The schoolwork engagement inventory: Energy, Dedication, and Absorption is a measure of students' engagement in schoolwork and has been demonstrated valid in Western student populations. In this study, we adapted this inventory to and tested its psychometric appropriates in Chinese upper secondary school students. Participants were 1,527 general high school students and 850 vocational high school students. The mean age of the total sample was 16.21 years. The results of confirmatory factor analyses showed that a modified one-factor model fitted the (...) data best. The results of the multigroup CFA showed that the factor structure was metrically invariant across school tracks and scalarly invariant across gender and school types. Moreover, schoolwork engagement was negatively related to emotional exhaustion and positively related to self-efficacy, perseverance of effort, teacher–student relationships, and life satisfaction. Overall, the CEDA can be regarded as a valid measure for the assessment of student engagement in the Chinese upper secondary school context. (shrink)

As a branch of statistical latent variable modeling, multidimensional item response theory plays an important role in psychometrics. Multidimensional graded response model is a key model for the development of multidimensional computerized adaptive testing with graded-response data and multiple traits. This paper explores how to automatically identify the item-trait patterns of replenished items based on the MGRM in MCAT. The problem is solved by developing an exploratory pattern recognition method for graded-response items based on the least absolute shrinkage and selection (...) operator, which is named LPRM-GR and facilitates the subsequent parameter estimation of replenished items and helps maintaining the effectiveness of item replenishment in MCAT. In conjunction with the proposed approach, the regular BIC and weighted BIC are applied, respectively, to select the optimal item-trait patterns. Simulation for evaluating the LPRM-GR in pattern recognition accuracy of replenished items and the corresponding item estimation accuracy is conducted under multiple conditions across different numbers with respect to dimensionality, response-category numbers, latent trait correlation, stopping rules, and item selection criteria. Results show that the proposed method with the two types of BIC both have good performance in pattern recognition for item replenishment in the two- to four-dimensional MCAT with the MGRM, for which the weighted BIC is generally superior to the regular BIC. The proposed method has relatively high accuracy and efficiency in identifying the patterns of graded-response items, and has the advantages of easy implementation and practical feasibility. (shrink)

Second/foreign language teaching has been found as one of the most emotional professions worldwide. To generate optimal academic outcomes and run an effective education, teachers and students’ emotions and feelings must be positively cared for. Given the significance of emotions in L2 education, many studies have followed positive psychology and examined various positive constructs. Nevertheless, love, as a PP variable, has been ignored in education due to its cultural/religious sensitivities. Trying to dispel the myths, recently, a new trend called a (...) “loving pedagogy” has started to find itself a place in second language acquisition research and practice. Yet, proposing a model of its application and an agenda for its research has been overlooked by scholars in this domain. Motivated by this lacuna, this research article provided the conceptualization, definitions, research bases, practical models, and implications of a loving pedagogy for SLA practitioners and future researchers. (shrink)

During the pandemic lockdown period, residents had to stay at home and increased stress and other mental health problems have been associated with the lockdown period. Since most public parks were closed, community parks within gated residential areas became the most important green space in Chinese cities, and the use of such space might help to reduce the residents’ stress levels. This study aimed to investigate to what extent urban residents in China used community parks, engaged in outdoor activity during (...) the lockdown period and if the use of such spaces helped to reduce their stress levels. An online questionnaire survey was carried out from 23 March to 23 April 2020. Ordinary Least Squares regression was used to analyse the association between community park use, outdoor activity, willingness to engage in outdoor activity, and stress level. All results have been further analysed by two-sampled t-test to explore the difference between young and old age groups. We found that the overall self-reported stress level of the respondents was relatively moderate during the lockdown period. Respondents had generally reduced their use of community parks and engagement in outdoor activity. There was no significant association between stress level and the use of community parks or the engagement in outdoor activities. However, we found that older people showed much lower stress levels, used community parks more frequently, and engaged in more outdoor activities than younger adults. The findings suggest that outdoor activities and spatial characteristics in urban China differ from Western studies and advance the need to integrate the stress management role of community parks with urban green space policy to optimise the use of community parks blended in with everyday life, particularly during the lockdown period. (shrink)