Search

Quality of learning in cooperative education sites was assessed in a survey of 383 site supervisors and 97 students. Indicators identified by both groups were as follows: student professional development, challenging experiences, constructive climate, academic integrity, student professionalism, and occupational skills. Supervisors added problem solving and independence; students added academic approach and critical thinking. (Contains 23 references.) (SK)

Cooperative education coordinators (n=383) identified the following quality indicators of worksites for student placement: promote students' professional development, encourage professionalism in the co-op experience, help develop thinking and communication skills, provide challenging learning experiences, and encourage pride and competence. (SK)

Results of a study involving 340 Japanese and 272 U.S. college students and another study with 206 Japanese and 681 U.S. college students found that 21 scenarios did contain different Japanese and American behavioral rules. Results of the second study showed the multidimensionality of the behavioral rules and the difficulties of intercultural situations. (SLD)

Examines the effects of teacher immediacy in the multicultural classroom on perceived cognitive, affective, and behavioral learning for White, Asian, Hispanic, and Black students. Finds that, in general, teacher immediacy behaviors enhance students' learning. Notes similarities and differences in the effects of teacher immediacy cues across United States cultural groups. (SR)

ABERFAN IS A SMALL VILLAGE IN SOUTH WALES. IN the 1960s, many of those living there worked at a nearby mine that had been built to exploit the large amount [...]

THE SAVOY HOTEL IN LONDON IS FAMOUS for fine dining, attentive service, grandiose interiors, and, of course, a three-foot high wooden black cat called Kaspar. In 1898, a South African [...]

This commentary is on the systematic review by Lee et al. on pages 49–58 of this issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the notion that people who believe in psychic ability possess various psychological attributes that increase the likelihood of them misattributing paranormal causation to experiences that have a normal explanation. The paper discusses the structure and measurement of belief in psychic ability, then reviews the considerable body of work exploring the relationship between belief in psychic ability, and academic performance, intelligence, critical thinking, probability misjudgement and reasoning, measures of fantasy proneness and the propensity to find correspondences in distantly related material. Finally, the paper proposes several possible directions for future research, including: the need to build a multi-causal model of belief; to address the issue of correlation versus causation; to resolve the inconsistent pattern of findings present in many areas; and to develop a more valid, reliable and fine-grained measure of belief in psychic ability., Surveys suggest that approximately 50% of Americans believe in the existence of extrasensory perception (e.g. Newport & Strausberg, 2001), and that similar levels of belief exist throughout much of Western [...]

The first author, a proponent of evidence for psychic ability, and the second, a sceptic, have been conducting a systematic programme of collaborative sceptic-proponent research in parapsychology. This has involved carrying out joint experiments in which each investigator individually attempted to mentally influence the electrodermal activity of participants at a distant location. The first two collaborations obtained evidence of 'experimenter effects', that is, experiments conducted by the proponent obtained significant results but those conducted by the sceptic did not. This paper describes a new collaborative study that attempted to replicate our previous findings and explore potential explanations for past results. The new study failed to replicate our previous findings. The paper investigates whether the results obtained in our initial studies may have been caused by a genuine psychic effect, and this third experiment failed to replicate this finding because some aspect of the study disrupted the production of that effect, or whether the results from our first two studies represented chance findings or undetected subtle artifacts, and the results obtained in the present study accurately reflect the absence of a remote detection of staring effect. The implications of this work are discussed, along with the benefits of conducting collaborative work for resolving disagreements in other controversial areas of psychology., For well over a hundred years scientists have explored the possible existence of psychic ability (Edge, Morris, Palmer, & Rush, 1986). This work has generated considerable controversy, with proponents arguing [...]

Mediums claim to be able to communicate with the deceased. Such claims attract a considerable amount of public interest and, if valid, have important implications for many areas of psychology. For over 100 years, researchers have tested alleged mediums. This work has obtained mixed results and provoked a considerable amount of methodological debate. This paper reviews the key issues in this debate, describes how the authors devised a method of testing that aimed to prevent the many problems that have hindered past research, and how they then used this method to test several professional mediums. The results of this work did not support the existence of genuine mediumistic ability. Competing interpretations of these results are discussed, along with ways in which the methodology presented in the paper could be used to assess conceptually similar, but non-paranormal, claims made in clinical, occupational and forensic contexts., Some individuals claim to possess mediumistic abilities that allow them to contact the 'spirit world' and receive information from the deceased. There are several reasons to subject these claims to [...]

Some alleged psychics appear to be able to deform metallic objects, such as keys and cutlery, by thought alone. This paper describes two studies that examined whether one aspect of these demonstrations could be created by verbal suggestion. In the first study, participants were shown a videotape in which a fake psychic placed a bent key on a table. Participants in one condition heard the fake psychic suggest that the key was continuing to bend, whilst those in the other condition did not. Participants in the suggestion condition were significantly more likely to report that the key continued to bend. These findings were replicated in the second study. In addition, participants who reported that the key continued to bend displayed a significantly higher level of confidence in their testimony than others, and were significantly less likely to recall that the fake psychic had suggested the continued bending of the key. Neither experiment revealed any differences between participants who expressed a prior belief in the paranormal compared with those who did not. The paper discusses the implications of these results for the psychology of suggestion and the assessment of eyewitness testimony for anomalous events., Psychics and mediums claim to possess a diverse range of paranormal powers, including, for example, the ability to predict the future, communicate with the dead, and read minds (Wiseman & [...]

In Experiment 1, participants took part in a fake seance. An actor suggested that a table was levitating when, in fact, it remained stationary. After the seance, approximately one third of participants incorrectly reported that the table had moved. Results also showed a significant relationship between the reported movement of the table and belief in the paranormal, with a greater percentage of believers than disbelievers, reporting that the table had moved. Experiment 2 varied whether the suggestion was consistent, or inconsistent, with participants' belief in the paranormal. Results again showed that believers were more susceptible to suggestion than disbelievers, but only when the suggestion was consistent with their belief in the paranormal. Approximately one fifth of participants believed that the fake seances contained genuine paranormal phenomena., The method of the seance is precisely adapted to produce illusions and hallucinations, and it strains credulity to imagine that any trustworthy observations come from it. (Coover, 1927, p. 262) [...]