Right or wrong? How feedback content and source influence children's mathematics performance and persistence.

The current study examined how different features of corrective feedback influenced children's performance and motivational outcomes on a mathematics task. Elementary school-aged children from the United States (N = 130; Mage = 7.61 years; 35% female; 60% White) participated in a Zoom session with a trained researcher. During the learning activity, children solved a series of mathematical equivalence problems and were assigned to different feedback conditions that varied in feedback content (correct answer alone vs. correct answer with verification) and feedback source (computer alone vs. computer with person). In terms of content, feedback with verification cues led to decreased persistence, decreased strategy variability, and higher reliance on entrenched strategies relative to feedback that contained the correct answer alone. In terms of source, feedback from the computer alone enhanced children's accuracy; however, the most resilient children received feedback from the computer and a person. Findings are discussed in light of existing feedback theories.

Vitamin D Status Is Associated with Intestinal Inflammation as Measured by Fecal Calprotectin in Crohn's Disease in Clinical Remission.

BACKGROUND: Vitamin D, as potential immune modulator, has been implicated as an environmental risk factor for Crohn's disease (CD). Vitamin D status may be associated with disease risk, severity, activity, and progression. While associations between circulating 25OHD and markers of disease activity and inflammation in CD have been reported, the results are inconsistent. AIM: To determine the association between vitamin D status and markers of disease activity and inflammation in CD. METHODS: One hundred and nineteen CD patients' active and inactive diseases were enrolled in the cross-sectional study. Subject demographics and clinical data were collected. A serum sample was collected for 25OHD and CRP analysis, and a stool sample was collected for fecal calprotectin (FC) measurement. RESULTS: The mean serum 25OHD concentration of the group was 59.8 (24.9) nmol/L. After controlling for confounding variables, serum 25OHD inversely correlated with FC (r = -0.207, P = 0.030), particularly among those in clinical remission (r = -0.242, P = 0.022). The association between FC and 25OHD was further confirmed by linear regression (r = 31.3 %, P < 0.001). FC was lower in patients with 25OHD levels ≥75 nmol/L compared with levels <25 nmol/L [FC: 32.2 (16.3-98.2) vs 100.0 (34.4-213.5) µg/g, P = 0.004]. In the current study, however, 25OHD was not significantly associated with either CRP or CDAI. CONCLUSION: Circulating 25OHD was significantly inversely associated with intestinal inflammation as determined by FC in CD. Subgroup analysis confirmed the association among those in clinical remission, but not in those with active disease. 25OHD was not associated with disease activity score (CDAI) or systemic inflammation (CRP). Vitamin D intervention studies are warranted to determine whether raising serum 25OHD levels in patients with CD may reduce intestinal inflammation as measured by FC.

Expecting the Unexpected: Infants Use Others' Surprise to Revise Their Own Expectations.

Human infants show systematic responses to events that violate their expectations. Can they also revise these expectations based on others' expressions of surprise? Here we ask whether infants (N = 156, mean = 15.2 months, range: 12.0-18.0 months) can use an experimenter's expression of surprise to revise their own expectations about statistically probable vs. improbable events. An experimenter sampled a ball from a box of red and white balls and briefly displayed either a surprised or an unsurprised expression at the outcome before revealing it to the infant. Following an unsurprised expression, the results were consistent with prior work; infants looked longer at a statistically improbable outcome than a probable outcome. Following a surprised expression, however, this standard pattern disappeared or was even reversed. These results suggest that even before infants can observe the unexpected events themselves, they can use others' surprise to expect the unexpected. Starting early in life, human learners can leverage social information that signals others' prediction error to update their own predictions.

Feelings on feedback: Children's emotional responses during mathematics problem solving.

Theories of learning emphasize the importance of both the cognitive and affective state of the learner. The current study focused on children's affective reactions to corrective feedback during mathematics problem solving. Eighty-seven elementary school children (M age = 7.6 years, 41% female, 68% White) solved mathematical equivalence problems during an online video call and received trial-by-trial feedback on their answers. Trained researchers used children's facial expressions, tone of voice, and verbal statements to quantify their positive and negative affect on each trial. Overall, children tended to express more positive affect than negative affect. However, negative affect was more prominent when the child was incorrect and received negative feedback, and higher negative affect was associated with lower accuracy and lower persistence on the task. These results provide novel empirical evidence for the role of emotions during children's STEM learning in a non-evaluative context.

