational institutions to cultivate these future workers and foster a range of cognitive and noncognitive skills that are easily transferrable between careers and workplaces. This chapter outlines four noncognitive graduate attributes discussed in previous chapters—respect for diversity, entrepreneurship, interest, and conscientiousness. Each attribute is discussed in terms of its importance to contemporary workplaces and employers, how potential employers or educational institutions may be able to identify the attribute, and how educational institutions can better prepare students for the workforce. In a rapidly changing economy in which individuals are expected to change careers multiple times, widely applicable knowledge, skills, and abilities are becoming far more valuable to employers, and more central to educational programs.