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For plant identification in school biology, many digital and analogue identification methods have been developed to make this demanding and little motivating process more student-orientated. In this experimental field study, we examine two empirically developed tools: the digital identification app "ID-Logics' and the paper-based key, generated by the online platform 'Eikes Baumschule'. In line with Self-Determination Theory (SDT), an evaluation study with 251 students was conducted to investigate the effect of both tools on students' intrinsic motivation. The results of the study were unexpected, as the different media regarding the SDT did not present themselves as projected: While both tools influence students' intrinsic motivation positively, each displays specific effects regarding enjoyment, perceived competence, and perceived autonomy. Taking these effects into account, each tool under investigation offers different advantages and disadvantages for plant identification in the field. The resulting opportunities and challenges, for plant identification, of both tools are discussed critically against the background of SDT, and future directions for research on intrinsic motivation in the context of species identification are mapped. Furthermore, this study shed light on the process of species identification and thus indicates recommendations for practical use in biology lessons.

Student success and drop-out predictions have gained increased attention in recent years, connected to the hope that by identifying struggling students, it is possible to intervene and provide early help and design programs based on patterns discovered by the models. Though by now many models exist achieving remarkable accuracy-values, models outputting simple probabilities are not enough to achieve these ambitious goals. In this paper, we argue that they can be a first exploratory step of a pipeline aiming to be capable of reaching the mentioned goals. By using Explainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI) methods, such as SHAP and LIME, we can understand what features matter for the model and make the assumption that features important for successful models are also important in real life. By then additionally connecting this with an analysis of counterfactuals and a theory-driven causal analysis, we can begin to reasonably understand not just "if" a student will struggle but "why" and provide fitting help. We evaluate the pipeline on an artificial dataset to show that it can, indeed, recover complex causal mechanisms and on a real-life dataset showing the method's applicability. We further argue that collaborations with social scientists are mutually beneficial in this area but also discuss the potential negative effects of personal intervention systems and call for careful designs.

When meeting someone at zero acquaintance, we make assumptions about each other that encompass emotional states, personality traits, and even cognitive abilities. Evidence suggests individuals can accurately detect psychopathic personality traits in strangers based on short video clips or photographs of faces. We present an in-depth examination of this ability. In two studies, we investigated whether high psychopathy traits are perceivable and whether other traits affect ratings of psychopathic traits in the sense of a halo effect. On the perceiver's end, we additionally examined how cognitive abilities and personality traits of the responders affect these ratings. In two studies (n[subscript 1] = 170 community adults from the USA, n[subscript 2] = 126 students from Australia), participants rated several targets on several characteristics of psychopathy, as well as on attractiveness, masculinity, sympathy, trustworthiness, neuroticism, intelligence, and extraversion. Results show that responders were generally able to detect psychopathy. Responders generally came to a consensus in their ratings, and using profile similarity metrics, we found a weak relation between ratings of psychopathy and the targets' psychopathy level as determined by the Psychopathy Checklist: Short Version. Trait ratings, though, were influenced by the ratings of other traits like attractiveness. Finally, we found accuracy in the perception of psychopathy was positively related to fluid intelligence but unrelated to emotion perception ability.

Ratings of perceptual experience on a trial-by-trial basis are increasingly used in masked priming studies to assess prime awareness. It is argued that such subjective ratings more adequately capture the content of phenomenal consciousness compared to the standard objective psychophysical measures obtained in a session after the priming experiment. However, the concurrent implementation of the ratings within the priming experiment might alter magnitude and processes underlying semantic priming, because participants try to identify the masked prime. In the present study, we therefore compared masked semantic priming effects assessed within the classical sequential procedure, in which prime identification is psychophysically assessed after the priming experiment, with those obtained in a condition, in which prime awareness is rated within the priming experiment. Two groups of participants performed a lexical decision task (LDT) on targets preceded by masked primes of 20, 40, or 60 ms durations, to induce the variability of prime awareness. One group additionally rated prime visibility trials-wise using the Perceptual Awareness Scale (PAS), whereas the other group only performed the LDT. Analysis of reaction times (RTs) as well as drift diffusion modeling revealed general priming effects on RT and drift rate only in the PAS-absent group. In the PAS-present group, residual priming effects on RT and the non-decisional component t0 were obtained for trials with rated prime awareness. This shows that assessing subjective perceptual experience on a trial-by-trial basis heavily interferes with semantic processes underlying masked priming, presumably due to attentional demands associated with concurrent prime identification.

We designed a video-based intervention to prepare preservice teachers to deal with classroom disruptions. Using tandem cases, we produced staged videos showing a functional scenario, in which a teacher deals effectively with disruptive behaviour, and a dysfunctional scenario, in which a teacher's behaviour leads to the escalation and spread of the disruption. We addressed two research questions. The first was whether video-based learning arrangements helped preservice teachers to develop three facets of professional vision: noticing critical incidents leading to disruptions, theoretical reflection on these incidents, and the development of appropriate strategies to deal with disruptions. The second was whether functional and dysfunctional video scenarios had different effects on knowledge acquisition, self-efficacy, noticing, reasoning, and the generation of strategies. We used a video test, a multiple-choice test, and a self-efficacy questionnaire to measure the effects in a pre-post design. Our findings show that both groups benefit from the video-based learning arrangements. Differential effects were only found for knowledge acquisition and (not significant) for reasoning.

