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The purpose of this study was to measure the beliefs that faculty from various academic disciplines hold about both the nature of their own intelligence and the intelligence of their students. Faculty at one land grant institution participated in this pilot study, completing an eight-item mindset survey based on the work of Dweck (2000, 2006). Though several variables were studied (i.e., age range, position, rank, gender, college/academic discipline), only position was statistically significant for difference in beliefs between teaching and tenure-track faculty. Findings also show that faculty's beliefs about their own intelligence and the intelligence of their students are consistent. These results suggest that tenure-track faculty should engage with teaching faculty, focusing on creating a student-centered learning environment to empower students through a growth mindset in their classrooms.

The field of athletic advising has existed since the 1970s. In the early 1990s, the National Collegiate Athletic Association mandated that higher education institutions provide academic support for student-athletes. Few researchers have identified those serving as athletic advisors, so the literature features little data on advisor demographics, training, education, and work responsibilities. Therefore, the background and experiences of 277 members of the National Association of Academic Advisors for Athletics, who responded to a survey, were explored. Specifically, athletic advisor educational and training background, burnout levels, meaning of the profession as participants describe it, advice for prospective advisors, and the knowledge they wish they had gained before entering the field are addressed. Dramaturgy was utilized as a framework for analyzing this research.

First-year courses prepare students for the transition to, and success in, college. Institutions are interested in assessing student learning outcomes to achieve institutional goals and maintain accreditation. Though it may be difficult to measure student learning and success, colleges aim to assess student learning in the classroom by setting learning outcomes and objectives. The purpose of this study was to explore students' achievement of learning outcomes in a required first-year course through their submission of six-word memoirs about what they learned. This study's framework was Lave and Wenger's (1991) situated learning theory through the process of legitimate peripheral participation.

Background: Exposure to heat during pregnancy has been associated with reduced fetal growth. Less is known about associations with cold and the potential for critical time windows of exposure. OBJECTIVES: We aimed to evaluate, in a national retrospective cohort, critical windows of susceptibility during pregnancy to extreme temperatures (low and high) and fetal growth, among 624,940 singleton term births in Israel during the period 2010-2014. Methods: Temperature exposures were estimated using a spatially refined gridded climate data set with a 1-h and 1- [km.sup.2] resolution. Percentiles of temperature were categorized by climatic zone for the entire pregnancy and by trimesters and weeks. Generalized additive models with the distributed lag nonlinear model framework were used to estimate unadjusted and adjusted associations between percentiles and categories of temperature and fetal growth markers: term [births after 36 weeks of gestational age (GA)] mean birth weight and term low birth weight (tLBW, term infants with birth weight below 2,500 g). Results: After adjustment, extreme temperatures (percentiles) during the entire pregnancy were associated with a lower mean birth weight {90th vs. 41st-50th percentile: -65 g; 95% CI: -72 g, -58 g}. Similar inverse U-shaped patterns were observed for all trimesters, with stronger associations for heat than for cold and for exposures during the third trimester. For heat, results suggest critical windows between 3-9 and 19-34 GA-weeks, with the strongest association estimated at 3 GA-weeks (temperature >90th vs. 41st-50th percentiles: -3.8 g; 95% CI: -7.1 g, -0.4 g). For cold, there was a consistent trend of null associations early in pregnancy and stronger inverse associations over time, with the strongest association at 36 GA-week ( Discussion: Findings from our study of term live births in Israel (2010-2014) suggest that exposure to extreme temperatures, especially heat, during specific time windows may result in reduced fetal growth. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP8117, Background Increases in mean temperature and the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events due to climate change are expected to increase climate-related morbidity and mortality (Basagana 2018; IPCC 2014). [...]

