The roles that essentially contested concepts play in persuasive discourse are examined in this paper. The first section of the paper reviews W. B. Gallie's original explication of the nature of essentially contested concepts and the body of theoretical literature that has developed in response to it. It then notes three major areas of…

Three dimensions of the relationship between children and their communities that have been identified are (1) children's sense of community as it develops from infancy through middle childhood, (2) characteristics of a competent community, and (3) the interaction between children's developmental growth and community resources. Children's sense of…

This document, published in India by the Regional College of Education, deals with 13 subjects: the tough context (thinking), definitions of concept, functions of concept, the process of concept formation, discriminant learning, mediation process, second signalling system, factors affecting concept formation, studies in concept formation, the…

This paper provides a review of the literature on the topic of sex roles. The author identifies two levels on which to study this issue: (1) the social identity model and the dramaturgical perspective, which can serve as a unified theoretical framework for phenomena and findings related to sex roles; and (2) a lessening of the terminological and…

This study was designed to test two alternate hypotheses regarding the meaning of increased lateral head movements in infants during experiments in which the mothers' voices were displaced from their faces. One interpretation is that the lateral looking responses of the infants are attributable to maturational effects on the infants' physiological…

This document reviews the use of mathematical models of learning for research in the learning of science concepts. Three mathematical models for the representation of concept learning are presented. (SL)

INVESTIGATED WERE JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT'S UNDERSTANDINGS OF THE CONCEPTS INTRINSIC TO PROBABILITY THEORY. THE SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES WERE TO EXPLORE (1) THE VARIATION AND CONSISTENCY IN USAGE OF QUANTITATIVE LANGUAGE TERMS, (2) THE ABILITY TO GENERATE POSSIBLE COMBINATIONS AND PERMUTATIONS, (3) THE RECOGNITION AND UTILIZATION OF THE CONCEPT OF…

Studied were selected aspects of the learning process related to biological concepts and the processes leading to their acquisition. Data were obtained using a series of structured interviews based on jury-graded check lists. The population consisted of 36 randomly-selected students from three randomly-selected classes using Green Version BSCS…

REPORTED IS THE DETERMINATION OF THE RELATIVE EFFECTIVENESS OF TWO METHODS OF INSTRUCTION IN TEACHING CLASSIFICATIONAL CONCEPTS OF PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL CHANGE TO ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CHILDREN. THROUGH TEACHER-DIRECTED DEMONSTRATION-DISCUSSION, STUDENTS IN GRADES 2-6 WERE INSTRUCTED IN THE CONCEPTS OF PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL CHANGE WITH THE…

This reports the effects of the number of relevant stimulus dimensions and figural versus verbal stimuli on the concept learning ability of college students. Results force a consideration of mediational variables in explaining this form of cognitive learning. A set of verbal materials analogous to a set of dimensionalized figural materials was…

Some 96 fourth-grade boys participated in a study investigating the influence of personality and stimulus characteristics on perceptions of the meanings of verbal evaluations, and the functioning of differentially perceived evaluations as reinforcers in a learning task. Personality variables measured were anxiety, locus of control, need for…

To test whether the process of learning mathematics involves the effect of a hierarchical concept (as opposed to a "snowball" effect, in which one set of concepts becomes the basis for a new set), a matrix of correlations of progress test scores from a self-instructional high school algebra course was analyzed. The form of the matrix did not…

This investigation examined in the laboratory the type of learning commonly found in the school situation--the formalized acquisition of concepts. A verbal concept-learning task suitable for college students was devised which permitted the externalizing and quantifying of behavior at 6 points in the learning process. A pilot study evaluated the…

The article introduces multi-purpose materials and suggestions for developing basic concepts with young children or the developmentally disabled. An informal checklist for beginning concepts is provided and instructions for using the geo-form board, form boxes for geometric shapes, race track forms and memory banks are included. (SBH)

A schema is best understood as a statistically defined concept. Schematic concept formation consists of abstracting the common elements or properties of a defined class in a schema. Thereafter, both discrimination and retention are facilitated, since only deviations from the schema need be processed for any particular class exemplar. In the…