Educational videos are becoming increasingly important for schools. More and more often, students consume videos on YouTube in order to carry out school tasks. At the same time, the digital world is increasingly influencing perceptions of history. The internet contains numerous examples of how history is instrumentalized. Counterfeiting and manipulation distort historical information and abuse it for political purposes. This article presents the results of a research project on history teaching in a seventh grade (age 12-14) class in Germany. The study's aim was to find out if creating one's own videos using the method of digital storytelling generally leads to a more critical evaluation of educational videos. Students produced short videos on the subject of 'European expansion in the early modern period'. One group was secretly commissioned to portray the Europeans as superior to the indigenous societies of America, thus creating a manipulative video. At the end of the lesson, the students rated the credibility of the videos. In addition, interviews with students were conducted. The aim was to investigate whether students trained in digital storytelling could easily identify biased information. The data were analysed using qualitative text analysis. Findings show that students primarily judge videos based on aesthetic features, rarely adopting a media-critical perspective.

Careless responding is a bias in survey responses that disregards the actual item content, constituting a threat to the factor structure, reliability, and validity of psychological measurements. Different approaches have been proposed to detect aberrant responses such as probing questions that directly assess test-taking behavior (e.g., bogus items), auxiliary or paradata (e.g., response times), or data-driven statistical techniques (e.g., Mahalanobis distance). In the present study, gradient boosted trees, a state-of-the-art machine learning technique, are introduced to identify careless respondents. The performance of the approach was compared with established techniques previously described in the literature (e.g., statistical outlier methods, consistency analyses, and response pattern functions) using simulated data and empirical data from a web-based study, in which diligent versus careless response behavior was experimentally induced. In the simulation study, gradient boosting machines outperformed traditional detection mechanisms in flagging aberrant responses. However, this advantage did not transfer to the empirical study. In terms of precision, the results of both traditional and the novel detection mechanisms were unsatisfactory, although the latter incorporated response times as additional information. The comparison between the results of the simulation and the online study showed that responses in real-world settings seem to be much more erratic than can be expected from the simulation studies. We critically discuss the generalizability of currently available detection methods and provide an outlook on future research on the detection of aberrant response patterns in survey research.

Teaching simulations such as scriptwriting tasks offer a novel way to support pre-service teachers in gaining diagnostic competencies and in guiding students to work through difficulties. We first report on the theory-driven development of a scriptwriting task, specifically the theoretically-founded language- and accompanying content-related challenges concerning fraction multiplication and division that were embedded in the task. In a validation study, nine experts in mathematics education and/or academic language development participated in an expert rating of the scriptwriting task, assessing the intended embedded student difficulties. As a further means of examining content validity, a second study was conducted in which 32 completed dialogues from the scriptwriting tasks from pre-service primary mathematics teachers were compared to the results of the expert rating. Findings of the validation study highlighted that the experts recognised the intended embedded content. Correspondingly, the results of the second study revealed that the pre-service teachers also identified the intended content.

The stressors of teaching can be individual and hard to identify. Merely recalling stressful events after a lesson can be biased by neglect, modification, or extenuation of memories. Therefore, the present study explores how video data can be used to reactivate or relive stressor memory. Eight teachers' lessons were recorded while their stress was assessed through electrodermal activity (EDA). Teachers then watched their recorded lessons retrospectively while EDA was measured once more but they were additionally asked to use a joystick to indicate when they recalled being stressed during their lesson. Results show that teachers in the watching condition did not re-experience or recall the same situations as stressful as in the teaching condition. They indicate that video feedback can be used as a tool for coping with stressful teaching events only if teachers are also provided with information about their actual stress level during teaching. The implications of these results are discussed.

Previous studies mostly examined the role of orthographic knowledge in basic reading processing (i.e., word-reading), however, regarding higher reading processing (i.e., sentence- and text-comprehension), mixed results were reported. In addition, previous research in transparent languages, such as German, focused mostly on typically skilled readers. The aim of this study was to examine the role of orthographic knowledge in basic reading processing (word-reading) as well as in higher reading processing (sentence- and text-comprehension), in addition to phonological awareness and naming speed in a sample of German elementary school poor readers. For this purpose, data from 103 German third-graders with poor reading proficiency were analyzed via multiple linear regression analysis. Analyses revealed that orthographic knowledge contributes to reading at word- and sentence-level, but not at text-level in German third-graders with poor reading proficiency, over and above phonological awareness and naming speed. These findings support that orthographic knowledge should be considered as a relevant reading related predictor. Therefore, it would be reasonable to include the assessment of orthographic knowledge skills in diagnostic procedures to identify children at risk to develop reading difficulties, besides phonological awareness and naming speed.

Identifying illicit behavior in survey research is inherently problematic, since self-reports are untrustworthy. We argue that fraudulent interviewers can, however, be identified through statistical deviance of the distributional parameters of their interviews. We document that a high proportion of the variation in the data is due to the interviewer. In addition, we show that the incidence of interviewer-induced anomalies is strongly associated with the perceived level of corruption across the countries participating in the European Social Survey 2010. The major implication of the findings is that the data from some countries cannot be used fruitfully for cross-national comparative research.

This study investigates how well prepared student teachers are to implement species identification in school. Data were collected with the help of a questionnaire and a PowerPoint presentation in which local plant and animal species were presented. Participants (n = 357) correctly identified, on average, 23% of the plants and 44% of the animals. They identified plants mainly by flower characteristics and leaves, and animals mainly by shape and colour. Family and school were key sources of participants' knowledge of species. The self-estimated competence of participants to identify species was positively correlated with their taxonomic knowledge and the amount of time they had spent on species identification during their own schooldays. The number of correctly identified plant and animal species increased with interest in identifying species and participation in species identification courses. Participants considered learner-centred education and experience-based learning, and the use of living organisms to be most important when identifying species in school.

