Human Development & Quantitative Methodology
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2248
The departments within the College of Education were reorganized and renamed as of July 1, 2011. This department incorporates the former departments of Measurement, Statistics & Evaluation; Human Development; and the Institute for Child Study.
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Item Developing and validating a measure of epistemic competence beliefs to examine undergraduate students’ critical-analytic thinking in a multiple source use task(2024) Schoute, Eric Cornelis; Alexander, Patricia A; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Background: This dissertation aimed to develop and validate a novel Epistemic Competence Beliefs Measure (ECBM) to capture students’ ability to identify and utilize relevant sources for complex issues. Epistemic competence was hypothesized to be critical in performing multiple source use (MSU) tasks, particularly in predicting critical-analytic thinking in argumentative essays. The study was conducted in two phases, focusing on the ECBM’s development, its content validity, and predictive validity in an MSU context. Methods: Phase 1 involved creating the ECBM’s based on epistemic beliefs and cognition theories, presenting students with controversial scenarios. Content validity was assessed by an international panel of experts. Phase 2 implemented the ECBM in a university course, collecting data through argumentative claim selection forms, search logs, notes, essays, and a retroactive behaviors questionnaire. Data were analyzed using content analysis, cluster analysis, ANOVA, multiple linear regression, and regression trees to determine the ECBM’s predictive validity. Findings: The study revealed significant variability in students’ epistemic competence as measured on the ECBM, though no direct predictive relationship to enacted epistemic competence and exhibited critical-analytic thinking was established. Students’ critical-analytic thinking varied significantly, influenced by their GPA and TORR scores. Notably, students with higher relational reasoning abilities exhibited superior critical-analytic thinking in their essays, supporting the theorized link between these constructs. Implications: For future research, the ECBM can be refined and more closely integrated into the MSU project by aligning its completion with the task’s introduction. This integration may enhance students’ epistemic agency and awareness. Furthermore, diversifying study populations across different sociocultural contexts and employing Bayesian and mixed-methods analyses can provide deeper insights into epistemic competence and critical-analytic thinking. Practical implications suggest procedural adjustments to better align the MSU project with theoretical frameworks, potentially improving instructional practices. Conclusions: The novel Epistemic Competence Beliefs Measure is a meaningful contribution to the literature on epistemic beliefs as it unearthed theoretically and practically meaningful profiles of undergraduates’ appraisal of the characteristics of complex, controversial issues. The data-analytic focus on students’ variability rather than only consistency in characterizations of the scenarios highlighted the value of examining epistemic beliefs in a more situated, contextualized manner. This resulting findings of varying beliefs dispute the lingering assumption that epistemic beliefs are stable across contexts. While the assessment of the ECBM’s predictive validity identified no significant relations, the findings underscore the importance of relational reasoning to critical-analytic thinking. Future research should focus on refining the ECBM, exploring its applicability in diverse contexts, and employing comprehensive analytical methods to further elucidate these constructs.Item Writing to Discover: Adding Complexity to Views Of Writing As an Agent of Change in Undergraduates’ Knowledge, Interest, Confidence, and Calibration(2024) van Meerten, Julianne E.; Bolger, Donald J; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The rationale behind the present study consisted of evidence reported to date for Galbraith et al.’s (1999, 2018, 2023) dual-process model of writing, suggesting that not only do writers engage in knowledge transformation, but in the development of new knowledge. An additional aspect of Galbraith et al.’s (2023) work is their proposal and validation of a novel subjective knowledge measure, tailored to those two processes, with potential to be used as a tool for calibration, knowledge activation, and learning. The purpose of the present study was to (a) investigate knowledge development comparing two different writing tasks relative to a comparison task of rereading a text passage, (b) explore patterns in subjective knowledge, confidence, and situational interest ratings throughout engagement with such tasks, (c) examine the predictive power of those ratings for post-intervention knowledge, and (d) compare confidence ratings with evidence of knowledge, that is, calculating calibration scores.The study used a pretest-posttest repeated measures intervention design, in which 146 undergraduate students, enrolled in human development and psychology research methodology courses, were randomly assigned to experimental or comparison conditions. Students in all conditions started by reading a text on the topic of research design, after which students in the experimental conditions engaged in two writing activities, consisting of a free-write (for both experimental conditions) and either an explanatory or persuasive writing