Integration in der Schule - ein Forschungseinblick

«Die Integration von Schülerinnen und Schülern wird im Wesentlichen durch die Klassenlehrpersonen bestimmt.» – Eine von vielen lehrreichen Erkenntnissen der aktuellen Integrations-Forschung. Spannend auch für jene, die sich in der Regel an der Praxis orientieren.

Improving memory in elderly adults by instructing them in professional actors' learning strategies

This study examined a new type of cognitive intervention. For four weeks, participants (ages 65 to 82) were instructed in professional acting techniques, followed by rehearsal and performance of theatrical scenes. Although the training was not targeted in any way to the tasks used in pre- and post-testing, participants produced significantly higher recall and recognition scores after the intervention. It is suggested that the cognitive effort involved in analyzing and adopting theatrical characters' motivations (and then experiencing those characters' mental/emotional states during performance) is responsible for the observed improvement. A secondary strand of this study showed that participants who were given annotated scripts in which the implied goals of the characters were made explicit demonstrated significantly faster access to the stored material, as measured by a computer latency task.

Sport as a means of immigrant youth integration: An empirical study of sports, intercultural relations, and immigrant youth integration in Switzerland

Der Beitrag geht der Bedeutung des Sports für die Integration von jugendlichen Einwanderern in die Aufnahmegesellschaft nach. Aufgrund von Daten einer Querschnittstudie bei 454 Jugendlichen der ersten Einwanderergeneration aus Gymnasien, Berufsschulen und Vorlehreeinrichtungen der deutschen Schweiz zeigen unsere Ergebnisse, dass der Sport für die meisten Jugendlichen mit Migrationshintergrund ein wichtiger Teil ihrer Freizeit darstellt, auch wenn der Anteil von Migrantinnen, die Mitglied eines Sportvereins sind, im Vergleich zu Migranten zweimal niedriger ausfällt. Zudem haben sowohl männliche wie weibliche Jugendliche mit Migrationshintergrund, die Sport in einem Sportverein ausüben, deutlich mehr persönliche Kontakte mit Schweizer Peers während ihrer sportlichen Aktivitäten. Jugendliche, die von häufigen persönlichen Kontakt mit Schweizer Peers im Sport berichten, haben auch deutlich mehr interkulturelle Kontakte in ihrer Freizeit generell und innerhalb des Kreises ihren engsten Freunde. Schließlich vermögen häufige Kontakte mit Schweizer Peers im Sport das Gefühl der jugendlichen Einwanderer, in der Schweiz integriert zu sein, zu erhöhen.

Beta-alanine supplementation improves jumping power and affects severe-intensity performance in professional alpine skiers.

INTRODUCTION Supplementation with beta-alanine may have positive effects on severe-intensity, intermittent, and isometric strength-endurance performance. These could be advantageous for competitive alpine skiers, whose races last 45 to 150 s, require metabolic power above the aerobic maximum, and involve isometric muscle work. Further, beta-alanine supplementation affects the muscle force-frequency relationship, which could influence explosiveness. We explored the effects of beta-alanine on explosive jump performance, severe exercise energy metabolism, and severe-intensity ski-like performance. METHODS Nine male elite alpine skiers consumed 4.8 g/d beta-alanine or placebo for 5 weeks in a double-blind fashion. Before and after, they performed countermovement jumps (CMJ), a 90-s cycling bout at 110% VO2max (CLT), and a maximal 90-s box jump test (BJ90). RESULTS Beta-alanine improved maximal (+7 ± 3%, d = 0.9) and mean CMJ power (+7 ± 2%, d = 0.7), tended to reduce oxygen deficit (-3 ± 8%, p = .06) and lactate accumulation (-12 ± 31%) and enhance aerobic energy contribution (+1.3 ± 2.9%, p = .07) in the CLT, and improved performance in the last third of BJ90 (+7 ± 4%, p = .02). These effects were not observed with placebo. CONCLUSIONS Beta-alanine supplementation improved explosive and repeated jump performance in elite alpine skiers. Enhanced muscle contractility could possibly explain improved explosive and repeated jump performance. Increased aerobic energy production could possibly help explain repeated jump performance as well.