Vertebrate species knowledge, a key factor for conserving biodiversity, is a compulsory part of school curricula. This study evaluated the vertebrate species knowledge of sixth-grade German grammar school pupils (aged 11-13) to investigate the influence of socio-demographic factors (gender, size of hometown, mother tongue), personal expectations (favourite school subject, performance in biology, expected test results) and possibilities to do nature observations (favourite playing area, number of excursions to nature) on identification skills. In addition, the study examined whether schoolchildren's taxonomic knowledge changed over the years. In a species identification test, participants (N = 984) scored an average of 14.18 ± 3.82 out of 25 points. The results showed that their species knowledge was significantly influenced by their personal expectations on test performance, the school, favourite playing area, mother tongue and gender. Hometown size, the number of excursions to nature, favourite school subject and performance in biology did not significantly affect children's species knowledge. Mammals had the highest identification rates, whereas birds and reptiles were rather unknown. These results were compared with a similar dataset in 2006 indicating a 15% loss in pupils' species knowledge within the last decade. A change in the curriculum as a reason for this decline in taxonomic knowledge is discussed.

The construct of career adaptability has recently gained importance in research on vocational development and has led to a variety of theoretical and empirical approaches. Alongside with vocational identity it has been theorised as the crucial meta-competency of modern career construction. Due to its roots in adolescent career development, career adaptability is not limited to the vocational adjustments of working adults, but is also highly relevant for the pre-occupational orientation processes of adolescents initially developing a vocational identity. Despite the recent increase in empirical research on career adaptability, the field of vocational education has been largely neglected so far. Therefore, a quantitative survey among nearly N = 400 commercial apprentices within the German dual system of VET has been conducted. This study focuses on the replication of the Career Adapt-Abilities Scale (CAAS) among commercial apprentices within the German dual system, and its discrimination against alternative operationalisations of career adaptability. Furthermore, the relationship between career adaptability and vocational identity (operationalised as occupational and organisational identification) was explored. Results showed that the four-dimensional structure of career adaptability covered by the CAAS could be largely replicated in the dual system. In addition, it was found that the CAAS can in part be separated from alternative operationalisations. Finally, the results confirmed career adaptability positively predicts both foci of identification in a cognitive and affective manner. This indicates that career adaptability can be seen as a beneficial factor for vocational education and training as it fosters the vocational ties of apprentices in terms of their identity.

The evaluative conditioning (EC) phenomenon is central to the study of preference acquisition and attitude formation. Early studies have reported EC in the absence of awareness, but more recent work has questioned this conclusion. In previous work, using briefly presented and pattern-masked conditioned stimuli (CSs), we found that above-chance forced-choice identification of CSs is necessary for EC. Here we extend this work by addressing more directly the inherently subjective issue of consciousness. In 2 studies, we assessed whether above-threshold perceptual awareness of CSs is necessary for EC. Contrasting unconscious learning claims, EC was absent under low and intermediate levels of perceptual awareness. Additional findings suggest that the perceptual awareness task does not interfere with EC, and that it is more sensitive than memory-based awareness proxies. We also found that a confounded variant of the forced-choice identification task can artifactually induce EC; and that an unconfounded version of the task does not induce nor interfere with EC. We discuss limitations of the present studies as well as their relevance for the debate about the automaticity of evaluative learning.

It has been suggested that due to functional similarity, sortal object individuation might be a primordial form of psychological essentialism. For example, the relative independence of identity judgment from perceived surface features is a characteristic of essentialist reasoning. Also, infants engaging in sortal object individuation pay more attention to kind than surface feature information when judging the identity of objects (e.g.). Indeed, previous research found that 14-month-old infants can judge trans-temporal identity even in complete absence of kind-specific surface features. Here, we used another more demanding non-linguistic paradigm to test the limits of these abilities in 14-, 18-, 23- and 36-month-old infants, comparing their performance to recent great ape data. Particularly, we presented infants with two food kinds, whose surface features were then fully transformed to make them look identical. If reasoning according to essentialist principles, participants should select the preferred item despite superficial manipulations. However, only 36-month-olds reliably tracked the preferred item after superficial manipulations. This suggests that, although basic psychological essentialism may emerge early in infancy, more complex forms require domain-general cognitive prerequisites, which only develop in more protracted form.

Language-specific differences in number words influence number processing even in nonverbal numerical tasks. For instance, the unit-decade compatibility effect in two-digit number magnitude comparison (compatible number pairs [42_57: 4 < 5 and 2 < 7] are responded to faster than incompatible pairs [47_62: 4 < 6 but 7 > 2]) was shown to be influenced by the inversion of number words (e.g., in German the number word for 42 is "zweiundvierzig" [literally: "two-and-forty"]). In two studies, we used articulatory suppression to investigate whether previously observed cross-linguistic differences in two-digit number processing are indeed driven by differences in number word formation. In a two-digit number comparison task, German- and English-speaking participants had to identify the larger of two numbers presented in Arabic digits. In Study 1, participants performed the same task twice, with and without articulatory suppression. In Study 2, the percentage of within-decade filler items (36_39) was manipulated additionally. As expected, in both studies between-groups differences in the compatibility effect disappeared under articulatory suppression irrespective of the percentage of fillers included. Furthermore, paralleling results of previous studies including 33% or less filler items, we found that the compatibility effect was larger in German compared with English speakers in the 20% filler condition. However, this pattern was reversed in the 50% filler condition in both studies. Thus, results provide first direct evidence for influences of verbal number word formation on symbolic number processing. Moreover, these new findings suggest that linguistic influences and those of cognitive control processes associated with characteristics of the stimulus set interact in symbolic number processing.

