The influence of emotional body posture on adults' and 8-year-olds' perception facial expressions

The present set of experiments was designed to investigate the development of children's sensitivity of facial expressions observed within emotional contexts. Past research investigating both adults' and children's perception of facial expressions has been limited primarily to the presentation of isolated faces. During daily social interactions, however, facial expressions are encountered within contexts conveying emotions (e.g., background scenes, body postures, gestures). Recently, research has shown that adults' perception of facial expressions is influenced by these contexts. When emotional faces are shown in incongruent contexts (e.g., when an angry face is presented in a context depicting fear) adults' accuracy decreases and their reaction times increase (e.g., Meeren et a1. 2005). To examine the influence of emotional body postures on children's perception of facial expressions, in each of the experiments in the current study adults and 8-year-old children made two-alternative forced choice decisions about facial expressions presented in congruent (e.g., a face displayed sadness on a body displaying sadness) and incongruent (e.g., a face displaying fear on a body displaying sadness) contexts. Consistent with previous studies, a congruency effect (better performance on congruent than incongruent trials) was found for both adults and 8-year-olds when the emotions displayed by the face and body were similar to each other (e.g., fear and sad, Experiment l a ) ; the influence of context was greater for 8-year-olds than adults for these similar expressions. To further investigate why the congruency effect was larger for children than adults in Experiment 1 a, Experiment 1 b was conducted to examine if increased task difficulty would increase the magnitude of adults' congruency effects. Adults were presented with subtle facial and despite successfully increasing task difficulty the magnitude of the. congruency effect did not increase suggesting that the difference between children's and adults' congruency effects in Experiment l a cannot be explained by 8-year-olds finding the task difficult. In contrast, congruency effects were not found when the expressions displayed by the face and body were dissimilar (e.g., sad and happy, see Experiment 2). The results of the current set of studies are examined with respect to the Dimensional theory and the Emotional Seed model and the developmental timeline of children's sensitivity to facial expressions. A secondary aim of the series of studies was to examine one possible mechanism underlying congruency effe cts-holistic processing. To examine the influence of holistic processing, participants completed both aligned trials and misaligned trials in which the faces were detached from the body (designed to disrupt holistic processing). Based on the principles of holistic face processing we predicted that participants would benefit from misalignment of the face and body stimuli on incongruent trials but not on congruent trials. Collectively, our results provide some evidence that both adults and children may process emotional faces and bodies holistically. Consistent with the pattern of results for congruency effects, the magnitude of the effect of misalignment varied with the similarity between emotions. Future research is required to further investigate whether or not facial expressions and emotions conveyed by the body are perceived holistically.

Exploring Teacher Candidates’ Experience, Perception, and Knowledge of Multicultural Education in Two Ontario Universities

In this study, teacher candidates’ experiences, perceptions, and knowledge of multicultural education at 2 Ontario universities were used determine to the effectiveness of their teacher education programs in preparing them to teach in multicultural classrooms. The research also strived to highlight the most effective practices in these programs that contributed to the preparation of teacher candidates for employment in culturally, racially, and ethnically diverse classrooms in Ontario. A questionnaire and interviews were used to determine the effectiveness of the program in preparing them to teach in diverse classrooms. The findings revealed the need for a greater emphasis of multicultural education in teacher education programs at these universities. The data showed that teacher candidates were most critical of the courses and the delivery of the curriculum in relation to multicultural education. Teacher candidates were also concerned with the lack of multicultural education in their practicum placements. In addition, teacher candidates indicated in the questionnaire that they felt competent adapting instruction to the needs of students in multicultural classrooms. However, the results obtained from the interviews were more varied. The interviews highlighted that teacher candidates were hesitant about teaching in culturally diverse classrooms and less likely to state that they were prepared for these teaching environments. As well, many teacher candidates believed their peers were not prepared for multicultural issues. Teacher candidates believed the program could be improved in many ways including specific instruction across all classes, more diverse practicum experiences, guest speakers, case studies, and the creation of new courses that specifically address multicultural education.