Evaluation of Swiss slaughterhouse data for integration in a syndromic surveillance system

BACKGROUND: We evaluated Swiss slaughterhouse data for integration in a national syndromic surveillance system for the early detection of emerging diseases in production animals. We analysed meat inspection data for cattle, pigs and small ruminants slaughtered between 2007 and 2012 (including emergency slaughters of sick/injured animals); investigating patterns in the number of animals slaughtered and condemned; the reasons invoked for whole carcass condemnations; reporting biases and regional effects. RESULTS: Whole carcass condemnation rates were fairly uniform (1-2‰) over time and between the different types of production animals. Condemnation rates were much higher and less uniform following emergency slaughters. The number of condemnations peaked in December for both cattle and pigs, a time when individuals of lower quality are sent to slaughter when hay and food are limited and when certain diseases are more prevalent. Each type of production animal was associated with a different profile of condemnation reasons. The most commonly reported one was "severe lesions" for cattle, "abscesses" for pigs and "pronounced weight loss" for small ruminants. These reasons could constitute valuable syndromic indicators as they are unspecific clinical manifestations of a large range of animal diseases (as well as potential indicators of animal welfare). Differences were detected in the rate of carcass condemnation between cantons and between large and small slaughterhouses. A large percentage (>60% for all three animal categories) of slaughterhouses operating never reported a condemnation between 2007 and 2012, a potential indicator of widespread non-reporting bias in our database. CONCLUSIONS: The current system offers simultaneous coverage of cattle, pigs and small ruminants for the whole of Switzerland; and traceability of each condemnation to its farm of origin. The number of condemnations was significantly linked to the number of slaughters, meaning that the former should be always be offset by the later in analyses. Because this denominator is only communicated at the end of the month, condemnations may currently only be monitored on a monthly basis. Coupled with the lack of timeliness (30-60 days delay between condemnation and notification), this limits the use of the data for early-detection.

Algebra of Classical Theoretical Term Reductions in the Sciences

An elementary algebra identifies conceptual and corresponding applicational limitations in John Kemeny and Paul Oppenheim’s (K-O) 1956 model of theoretical reduction in the sciences. The K-O model was once widely accepted, at least in spirit, but seems afterward to have been discredited, or in any event superceeded. Today, the K-O reduction model is seldom mentioned, except to clarify when a reduction in the Kemeny-Oppenheim sense is not intended. The present essay takes a fresh look at the basic mathematics of K-O comparative vocabulary theoretical term reductions, from historical and philosophical standpoints, as a contribution to the history of the philosophy of science. The K-O theoretical reduction model qualifies a theory replacement as a successful reduction when preconditions of explanatory adequacy and comparable systematicization are met, and there occur fewer numbers of theoretical terms identified as replicable syntax types in the most economical statement of a theory’s putative propositional truths, as compared with the theoretical term count for the theory it replaces. The challenge to the historical model developed here, to help explain its scope and limitations, involves the potential for equivocal theoretical meanings of multiple theoretical term tokens of the same syntactical type.

Colloidal meteorological processes in the formation of precipitation

This paper is the edited translation of the paper by Walter Findeisen “Die kolloidmeteorologischen Vorgänge bei der Niederschlagsbildung” (Colloidal meteorological processes in the formation of precipitation) that was published 1938 in the Meteorologische Zeitschrift 55, 121–133

Dysfunction of Cortical Dendritic Integration in Neuropathic Pain Reversed by Serotoninergic Neuromodulation

Neuropathic pain is caused by long-term modifications of neuronal function in the peripheral nervous system, the spinal cord, and supraspinal areas. Although functional changes in the forebrain are thought to contribute to the development of persistent pain, their significance and precise subcellular nature remain unexplored. Using somatic and dendritic whole-cell patch-clamp recordings from neurons in the anterior cingulate cortex, we discovered that sciatic nerve injury caused an activity-dependent dysfunction of hyperpolarization-activated cyclic nucleotide-regulated (HCN) channels in the dendrites of layer 5 pyramidal neurons resulting in enhanced integration of excitatory postsynaptic inputs and increased neuronal firing. Specific activation of the serotonin receptor type 7 (5-HT7R) alleviated the lesion-induced pathology by increasing HCN channel function, restoring normal dendritic integration, and reducing mechanical pain hypersensitivity in nerve-injured animals in vivo. Thus, serotoninergic neuromodulation at the forebrain level can reverse the dendritic dysfunction induced by neuropathic pain and may represent a potential therapeutical target.

Migrantinnen in interkulturellen Vereinen: Perspektiven zur Integration in den Sport

