scholarly journals The Mystery of Remote Communality: University Students’ and Teachers’ Perceptions During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Human Arenas ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Satu Uusiautti ◽  
Sanna Hyvärinen ◽  
Sina Björkman

AbstractThe aim of this study was to examine how the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic affected the communality among university personnel and students. Herein, we report the findings from a northern Finnish university in which student (mean number of participants, n = 339) and staff (mean number of participants, n = 133) perceptions and experiences were surveyed. The data (gathered between March 2020 and June 2021 in 7 surveys) included responses to questions about satisfaction with remote and hybrid work and communality. In addition, as the focus of the analysis in this research, we collected the participants’ descriptions of their experiences and thoughts through open-ended questions. The sense of communality among the students, students and teachers, and staff differed, but the appreciation for flexible interactions and availability was similar between the groups. This study discusses the importance of retaining a sense of communality during and after abnormal times on the basis of the reported findings.

Author(s):  
Natalya Emelyanova ◽  
Elena Voronina

<p class="BODYTEXT">Learning management systems (LMS) have been proven to encourage a constructive approach to knowledge acquisition and support active learning. One of the keys to successful and efficient use of LMS is how the stakeholders adopt and perceive this learning tool. The present research is therefore motivated by the importance of understanding teachers' and students' perceptions of LMS in order to anticipate possible issues (problems) and help to build a productive learning environment and a committed user community. The paper looks at this process at a Russian university (National Research University Higher School of Economics – HSE) where the system is being implemented and examines the following issues: qualification and readiness of the stakeholders to use LMS and their perceptions of the system's convenience, effectiveness, and usefulness. The research reveals remarkable divergence of students’ and teachers’ perceptions of various aspects of LMS which must be considered when raising the effectiveness of the system and building commitment to e-learning. They are analyzed and explicated in the present paper.</p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></p>


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Folkert Kuiken ◽  
Ineke Vedder

This paper aims to investigate how L2 teachers perceive syntactic complexity in L2 writing, and to what extent teachers’ judgements are related to current theoretical views. The main reason for conducting the study is that the majority of studies that have investigated the development of syntactic complexity in L2 have been grounded in hypothesis-testing research; few studies, however, have explored whether teachers’ perspectives on syntactic complexity reflect the development of syntactic complexity as hypothesised in the SLA literature. Two groups of language teachers (eleven of L2-Dutch and sixteen of L2-Italian) were asked to evaluate individually the syntactic complexity of a sample of argumentative texts written by L2 university students of, respectively, Dutch and Italian. In the panel discussion that followed, teachers discussed their motivation behind their assigned scores and the feedback they had proposed. The results revealed that teachers tended to focus primarily on accuracy and comprehensibility. When their comments were concerned with syntactic complexity, both similarities and differences (related to target language and writing context) emerged between Dutch and Italian. Teachers’ reflections appeared to be only partly aligned with existing theoretical views on syntactic complexity.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Kiltz ◽  
Raven Rinas ◽  
Martin Daumiller ◽  
Marjon Fokkens-Bruinsma ◽  
E.P.W.A. Jansen

A wealth of evidence has indicated that both students and teachers experience high levels of stress, burnout, and ultimately compromised well-being in the university context. However, although numerous studies have investigated well-being among university students, and some studies have addressed well-being among university teachers, these lines of research are often conducted in isolation from one another. This is surprising, as the importance of considering reciprocal links between students and teachers has been suggested in numerous empirical studies. Additionally, when researching well-being in academia, conceptualizations of well-being differ from study-to-study. The present research therefore investigated how students and teachers conceptualize well-being at the university based on their personal experiences, as well as how student and teacher well-being interact. To examine this, six university students (50% female), and ten teachers (50% female) from Germany and the Netherlands participated in semi-structured interviews. Qualitative analysis using a multistage coding process revealed detailed insights concerning students’ and teachers’ perceptions of well-being that coincided with positive psychology, resilience, multifaceted, and basic psychological need fulfillment approaches. Moreover, an interaction between students’ and teachers’ well-being became apparent, including several factors such as the student-teacher relationship, that contributed to both population’s well-being. The present findings lend evidence towards a more coherent conceptualization of well-being for further research and are discussed in terms of suggestions for initiatives that simultaneously support both populations, for example, through the student-teacher relationship.


