The present study investigates the effects of an intervention presenting resolvable, scientific controversies and an epistemological sensitization measure on the changes in psychology students’ epistemological beliefs. Drawing on the notion that the presentation of resolvable scientific controversies induces epistemological doubt and the notion that inducing epistemological doubt is eased in the presence of an epistemological sensitization, we used an epistemological beliefs intervention consisting of five resolvable controversies that were applied in a sample consisting of psychology students. We hypothesized that the intervention would reduce absolutist and multiplist epistemological beliefs while, at the same time, increasing evaluativist beliefs. We also assumed that the epistemological sensitization would enhance the effect of the intervention. For a domain-specific questionnaire, the results indicated a reduction of absolutist epistemological beliefs regardless of the presence of the epistemological sensitization. Unexpectedly, there was a backfire effect indicated by a rise of multiplist beliefs. For a domain- and topic-specific questionnaire, there was no significant reduction of absolutist and multiplist beliefs but a significant increase in evaluativist beliefs when the epistemological sensitization was present. A measure assessing argumentation skills revealed an increase in argumentation skills only when the epistemological sensitization is present. Finally, we discuss limitations, educational implications, and directions for future research.

Although the reciprocal relationship of teacher burnout and teacher self-efficacy (TSE) is well documented, the literature still lacks studies investigating their (latent) changes and interrelations of change over time. By applying a latent change regression model in our study, we aimed to contribute to this research gap by examining changes in burnout and their relations to changes in TSE during the COVID-19 pandemic—a very challenging time for teachers. As the implementation of digital learning material played a major role during the pandemic, we were also interested if attitudes and self-efficacy toward e-Learning were related to changes in burnout and TSE. Our sample consisted of 92 German in-service teachers who completed a questionnaire twice during the 2019–2020 school year. Our main findings are that the burnout components depersonalization and lack of accomplishment significantly increased from the pre- to post-COVID-19 outbreak, whereas emotional exhaustion did not. Changes in burnout were negatively correlated to changes in TSE, but we found little evidence for relations of change in burnout and TSE with variables concerning e-Learning. Our findings indicate that the challenge was not the work overload but rather a lack of resources. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

The aim of this study is to investigate whether worked examples are effective in fostering psychology students' explanation competence. Explanation competence is a context-specific cognitive disposition that enables a person to construct a causal model of an observable psychological phenomenon by drawing on psychological theories. We set up a training intervention using worked examples to demonstrate how the observed psychological phenomenon (e.g., cognitive dissonance) is represented in an explanation. Instructional support was implemented using a fading procedure. We investigated the effects of worked examples on explanation competence using a sample of psychology students (n ¼ 46) from a German university. In an experimental between-group pre-and post-tests design, the participants in the experimental condition received the training intervention, whereas the participants in a control condition did not receive the intervention. The experimental and control groups did not differ in their explanation competence before the training intervention. Participants in the experimental condition had a significant higher explanation competence after the training intervention than the participants in the control condition. Thus, our results indicate that worked examples effectively foster psychology students' explanation competence. Considerations on how the results could be implemented in actual teaching settings are provided.

In this paper, we explain the reasons behind constraint interaction, which is the phenomenon that the results of testing equality constraints may depend heavily on the scaling method used. We find that the scaling methods interfere with the testing procedures because scaling methods determine which transformations of population quantities model parameters actually estimate. We therefore also develop rules on how to correctly interpret estimates of model parameters under alternative scaling methods.

Although the reciprocal relationship of teacher burnout and teacher self-efficacy (TSE) is well documented, the literature still lacks studies investigating their (latent) changes and interrelations of change over time. By applying a latent change regression model in our study, we aimed to contribute to this research gap by examining changes in burnout and their relations to changes in TSE during the COVID-19 pandemic—a very challenging time for teachers. As the implementation of digital learning material played a major role during the pandemic, we were also interested if attitudes and self-efficacy toward e-Learning were related to changes in burnout and TSE. Our sample consisted of 92 German in-service teachers who completed a questionnaire twice during the 2019–2020 school year. Our main findings are that the burnout components depersonalization and lack of accomplishment significantly increased from the pre- to post-COVID-19 outbreak, whereas emotional exhaustion did not. Changes in burnout were negatively correlated to changes in TSE, but we found little evidence for relations of change in burnout and TSE with variables concerning e-Learning. Our findings indicate that the challenge was not the work overload but rather a lack of resources. Implications for research and practice are discussed.