The article is devoted to the analysis of the peculiarities of organizing and conducting trainings in the system of professional training of personnel of the Federal Police of Germany (BPOL). The main focus is on the organization of training on the use of weapons, coercive means, situational training. It has been found out that during the exercises of firing proficiency not only the skills of marksmanship are worked out, but also various complex situational trainings are carried out, which reflect the situations of daily activities of the police and require them to take appropriate action (the correct contention resolution in terms of tactics of action and the lawfulness and decision making on the use or non-use of weapons). As a result of the use of general scientific methods for the analysis, synthesis and generalization of information of directive/documents, orders, scientific and didactic sources as well as studying and generalizing the pedagogical experience of organizing trainings for BPOL personnel, it was found that in the development of situational trainings and training on the use of weapons, coercive means and own security, the trainers of BPOL were guided by both traditional "linear" and "nonlinear" pedagogical principles for organization of training exercises. On the basis of the generalization of the research results, it has been established that the situations that are developed for such trainings are constantly updated and correspond to the realities of time. At the heart of all scenarios, there are nine standard police cases: police communication, personal identification, detention, search of persons, transportation of detainees, vehicle control, first medical aid, collection of materials for identification and its entry into the database, search of premises and belongings. While assessing the actions of a policeman in solving a situation, the trainers take into account: communication skills (both with the partner and with the "opponent"), tactics of action, compliance with the requirements of self-defense, the correct use of coercive means, the lawfulness of all measures taken, the provision of first medical care, achievement of a goal (solution of a situation).

We investigated the ability to detect a face among other visual objects in a complex visual array in 3-, 4-, and 5-year-old children, as well as in adults. To this end, we used a visual search paradigm implemented on a touch-tablet device. Subjects (N = 100) saw up to eighty 3 × 3 visual search arrays and had to find and tap upon a target--a face or a car--among eight objects that served as distractors. Our data revealed a relative face detection advantage, which did not differ in its extent between children and adults. This suggests that, beginning in young childhood and ending in adulthood, face detection performance advances as a consequence of other cognitive functions such as a general advance in visual search performance. Our study closes a gap in the knowledge about the development of face detection--as a prototype for social stimuli and their capacity to attract attention--from early to middle childhood.

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 terrorists. To date there is only a small body of empirical research comparing these two forms of targeted violence in depth. In order to fill this gap, this article presents findings from a qualitative analysis of prosecution files comparing the developmental pathways of German school attackers (N = 7; age range: 13 to 23) and Jihadi attackers (N = 7; age range: 21 to 28 years) who committed their attacks between 2000 and 2013. Using theoretical coding and constant case comparison, the contribution shows that the two phenomena have overlaps in which developmental processes and social mechanisms are similar. Both school attackers and Jihadi attackers frame their act of violence using cultural scripts and perform the attack on a public stage where victims are attacked not on the basis of personal conflicts but because of their symbolic meaning. Taking into account the similarities in the perpetrators' developmental pathways, the authors propose that it might be more fruitful from an operational perspective to discuss severe target school violence and terrorist attacks under a common concept of demonstrative violence than to artificially assign them to exclusive classes of violence.

Background: The detection of specific language impairment (SLI) in children growing up bilingually presents particular challenges for clinicians. Non-word repetition (NWR) and sentence repetition (SR) tasks have proven to be the most accurate diagnostic tools for monolingual populations, raising the question of the extent of their usefulness in different bilingual populations. Aims: To determine the diagnostic accuracy of NWR and SR tasks that incorporate phonological/syntactic complexity as discussed in recent linguistic theory. The tasks were developed as part of the Language Impairment Testing in Multilingual Settings (LITMUS) toolkit, in two different national settings, France and Germany, and investigated children with three different home languages: Arabic, Portuguese and Turkish. Methods & Procedures: NWR and SR tasks developed in parallel were administered to 151 bilingual children, aged 5;6-8;11, in France and in Germany, to 64 children in speech-language therapy (SLT) and to 87 children not in SLT, whose first language (L1) was Arabic, Portuguese or Turkish. Children were also administered standardized language tests in each of their languages to determine likely clinical status (typical development (TD) or SLI), and parents responded to a questionnaire including questions about early and current language use (bilingualism factors) and early language development (risk factors for SLI). Monolingual controls included 47 TD children and 29 children with SLI. Results were subjected to inter-group comparisons, to diagnostic accuracy calculation, and to correlation and multiple regression analyses. Outcomes & Results: In accordance with previous studies, NWR and SR identified SLI in the monolingual children, yielding good to excellent diagnostic accuracy. Diagnostic accuracy in bilingual children was fair to good, generally distinguishing children likely to have SLI from children likely to have TD. Accuracy was necessarily linked to the determination of clinical status, which was based on standardized assessment in each of the child's languages. Positive early development, a composite risk factor for SLI, and not variables related to language exposure and use, generally emerged as the strongest predictor of performance on the two tasks, constituting additional, independent support for the efficacy of NWR and SR in identifying impairment in bilingual children. Conclusions & Implications: NWR and SR tasks informed by linguistic theory are appropriate for use as part of the diagnostic process for identifying language impairment in bilingual children for whom the language of assessment is different from the home language, in diverse sociolinguistic contexts.

