Comparing cultural and individual learning tendencies.

This article reports on a dyad model of lesson study aimed at scaffolding the theory and practice of learning to teach physical education. Participants were pre-service teachers (PSTs) completing a 38-week Master’s-level Postgraduate Certificate in Education in eastern England, training to teach the secondary age range (11–18 years). A total of 40 PSTs volunteered to participate in the study during their school-based training. A three-year cross-sectional case-study framework involving three distinct cohorts of PSTs allowed for a comparison of data, captured through computer-mediated communication. Dialogue through email communications and electronic evaluations was analysed inductively. Three substantive themes were identified as a result of the PSTs’ experiences: (a) developing confidence in the classroom through collaboration with a peer; (b) developing physical education pedagogies to support students’ individual learning needs; and (c) developing physical education pedagogies to support assessment of students’ progress. The dyad lesson study model provided a safe and non-hierarchical platform for collaboration between PSTs. Peer-to-peer reflection on aspects of their own practice instilled confidence and enhanced understanding, particularly in relation to understanding students’ individual learning needs to promote progress and assessing such progress. Dyad lesson study positively supported PSTs’ professional development against prescribed Teachers’ Standards beyond the formal hierarchical rules and structures associated with the school-based training process. Such collaborative conversations can help to minimise professional isolation for PSTs during their school-based training and address the juxtaposition of connecting the theory of learning to teach with a holistic view of student learning in practice.

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Processing of novel food reveals payoff and rank-biased social learning in a wild primate

Scientific Reports ◽

10.1038/s41598-021-88857-6 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Charlotte Canteloup ◽

Mabia B. Cera ◽

Brendan J. Barrett ◽

Erica van de Waal

Keyword(s):

Social Learning ◽

Learning Strategies ◽

Individual Learning ◽

Diffusion Experiment ◽

Vervet Monkeys ◽

Dynamic Learning ◽

Novel Food ◽

Bias Attention ◽

Higher Rank ◽

Learning From Others

AbstractSocial learning—learning from others—is the basis for behavioural traditions. Different social learning strategies (SLS), where individuals biasedly learn behaviours based on their content or who demonstrates them, may increase an individual’s fitness and generate behavioural traditions. While SLS have been mostly studied in isolation, their interaction and the interplay between individual and social learning is less understood. We performed a field-based open diffusion experiment in a wild primate. We provided two groups of vervet monkeys with a novel food, unshelled peanuts, and documented how three different peanut opening techniques spread within the groups. We analysed data using hierarchical Bayesian dynamic learning models that explore the integration of multiple SLS with individual learning. We (1) report evidence of social learning compared to strictly individual learning, (2) show that vervets preferentially socially learn the technique that yields the highest observed payoff and (3) also bias attention toward individuals of higher rank. This shows that behavioural preferences can arise when individuals integrate social information about the efficiency of a behaviour alongside cues related to the rank of a demonstrator. When these preferences converge to the same behaviour in a group, they may result in stable behavioural traditions.

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Training of vocational trainers for individual learning, vocational, and problem counseling of physically handicapped adolescents

International Journal of Rehabilitation Research ◽

10.1097/00004356-198112000-00019 ◽

1981 ◽

Vol 4 (4) ◽

pp. 561

Author(s):

K. Koehl

Keyword(s):

Individual Learning ◽

Physically Handicapped

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Pay-off-biased social learning underlies the diffusion of novel extractive foraging traditions in a wild primate

Proceedings of The Royal Society B Biological Sciences ◽

10.1098/rspb.2017.0358 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 284 (1856) ◽

pp. 20170358 ◽

Cited By ~ 26

Author(s):

Brendan J. Barrett ◽

Richard L. McElreath ◽

Susan E. Perry

Keyword(s):

Social Learning ◽

Learning Strategies ◽

Individual Learning ◽

Adaptive Behaviour ◽

Cultural Dynamics ◽

New Techniques ◽

Individual Level ◽

Important Variation ◽

In The Wild ◽

Innovation And Diffusion

The type and variety of learning strategies used by individuals to acquire behaviours in the wild are poorly understood, despite the presence of behavioural traditions in diverse taxa. Social learning strategies such as conformity can be broadly adaptive, but may also retard the spread of adaptive innovations. Strategies like pay-off-biased learning, by contrast, are effective at diffusing new behaviour but may perform poorly when adaptive behaviour is common. We present a field experiment in a wild primate, Cebus capucinus , that introduced a novel food item and documented the innovation and diffusion of successful extraction techniques. We develop a multilevel, Bayesian statistical analysis that allows us to quantify individual-level evidence for different social and individual learning strategies. We find that pay-off-biased and age-biased social learning are primarily responsible for the diffusion of new techniques. We find no evidence of conformity; instead rare techniques receive slightly increased attention. We also find substantial and important variation in individual learning strategies that is patterned by age, with younger individuals being more influenced by both social information and their own individual experience. The aggregate cultural dynamics in turn depend upon the variation in learning strategies and the age structure of the wild population.

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