Role Differences in the Perception of Injustice

The current dissertation examined role differences in the perception of injustice; specifically, differences in how victims and offenders respond to a situation that they both agree is unfair. Past research has demonstrated that role affects reactions to transgressions and injustice, including recall of transgressions, and attributions of blame and responsibility (e.g., Baumeister, Stillwell, & Wotman, 1990; Mikula, Athenstaedt, Heschgl, & Heimgartner, 1998). However, to date, little work has examined role differences in perceptions of why an event is perceived as unfair (i.e., how an injustice is framed) or how justice should be restored. These were the perceptions I focused on in the present thesis. I also examined potential concerns that may motivate victims' and offenders' justice reactions, as well as the potential interaction between role and relationship quality in predicting justice reactions. In Studies 1 and 2, several of the predicted role differences in concerns were found; however, these did not lead to the expected differences in framing and restoration. In Study 1, using a vignette methodology, I found differences primarily in how victims and offenders believed justice should be restored. Overall, the significant role effects showed an accommodating response pattern (e.g., offenders proposed punishment more than did victims and neutral observers, whereas victims recommended minimal compensation more than did offenders and neutral observers), inconsistent with previous research and my hypotheses. Study 2, which employed a sample of romantic couples, substantiated the accommodating pattern found in Study 1. Study 3, which sampled a broader range of relationships, also showed i \ examples of accommodating reactions. In addition, Study 3 provided some support for the hypothesized interaction between role and relationship quality, such that responses were more accommodating as relationship quality increased. For example, offenders more strongly endorsed methods of restoration such as offender apology and recognition of the relationship with increasing relationship quality. Overall, the results from this dissertation support the general notion that victims and offenders respond to injustice differently, and, in-line with previous research on other justice-related responses (e.g., Mikula et at, 1998), suggest that victims and offenders show an other-serving, accommodating tendency in justice reactions when relationship quality is high.

Exploring Gifted Adults' Perception of Giftedness in their Pursuit of Graduate Education

This qualitative study explores 8 gifted adults' perceptions of their own giftedness and how those perceptions influenced their pursuit of graduate education as revealed by retrospective interviews. This study serves to inform the existing literature surrounding giftedness especially as it relates to gifted individuals across the lifespan and their experiences and perceptions of education at all levels. This study also provides insight into the emotional impact being labeled gifted has on an individual's self-concept and academic identity. The major themes that emerged using the interpretive phenomenological analysis method (Smith & Osborn, 2003) were discussed under five main headings: Evolution of Giftedness, Success and Failure, Expectations, Effort, and Doubt and Proof. An adaptation of the listening guide method (Gilligan, Spencer, Weinberg, & Bertsch, 2003) was used to provide a unique and personal perspective of the phenomenon of giftedness and revealed the feelings behind the themes that emerged in the interpretive phenomenological analysis method. Specifically; this study illuminates the lack of evolution that an individual's understanding and perception of giftedness undergoes across the lifespan, and the impact such a static and school-bound understanding has on gifted adults' self-concept. It also reveals the influence that gifted individuals' innate need to achieve has on their academic aspirations and their perceptions of themselves as gifted. Furthermore, it reveals how important the understanding and internalization of failure can be on the self-concept of gifted individuals, and that this issue needs immediate attention at all levels of education.