Reading comprehension is based on the efficient accomplishment of several cognitive processes at the word, sentence, and text level. To the extent that each of these processes contributes to reading comprehension, it can cause reading difficulties if it is deficient. To identify individual sources of reading difficulties, tools are required that allow for a reliable and valid assessment of individual differences in specific cognitive processes of reading comprehension. The present study shows the usefulness of this process-oriented approach to assessing reading comprehension skills by using the example of a test for assessing syntactic skills in German primary schoolchildren. The test comprises a grammaticality judgment task that contains items with carefully varied features that are known to facilitate or impede syntactic processes. By means of explanatory item response models, we demonstrate that empirical item difficulties vary as a function of experimentally varied item features, indicating that the test indeed assesses syntactic skills. Moreover, the test measures individual differences in syntactic skills across the whole range of skill levels and is sensitive to developmental changes. We conclude that the test is a valid tool to assess individual differences and to detect deficits in this component process of reading comprehension.

Background: This study investigated the application of a newly developed neuropsychological assessment, the Wolfenbütteler Dementia Test for Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities (WDTIM) in combination with the Dementia Screening Questionnaire for Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities (DSQIID). Methods: The instruments were evaluated in a prospective 2-year follow-up study. A total of 102 people with an intellectual disability were assessed at 6-month intervals. Data were analysed using qualitative and statistical analyses. Results: Four groups of individuals emerged from the analysis: (1) confirmed suspicion, (2) no suspicion, (3) questionable suspicion and (4) early suspicion. Significant differences were found between groups 1 and 2. The WDTIM could be administered to 90%-100% of all participants exhibiting mild-to-moderate intellectual disability and to 50% with severe intellectual disability. Conclusions: The WDTIM was shown to have good applicability to people with mild-to-moderate intellectual disability and to be appropriate for detecting cognitive changes. Using the two instruments in combination achieved greater accuracy in reinforcing a dementia suspicion than did using the DSQIID alone.

Background: Adolescent depression has been recognized as a complex problem that presents a global public health challenge. Left undetected and untreated, depression can significantly reduce quality of life. Objective: The main purpose of this paper is to re-visit risk and protective factors for depression in adolescents with a specific focus on exploring the individual, familial, and social contexts of depression (especially high and very high depression levels) in a multi-country sample of youth in order to see if these factors are mitigated by cultural location. Methods: Questionnaire data from a cross-sectional study of a randomly selected sample of 5149 middle-school students from four EU-countries (Austria, Germany, Slovenia, and Spain) was used. Applying variance analysis, we examined the prediction strength for the observed risk and protective factors. Results: In all participating countries we show that in for both male and female adolescents, depression is linked to a broad range of interactive individual, and social protective and risk factors, such that even if the contribution of a single factor is low but still significant and this factor's prediction strength is low or moderate, taken together, the cumulative prediction strength of these factors yields a remarkably similar coefficient of determination of 42-49% in all samples. Conclusions: We have established a significant and relevant combination of the individual and social multifactorial risk and protective factors that characterize depression in adolescents of both genders, no matter their country of location and with that, we call for a multifaceted and comprehensive approach to mental health assessment, prevention and intervention.

Writing essays and receiving feedback can be useful for fostering students' learning and motivation. When faced with large class sizes, it is desirable to identify students who might particularly benefit from feedback. In this article, we tested the potential of Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) for identifying poor essays. A total of 14 teaching assistants evaluated a sample of N = 60 German essays. Using the human graders' evaluations as the standard of comparison, more of the poor essays were correctly identified by LSA than by random sampling (i.e., selecting essays by chance). By contrast, selection by text length did not perform better than random sampling. When three different teaching assistants evaluated another sample of N = 94 essays, the results largely replicated those found in the first sample. We conclude that LSA can help university teachers to identify poorly performing students. Additional analyses were computed to investigate the potential of combining the methods in different ways.

Early identification of primary language delay is crucial to implement effective prevention programs. Available screening instruments are based on parents' reports and have only insufficient predictive validity. This study employed observational measures of preverbal infants' gestural communication to test its predictive validity for identifying later language delays. Pointing behavior of fifty-nine 12-month-old infants was analyzed and related to their language skills 1 year later. Results confirm predictive validity of preverbal communication for language skills with the hand shape of pointing being superior compared to the underlying motives for pointing (imperative vs. declarative). Twelve-month-olds who pointed only with their open hand but never with their index finger were at risk for primary language delay at 2 years of age.

One of the few recurring characteristics in school shooters' stories is their expression of existential concerns. Many discuss their hatred of the world and existential loneliness in their manifestos, suicide letters, or social media updates. These expressions--called leaking--are made during the planning period preceding their deed. They are not only important in terms of prevention, but also help us understand the intrinsic meanings in this seemingly irrational and psychopathological behavior. This study offers a content analysis of the existential issues in personal expressions of school shooters prior to their deeds in order to shed more light on their motives.

The standardized, indicated school-based prevention program "Networks Against School Shootings" combines a threat assessment approach with a general model of prevention of emergency situations in schools through early intervention in student psychosocial crises and training teachers to recognize warning signs of targeted school violence. An evaluation study in 98 German schools with 3,473 school staff participants (M[subscript age] = 46.2 years) used a quasi-experimental comparison group design with three measurement points (pre, post, and 7 months followup) with schools randomly allocated to implementation conditions. The study found increases in teachers' expertise and evaluation skills, enhanced abilities to identify students experiencing a psychosocial crisis, and positive secondary effects (e.g., teacher-student interaction, feelings of safety).