task. Simultaneously, students in the comparison condition reread the initial text twice while being tasked with, first, surface-level strategies and, second, deep-level reading strategies. At least a week after the intervention, students in all conditions completed a transfer test, consisting of an argument writing task. Students rated their subjective knowledge about the topic (using an adapted version of Galbraith et al.’s [2023] instrument), confidence in their knowledge about the topic, and situational interest in the topic at hand multiple times throughout the study. The study occurred in real classrooms, using materials akin to existing course materials, on a topic already part of existing course curricula but not yet covered, which contributed to its high ecological validity. Exploratory factor analyses indicated that the two subscales of subjective knowledge ratings and the single-item confidence rating needed to be combined into one factor (Subjective Knowledge/Confidence; SKC) and treated as such in all analyses. Further, tests of condition regarding knowledge gains, one of the primary hypotheses, needed to be adjusted because of a failure of randomization between groups that was observed upon analyzing initial between-group equivalence. Despite random assignment to conditions, significant differences between conditions on the primary dependent variable of conceptual knowledge were found at pretest for the comparison (control) group. Because such a difference at pretest would invalidate any causal conclusions drawn from comparisons between the experimental and comparison conditions, further comparisons were made only between the two experimental groups in addressing those research questions that pertained to the effect of condition on changes in knowledge and the subjective factors measured, as well as the predictive value of those subjective factors for post-intervention knowledge levels. Findings indicated that the writing intervention central to the present study had a positive, significant effect on learning about the topic of research design for students in both experimental conditions (i.e., explanation and persuasion) relative to their pretest knowledge levels. Additionally, students in the persuasion group were significantly better calibrated than students in the rereading group, and SKC ratings at posttest were a significant predictor of transfer-test knowledge scores for both the explanation and the persuasion groups, indicating an improved relationship between confidence and actual knowledge levels. The findings of this study underscore the importance of providing students with a range of learning strategies, including rereading and writing, to help them acquire knowledge. Educators can use these findings to inform their instructional decisions, recognizing that students’ individual needs will vary and that a combination of strategies may be most effective in promoting knowledge development.Item HIGHER-ORDER THINKING ACROSS STAGES OF AN ARGUMENTATIVE MULTIPLE SOURCE USE TASK(2024) Sun, Yuting; Alexander, Patricia A.; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Higher-order thinking is foundational to deeper learning and has been a major theme in the philosophical, psychological, and educational literatures. Multiple source use tasks (MSU) offer a rich context to investigate higher-order thinking, although systematic research on higher-order thinking in MSU contexts remains scarce. In addition, prior studies were often conducted in orchestrated settings, limiting their ecological validity. Guided by the Integrated Framework of Multiple Texts (List & Alexander, 2019), the current study aimed to unearth higher-order processes that unfolded over the Preparation, Execution, and Production stages of an ecologically valid MSU task. The study explored how a notetaking scaffold impacted higher-order processes, as manifested in the notes taken during the Execution stage and the argumentative essays written during the Production Stage.Participants were 105 undergraduate students enrolled in a course where MSU tasks are integral components. Over four class sessions, students completed learner characteristics measures, searched for sources online while completing a search log (Preparation stage), read and took notes on documents they selected (Execution stage), and wrote argumentative essays based on their notes (Production stage). Further, using a quasi-experimental design, students in the experimental class received a notetaking scaffold that prompted them to attend to key features of individual documents and integrate information across documents. The comparison class took notes in their preferred ways. Analyses revealed a variety of higher-order processes at each task stage. Students seemed to face more challenges in some processes (e.g., critical analysis, synthesis) than others (e.g., documenting evidence, justifying claims). The notetaking scaffold effectively facilitated some processes in notetaking (documenting source information) and essay writing (sourcing, counterarguing). Further, associations were found among processes occurring at different stages, with those related to sourcing and source evaluation being central. The study contributed to a more comprehensive understanding of students’ higher-order thinking across stages of a natural, class-based MSU task. Implications for future investigations using improved MSU tools and alternative analytical approaches and designs are discussed. Practically, the study pointed to the need for more explicit instructions and support in such areas as enhancing students’ understanding about argumentation and critical