Students’ Use and Perceptions of Social Networking Technologies: Connections to Reading, Reading Ability, and Self-Perception

Abstract This study was undertaken to examine traditional forms of literacy and the newest form of literacy: technology. Students who have trouble reading traditional forms of literacy tend to have lower self-esteem. This research intended to explore if students with reading difficulties and, therefore, lower self-esteem, could use Social Networking Technologies including text messaging, Facebook, email, blogging, MySpace, or Twitter to help improve their self-esteem, in a field where spelling mistakes and grammatical errors are commonplace, if not encouraged. A collective case study was undertaken based on surveys, individual interviews, and gathered documents from 3 students 9-13 years old. The data collected in this study were analyzed and interpreted using qualitative methods. These cases were individually examined for themes, which were then analyzed across the cases to examine points of convergence and divergence in the data. The research found that students with reading difficulties do not necessarily have poor self-esteem, as prior research has suggested (Carr, Borkowski, & Maxwell, 1991; Feiler, & Logan, 2007; Meece, Wigfield, & Eccles, 1990; Pintirch & DeGroot, 1990; Pintrich & Garcia, 1991). All of the participants who had reading difficulties, were found both through interviews and the CFSEI-3 self-esteem test (Battle, 2002) to have average self-esteem, although their parents all stated that their child felt poorly about their academic abilities. The research also found that using Social Networking Technologies helped improve the self-esteem of the majority of the participants both socially and academically.

The Effects of Body Posture on Emotion Perception: A Developmental and Theoretical Analysis

Previously, studies investigating emotional face perception - regardless of whether they involved adults or children - presented participants with static photos of faces in isolation. In the natural world, faces are rarely encountered in isolation. In the few studies that have presented faces in context, the perception of emotional facial expressions is altered when paired with an incongruent context. For both adults and 8- year-old children, reaction times increase and accuracy decreases when facial expressions are presented in an incongruent context depicting a similar emotion (e.g., sad face on a fear body) compared to when presented in a congruent context (e.g., sad face on a sad body; Meeren, van Heijnsbergen, & de Gelder, 2005; Mondloch, 2012). This effect is called a congruency effect and does not exist for dissimilar emotions (e.g., happy and sad; Mondloch, 2012). Two models characterize similarity between emotional expressions differently; the emotional seed model bases similarity on physical features, whereas the dimensional model bases similarity on underlying dimensions of valence an . arousal. Study 1 investigated the emergence of an adult-like pattern of congruency effects in pre-school aged children. Using a child-friendly sorting task, we identified the youngest age at which children could accurately sort isolated facial expressions and body postures and then measured whether an incongruent context disrupted the perception of emotional facial expressions. Six-year-old children showed congruency effects for sad/fear but 4-year-old children did not for sad/happy. This pattern of congruency effects is consistent with both models and indicates that an adult-like pattern exists at the youngest age children can reliably sort emotional expressions in isolation. In Study 2, we compared the two models to determine their predictive abilities. The two models make different predictions about the size of congruency effects for three emotions: sad, anger, and fear. The emotional seed model predicts larger congruency effects when sad is paired with either anger or fear compared to when anger and fear are paired with each other. The dimensional model predicts larger congruency effects when anger and fear are paired together compared to when either is paired with sad. In both a speeded and unspeeded task the results failed to support either model, but the pattern of results indicated fearful bodies have a special effect. Fearful bodies reduced accuracy, increased reaction times more than any other posture, and shifted the pattern of errors. To determine whether the results were specific to bodies, we ran the reverse task to determine if faces could disrupt the perception of body postures. This experiment did not produce congruency effects, meaning faces do not influence the perception of body postures. In the final experiment, participants performed a flanker task to determine whether the effect of fearful bodies was specific to faces or whether fearful bodies would also produce a larger effect in an unrelated task in which faces were absent. Reaction times did not differ across trials, meaning fearful bodies' large effect is specific to situations with faces. Collectively, these studies provide novel insights, both developmentally and theoretically, into how emotional faces are perceived in context.