This paper contains a collaborative video-based approach to foster prospective teachers' diagnostic skills with respect to pupils' L2 reading processes. Together with a peer, the prospective teachers watched, systematically selected, analysed and commented on clips from a comprehensive video corpus on L2 reading strategies. In order to assist the prospective teachers in this demanding process, a "Standardised Clip Protocol" (SCP) was developed and tutorial support was provided. The SCPs were subjected to various empirical procedures. Quantitatively, the frequency of all learning challenges mentioned by the prospective teachers was counted. Qualitatively, the nature of the diverse reading challenges identified by the prospective teachers was investigated. In that respect, a focus was put on the prospective teachers' diagnostic findings regarding pupils' lexical and conceptual awareness. The results indicate that the skills to notice and diagnose L2 learners' lexical and conceptual reading challenges form an essential part of "Teacher Language Awareness" (TLA) and should be integrated into teacher education programmes.

Socialization has become a common discourse to view doctoral students' development in long-term academic training. Using this concept and the four-stage model by Stein and Weidman, the research examines the academic socialization of 53 Chinese doctoral students in Germany selected from 8 universities across 7 federal states. A combination of quantitative and qualitative methods has been applied. Findings show that the academic socialization takes place in three aspects of students' life, namely the identification of their doctoral status, the interaction with supervisor and their motivation of doing research. Based on that, the clearness of identification, effectiveness of interaction and steadiness of motivation are displayed as necessary conditions for a comparatively high level of academic socialization in German academic field.

The reliance on self-reports in detecting noncredible symptom report of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in adulthood (aADHD) has been questioned due to findings showing that symptoms can easily be feigned on self-report scales. In response, Suhr and colleagues developed an infrequency index for the Conners' Adult ADHD Rating Scale (CII) and provided initial validation for its utility in detecting noncredible symptom report. The aim of this study was to evaluate the utility of the CII in detecting noncredible aADHD symptom report by using a simulation design. Data did not support the validity of the CII for the detection of noncredible aADHD symptoms, as it failed to differentiate instructed malingerers from genuine patients with sufficient accuracy. It is concluded that there is a need for infrequency scales composed of items that were specifically developed to be endorsed infrequently and embedded within valid self-report scales.

In emotion regulation research, it is common to distinguish adaptive from maladaptive emotion regulation strategies. However, little is known about their interactional impact (compensational or interfering effects) on adolescents' adjustment. We collected longitudinal, multiple informant questionnaire data from N = 608 adolescents and their parents to examine the prevalence of adolescents' anger regulation profiles using latent profile analysis. We identified five anger regulation profiles--an "adaptive," a "maladaptive," a "low," a "medium," and an "undefined" profile. The first three profiles could be replicated 1 year later, as could one additional "multiple" and another "undefined profile." Findings supported the assumption that adaptive strategies compensate for the negative impact of maladaptive strategies, yielding negative psychosocial consequences, particularly for the maladaptive profiles. Moreover, different profiles were divergently related to adolescents' internalizing and externalizing problems concurrently and over time. Results highlight the importance of considering both adaptive and maladaptive anger regulation strategies in prevention and psychotherapy.

The perceptual fluency hypothesis claims that items that are easy to perceive at encoding induce an illusion that they will be easier to remember, despite the finding that perception does not generally affect recall. The current set of studies tested the predictions of the perceptual fluency hypothesis with a picture generation manipulation. Participants identified mixed lists of intact images and images whose certain parts were deleted (generate condition) and made predictions about their subsequent memory performance, followed by a recall test. The intact condition always produced higher memory predictions and shorter identification latencies than the generate condition, consistent with the perceptual fluency hypothesis (Experiments 1 to 3). The actual memory performance for generate images was higher than intact images when aggregate judgments of learning (JOLs) were used (Experiment 1) and equivalent to intact images when item-by-item JOLs were used (Experiment 2 to 3). In Experiment 3, introducing a manipulation that facilitates naming latency for generate images did not increase JOL ratings, providing evidence that not all manipulations that facilitate the ease of perception produce higher JOLs. In Experiment 4, the role of a priori beliefs for the picture generation manipulation was assessed through an online questionnaire. Reading a scenario about the manipulation produced no JOL differences for intact and generate images. The results of the 4 experiments reported here are generally consistent with the perceptual fluency hypothesis of metamemory, and are discussed in terms of experience-based and theory-based processes in metamemory judgments and Koriat's (1997) cue utilization framework.

Background: In this study, we evaluated the feasibility of using the German-language version of a recently developed screening tool for dementia for persons with intellectual disability (ID): the National Task Group -- Early Detection Screen for Dementia (NTG-EDSD). Method: Some 221 paid carers of ageing persons with ID were asked to use the NTG-EDSD and report back on its utility and on 4 feasibility dimensions, and to provide detailed feedback on aspects deemed critical or missing. Results: All feasibility dimensions were rated good to very good, and 80% of respondents found the NTG-EDSD useful or very useful for the early detection of dementia. This highlights a high acceptability of this instrument by the main target group. Conclusions: The positive feasibility evaluation of the NTG-EDSD indicates the usability and adequacy of this instrument for application of early detection of dementia in persons with ID.