analysis of documents.Item INHIBITION IS KEY: A COGNITIVE APPROACH TO SUCCESSFUL WORD PROBLEM SOLVING(2024) Jaffe, Joshua Benjamin; Bolger, Donald J; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Numerical competency and reading comprehension skills are necessary, but insufficient for word problem success. Depending on the word problem structure, successful problem solving may require inhibiting the seemingly obvious and correct answer. Inhibitory control plays a significant role in processing and solving word problems. Through classroom practices and textbook problems, I argue that individuals form associations between relational terminology and specific mathematical operations (“more” for addition and “less” for subtraction), and the notion that all numerical values in a problem must be used to produce an answer. In this study, I proposed an inhibitory performance-based model that posits two approaches to problem solving: (a) a successful approach where solvers inhibit mathematical associations and form appropriate set schemas to conceptualize semantic relations, and (b) an association approach where solvers do not inhibit associations and therefore may have an inaccurate understanding of the semantic relations. To test the model, data were analyzed from 105 undergraduate students at the University of Maryland. The study consisted of four sections: cognitive skills, word problems, domain-specific inhibitory control tasks, and a semi-structured interview. The word problem section included problems that were both consistent and inconsistent with an individual’s operational and numerical associations. Overall, the quantitative results identified that participants performed significantly worse on inconsistent problems. Further, the data suggest that failure to correctly answer inconsistent problems may be due to inhibitory control rather than other cognitive skills. The qualitative data indicated that a vast majority of participants believed in both mathematical associations and remembered classroom experiences that may have contributed to these beliefs. While inhibitory control has been suggested to play a significant role in word problem performance, this is one of the first studies to explicitly examine the relationship through domain-specific inhibitory control tasks and an interview. These results guide a path for future research to examine how individuals develop mathematical associations and for interventions to dissuade their usage.Item Integrating Cognitive and Perceptual Processes in Mental Arithmetic(2023) Medrano, Josh Rainier Lucas; Prather, Richard W; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Decades of research have established the importance of working memory in arithmetic computation (DeStefano & LeFevre, 2004). More recently, research has also shown that a formally irrelevant perceptual cue—spacing—can influence problem-solving (Landy & Goldstone, 2007). In a multi-operand problem, individuals solve less accurately and more slowly when the spacing between operands and operators is inconsistent with the order of operations (e.g., 2 x 3+4) compared to when spacing is consistent (e.g., 2x3 + 4). While this effect of physical spacing is widely demonstrated, it is unknown whether this perceptual cue also influences working memory. To examine this, I used a dual-task paradigm, wherein participants (N = 115 adults, mean = 32.41 years, median = 27.22, standard deviation = 15.56) evaluated an expression while completing either a visuospatial (dot pattern) or phonological (letter span) memory task. There were three conditions. The arithmetic stimuli differed between conditions: In the no-spacing (NS) condition, spacing was neutral for all arithmetic expressions; in the spacing-varying (SV) condition, spacing was neutral, consistent, or inconsistent; in the spacing-varying with parenthesis condition (SVP), spacing varied and there were parentheses around multiplied operands (e.g., (2 x 3)+4). The configuration of the working memory tasks was the same for all conditions. Analyses of variance tests (ANOVAs) of arithmetic and recall performance were conducted with spacing, working memory load (low and high) and type (visuospatial and phonological) as independent variables. Results showed that first, working memory load and type, as well as spacing, influenced arithmetic and recall performance, consistent with previous work and partially supporting our hypotheses. Second, compared to the SV condition, inconsistent spacing yielded higher arithmetic accuracy and spacing did not affect or interact with working memory in the SVP condition. Third, exploratory analyses showed that participants’ performance was influenced by math anxiety, age, and math education. Participants who had lower levels of math anxiety, were younger, and had taken three or more math classes after high school had, descriptively, higher arithmetic and recall accuracy. Overall, these results have theoretical implications particularly for mathematical cognition research, as well as practical implications, such as in the design of instructional materials.Item TEXT COMPREHENSION ACROSS PRINT AND AUDIO: A PERSON-CENTERED MIXED METHODS STUDY(2023) Singh, Anisha; Alexander, Patricia; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The use of the audio medium (e.g., audiobooks and podcasts) is proliferating in everyday and educational contexts. Yet, research investigating text processing in audio compared to the more commonly used print medium is limited in scope. Specifically, the research so far has majorly focused on younger learners or English language learners, narrative genre texts, operationalized