Serious Games provides a thorough exploration of the claim that playing games can provide learning that is deep, sustained and transferable to the real world. "Serious games" is defined herein as any form of interactive computer-based game software for one or multiple players to be used on any platform and that has been developed to provide more than entertainment to players. With this volume, the editors address the gap in exisiting scholarship on gaming, providing an academic overview on the mechanisms and effects of serious games. Contributors investigate the psychological mechanisms that take place not only during gaming, but also in game selection, persistent play, and gaming impact.

The work in this collection focuses on the desirable outcomes of digital game play. The editors distinguish between three possible effects -- learning, development, and change -- covering a broad range of serious games potential impact. Contributions from internationally recognized scholars focus on five objectives:

• Define the area of serious games
• Elaborate on the underlying theories that explain suggested psychological mechanisms elicited through serious game play, addressing cognitive, affective and social processes
• Summarize the empirical evidence on the effectiveness of serious games,
• Introduce innovative research methods as a response to methodological challenges imposed through interactive media
• Discuss the possibilities and limitations of selected applications for educational purposes.

Anchored primarily in social science research, the reader will be introduced to approaches that focus on the gaming process and the users experiences. Additional perspectives will be provided in the concluding chapters, written from non-social science approaches by experts in academic game design and representatives of the gaming industry. The editors acknowledge the necessity for a broader interdisciplinary study of the phenomena and work to overcome the methodological divide in games research to look ahead to a more integrated and interdisciplinary study of digital games.

This timely and singular volume will appeal to scholars, researchers, and graduate students working in media entertainment and game studies in the areas of education, media, communication, and psychology.

This book explores the ways in which discourses of religious, racial, and national identity blur and engage each other in the medieval West. Specifically, the book studies depictions of Muslims in England during the 1330s and argues that these depictions, although historically inaccurate, served to enhance and advance assertions of English national identity at this time. The book examines Saracen characters in a manuscript renowned for the variety of its texts, and discusses hagiographic legends, elaborations of chronicle entries, and popular romances about Charlemagne, Arthur, and various English knights. In these texts, Saracens engage issues such as the demarcation of communal borders, the place of gender norms and religion in communities' self-definitions, and the roles of violence and history in assertions of group identity. Texts involving Saracens thus serve both to assert an English identity, and to explore the challenges involved in making such an assertion in the early fourteenth century when the English language was regaining its cultural prestige, when the English people were increasingly at odds with their French cousins, and when English, Welsh, and Scottish sovereignty were pressing matters.

This book brings together in one volume information about the neurobiological, genetic, and behavioral bases of reading and reading disabilities. In recent years, research on assessment and treatment of reading disability (dyslexia) has become a magnet for the application of new techniques and technologies from neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and cognitive neuroscience. This interdisciplinary fusion has yielded numerous and diverse findings regarding the brain basis of this syndrome, which are discussed in this volume by leading researchers. Intervention approaches based on such research are presented. The book also calls for research in specific directions, to encourage the field to continue moving into the bold frontier of how the brain reads.

The volume is essential reading for a range of researchers, clinicians, and other professionals interested in reading and reading disability, and also commemorates the tenth anniversary of the Extraordinary Brain Conferences hosted by The Dyslexia Foundation.

Preferences are assumed to play a crucial role in many phenomena that are studied in learning psychology, social psychology, consumer science, emotion research, and clinical psychology. Given the pervasive impact that preferences have on behaviour, it is important to know where these likes and dislikes come from. Although some preferences are genetically determined, most stem from learning that took place during the lifetime of the individual. In this special issue, the editors focus on one such type of learning: associative learning of likes and dislikes, that is, changes in liking that are due to the pairing of stimuli. Prior studies on evaluative conditioning have shown that pairing an affectively neutral stimulus with an affectively positive or negative stimulus will change the liking of the originally neutral stimulus. The papers that are part of this special issue explore the relevance of evaluative conditioning for social psychology, provide new data about the impact of contingency awareness, attention, and extinction trials on evaluative conditioning, and examine whether pairing stimuli can also result in the transfer of non-evaluative stimulus properties.