Plagiarism continues to dominate the academic world as one of its greatest challenges, and the existing literature suggests cross-cultural investigation of this critical issue may help all shareholders who detect, are confronted by and struggle with this issue to address it. Therefore, the present study, drawing upon a cross-cultural investigation using a questionnaire, aimed to investigate the differences between three groups of students, namely, Turkish (n = 106), Georgian (n = 83) and German (n = 72) regarding their tendency to conduct academic theft. It also investigated ways in which to plagiarise and reasons for and awareness of this issue. The results show that lack of time, busy schedules and weak academic writing skills are the most frequent reasons for plagiarism. However, in contrast to previous studies, the role of the Internet was found to be minimal in relation to increasing plagiarism. It is also worth noting that the German participants were found to have a higher level of sensitivity to this academic malpractice and were seen to be much more successful at identifying it. The article concludes with workable suggestions on how to discourage academic theft at universities.

Identity formation is particularly challenging for stigmatized minorities. The minority stress model (MSM) posits that both negative stereotypes and their internalization represent stressors. There is evidence that this applies to the gifted, too. However, their status is ambiguous, given that both negative and positive stereotypes exist. Furthermore, individual wellbeing also hinges on one's identity stage, as outlined in the Cass identity model (CIM). The CIM was applied to gifted identity development in a survey of 742 high-IQ society members (16-79 years). Identity stages could be reliably and validly assessed with a new measure and were related to adjustment and coping as expected. Latent class analysis revealed four groups, which resembled the CIM, but with a few notable exceptions. Ordinal-logistic regression showed that years since first suspicion and since diagnosis of giftedness predicted group membership. In sum, identity development in the gifted examined here shows similarities with the CIM stages (which are differentially related to wellbeing and feelings toward one's own giftedness) but has its own specific characteristics, too.

In Germany, parents can request counseling and assessment of school-related learning and behavioral issues from either independent counseling centers or school-based ones. Focusing on giftedness consultations at independent counseling centers, the goal of this study is to provide a detailed description of the reasons for and the issues discussed during the consultation process. Specifically, the frequency and relationships among each other are examined as well as the relationships with the client characteristics gender, age, and ability. A questionnaire, completed by the counseling professionals, was used to assess the reasons that were given for seeking consultation and the topics that were addressed during the counseling process at 14 psychodiagnostic counseling centers. Overall, data from 156 children and adolescents (25% female) were included in the analyses. Frequent reasons for and topics of the consultations were giftedness assessment, advocacy of gifted education, and motivation. Correlation analyses identified two separate groups of themes: "social and behavioral problems" and "learning disorders and achievement-related problems." Whereas the motives for seeking consultation and the counseling issues were typically the same for both boys and girls, some of these varied greatly depending on age, type of school, and aptitude of the children. These results are discussed with respect to the current state of research as well as their implications for counseling practice and the qualifications of the professional counseling personnel.

Teacher nominations are often used in school settings to identify gifted children. However, although high intelligence is part of almost all definitions of giftedness, prior research has consistently shown that not all children nominated as gifted by teachers have high intelligence. In order to further understand the characteristics of these students, we herein explore the role of another cognitive construct, namely working memory (WM). In a sample comprising N = 81 fourth graders, both WM and intelligence showed the same predictive value for characterizing teacher-nominated gifted children, pointing to the importance of the thus-far-unattended WM for characterizing these students.

As a result of globalisation and the European integration process, identity concepts of young Europeans are becoming more and more diverse and possibly heterogeneous. The factors that influence the development of identity formation and impact on identity constructions are complex--but language seems to be of central importance. It is generally accepted that language and identity are closely connected and that identities are shaped to a large extent through discursive practice. These interactions no longer take place in the mother tongue alone; they are increasingly affected by the wide use of English as a lingua franca (ELF) in Europe or, Euro-English. This raises the question of whether European identity should be built upon linguistic diversity, as officially promoted by the European Union, or whether the use of ELF could help to fulfill this unifying function. Drawing on a questionnaire survey conducted at the University of Braunschweig with 1061 students, the article investigates the potential role of ELF in the formation of a common European identity.

Reading and writing are necessary prerequisites for a successful school career. Therefore it is important to identify precursor variables which predict these abilities early in order to identify children possibly at risk of developing reading or spelling difficulties. Relevant precursors include letter knowledge, phonological awareness (PA), vocabulary, and cognitive abilities. Moreover, also social aspects such as the socioeconomic status of the family (SES), the migration background and the "Home Literacy Environment" (HLE) are of importance. So far, only a few studies are available which analyse the early development of different possible explanatory factors simultaneously in the years before and after school enrolment. In particular, the relative impact of HLE on early and later linguistic competencies in a German context remains unclear. Thus, in our longitudinal study, covering the period from kindergarten to Grade 1, we focused on the role HLE plays in the development of language competencies of 921 German children, compared to the impact of several other important variables. The results highlight the importance of HLE for the development of linguistic competencies also for a German context. HLE was not only a good predictor of early vocabulary and PA, but additionally directly influenced PA at the beginning of primary school. Moreover, HLE acted as a mediator between SES and migration background on the one hand and the precursors on the other hand. This finding indicates that research and policy should focus more on the learning environments in families to improve children's achievement. (Contains 4 tables and 1 figure.)

The present study explores what mechanism might be responsible for the reported link between presence of a calling in one's career and life satisfaction. It is proposed that vocational identity achievement acts as one important mediator of this relation and that the effects can be observed even when controlling for core self-evaluations (CSEs). The study used a short-term longitudinal design based on a sample of 269 German college students from different majors. The results confirmed the mediation model, with calling predicting vocational identity achievement 6 months later and identity serving as a stronger predictor of life satisfaction, all controlling for CSEs. However, contrary to previous research, presence of calling was not directly related to life satisfaction and even showed a negative relation when vocational identity achievement was controlled. The results are interpreted to suggest a multifaceted relation between calling and life satisfaction. (Contains 2 tables.)