comprehension as a unidimensional construct, and used variable-centered analytical techniques. The current mixed methods study aimed to explore text processing across print and audio by focusing on four interrelated dimensions—learner, text, task, and test. I used finite mixture modeling for the quantitative part of the study to identify meaningful reader and listener profiles. Following the identification and validation of profiles, students from the profiles were interviewed to complement and enhance the understanding of the groups. Specifically, the study aimed to investigate differences across the two mediums vis-à-vis learner characteristics, text and test processing behaviors, and comprehension outcomes. A further goal of the study was to identify meaningful and distinct reader and listener profiles by accounting for affective and behavioral variables, and validating the profiles on cognitive variables. Finally, the study aimed to build qualitatively rich descriptions of the quantitatively unearthed profile groups. To address these aims, undergraduate students (n =130) were recruited from human development courses. They completed measures related to self-efficacy and reported their reading and listening habits. Each participant’s screen was recorded as they processed text in print and audio. Text processing behaviors (e.g., scrolling, increasing playback speed) and off-task behaviors (e.g., eating, fidgeting) were coded. Learner-related, text processing, and task variables were used to find meaningful reader and listener profiles. The profiles were validated using prior topic knowledge and comprehension as covariate and outcome, respectively. Students belonging to each profile were invited for interviews (n = 10). The format was a cued retrospective interview, wherein video clips were used to prompt participants. The interviews were transcribed, segmented into utterances, and coded for learner-related, text-related, task-related, and test-related content. Results from the variable-centered analysis revealed that reading print or listening to audio led to similar performance levels on items targeting recall and inference. However, reading print was associated with higher scores on the item assessing the main idea than listening to audio. Results from the mixture modeling and interviews revealed three reader profiles—Distracted Surfers, Labored Harvesters, and Fluent Surveyors—and three listener profiles—Inconsistently Attentive, Inattentive, and Persistently Attentive. The profiles were found to differ qualitatively on strategies, text processing depth, and attention regulation. This study’s contribution is in expanding the research on comprehension across different mediums both in terms of scope and methodologically. The current investigation demonstrates that learner characteristics and text processing behaviors need to be accounted for when studying comprehension with different mediums. Practically, it has implications for practitioners looking to incorporate audio for content delivery in their courses and for instructional designers developing educational technology tools to optimize learning.Item Exploring the Contributions of Word Knowledge and Figural Reasoning Ability to College Students' Performance on a Measure of Relational Reasoning with Words(2021) Zhao, Hongyang; Alexander, Patricia; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Word knowledge has long been considered as one of the most important predictors of reading comprehension, academic achievement, and social development. However, it was relatively narrowly conceptualized and measured as either the number of words individuals know the general meaning of (i.e., breadth) or the simple association between two words (i.e., depth). The problem with such a one-sided view is that the existing measures of word knowledge is limited in revealing the quality of word knowledge, which is characterized by both depth and breadth. In this investigation, by comparison, quality of word knowledge was conceptualized as individuals’ fine-grained understanding of the word meanings as they systematically identified semantic similarities and differences among a group of words. It is believed that through deliberate comparisons among word sets, individual’s understanding of the intricacy, subtlety in the meaning of words can be revealed. Therefore, this study offered a new approach in assessing the word knowledge quality informed by a theoretical model of relational reasoning and its four resulting forms (Alexander & DRLRL, 2012). A novel measure of word knowledge quality, Relational Reasoning with Words (R2W2) was developed and validated in this study. Moreover, the unique contributions of relational reasoning ability and word knowledge to college students’ performance on R2W2 were also analyzed. With a sample that involved 338 participants from four US universities, the study found that R2W2 was a reliable and valid measure for word knowledge quality with sound psychometric properties on the item level. In addition, word knowledge was found to contribute to college students’ performance on R2W2 more than relational reasoning ability. Implications for future research and practice are also presented and discussed.Item Family Values: Assessing Reciprocal Effects on Longitudinal Change in Children's and Parents' Valuing of Math and Sports(2021) Faust, Lara Turci; Wigfield, Allan; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The present study investigated the bidirectional influence that children’s and parents’ task values in math and sports have on change in the task values of the other group from first