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Preparing for high-stakes exams in introductory physics courses is generally a self-regulated activity. Compared to other exam reviewing strategies, doing practice exams has been shown to help students recognize gaps in their knowledge, encourage active practicing, and produce long-term retention. However, many students, particularly students who are struggling with the course material, are not guided by research-based study strategies and do not use practice exams effectively. Using data collected from a fully online course in Spring 2021, this study examines two interventions aimed at improving student self-regulated studying behaviors and enhancing student metacognition during exam preparation. We found that a modified format of online practice exams with one attempt per question and delayed feedback, increases the accuracy of feedback about student readiness for exams but does not change the accuracy of their predicted exam scores or studying behaviors. Additionally, an added mock exam one week before the actual exam impacts students' intentions for studying but does not impact actual study behaviors or facilitate metacognition. These results suggest that interventions designed to improve exam preparation likely need to include explicit instruction on study strategies and student beliefs about learning.

Background Thrombotic events are a major complication of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM). There are only two available risk prediction models for thrombotic events, HCM Risk-CVA score and French HCM score developed by foreign scholars, yet the former one has been found to have limited predictive value in Chinese HCM patients. Objective To develop a risk prediction model for thrombotic events in Chinese patients with HCM. Methods A retrospective cohort study design was used. Five hundred and thirty-seven HCM patients who admitted to West China Hospital of Sichuan University from 2010 to 2018 were recruited. Post-discharge health status was collected by use of telephone follow-up or checking the treatment status recorded in the electronic medical record system once every 6 to 12 months until a composite thrombotic event (defined as the endpoint event) or death occurred or the determined thrombotic risk assessment day of this study (2019-12-31). Univariate and multvariate Cox regression analyses were applied to build a thrombotic risk prediction model, and its internal validation was tested in a resample using the bootstrapping technique. Results Due to data missing, 24 cases were excluded, and the other 513 cases were finally included. During a median follow-up of 4.2 years (IQR: 1.3-6.2 years), thrombotic events occurred in 42 cases (8.18%), with an annual morbidity rate of 2.10%〔95%CI (1.47%, 2.73%) 〕. By multivariate Cox regression analysis, age, prior thrombotic event and left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) were identified (P

ABSTRACT In instructional settings involving social interactions, emotions such as discomfort, embarrassment, and shame can be induced by social comparison of competence, judgment from peers, and conflict with other students. As part of the special issue Centering Affect and Emotion Toward Justice and Dignity in Science Education, this paper presents a case study of how four university engineering students in an introductory physics course addressed the emotional discomfort that arose when a hierarchy of competence emerged among group members, to demonstrate two points. First, local hierarchical positionings of who is more or less competent can create vulnerabilities and discomfort, which students can cope with by sharing and relating to each other's negative emotional experiences as engineering majors. This “emotional resonance” can be a resource for helping students locally reposition to find common ground and resist hierarchical positionings. Second, the local construction of hierarchical positioning among students, and the resulting emotional discomfort, can be supported by larger institutional structures and hierarchies within STEM culture. Although emotional resonance can locally alleviate discomfort and help students avoid hierarchical positionings, the legitimacy of positioning some students as “smarter” than others based on institutional labels and other markers of success can be left unchallenged. Therefore, efforts to support student emotions in STEM education should look beyond local interventions and critically examine pathways through which institutional structures and STEM culture can create hierarchical and competitive relations between students, generate feelings of not being “smart” enough, and increase the socioemotional risks of learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hypertension is one of the most common chronic diseases in older people, and the prevalence is on the rise as the global population ages. Hypertension is closely associated with many adverse health outcomes, including cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease and mortality, which poses a substantial threat to global public health. Reasonable blood pressure (BP) management is very important for reducing the occurrence of adverse events. Frailty is an age-related geriatric syndrome, characterized by decreased physiological reserves of multiple organs and systems and increased sensitivity to stressors, which increases the risk of falls, hospitalization, fractures, and mortality in older people. With the aging of the global population and the important impact of frailty on clinical practice, frailty has attracted increasing attention in recent years. In older people, frailty and hypertension often coexist. Frailty has a negative impact on BP management and the prognosis of older hypertensive patients, while hypertension may increase the risk of frailty in older people. However, the causal relationship between frailty and hypertension remains unclear, and there is a paucity of research regarding the efficacious management of hypertension in frail elderly patients. The management of hypertension in frail elderly patients still faces significant challenges. The benefits of treatment, the optimal BP target, and the choice of antihypertensive drugs for older hypertensive patients with frailty remain subjects of ongoing debate. This review provides a brief overview of hypertension in frail older adults, especially for the management of BP in this population, which may help in offering valuable ideas for future research in this field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Obesity has become a global epidemic during the last several years. In addition to genes, lifestyle, socioeconomic status, and other factors that mainly give rise to obesity, gut microbiome recently has aroused great concern for its pivotal role in obesity and host metabolism. A great number of studies have done to uncover the inner associations between gut microbiota and obesity. Among the commonly reported findings, the phylum of Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes are highly related to excessive weight gain, with a higher ratio of F/B in obese subjects. In this review, we summarized some important studies focusing on the alteration and possible role of different bacterial taxa affecting obesity. We also discussed the diet effect on intestinal microbial community and potential molecular mechanisms of energy metabolism involved by gut microbiota.