The experience of a calling may be seen as the ultimate form of subjective career success that has many positive consequences for individuals and organizations. We are here concerned with the conceptualization of a new multidimensional measure of calling, the MCM. In the first two studies we employed a qualitative approach and came up with five core categories of the experience of a calling. Three of them could be empirically distinguished in our later quantitative studies, i.e., Identification & Person-Environment-Fit (IP), Transcendent Guiding Force (TGF), and Sense and Meaning & Value-Driven-Behavior (SMVB). We tested the reliability and validity of the MCM in two different countries (Germany and USA). Our data show that whereas TGF is most closely related to a direct calling measure, IP is more strongly related to job satisfaction. Both IP and TGF seem to have a buffering function against burnout. SMVB is endorsed most in the USA, whereas IP is endorsed most in Germany. We conclude that a multidimensional conceptualization seems appropriate in studying the experience of a calling and its consequences. (Contains 5 tables.)

Identity fusion is a relatively unexplored form of alignment with groups that entails a visceral feeling of oneness with the group. This feeling is associated with unusually porous, highly permeable borders between the personal and social self. These porous borders encourage people to channel their personal agency into group behavior, raising the possibility that the personal and social self will combine synergistically to motivate pro-group behavior. Furthermore, the strong personal as well as social identities possessed by highly fused persons cause them to recognize other group members not merely as members of the group but also as unique individuals, prompting the development of strong relational as well as collective ties within the group. In "local fusion", people develop relational ties to members of relatively small groups (e.g., families or work teams) with whom they have personal relationships. In "extended fusion", people project relational ties onto relatively large collectives composed of many individuals with whom they may have no personal relationships. The research literature indicates that measures of fusion are exceptionally strong predictors of extreme pro-group behavior. Moreover, fusion effects are amplified by augmenting individual agency, either directly (by increasing physiological arousal) or indirectly (by activating personal or social identities). The effects of fusion on pro-group actions are mediated by perceptions of arousal and invulnerability. Possible causes of identity fusion--ranging from relatively distal, evolutionary, and cultural influences to more proximal, contextual influences--are discussed. Finally, implications and future directions are considered. (Contains 6 footnotes and 2 figures.)

Background: There is still relatively little research on the social context within which bullying develops and remains stable. Aim: This study examined the short-term stability of bullying victimization among primary school students in the United Kingdom and Germany (mean age, 8.9 years) and the individual and social network factors that contributed to remaining a victim of bullying. Sample: The sample consisted of 454 children (247 males and 207 females). Methods: Participants completed questionnaires on bullying victimization at three assessment points over a 9-week period. Other measures consisted of self-reported demographic, peer, and family relationship characteristics. Social network indices of density, reciprocity, and hierarchy were constructed using friendship and peer acceptance nominations. Results: Relative risk analyses indicated a six-fold increased risk of remaining a victim at consequent follow-ups, compared to a child not victimized at baseline becoming a victim over the follow-up period. Individual characteristics explained substantially more variance in the stability of bullying victimization than class-level factors. Hierarchical logistic regression analyses revealed that being victimized by siblings and being rejected by peers predicted remaining a victim over a 9-week period. Conclusions: Bullying victimization among primary school students proved moderately stable over a 9-week period. Individual characteristics were more influential in predicting the stable victim role than class-level factors. Our findings have implications for the identification of stable victims in primary school and early preventative bullying programs.

The "hot hand" belief in sports refers to the conviction that a player has a higher chance of making a shot after two or three successful shots than after two or three misses (resulting in "streaks"). This belief is usually considered a cognitive fallacy, although it has been conjectured that in basketball the defense will attack a"hot" player and prevent streaks from occurring. To address this argument, we provide the first study on the hot hand in volleyball, where the net limits direct defensive counterstrategies, meaning that streaks can more likely emerge if a player is hot. We first establish that athletes believe in the hot hand in volleyball (Study 1A). Analyzing the top 26 first-division players, we then show that streaks do exist for half of the players (Study 1B). Coaches can detect players' performance variability and use it to make strategic decisions (Study 2A). Playmakers are also sensitive to streaks and rely on them when deciding to whom to allocate the ball (Study 2B). We conclude that for volleyball the hot hand exists, coaches and playmakers are able to detect it, and playmakers tend to use it "adaptively," which results in more hits for a team. (Contains 3 figures, 3 tables, and 4 footnotes.)

What role does social identity play in the transition from employed work to entrepreneurship? It was expected that social identity affects the cognitive processes that, according to the theory of planned behavior (TPB), underlie the formation of entrepreneurial intentions. Focusing on academic scientists' intentions to commercialize research knowledge, we investigated social identity (scientists' group identification with their workplace peers in academia) as a moderator in the TPB model. Our hypotheses were tested in a sample of 488 German scientists. The data revealed that entrepreneurial intentions were predicted by attitude, social norms, and perceived control and that group identification was negatively associated with perceived control. Multi-group structural equation modeling further showed that group identification moderated the TPB-intention link. Scientists with low group identification based their entrepreneurial intentions not so much on social norms and attitudes but on their self-initiative and control beliefs. Among scientists with high group identification, in turn, entrepreneurial intentions were mainly a function of social norms. These results, in sum, illustrate the long-neglected importance of identification with, and social cohesion within, peer groups at the workplace for the transition to entrepreneurship. (Contains 1 figure and 2 tables.)