No abstract

No abstract

Background Among the factors known to influence reading development and performance, attitude toward reading is shown to be particularly critical for developing learners. Reading attitude enhances independent reading, levels of engagement in classroom reading activities, and the amount and variety of topics in reading, which in turn influence reading skills and strategies. Reading attitude is an important element in students’ active engagement and achievement in reading. Purpose The first purpose of this study was to test whether Korean students’ home literacy resources, parental support and parents’ reading attitude, and teachers’ use of instructional strategies in relation to reading could predict Korean students’ reading attitude. The second purpose was to test a model linking family- and school-related factors, reading attitude, and reading behaviors and learning strategy use as outcomes. Specifically, we hypothesized that positive and negative attitudes toward reading would mediate the relationships between home, parent, and teacher variables and reading outcomes. Design Using a nationally representative sample from the PISA 2009 database, we tested two structural equation models. Because there were two categories of outcomes examined in this study, we fitted the model separately for each outcome category. The first model (Reading Behavior Model) included reading activities such as reading for enjoyment, reading diversity, and online reading as outcome variables. The second model (Learning Strategy Model) shared the same model structure with the first one except that the outcome variables were use of learning strategies such as memorization, elaboration, and control. In both models, reading attitudes were hypothesized to mediate the relationship between contextual factors (i.e. gender, home resources, parental and teacher influences) and the reading/learning outcomes. Conclusions Gender, books and other types of literacy resources in the home, and parents’ attitudes toward reading functioned as consistent predictors of Korean students’ positive and negative attitudes toward reading. Among the contextual factors, parents’ reading attitude and parental support for reading directly as well as indirectly predicted students’ reading behaviors via students’ reading attitude. Parental support for reading and teachers’ instruction and assignment strategies in reading directly predicted students’ use of learning strategies as well. Positive attitudes toward reading also predicted students’ use of memorization, elaboration, and control strategies. Thus, reading attitude was an important mediator between parent- and teacher-related contextual factors and reading/learning engagement of Korean adolescents.

The current study compared the effects of informative and confirmatory feedback on brain activation during negative feedback processing. For confirmatory feedback trials, participants were informed that they had failed the task, whereas informative feedback trials presented task relevant information along with the notification of their failure. Fourteen male undergraduates performed a series of spatial-perceptual tasks and received feedback while their brain activity was recorded. During confirmatory feedback trials, greater activations in the amygdala, dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, and the thalamus (including the habenular) were observed in response to incorrect responses. These results suggest that confirmatory feedback induces negative emotional reactions to failure. In contrast, informative feedback trials elicited greater activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) when participants experienced failure. Further psychophysiological interaction (PPI) analysis revealed a negative coupling between the DLPFC and the amygdala during informative feedback relative to confirmatory feedback trials. These findings suggest that providing task-relevant information could facilitate implicit down-regulation of negative emotions following failure.

Background Among the factors known to influence reading development and performance, attitude toward reading is shown to be particularly critical for developing learners. Reading attitude enhances independent reading, levels of engagement in classroom reading activities, and the amount and variety of topics in reading, which in turn influence reading skills and strategies. Reading attitude is an important element in students’ active engagement and achievement in reading. Purpose The first purpose of this study was to test whether Korean students’ home literacy resources, parental support and parents’ reading attitude, and teachers’ use of instructional strategies in relation to reading could predict Korean students’ reading attitude. The second purpose was to test a model linking family- and school-related factors, reading attitude, and reading behaviors and learning strategy use as outcomes. Specifically, we hypothesized that positive and negative attitudes toward reading would mediate the relationships between home, parent, and teacher variables and reading outcomes. Design Using a nationally representative sample from the PISA 2009 database, we tested two structural equation models. Because there were two categories of outcomes examined in this study, we fitted the model separately for each outcome category. The first model (Reading Behavior Model) included reading activities such as reading for enjoyment, reading diversity, and online reading as outcome variables. The second model (Learning Strategy Model) shared the same model structure with the first one except that the outcome variables were use of learning strategies such as memorization, elaboration, and control. In both models, reading attitudes were hypothesized to mediate the relationship between contextual factors (i.e. gender, home resources, parental and teacher influences) and the reading/learning outcomes. Conclusions Gender, books and other types of literacy resources in the home, and parents’ attitudes toward reading functioned as consistent predictors of Korean students’ positive and negative attitudes toward reading. Among the contextual factors, parents’ reading attitude and parental support for reading directly as well as indirectly predicted students’ reading behaviors via students’ reading attitude. Parental support for reading and teachers’ instruction and assignment strategies in reading directly predicted students’ use of learning strategies as well. Positive attitudes toward reading also predicted students’ use of memorization, elaboration, and control strategies. Thus, reading attitude was an important mediator between parent- and teacher-related contextual factors and reading/learning engagement of Korean adolescents.