Being prepared with accurate, credible, and timely information during a disaster can help individuals make informed decisions about taking appropriate actions. Unfortunately, many people have difficulty understanding health and risk-related resources. This exploratory, mixed methods study assessed disaster information seeking behaviors and…

This study examined differences in the awareness, use, and perceived impact of educators, employers, and workforce training providers toward skills standards implementation in the State of Illinois. Group differences were revealed on the use of skills standards, with educators displaying significantly higher levels of use than employers or…

This paper reports the outcomes of a survey to investigate the level of cultural understanding and confidence for teachers working in culturally diverse classrooms. The survey was administered to teachers in primary and secondary schools in an Australian regional city. The aim of analysis was to determine the direction and strength of association…

This article reports recent research investigating the use of retrospective miscue analysis (RMA) as an instructional strategy with proficient second-language (L2) readers. RMA aims to heighten a reader's awareness of the reading process by involving readers in detailed analysis of their oral reading behavior. Using a cross-case analysis of three…

The competition among relations in nominals (CARIN) theory of conceptual combination (C. L. Gagne & E. J. Shoben, 1997) proposes that people interpret nominal compounds by selecting a relation from a pool of competing alternatives and that relation availability is influenced by the frequency with which relations have been previously associated…

In developing a Library Orientation Tour, it is important to be perceptive about the needs of a college population. At Queensborough Community College the student population is a mix of traditional and non-traditional students from diversified backgrounds. The initial contact with the Library, and its resources, may be overwhelming for students…

Two questions motivated this study: (a) Does test familiarity influence teachers' judgments of their students' test performance? and (b) Does the disability status of students influence their teachers' judgments? Teachers (n=19) judged item performances for one student with disabilities and one student without disabilities (n pairs=19) from their…

Background: Texas does not require health education or tobacco use prevention education (TUPE) in its middle schools. During planning for the Texas Tobacco Prevention Initiative, this baseline research was conducted to (1) describe tobacco prevention and control practices in middle schools prior to the pilot, (2) analyze implementation of a state…

Examined the relationships between student differences, prior experience with the subject material, past performances, teaching behaviors, and perceived learning and achievement. Found that achievement is affected by test anxiety and high school GPA, and that content-unfamiliar students, unlike content-familiar students, are more positively…

Examined children's comprehension and production of idioms through the roles of familiarity and of different kinds of contextual information on comprehension. A sample of 264 children showed that familiarity (i.e., frequency of exposure) plays a minor role and only for children who are not yet able to use contextual information. (18 references)…

Outlines a psychophysiological (involuntary responses to novel environmental stimuli) model of the role of orienting responses (ORs) in learning from televised lectures. Demonstrates that insertion of videographics in talking-head lectures produces ORs in television viewers. Finds that ORs enhance learning of familiar material but interfere with…

A study involving 11 male and 11 female inhabitants of Leiden (Netherlands) tested the hypothesis that a subject's judgments of the personality of unfamiliar target persons correspond better with the subject's Implicit Personality Theory than do judgments of the personality of familiar persons. The results confirm the hypothesis. (TJH)

Explored variation in destination search among group of retirement migrants (n=163) in terms of distance between origin and destination, previous place experience with destination, and presence of friends and family at destination. Found that first two factors significantly restricted search for potential destinations, but third did not. Suggests…

A survey of 143 clergy found 29% had no education about child abuse and neglect and that 22% believe that evidence, rather than the suspicion of abuse, is required before a report is made. The need for increased efforts to educate clergy about child abuse and neglect is discussed. (CR)

Examined children's tendency to make argument structure overgeneralization errors. Found that 3- to 8-year-olds were more likely to overgeneralize verbs less familiar to them, supporting the hypothesis that verb usage in particular construction types becomes entrenched over time. As children learn transitivity status of particular verbs, they…