The View From Carnegie 210

This past semester, the Cognitive Group discussed an article by Nelson, L. D., & Simmons, J. P. (2007) investigating the Name-Letter effect (see the previous entry for details). The group was surprised by the finding that students whose names began with C or D had lower GPAs than students whose names began with A or B. We did our best to analyze the design of the study and to critically consider the context in which the results were presented.

The need for such critiques is made apparent with the publication in Newsweek (November, 2007) of a summary of the effect. A comparison of the Newsweek synopsis with the article itself provides an excellent illustration of how the popular media presents findings from Psychological Science.

To read the Newsweek summary, please continue reading...

Continue reading "Update! Can't get those letters out of my mind..." »

Tags: Cognitive Psychology Name-letter effect Update

Posted by Aimee Knupsky at 8:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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Over the last two years, students in our lab have become interested in the concept of embodied cognition...perhaps due to my enthusiasm for this growing area of research. This year, senior Jamie Skender completed her comprehensive project utilizing ideas from embodied cognition to examine the influence of congruent movement on the recall of words in children (poster). Next year, senior Amber Sharp will be examining the influence of teaching strategies derived from embodied cognition on reading comprehension in children.

In addition, Liz Marsh, a 2009 alum, was recently offered a position in the lab of Art Glenberg, prominent embodied cognition researcher. Liz is particularly excited to be part of the transition of Glenberg's lab from the University of Wisconsin to Arizona State University. Those of us in the cognitive labs at Allegheny hope that Liz will keep us up to date regarding this exciting field.

In the meantime, however, you can listen to Arthur Glenberg explain the early roots of this field as well as his journey through it in the Brain Science Podcast #36: Art Glenberg on Embodied Cognition.

Tags: Embodied Cognition Glenberg Student Research

Posted by Aimee Knupsky at 6:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A common complaint from students in many classes pertains to the amount of busywork assigned. This mantra inspires an interesting conundrum for teachers...to assign or not to assign those quizzes, supplemental readings, practice problems, writing exercises? On the one hand, we understand the value of students working with information being presented in as many different (appropriate) ways as possible. On the other hand, we risk having students "drop-out" when faced with a steady stream of work that can seem repetitive and oppressive.

Recently, there has been a surge of research in cognitive psychology on the process of learning in the classroom. I think this line of research shows promise for helping educators navigate the pedagogical dilemma of busywork. Studies have shown that practice with material that is distributed over the long run (e.g., over the semester) leads to much longer retention than does mass practice (commonly known as 'cramming'). Research has also found that being repeatedly tested on a topic leads to better performance than does study alone. Futhermore, new data now suggests that (despite the principle of encoding specificity) practice tests do not need to share an identical format with the actual test. Instead, what seems to be of primary importance is the effort required on the part of the learner during the practice measures and that feedback is given by teachers on them.

The short story, from my perspective, is that we seem to have a semantics problem here. Busywork has come to mean something we are asked to do that simply fills the time, but that has no inherent value. Given what we know about the distributed practice of material and the importance of repeated testing to learning, however, busywork should not be abandoned. Instead, I suggest a new interpretation of the word. Busywork should be reconceived as structured, focused work that keeps students busy (read engaged here) with the material to be learned.

Of primary importance will be getting students to see the value of that work so that their motivation to continue remains high. I believe the challenge is for educators to "take-back" this concept and make sure to have conversations with their students regarding its importance to their learning. Perhaps the next research question should be how to ensure that our new busywork achieves these goals.

For a reading list of cognitive research on learning in the class room, read more:

Continue reading "The "Busywork" Puzzle" »

Tags: Busywork Cognitive Psychology Learning in the Classroom Testing Effect

Posted by Aimee Knupsky at 11:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Recently, my FS101 students and I listened to an All in the Mind podcast discussing clinical, cognitive, and neuroscience investigations of meditation and, in particular, mindfulness (See Entry Here). One of the most intriguing ideas discussed in the podcast was the idea that mindfulness could actually increase and focus attention. If this is the case, mindfulness training could have several applications to the classroom. One way to examine this idea further might be to examine attentional gains in people who are trained in meditation.

Turns out that a team of researchers has actually begun to tackle these issues, and Scientific America's Street Science summarizes this research nicely.

In addition, you can read the abstract for the group's most recent publication by reading more:

Continue reading "Meditation & Attention...Research Update" »

Tags: Attention Cognitive Psychology Meditation

Posted by Aimee Knupsky at 8:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One of my greatest pet-peeves as an experimental psychologist is the perception that psychology is not a "hard" science. Therefore, I was ecstatic when I read an article in this month's Observer by APS President John Cacioppo discussing recent research demonstrating the importance of psychological science. Most interestingly, Cacioppo reviews a study by Boyack, Klavans & Borner (2005) demonstrating that psychology is one of the seven hub disciplines of science (along with mathematics, physics, chemistry, earth sciences, medicine, and the social sciences). As Cacioppo notes, the results of the study "indicate that scientific contributions in psychology advance not only the discipline but many other scientific fields as well." I'm proud that my discipline is doing it's part to support the scientific process!

Tags: FS101 hubs of science psychological science

Posted by Aimee Knupsky at 3:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)