This small set of 3 titles, was first published in 1980 and 1987. The three volumes make important contributions to the study of cognitive process analyses of aptitude; learning and problem-solving; and conative and affective aspects of human performance, in coordination with cognitive psychology. Taken together the editors hoped they would provide at least one solid platform for a more comprehensive integration of cognitive, conative, and affective theory and research in the instructional psychology of the future.

Neal E. Miller's pioneering work in experimental psychology has earned him worldwide respect. This second in a two-volume collection of his work brings together forty-three of Miller's most important and representative essays on learning, motivation, and their physiological mechanisms. They were selected on the basis of their current relevance and their historical significance at the time they were published. In order to emphasize the main themes, essays on a given topic have been grouped together.

"Learning, Motivation, and Their Physiological Mechanisms" begins when the author first discovered the thrill of designing and executing experiments to get clear-cut answers concerning the behavior of children and of rats. The first study was one of the earliest ones on the behavioral effects of the recently synthesized male hormone, testosterone. The second was one of the earliest studies demonstrating the value of using a variety of behavioral techniques to investigate the motivational effects of a physiological intervention. The next studies investigated the satisfying and rewarding effects of food or water in the stomach versus in the mouth and the thirst-inducing and reducing effects of hyper- and hypotonic solutions, respectively, injected into the brain. The last study describes a technique devised for extending the analysis of the mechanism of hunger to the effects of humoral factors in the blood.

The study is completed with an examination of trial-and-error learning that was motivated by direct electrical stimulation of the brain and rewarded by the termination of such stimulation. Other studies show that the stimulation via such electrodes not only elicits eating, but also has the principal motivational characteristics of normal hunger. The conclusion deals with a series of experiments that overthrows strong traditional beliefs by proving that glandular and visceral responses mediated by the autonomic nervous system are subject to instrumental learning, which can be made quite specific.

Psychologists have spent thousands of years studying the learning processes of the white rat, yet until recently they have neglected the laboratory of everyday social behavior for studying learning in man. In this book the leading experts in learning theory and pharmacology examine the role of learning mechanisms in smoking. The results provide new insights into the study of learning and determine new directions for future research on smoking and its control.

Two opening essays establish the framework for the volume. One is a thorough review of research on controlling smoking behavior, and the other is a review of findings on the personality of the smoker and the non-smoker. A second part includes four essays. The first discusses the role played by habit in smoking, defining habit in terms of "fixed behavior patterns, over learned to the point of becoming automatic, and marked by decreasing awareness and increasing dependency on secondary rather than primary reinforcement." The second discusses mechanisms of self-control, concentrating on humiliation or the realization of "membership in an ethically repugnant class" as one typical means of achieving such control. The third is an excellent statement of the reinforcement position, and the fourth discusses the role of nicotine as an addictive agent. Part three presents the views of sociologists on smoking behavior and goes on to discuss the effects of prolonged alcohol ingestion on the eating, drinking, and smoking patterns of chronic alcoholics.

In its new approach to the study of smoking and learning behavior this book is of continuing interest to psychologists, psychiatrists, medical doctors, public health officers, teachers--anyone interested in the scientific study and practical control of smoking behavior. It is valuable collateral reading for courses in experimental psychology, social psychology, and health education on both the undergraduate and graduate levels.

"William A. Hunt" (1903-1986) was professor of psychology at Loyola University, Chicago. He was also chairman of the Department of Psychology at Northwestern University. During World War II, he headed the Navy's clinical psychology program. He has served as a member of the Medical Advisory Group to the Administrator of Veterans Affairs, the Army's Scientific Advisory Panel, and the Community Research and Resources Panel of the National Institutes of Mental Health, as well as being for many years a consultant to the Surgeons General of both the Army and Navy.