Im deutschsprachigen Raum wird ein hoher Anteil an Migrantinnen, die sportlich inaktiv und in Sportvereinen unterrepräsentiert sind, konstatiert (Burrmann et al., 2015; Lamprecht et al., 2014). Migrantinnen ist der Zugang zu Sportaktivitäten häufig erschwert aufgrund von Diskriminierung, Konflikten und Grenzziehungsprozessen, denen Aspekte betreffend des Geschlechts und der Ethnizität inhärent sind. Vor diesem Hintergrund wurde bislang häufig das Potenzial der Integration in den Sport bzw. Sozialisation zum Sport von Migrantinnen in (ethnischen) Sportvereinen und im Schulsport untersucht. Wie jedoch die Integration in den Sport in interkulturellen Vereinen, welche Sportangebote offerieren, funktioniert, ist weder in der Migrations- noch in der sportbezogenen Integrationsforschung ein gängiges Thema. Basierend auf dem theoretischen Ansatz Boundary Work (Lamont & Molnár, 2002) untersucht die vorliegende Studie geschlechtsbezogene und ethnische Grenzziehungsprozesse hinsichtlich der Sportpartizipation von Migrantinnen in einem interkulturellen Verein sowie vereinsbezogene Möglichkeiten, welche die Integration in den Sport fördern. Es wurden halbstrukturierte Interviews mit acht Migrantinnen verschiedener Herkunft und zwei Leiterinnen eines interkulturellen Vereins in der deutschsprachigen Schweiz durchgeführt. Zusätzlich erfolgte eine Gruppendiskussion mit sechs Migrantinnen. Mittels qualitativer Inhaltsanalyse und dokumentarischer Methode wurden geschlechtsbezogene und ethnische Grenzen sowie Möglichkeiten für eine Sportpartizipation durch den Verein abgeleitet. Hinsichtlich der erschwerten Sportpartizipation indizieren die Resultate vielfältige, miteinander verschränkte, sich überlagernde und durchlässige Grenzen, die das Geschlecht und die Ethnizität allgemein betreffen. Im Speziellen wirken migrationsbedingt und lebensphasenspezifisch geprägte Haltungen gegenüber „mütterlichen“ Verpflichtungen, sprachlichen- und beruflichen Aus- bzw. Weiterbildungspflichten sowie Praktiken der Körperverhüllung. Die jeweilige Struktur der Grenzverschränkungen wirkt z.T. mehrfach restriktiv und prägt zugleich die verfügbare Zeit und finanzielle Mittel der Migrantinnen, was eine Dilemma artige Situation hervorruft. Zur Überwindung der Grenzen bietet der interkulturelle Verein insbesondere professionelle Mitarbeiterinnen; Kinderbetreuung; niederschwellige, kosten- und zeitgünstige Sportangebote exklusiv für Frauen; und eine wohlwollende Atmosphäre mit gleichberechtigtem Zusammensein. Interkulturelle Vereine können somit den Zugang zu Sportangeboten für Migrantinnen erleichtern und die Integration in den Sport bzw. die Sozialisation zum Sport fördern. Dies geschieht z.B. infolge bedarfsgerechter Vereinsangebote, unverbindlicher Teilnahmebedingungen und einer integrationsorientierten Vereinskultur. Der auf Grenzziehung fokussierte theoretische Ansatz und die vorliegenden Resultate eröffnen neue Forschungsperspektiven im Bereich Sport und Sozialisation sowie Integration.

Left atrial remodeling, early repolarization pattern, and inflammatory cytokines in professional soccer players

OBJECTIVES: Although regular physical exercise clearly reduces cardiovascular morbidity risk, long-term endurance sports practice has been recognized as a risk factor for atrial fibrillation (AF). However, the mechanisms how endurance sports can lead to AF are not yet clear. The aim of our present study was to investigate the influence of long-term endurance training on vagal tone, atrial size, and inflammatory profile in professional elite soccer players. METHODS: A total of 25 professional major league soccer players (mean age 24+/-4 years) and 20 sedentary controls (mean age 26+/-3 years) were included in the study and consecutively examined. All subjects underwent a sports cardiology check-up with physical examination, electrocardiography, echocardiography, exercise testing on a bicycle ergometer, and laboratory analysis [standard laboratory and cytokine profile: interleukin (IL)-6, tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-alpha, IL-8, IL-10]. RESULTS: Athletes were divided into two groups according to presence or absence of an early repolarization (ER) pattern, defined as a ST-segment elevation at the J-point (STE) >/=0.1mm in 2 leads. Athletes with an ER pattern showed significantly lower heart rate and an increased E/e' ratio compared to athletes without an ER pattern. STE significantly correlated with E/e' ratio as well as with left atrial (LA) volume. The pro-inflammatory cytokines IL-6, IL-8, TNF-alpha as well as the anti-inflammatory cytokine IL-10 were significantly elevated in all soccer players. However, athletes with an ER pattern had significantly higher IL-6 plasma levels than athletes without ER pattern. Furthermore, athletes with "high" level IL-6 had significantly larger LA volumes than players with "low" level IL-6. CONCLUSIONS: Athletes with an ER pattern had significantly higher E/e' ratios, reflecting higher atrial filling pressures, higher LA volume, and higher IL-6 plasma levels. All these factors may contribute to atrial remodeling over time and thus increase the risk of AF in long-term endurance sports.