Compares the effects of a Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) education unit in two curricular settings upon secondary school students' knowledge of and attitudes toward HIV prevention behaviors. Findings from experimental groups (n=260) revealed significant improvement of HIV attitudes only in the health education class, and HIV attitude change is…

The main differences between pragmatism and scientific realism seem to focus on the certainty of knowledge. Pragmatists contend that one can never be entirely certain of one's beliefs, whereas scientific realists argue that progress has been, and can be, made in explaining things about the world. (SLD)

The social representation attached to an English or Argentinan national identity were studied for schoolboys aged 7, 10, 12, and 17 years (220 in England and 146 in Argentina) following the Falkland Islands conflict. Findings suggest the potential of socially oriented theoretical frameworks for research on political socialization. (SLD)

Studied prior knowledge as a mediator of effectiveness of the elaborative interrogation strategy for 50 male and 50 female undergraduates in a learning task. The elaborative interpretation group had significantly greater matching scores on an associative memory test for animal information than the control group only for familiar animals. (SLD)

A survey of 1,140 primary care physicians and psychiatrists who graduated from medical school from 1950 through 1985 indicated that knowledge of genetics is increasing, especially among more recent graduates, but deficiencies remain. Need is seen for greater emphasis on genetics to reduce chance of physician error as more tests become available.…

An expert teacher was studied, using ethnographic and phenomenological techniques, as he planned and taught 2 philosophy courses to gifted students, ages 12-18. The paper provides an overview of the teacher's thoughts and an explanation of the impact of an unwritten and unobservable collection of knowledge on the teacher's observable planning and…

Describes research using students at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign that investigated the ways in which different levels of knowledge about a topic can affect search strategies in an online public access catalog. Previous research is reviewed, and implications for information intermediaries and designers of information retrieval…

Describes a five-week summer program for elementary teachers designed to develop content knowledge in physics through immersion in the subject and cooperative learning. Teachers indicated they changed their science teaching orientation toward process and content and increased their awareness of the power of demonstrations and student-generated…

The effects of conceptual change text and application questions in 139 college students' learning of electricity concepts were investigated. The experiment was a 2X2X2X2 factorial. Compared to traditional text and no questions, conceptual change text and application questions, respectively, improved acquisition of qualitative concepts.…

The study found that apartheid impacted the sociopsychological and physical circumstances of 12 African and 11 White people with retinitis pigmentosa in South Africa. Findings are discussed in terms of onset of condition, effects on subjects' lives, knowledge of social services, and needs unmet by existing services. (JDD)

A survey conducted of 902 legal, health, law enforcement, and social services professionals attending child sexual abuse educational programs found that those professionals with formal training, more years of professional practice, and who see 5 or more victims per month were more knowledgeable about child sexual abuse, but differences were not…

A study explored the responses of medical students, resident physicians, and experienced physicians to 12 vignettes describing hypothetical patients to determine the relationship between clinical experience and susceptibility to bias in treatment decisions resulting from presentation of possible outcomes. Framing bias was most evident in the…

A study of the relationship between first-year results for 115 Dutch medical students and achievement during medical school was studied using an item-response theory model for the longitudinal measure of change with stochastic parameters (developed by Albers et al., 1989) indicates that a low rate of growth in the first year persists. (SLD)

Researchers assessed geographic literacy in 300 college students, comparing a variety of demographic and academic factors to levels of geographic literacy. Findings reveal weak relationships between some of the academic factors and geographic competence. However, very powerful relationships are evident between geographic literacy and race, age,…

Test taking and scoring are examined from the normative and descriptive perspectives of judgment and decision theory. The number-right scoring rule is endorsed because it discourages omissions and is robust against variability in respondent motivations, item vagaries, and limitations in judgments of uncertainty. (SLD)