Learning is among the most basic of human activities. The study of, and research into, learning forms a central part of educational studies. The well-respected and established authors, Jarvis and Parker, not only focus on the psychological processes of human learning, but they also examine the importance of the relationship between the body and the mind. For the first time, this book considers how our neurological, biological, emotional and spiritual faculties all impact on human learning. Topics covered include: the biology of learning personality and human learning thinking and learning styles gender and human learning life cycle development and human learning emotional intelligence and learning morality and human learning learning in the social context. Drawing on material from the worlds of science and social science, and with contributions from international authors, this book will be of interest to academics in a wide range of disciplines.

The present special issue presents an overview of recent developments and controversies in research on human contingency learning. Contributions range from purely fundamental, theoretical analyses, over empirically oriented reports, to more applied contributions, reflecting the breadth of scope of contemporary research on human contingency learning. Taken together, these papers attest to the richness and diversity of current research on human contingency learning and identify key issues to be addressed in future research.

'Sarma's book may be the most important work on education written this century' - Skeptic As the head of Open Learning at MIT, Sanjay Sarma has a daunting job description: to fling open the doors of the MIT experience for the benefit of the wider world. But if you're going to undertake such an ambitious project, you must first ask: How exactly does learning work? What conditions are most conducive? Are our traditional classroom methods - lecture, homework, test, repeat - actually effective? And if not, which techniques are? Grasp takes readers across multiple frontiers, from fundamental neuroscience to cognitive psychology and beyond, as it explores the future of learning. For instance: * Scientists are studying the role of forgetting, exposing it not as a simple failure of memory but a critical weapon in our learning arsenal * New developments in neuroimaging are helping us understand how reading works in the brain. It's become possible to identify children who might benefit from specialised dyslexia interventions - before they learn to read * Many schools have begun converting to flipped classrooms, in which you watch a lesson at home, then do your 'homework' in class Along the way, Sarma debunks long-held views such as the noxious idea of 'learning styles,' while equipping readers with a set of practical tools for absorbing and retaining information across a lifetime of learning. He presents a vision for learning that's more inclusive and democratic - revealing a world bursting with powerful learners, just waiting for the chance they deserve. Drawing from the author's experience as an educator and the work of researchers and educational innovators at MIT and beyond, Grasp offers scientific and practical insight, promising not just to inform and entertain readers but to open their minds.

In the World Library of Educationalists series, international experts themselves compile career-long collections of what they judge to be their finest pieces--extracts from books, key articles, salient research findings, major theoretical and/practical contributions--so the work can read them in a single manageable volume. Readers will be able to follow the themes and strands of their work and see their contribution to the development of a field.
A developmental psychologist by training, Howard Gardner has spent the last 30 years researching, thinking and writing about the development and education of the mind. He has contributed over 30 years researching, thinking and writing about the development and education of the mind. He has contributed over 30 books and 700 articles to the field. He is best known for his critique of the notion that intelligence is one single human intelligence that can be assessed through psychometric tests. Instead Gardner developed the theory of "multiple intelligence" which states that an individual has eight relatively autonomous intelligence:
- Language
- Music
- Emotional
- Logical-mathematical
- Spatial
- Kinesthetic
- Creative
- Interpersonal (understanding oneself)
This theory has proved popular, particularly with those who see the IQ testing a relatively narrow set of abilities.
In this book, he brings together over 20 of his key writings in one place. The book begins with a specially written Introduction, which gives an overview of Howard's career and contextualizes his selection in this book. Through his selection we can see the development of his thinking as well as the development of the field. This is the onlybook that offers this insight into this great scholar's work.

This book explores the ways in which discourses of religious, racial, and national identity blur and engage each other in the medieval West. Specifically, the book studies depictions of Muslims in England during the 1330s and argues that these depictions, although historically inaccurate, served to enhance and advance assertions of English national identity at this time. The book examines Saracen characters in a manuscript renowned for the variety of its texts, and discusses hagiographic legends, elaborations of chronicle entries, and popular romances about Charlemagne, Arthur, and various English knights. In these texts, Saracens engage issues such as the demarcation of communal borders, the place of gender norms and religion in communities' self-definitions, and the roles of violence and history in assertions of group identity. Texts involving Saracens thus serve both to assert an English identity, and to explore the challenges involved in making such an assertion in the early fourteenth century when the English language was regaining its cultural prestige, when the English people were increasingly at odds with their French cousins, and when English, Welsh, and Scottish sovereignty were pressing matters.