In the United States, pregnant people considering a vaginal birth after cesarean delivery (VBAC) face this decision in a highly contested environment where VBAC is simultaneously encouraged—situated within discourses promoting vaginal birth—and discouraged through discourses emphasizing reproductive risk. Woven through these competing discourses is a shared emphasis on maternal responsibility, reflective of a socially constructed belief that birth method is bound implicitly to one's "goodness" as a mother. This paper employs a discursive analytic lens to examine the experiences of 16 pregnant people in New York City seeking VBACs for their upcoming births. We examine how sociocultural discourses of "responsible" mothering shape participants' experiences of considering VBAC and examine participants' anxieties over VBAC and its attainability in light of their past birth experiences. Our analysis demonstrates that participants reproduce discourses privileging vaginal birth, and simultaneously challenge these discourses by invoking an "embodied knowledge" that enables them to assert themselves as responsible mothers in the context of past cesarean deliveries and uncertainty surrounding their upcoming births. Implications are discussed in the context of existing literature on birth and discourses of maternal responsibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this essay is to explore synergy between the pedagogy of teaching group fitness classes and that of teaching in higher education (i.e., undergraduate and graduate courses). The authors are both faculty and group fitness instructors. Through a brief review of literature, personal experiences as group fitness instructors, and perspectives of other faculty who teach fitness, the essay sought to explore pedagogical considerations between teaching fitness and teaching in higher education. Instructional differences, similarities, and overlaps were considered. In addition, teaching training and pandemic pivoting were also explored. The authors concluded with a call for more scholarly discourse on teaching in group fitness and higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Feminist scholars and activists writing about breast cancer care among women have highlighted the sexist and heterosexist assumptions often embedded in the medical management of breast cancer, and of mastectomy in particular. Despite these contributions, and some speculation that sexual minority women may be less interested in breast reconstruction, limited research explores sexual minority women's lived experience of mastectomy and decision making about reconstruction. Thirteen lesbian and/or bisexual women who had undergone mastectomy for treatment of breast cancer participated in individual qualitative interviews exploring decisions to have, or not have, breast reconstruction. Reasons for/against reconstruction reflected themes identified in prior studies among heterosexual women. Although participants described sexual, gender, and political identities and orientations as influences on their decision making, for most participants, experiences with physicians who encouraged reconstruction and concerns about stigmatization of illness in romantic, professional, and social contexts were also central. Findings are interpreted through feminist dis/ability, medicalization, and existential frameworks.

One form of support-seeking behavior can be found in online communities, spaces for users to read and share in their own words. We sought to understand how members of "r/PMDD," an online community focused on premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), interface with others by posting information, sharing personal narratives, and asking for advice. Top posts were analyzed using thematic decomposition, and four major themes emerged: (1) construction of PMDD as an "other" self-state, (2) diagnosis as complicated, (3) online camaraderie, and (4) agency gained through knowledge. Findings highlight both the ways in which premenstrual distress remains stigmatized and misunderstood within social and medical realms, as well as the important role that online communities can play to fill in the gaps of social support and information-sharing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a qualitative investigation of young feminists' experience of body consciousness, 25 feminist women each participated in one of 6 focus groups examining the ways they experienced body image and negotiated cultural messages about women's appearance. Participants described their experience with objectification and its impact on their body image, sense of self, and relationships with other women. Although feminism provided an alternative way to understand cultural messages and reframe negative thoughts, this understanding did not necessarily affect aesthetic reactions. Participants experienced conflict between their feminist "beliefs" and their "feelings" about beauty ideals and their own appearance. This conflict is interpreted in terms of a mere exposure effect and existing genderpower relations. Suggestions of ways feminist psychologists can support young women's strategies for resisting negative cultural messages are provided.

Background: Resource trade-off theory suggests that increased performance on a given trait comes at the cost of decreased performance on other traits. Methods: Growth data from 1889 subjects (996 girls) were used from the GrowUp1974 Gothenburg study. Energy Trade-Off (ETO) between height and weight for individuals with extreme body types was characterized using a novel ETO-Score (ETOS). Four extreme body types were defined based on height and ETOI at early adulthood: tall-slender, short-stout, short-slender, and tall-stout; their growth trajectories assessed from ages 0.5-17.5 years. A GWAS using UK BioBank data was conducted to identify gene variants associated with height, BMI, and for the first time with ETOS. Results: Height and ETOS trajectories show a two-hit pattern with profound changes during early infancy and at puberty for tall-slender and short-stout body types. Several loci (including FTO, ADCY3, GDF5, ) and pathways were identified by GWAS as being highly associated with ETOS. The most strongly associated pathways were related to “extracellular matrix,” “signal transduction,” “chromatin organization,” and “energy metabolism.” Conclusions: ETOS represents a novel anthropometric trait with utility in describing body types. We discovered the multiple genomic loci and pathways probably involved in energy trade-off. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Head coaches play an important role in their influence on college athletes and their academic goals. Concerns have been raised about coaches' prioritizing athletic team success over academics. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to explore the impact of head coach transition on National Collegiate Athletic Association teams' academic culture through the perspectives of athletic advisors. Interviews were conducted with 16 athletic advisors on their perceptions of the previous and new coaches' perspective on, and involvement with, academics in addition to the transition period. Findings show the importance of the relationship between coaches and athletic advisors, that advisors were quick to discern if the new coach was going to elevate or deteriorate the program's academic culture compared with predecessors, the need for advisors' involvement in the search process for a new coach, and the role academics had in coach searches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deleterious mutations in the BRCA1/BRCA2 genes elevate lifetime risk of breast and ovarian cancer. Each child of a mutation-positive parent has a 50% chance of inheriting it. Preimplantation genetic diagnosis [...]