2002 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 69-79 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joan M. Preston ◽  
Michael Eden

Abstract. Music video (MV) content is frequently measured using researcher descriptions. This study examines subjective or viewers’ notions of sex and violence. 168 university students watched 9 mainstream MVs. Incidence counts of sex and violence involve more mediating factors than ratings. High incidents are associated with older viewers, higher scores for Expressivity, lower scores for Instrumentality, and with video orders beginning with high sex and violence. Ratings of sex and violence are associated with older viewers and lower scores for Instrumentality. For sex MVs, inexperienced viewers reported higher incidents and ratings. Because MVs tend to be sexier but less violent than TV and film, viewers may also use comparative media standards to evaluate emotional content MVs.


2015 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Andrew Comensoli ◽  
Carolyn MacCann

The current study proposes and refines the Appraisals in Personality (AIP) model in a multilevel investigation of whether appraisal dimensions of emotion predict differences in state neuroticism and extraversion. University students (N = 151) completed a five-factor measure of trait personality, and retrospectively reported seven situations from the previous week, giving state personality and appraisal ratings for each situation. Results indicated that: (a) trait neuroticism and extraversion predicted average levels of state neuroticism and extraversion respectively, and (b) five of the examined appraisal dimensions predicted one, or both of the state neuroticism and extraversion personality domains. However, trait personality did not moderate the relationship between appraisals and state personality. It is concluded that appraisal dimensions of emotion may provide a useful taxonomy for quantifying and comparing situations, and predicting state personality.


2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 117-125
Author(s):  
Johannes Schult ◽  
Rebecca Schneider ◽  
Jörn R. Sparfeldt

Abstract. The need for efficient personality inventories has led to the wide use of short instruments. The corresponding items often contain multiple, potentially conflicting descriptors within one item. In Study 1 ( N = 198 university students), the reliability and validity of the TIPI (Ten-Item Personality Inventory) was compared with the reliability and validity of a modified TIPI based on items that rephrased each two-descriptor item into two single-descriptor items. In Study 2 ( N = 268 university students), we administered the BFI-10 (Big Five Inventory short version) and a similarly modified version of the BFI-10 without two-descriptor items. In both studies, reliability and construct validity values occasionally improved for separated multi-descriptor items. The inventories with multi-descriptor items showed shortcomings in some factors of the TIPI and the BFI-10. However, the other scales worked comparably well in the original and modified inventories. The limitations of short personality inventories with multi-descriptor items are discussed.


2012 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Viren Swami ◽  
Angela Nogueira Campana ◽  
Rebecca Coles

Although patients of cosmetic surgery are increasingly ethnically diverse, previous studies have not examined ethnic differences in attitudinal dispositions toward cosmetic surgery. In the present study, 751 British female university students from three ethnic groups (Caucasians, South Asians, and African Caribbeans) completed measures of acceptance of cosmetic surgery, body appreciation, self-esteem, and demographic variables. Initial between-group analyses showed that Caucasians had lower body appreciation and self-esteem than Asian and African Caribbean participants. Importantly, Caucasians had higher acceptance of cosmetic surgery than their ethnic minority counterparts, even after controlling for body appreciation, self-esteem, age, and body mass index. Further analyses showed that ethnicity accounted for a small proportion of the variance in acceptance of cosmetic surgery, with body appreciation and self-esteem emerging as stronger predictors. Possible reasons for ethnic differences in acceptance of cosmetic surgery are discussed in Conclusion.


Author(s):  
Julian M. Etzel ◽  
Gabriel Nagy

Abstract. In the current study, we examined the viability of a multidimensional conception of perceived person-environment (P-E) fit in higher education. We introduce an optimized 12-item measure that distinguishes between four content dimensions of perceived P-E fit: interest-contents (I-C) fit, needs-supplies (N-S) fit, demands-abilities (D-A) fit, and values-culture (V-C) fit. The central aim of our study was to examine whether the relationships between different P-E fit dimensions and educational outcomes can be accounted for by a higher-order factor that captures the shared features of the four fit dimensions. Relying on a large sample of university students in Germany, we found that students distinguish between the proposed fit dimensions. The respective first-order factors shared a substantial proportion of variance and conformed to a higher-order factor model. Using a newly developed factor extension procedure, we found that the relationships between the first-order factors and most outcomes were not fully accounted for by the higher-order factor. Rather, with the exception of V-C fit, all specific P-E fit factors that represent the first-order factors’ unique variance showed reliable and theoretically plausible relationships with different outcomes. These findings support the viability of a multidimensional conceptualization of P-E fit and the validity of our adapted instrument.


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