Learning is among the most basic of human activities. The study of, and research into, learning forms a central part of educational studies. The well-respected and established authors, Jarvis and Parker, not only focus on the psychological processes of human learning, but they also examine the importance of the relationship between the body and the mind. For the first time, this book considers how our neurological, biological, emotional and spiritual faculties all impact on human learning.
Topics covered include:

• the biology of learning
• personality and human learning
• thinking and learning styles
• gender and human learning
• life cycle development and human learning
• emotional intelligence and learning
• morality and human learning
• learning in the social context.

Drawing on material from the worlds of science and social science, and with contributions from international authors, this book will be of interest to academics in a wide range of disciplines.

Designed for educators, researchers, practitioners, or anyone interested in maximizing human potential, Motivation for Learning and Performance outlines 50 key motivation principles based on the latest scientific evidence from the disciplines of psychology, education, business, athletics, and neurology. Using a highly applied and conversational style, the book is designed to inform the reader about how to diagnosis, analyze, and mediate learning and performance challenges influenced by motivation. The book features chapters on the biopsychology of motivation, how motivation changes across the lifespan, and the important influence of culture on motivated behavior. Three chapters are devoted to practical strategies and the implementation of motivational change. Special sections are included on enhancing motivation at work, in the classroom, in competitive environments, and during online education. Hoffman employs the innovative approach of using his interviews with "real" people including many notable personalities across diverse cultures and disciplines to illustrate motivated behavior. For example, readers will learn what motivated the colossal investment fraud masterminded by Bernie Madoff, the intimate thoughts of former NFL superstar Nick Lowery when he missed a field goal, and the joys and tribulations of Emmy-nominated "Curb your Enthusiasm" actress Cheryl Hines. The book provides a practical, applied, and multi-disciplinary resource for anyone interested in motivation and performance, but especially for university students at the graduate or undergraduate level studying education, psychology, business, leadership, hospitality, sports management, or military science. Additionally, the writing style and eclectic nature of the text will appeal to readers of non-fiction who can use the book to gain self-awareness to enhance performance of themselves or others.

This is the first book to provide a detailed overview and analysis of autodidactism, or self-education. Autodidacts' strong preference for teaching themselves is likely to manifest itself, in childhood, as a pronounced resistance to formal schooling. However, in later life, an autodidact's passion for learning will emerge as they participate in open or distance learning or even take responsibility for devising, structuring and following their own programme of education.
Beginning and ending with comprehensive and stimulating discussions of learning theories, The Passion to Learn includes fourteen case studies of autodidactism in informal learning situations, all written by authors with specialised knowledge. These wide-ranging case studies reflect the inherent diversity of autodidactism, yet four common themes emerge: emotional/ cognitive balance; learning environment; life mission; and ownership of learning. The final chapter addresses the implications of autodidactism for educational theory, research, philosophy and psychology.
This inquiry into autodidactism provides fresh insight into the motivation to learn. It shows how closely cognition, emotion and sensory perception act together in learning processes and draws upon memory studies, neurobiology, complexity theory and philosophy to illuminate the findings. At a time when such issues as participation in education, lifelong learning and alternative, non-formal modes of teaching and learning are in the forefront of international educational discourse, this fascinating, inspiring and timely book will be of great interest to anyone involved in the practice or policy of teaching and learning.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203329104

