Friendship and peer groups are important to youth. However, adults in afterschool programs and other youth-serving community-based organizations often either ignore peer relationships or deem them detrimental to desired youth outcomes. What would it mean to consider young people's friendships in a different light? How can this important element of…

An evaluation of the Princeton University Preparatory Program (PUPP), a college access program for low-income, high-achieving public high school students, yielded favorable findings regarding the perceptions of program participants. Survey results, which include responses from all 71 participants in the 2015-2016 program, indicated that the…

Analysis of incidents over the past ten years in Germany reveals that the boundaries between targeted attacks in schools and terrorist attacks are starting to blur. Bockler, Leuschner, Roth, Zick, and Scheithauer (2018) recently presented a set of hypotheses about similarities between the developmental pathways of school attackers and lone actor…

This study was designed to explore the experiences of Chinese international students attending a research university in the United States, from the time they received offers of acceptance to study abroad until they left China (pre-arrival period) through the end of their first quarter as freshmen (early post-arrival period). The researcher sought…

The purpose of the present study was to examine expertise in magic by interviewing 16 prominent Finnish magicians who were identified earlier through a social network analysis of 120 Finnish magicians. A semi-structured interview was administered that addressed the participants' histories; their relationship to magic, the nature of their…

Through this research we aim to contribute to the debate on the role of universities in industrial districts in the context of the new competitive panorama that they are facing. With this objective in mind, we have carried out a study based on a university located within a Spanish textile district, using Social Network Analysis techniques. Of…

Clustering on Social Learning Network still not explored widely, especially when the network focuses on e-learning system. Any conventional methods are not really suitable for the e-learning data. SNA requires content analysis, which involves human intervention and need to be carried out manually. Some of the previous clustering techniques need…

For researchers and practitioners interested in social relationships, the question remains as to how large social networks typically are, and how their size and composition change across adulthood. On the basis of predictions of socioemotional selectivity theory and social convoy theory, we conducted a meta-analysis on age-related social network…

Data mining is concerned with detecting patterns of data in raw datasets, which are then used to unearth knowledge that might not have been discovered using conventional querying or statistical methods. This discovered knowledge has been used to empower decision makers in countless applications spanning across many multi-disciplinary areas…

This dissertation presents new research on the "Bavarian Quantity Law" (the BQL) in the northern Bavarian dialect of Hahnbach. Building upon earlier investigation of the BQL (cf. Bannert 1976a,b for Central Bavarian) this study examines the historical, phonological, and phonetic motivations for this feature as well the variability in its…

Previous studies have confirmed that Facebook, the leading social networking site among young people, facilitates social connections among college students, but the specific activities and motives that foster social adjustment remain unclear. This study examined associations between patterns of Facebook activity, motives for using Facebook, and…

This study investigates the relationship between students' use of information and communication technology (ICT) for social communication and their computer and information literacy (CIL) scores. It also examines whether gender and socioeconomic background moderates this relationship. We utilized student data from IEA's International Computer and…

Background: Despite devotion of substantial resources and effort to increase parent/school partnerships, gaps remain between policy rhetoric and practice, especially in high-poverty communities. Current research focuses on parent involvement or effects of parent motivational beliefs on parent choice for behavior; however, it does not address the…

The use of games in education represents a promising tool to motivate and engage students in their learning process. Most of previous research on the topic has focused to develop theoretical frameworks or to conduct experiments as a means to analyse learning outcomes such as knowledge retention, problem-solving skills gains or attitudes toward…

Analysing the structure of a social network can help us understand the key factors influencing interaction and collaboration in a virtual learning community (VLC). Here, we describe the mechanisms used in social network analysis (SNA) to analyse the social network structure of a VLC for teachers and discuss the relationship between face-to-face…