A developmental perspective on feedback: How corrective feedback influences children's literacy, mathematics, and problem solving.

Research in psychology and education indicates that corrective feedback can be a powerful learning tool. We provide a developmental perspective to focus specifically on how corrective feedback influences learning in childhood (~ages 3-11). Based on a systematic search, we review 44 empirical papers published between 1990 and 2022 examining the effects of corrective feedback on children's performance in the domains of literacy (n=18), mathematics (n=14), and problem solving (n=12). Across these domains, we synthesize research on how children respond to lessons and practice with, versus without, corrective feedback to provide theoretical and practical insights into (1) the effectiveness of corrective feedback in early childhood, (2) the features of effective feedback messages at different ages, and (3) the role of individual learner differences. We make several novel recommendations with some focused on future research questions and others focused on ways teachers can provide effective feedback to children.

Predicting pragmatic cue integration in adults' and children's inferences about novel word meanings.

Language is learned in complex social settings where listeners must reconstruct speakers' intended meanings from context. To navigate this challenge, children can use pragmatic reasoning to learn the meaning of unfamiliar words. A critical challenge for pragmatic reasoning is that it requires integrating multiple information sources, which have typically been studied separately. Here we study this integration process. First, we experimentally isolate two sources of pragmatic information: expectations about informative communication and common ground. Next, we use a probabilistic model of conversational reasoning to formalize how these information sources should be combined and how this process might develop. We use this model to generate quantitative predictions, which we test against new experimental data from 3- to 5-year-old children (N = 243) and adults (N = 694). Results show close alignment between model predictions and data. Furthermore, the model provided a better explanation of the data compared with simpler alternative models assuming that participants selectively ignore one information source. This work integrates distinct sets of findings regarding information sources for early language learning and suggests that pragmatic reasoning models can provide a quantitative framework for understanding developmental changes in language learning. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

How young children integrate information sources to infer the meaning of words.

Before formal education begins, children typically acquire a vocabulary of thousands of words. This learning process requires the use of many different information sources in their social environment, including their current state of knowledge and the context in which they hear words used. How is this information integrated? We specify a developmental model according to which children consider information sources in an age-specific way and integrate them via Bayesian inference. This model accurately predicted 2-5-year-old children's word learning across a range of experimental conditions in which they had to integrate three information sources. Model comparison suggests that the central locus of development is an increased sensitivity to individual information sources, rather than changes in integration ability. This work presents a developmental theory of information integration during language learning and illustrates how formal models can be used to make a quantitative test of the predictive and explanatory power of competing theories.

Moderated Online Data-Collection for Developmental Research: Methods and Replications.

Online data collection methods are expanding the ease and access of developmental research for researchers and participants alike. While its popularity among developmental scientists has soared during the COVID-19 pandemic, its potential goes beyond just a means for safe, socially distanced data collection. In particular, advances in video conferencing software has enabled researchers to engage in face-to-face interactions with participants from nearly any location at any time. Due to the novelty of these methods, however, many researchers still remain uncertain about the differences in available approaches as well as the validity of online methods more broadly. In this article, we aim to address both issues with a focus on moderated (synchronous) data collected using video-conferencing software (e.g., Zoom). First, we review existing approaches for designing and executing moderated online studies with young children. We also present concrete examples of studies that implemented choice and verbal measures (Studies 1 and 2) and looking time (Studies 3 and 4) across both in-person and online moderated data collection methods. Direct comparison of the two methods within each study as well as a meta-analysis of all studies suggest that the results from the two methods are comparable, providing empirical support for the validity of moderated online data collection. Finally, we discuss current limitations of online data collection and possible solutions, as well as its potential to increase the accessibility, diversity, and replicability of developmental science.