Here Hans Eysenck applies the principles of modern learning theory to account for the observed phenomena of hysteria and anxiety. Such principles were initially developed through the experiments and theories of Pavlov, Hull, and Tolman. When "The Dynamics of Anxiety and Hysteria" initially appeared, these were considered the most advanced, relevant, and applicable to the subject matter. They have not been superseded by later work.
"The Dynamics of Anxiety and Hysteria" has never been published in the United States. It was the fifth book Eysenck authored as part of a series of experimental studies and theoretical work carried out under the auspices of the Institute of Psychiatry at the University of London. Two of the first four books-"Dimensions of Personality" and "The Psychology of Politics," have been reissued with new introductions. These focus on dimensional analysis of personality based on experimental and empirical studies.
The present work, on the other hand, goes beyond classification to a study of dynamics; from nosology to aetiology; from description to causation. Eysenck scientifically explores such topics as learning theory and human behavior, personality and learning theory; personality and perceptual processes, socialization and personality, drugs and personality, and psychological theory and psychiatric practice.
This volume, which complements Transaction's other new editions of Eysenck's groundbreaking work, will be of lasting significance to psychologists, psychiatrists, behavioralists, and students of personality disorders. He provided for modern psychology the empirical foundations of themes that previosly were the monopoly of psychoanalysis.
Hans J. Eysenck (1916-1997), a professor of psychology at the University of London and the director of its psychological department at the Institute of Psychiatry, was best known for his experimental researches in the field of personality. He was a prolific author and wrote, among others, "Rebel with a Cause, Dimensions of Personality," and "Intelligence," all available from Transaction.

Since its first edition, An Introduction to Theories of Learning has provided a uniquely sweeping review of the major learning theories from the 20th century that profoundly influenced the field of psychology. In this tenth edition, the authors present further experimental evidence that tests many of the fundamental ideas presented in these classic theories, as well as explore many of the advances in psychological science and neuroscience that have yielded greater insight into the processes that underlie learning in human beings and animals. The four main goals of this text are to define learning and to show how the learning process is studied (Chapters 1 and 2), to place learning theory in historical perspective (Chapter 3), and to present essential features of the major theories of learning with implications for educational practices (Chapters 4 through 16). The authors retained the best features of earlier editions while making revisions that reflect current research and scholarship, including coverage of active learning and the testing effect, information for problem solving in ravens, data illustrating the neurobiological basis of the cognitive map and spatial learning, new research on brain plasticity and its role in learning as well as the impact of poverty on brain and cognitive development, and new evidence that challenges the notion of learning styles. Complete with chapter summaries, discussion questions, and a glossary, this text is essential reading for theories of learning and applied cognitive psychology courses. See "Support Material" below for new online resources. Instructor resources include PowerPoint slides and a testbank containing over 500 questions (in both Microsoft Word and GIFT file formats). Student resources include chapter summaries, discussion questions, and a glossary of key terms.

Can you learn without knowing it? This controversial and much debated question forms the basis of this collection of essays as the authors discuss whether the measurable changes in behaviour that result from learning can ever remain entirely unconscious. Three issues central to the topic of implicit learning are raised. Firstly, the extent to which learning can be unconscious, and therefore implicit, is considered. Secondly, theories are developed regarding the nature of knowledge acquired in implicit learning situations. Finally, the idea that there are two separable independent processing systems in the brain, for implicit and explicit learning, is considered.
Implicit Learning and Consciousness challenges conventional wisdom and presents the most up-to-date studies to define, quantify and test the predictions of the main models of implicit learning. The chapters include a variety of research from computer modelling, experimental psychology and neural imaging to the clinical data resulting from work with amnesics. The result is a topical book that provides an overview of the debate on implicit learning, and the various philosophical, psychological and neurological frameworks in which it can be placed. It will be of interest to undergraduates, postgraduates and the philosophical, psychological and modeling research community.

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The model system of eyeblink classical conditioning in humans has enormous potential for the understanding and application of fundamental principles of learning. This collection makes classical conditioning accessible to teachers and researchers in a number of ways. The first aim is to present the latest developments in theory building. Second, as background for the current directions, Eyeblink Classical Conditioning, Volume I presents an overview of a large body of previously published research on eyeblink classical conditioning. Last, the authors describe eyeblink classical conditioning techniques. Each chapter includes a highlighted methods section so that interested readers can replicate techniques for teaching and research.