grade to 11th grade. Using latent change score models, I found that fathers’ math value both positively and negatively influenced change in children’s math values from first grade to 11th grade, and children’s values both positively and negatively influenced change in both mothers’ and fathers’ math values from first grade to 11th grade, consistent with my hypotheses and some prior research. However, mothers’ math value did not impact change in children’s math value during the study period. In addition, both mothers’ and fathers’ sports values positively influenced change in children’s sports value, and children’s sports value positively influenced change inboth their mothers’ and fathers’ sports values. Findings in the sports domain indicated differences in how mothers’ and fathers’ values shape change in children’s values; namely that mothers have smaller but consistent effects whereas fathers have larger effects that occur during educational transitions. Supplementary analyses also suggest that children’s perceptions of their parents’ values in math and sports consistently and positively influence children’s own change in values from first grade to sixth grade. Possible explanations for these findings, as well as broader theoretical implications are discussed.Item How Do Children Learn New Words in A Second Language? The Role of Self-Teaching in Orthographic Learning(2021) Li, Yixun; Wang, Min; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Learning to read written words is the major benchmark that beginning readers must meet to achieve high-level reading comprehension later on. In my dissertation, I make among the first attempts to examine self-teaching— the process by which children teach themselves new written words via independent text reading— in L2. In past decades, self-teaching has been shown to be a robust means of written word learning across writing systems in L1. But very limited research has examined self-teaching in L2. The overarching aim of my dissertation is to: (1) identify the challenges of self-teaching in L2; (2) examine potential optimal learning conditions that can help L2 learners compensate for poor learning; and (3) provide a robust accounting of this literature via meta-analysis. Studies 1 and 2 examined self-teaching among English L2 learners with a non-alphabetic L1—Chinese (Study 1) and an alphabetic L1—Spanish (Study 2), and seek to explore the potential factors that affect L2 learners’ self-teaching. A systematic review will then be conducted to compare self-teaching across studies (Study 3). These attempts, among the first in the field, are expected to yield a comprehensive understanding of existing evidence and guide future research. Collectively, the findings from my work will not only enrich the theories of self-teaching and L2 word learning, but also will add to the growing evidence supporting the educational value of self-teaching in L1 and L2, and the mechanisms that support L2 learners in this endeavor.Item Relational Reasoning and Socially Shared Regulation of Learning in Collaborative Problem Solving(2020) Jablansky, Sophie; Alexander, Patricia A; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The ability to solve complex problems in collaborative settings is considered a critical 21st century competency. Yet, national and international reports have revealed deficiencies in both students’ and employees’ teamwork and communication skills, which are essential when working collaboratively. These deficits may be underlain by a limited understanding of how cognitive and social processes operate synchronistically as team members work together to solve complex problems. The current study aimed to investigate how two specific processes—relational reasoning (RR) and socially shared regulation of learning (SSRL)—unfold during a collaborative problem-solving (CPS) task. Specifically, the researcher assessed the extent to which different teams exhibited differential proportions of reasoning and regulation; how team activity was distributed across individuals; and, whether frequent sequences of reasoning and regulation could be identified. To address these aims, four teams of senior undergraduate students (n = 22) were recruited from a capstone design course in mechanical engineering. Over the course of the semester, teams conceptualized and prototyped a design to address a current market need. Each team was video-recorded during the conceptualization process—specifically, as teams evaluated and eliminated ideas from their corpus of designs. Team conversations were transcribed, segmented into utterances, and coded for the presence of RR, SSRL, and task-related and other talk. Results from chi-square tests of independence, social network analysis, and sequence mining revealed that teams indeed exhibited differential proportions of RR and SSRL, with antinomous reasoning and monitoring and control of consensus emerging as key CPS processes. Further, planning and reflection acted as bookends to CPS, while RR and monitoring processes co-occurred in the interim. Finally, CPS alternated between periods of activity that were shared more and less equally among team members. This study contributes to the literature on CPS by exploring the dynamic interplay between RR and SSRL and by demonstrating that CPS can be investigated at the micro level, meso level, and macro level. Methodologically, this study demonstrates how leveraging data mining techniques and assembling compelling visualizations can illustrate the recursive and cyclical character of RR and SSRL. Finally, limitations are noted, and implications for research and practice are forwarded.