Factors Contributing to Reading Performance: An In-Depth Analysis of the “Boy Crisis”

This research used a quantitative study approach to investigate the “boy crisis” in Canada. Boy crisis advocates suggest that boys are being surpassed by girls on reading assessments and promote strategies to assist male students. A feminist framework was used in this study that allowed for an investigation and discussion of the factors that mediate between gender and success at reading comprehension, interpretation, and response to text without ignoring female students. Reading scores and questionnaire data compiled by the Pan-Canadian Assessment Program were used in this research, specifically the PCAP-13 2007 assessment of approximately 30,000 13-year-old students from all Canadian provinces and Yukon Territory (CMEC, 2008). Approximately 20,000 participants wrote the reading assessment, while 30,000 students completed the questionnaire responses. Predictor variables were tested using parametric tests such as independent samples t-test, one-way ANOVA, chi-square analysis, and Pearson r. Findings from this study indicate that although boys scored lower than girls on the PCAP-13 2007 reading assessment, factors were found to influence the reading scores of both male and female students to varying degrees. Socioeconomic status, perceptions of the reading material used in language arts classrooms, reading preference, reading interest, parental involvement, parental encouragement for reading, and self-efficacy were all found to affect the reading performance of boys and girls. Relationships between variables were also found and are discussed in this research. The analysis presented in this study allows parents, educators, and policy makers to begin to critically examine and re-evaluate boy crisis literature and offers suggestions on how to improve reading performance for all students of all socioeconomic backgrounds.

Exploring Teacher Candidates’ Perception of Practicum Placement Within Concurrent Teacher Education in Two Ontario Universities

In this study, teacher candidates’ perception of their concurrent education program at two Ontario universities were examined, with specific emphasis on how the programs utilized practicum placements, to determine the effectiveness in preparing teacher candidates to teach. This research also strived to uncover the best ways to optimize concurrent teacher education through practicum placements. A questionnaire and interviews were used to uncover teacher candidates’ perceptions at one teacher education program that used full integration of practicum and one that used minimal integration of practicum. The findings revealed that teacher candidates were generally more satisfied with the overall program when there was full integration of practicum. There were statistically significant differences found between the two concurrent programs with regard to practicum time and preparedness and context of the practicum and a highly significant difference found for theory-practice divide. There was also a statistically significant difference (p < .05) observed between the teacher candidates at each university in terms of their beliefs about the need for improvement of their program. Some of the improvements that participants believed could be made to their respective programs included having (a) exceptional mentor teachers and teacher educators, (b) longer placements with a balance of observation and practicum teaching, (c) clear expectations and evaluations of practicum placement, and (d) more distinct connections between theory and practice made within the programs.

A Mind of its Own: The Lived Experience of Adult Students who are ADHD

Despite the growing trend towards recognizing that attention deficit hyperactive disorder occurs beyond childhood, the experience of adult students who are ADHD remains little researched or understood. Given the losses in efficiency and productivity in academic performance from adult ADHD, researching ADHD’s experiential aspects is significant for both educators and students in its potential to develop better strategies for accommodating those with the disorder. This study used hermeneutic phenomenology and existential psychology to describe the lived experience of adult students who are ADHD. Five adult students participated in the study, which involved two in-depth conversations with guiding questions such as: What is it like to be ADHD?; and What led to your perception that you have ADHD? Conversations were transcribed and thematic statements developed, using the life-world existentials of lived space, lived time, lived relationships and lived corporeality to deepen considerations of meaning.

Own the Podium Funding and Support: The Athletes' Perspective

The purpose of this study was to understand the experiences of Canada’s high performance athletes who have benefitted from Own the Podium (OTP)-recommended funding and support leading up to an Olympic or Paralympic Games. OTP, a nonprofit agency, is responsible for determining the overall investment strategy for high performance sport in Canada through recommendations to support national sport organizations (NSOs) with the aim to improve Canadian performances at the Olympic and Paralympic Games. For this study, data were collected through in-depth interviews with eleven Canadian high performance athletes (i.e., single-sport Summer/Winter Olympians and Paralympians and recently retired athletes). Analysis of the data resulted in twelve overarching themes; resources, pressure, missing gap, results, targeting, stress, expectations, boost in confidence, OTP relationship, OTP name, pre/post OTP, and lost funding. Overall, results from this exploratory research indicate that athletes generally had a favourable perception regarding OTP-recommended funding and support.