We have designed a flexible ecological momentary assessment/intervention smartphone (EMA/EMI) “app”. We examine the utility of this app for collecting real-time data, and assessing intra-subject variability, by using it to assess how freshman undergraduates spend their time. We also explore whether its use can promote greater self-awareness. Participants were randomly divided into an experimental group, who used the app, and a control group, who did not. We used the app to collect both randomized in-the-moment data as well as end-of-day data to assess time use. Using a posttest survey we asked participants questions about how they spent time throughout the school semester. We also asked the experimental group about their experience with the app. Among other findings, 80.49% participants indicated that they became more aware of how they spent their time using the app. Corroborating this report, among the experimental group, end-of-semester self-assessment of time spent wasted, and time spent using electronics recreationally, predicted semester GPA at a strength comparable to high school GPA and ACT score (two of the best single predictors for first semester college GPA), but had no correlation among controls. We discuss the advantages and limitations of using apps, such as ours, for EMA and/or EMI.
Positive interventions have shown promise for fostering hedonic (happiness) and eudaimonic (flourishing) well-being. However, few studies have focused on positive interventions that target hope as a means of increasing well-being, and none have examined the use of smartphone app-based systems for delivering interventions in the moments and contexts of daily life—an approach called ecological momentary intervention (EMI). We conducted a quasi-experimental pilot study using a pretest and posttest design to examine the feasibility and potential impact of a mobile app-based hope EMI. Participants appeared to engage with the intervention and found the experience to be user-friendly, helpful, and enjoyable. Relative to the control group, those receiving the intervention demonstrated significantly greater increases in hope; however, there were no between-group differences in hedonic and eudaimonic well-being. The authors recommend future research to examine the potential of EMI mobile apps to cultivate hope and promote flourishing.
Consistent with virtue theory, some individuals' reports were indicative of a probabilistic tendency toward compassion, and ESM compassion predicted ESM eudaimonia and pro-social behavior toward those in need.
Numerous studies show empathic concern promotes altruistic motivation and prosocial behavior. Here, we discuss empathic concern, its relation to altruistic motivation, and how empathic concern is invoked in experimental studies. We do this with an eye toward applying laboratory techniques in the classroom, and everyday life, to foster empathic concern and altruistic responding. This goes beyond teaching about empathic concern to setting up conditions that help people experience this psychological state, and its benefits, firsthand. Smartphone-based ecological momentary interventions (EMIs) can help us do this by raising self-and other-awareness, and by promoting empathic states and practices in daily life. While smartphones often pull us away from direct personal interaction, we explore ways of using these devices to redirect our attention to those around us. We end by suggesting that these ways of helping people regularly experience and act upon empathic concern in daily life might help nurture a compassionate disposition.
Educators intent on helping their students seek and live in God's kingdom will find this book inspiring and practical. Cairney presents a Christian pedagogy for reaching this goal, for teachers of young and old, serving in places religious and secular. Lessons from a kindergarten class find university application, and vice versa. Educators accustomed to explaining how their situations (I teach Y; I work at Z) exempt them from trying the ideas of another educator might reperceive their reasons as excuses. This is largely because Cairney has walked out the implications of his theology with attention to context and student uniqueness. Cairney outlines a Christian pedagogy to help students desire God's kingdom. Once students want the kingdom of God, they will seek it, find it, and involve themselves in it. Not all this takes place in the classroom. To cultivate character and stay focused on God's activity and purposes, educators need to engage the multiple communities students participate in, and help them reflect on how these communities are shaping what they want and pursue. One way Christian educators can do this is by helping ''students see, respond to, and navigate all of the practices of life (Christian and non-Christian), with a telos that is shaped by and directed toward the kingdom of God'' (pp. 91-92). Cairney defines education as ''the whole life of a community, and the experience of its members learning to live this life together, from the standpoint of a specific goal'' (p. 13). At my university, the men's basketball team exemplifies this orientation. Their first goal is discipleship to Christ. The coaches disciple every player, recruit for attitude more than ability, and structure practices and meetings to build character. Together they seek God's kingdom, more enlivened by their steady pursuit of Christ than by their national championships.This kind of orientation toward God (and his purposes) calls for a Christian pedagogy that inclines community members to seek God's kingdom. Among other things, this pedagogy comprises a ''collective shaping of the habits, beliefs, knowledge, dispositions, actions, and words' ' (p. 18). A Christian pedagogy will juxtapose God's kingdom with other purposes and practices, but this will depend
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