Originally published in 1987, Being Skilled presents a new model of how children learn to read, and in particular those who learn quickly and precociously. Bringing together ideas from such diverse sources as cognitive and developmental psychology and behaviour analysis perspectives on learning, Stuart McNaughton has produced a more complete theory based on a study of homes and classrooms, and the characteristics of reading behaviour in these settings. Within this theory reading is seen as a symbolic skill with structural properties that partly determine development; but it is also a social practice, in which learning is achieved through problem-solving and the performing of tasks set by particular environments. Drawing on extensive research carried out in Britain, North America and Australasia, McNaughton examines how interactions between teacher and child direct the task of learning to read, and how the relationship between home and school can be a well-matched or a poorly-matched setting in which learning may occur. Being Skilled will appeal to advanced students, researchers and theorists in education and development psychology and to anyone interested in the learning of complex skills.

Bringing together neurological assessments of reading and cognition, this provocative volume, originally published in 1985, presents eight major and sometimes controversial studies on the parts and patterns of the reading process. With comprehensive coverage ranging from psycholinguistics and education to neurophysiology, these studies highlight new directions in the field at the time. The contributors support an interactive rather than dichotomous model of brain function, and stress individual differences in assessing reading and cognitive skills.

What is the impact of the family environment on us, particularly with regard to our intellectual functioning? Does the role of early family environment wear off, as some researchers have suggested, or does it maintain or possibly even become more important as we grow older? This book examines the interrelationship between family environment and intellectual functioning in a lifespan perspective. Covering a wide range of topics, it provides the most comprehensive and up-to-date examination of life-span family influences on various aspects of intellectual function.
For cognitive, development/lifespan, and educational psychologists, and scholars studying the family and its influences, this volume will help:
*students learn about family effects;
*researchers update themselves in this active area of investigation;
*therapists understand problems in intellectual functioning in their clients and in treating these clients successfully; and
*educators gain a better grasp on how the students they teach are products not only of their genes and environments, in general, but of their family environments, in particular.

Originally published in 1994. Until this book was published, the application of computers to educational practice has received little input from psychological theory. Computers and the Collaborative Experience of Learning locates this topic within the contemporary movement of socio-cultural theory, drawing on the writing of Vygotsky and others. Charles Crook reviews psychological approaches to cognition and learning, in so far as they implicitly direct strategy in respect of computer-based learning. He also takes a novel stance in considering how new technology can enhance rather than undermine the social experience of learning and instruction, and can allow teachers to achieve more in the classroom. He argues that computers can provide the conditions for effective collaboration and enhance the social dimension of education. With its unique blend of theory and practice, from the primary school to university settings, Computers and the Collaborative Experience of Learning will be of interest to educational psychologists, as well as psychologists studying group processes, cognition and development.

The ability to learn is of crucial importance in human life, but understanding this ability has proved to be difficult. There have been many attempts to formulate scientific theories based on both animal experiments and human experience; and these have been applied to education and the treatment of psychological disturbance, with a certain amount of success. Originally published in 1984, this incisive guide to the research and its outcomes provides the background to one of the most debated topics in psychology today. Learning Theory and Behaviour Modification introduces the work of major figures, such as Pavlov and Skinner, which has strongly influenced theories in educational and clinical psychology, and formed the basis of the techniques known as 'behaviour modification'. As well as giving examples of these techniques the author relates new ideas about the scope and limits of behaviour modification to recent changes in the views of learning theorists. How much can experiments on animals tell us about human psychology?

Originally published in 1976, this title is an edited volume and reflects the major approaches being taken in structural learning at the time. Chapter 1 deals with the basic question of whether competence (knowledge) should be characterized in terms of rules (automata), on the one hand, or associations on the other. The bulk of Chapter 2 is devoted to a series of earlier experiments on rule learning by the editor and his associates. The two contributions in Chapter 3 deal with graph theoretical models. Piagetian models constitute the subject of Chapter 4. Chapter 5 deals with attempts to stimulate human behaviour with a computer. Chapter 6 ranges over a wide variety of competence models, with particular reference to logic and mathematics. In Chapter 7 the editor proposes a new theory of structural learning, together with some empirical results.