The Emotional State of Second-Language Learners in a Research Writing Course: Do Academic Orientation and Major Matter?

This study examined whether differences exist in the emotional state of students whose approach to undergraduate courses is either preferentially learning-oriented or grade-oriented. It focused on an understudied population of female college students of Saudi Arabian descent who were enrolled in a challenging writing course. Their emotional state was assessed both globally, through the appraisal of their degree of happiness, and locally, through the appraisal of their writing anxiety (a task-specific emotional state). The study contributed to the extant literature by examining whether the association between goal orientation and emotional state, which is predicted by goal orientation theory, could be found in the selected understudied student population. Results illustrate differences between STEM and non-STEM learners. For STEM students, a grade orientation was associated with declining self-reported happiness and increasing writing anxiety. In contrast, for both STEM and non-STEM students, a learning orientation was associated with increasing happiness and declining writing anxiety. Differences existed in the particular type of writing anxiety that was experienced by STEM and non-STEM students. These findings suggest that interventions for students who are struggling academically may need to address personal dispositions if such interventions are to foster subjective well-being (including positive emotions).

Battling Unawareness of One's Test Performance: Do Practice, Self-Efficacy, and Emotional Intelligence Matter?

The "Dunning-Kruger effect" refers to the tendency of poor performers to overestimate test outcomes. Although a widespread phenomenon, questions exist regarding its source and sensitivity to countermeasures. The present field study aimed to (a) examine whether practice with tests used in previous classes can enhance students' ability to estimate test outcomes, (b) determine the main source of the effect (i.e., is it unawareness of one's readiness or wishful thinking?), and (c) assess the extent to which particular individual differences can be used as predictors of test performance. In this study, participants practiced with old tests and then completed the final exam. Before and after the exam, they predicted their grades and indicated their subjective confidence in the predictions made. Furthermore, participants' emotional intelligence and self-efficacy about their academic abilities were surveyed. Results suggested that poor performers were not unaware of their test preparation, but rather engaged in wishful thinking. In fact, although they overestimated their test grades, their estimates not only improved after completing the final test but also were regarded with little confidence. Overall, estimation bias was a good predictor of students' final test performance, whereas subjective confidence and emotional intelligence only weakly predicted such performance. Thus, if proactive interventions are to be developed for at-risk students, performance-estimation tasks may offer valuable information regarding such students' future performance in a course much more than emotional intelligence and self-efficacy measures.

Grade prediction in the middle east: a post-pandemic case study of the optimism bias.

Evidence exists that the pandemic has brought about stress, and altered study habits and academic performance. No evidence exists regarding whether metacognition has also been altered. The present field study examined the accuracy and confidence with which college students make grade predictions in a general education course after the pandemic. It tested whether one of three types of biases affected students' predictions as a way to cope with the uncertainty of a final exam's outcome: illusion-of-knowing, optimism, and pessimistic bracing. Students made predictions both before and after completing the final exam (summative assessment) to determine the impact of each of the hypothesized biases on estimates made in a context of varying uncertainty. Accuracy was computed as the difference between expected and actual grades on the final exam. Confidence in the predictions made was measured on a Likert scale. Exam performance was categorized as good, poor, or inadequate. In this study, less-than-desirable performance was accompanied by overestimations. However, overestimations were made with little confidence and benefited from the information acquired from completing the exam. This pattern of results suggests that students who are not doing well are not under the spell of the illusion-of-knowing phenomenon. Indeed, their optimistic predictions are punctured by the awareness of a likely undesirable outcome (as indicated by their weak confidence in the predictions made). Implications and applications of these findings are discussed.

Interest of a multispecies approach in active biomonitoring: Application in the Meuse watershed.

A biomonitoring approach based on a single model species cannot be representative of the contaminations impacts on the ecosystem overall. As part of the Interreg DIADeM program ("Development of an integrated approach for the diagnosis of the water quality of the River Meuse"), a study was conducted to establish the proof of concept that the use of a multispecies active biomonitoring approach improves diagnostic of aquatic systems. The complementarity of the biomarker responses was tested in four model species belonging to various ecological compartments: the bryophyte Fontinalis antipyretica, the bivalve Dreissena polymorpha, the amphipod Gammarus fossarum and the fish Gasterosteus aculeatus. The species have been caged upstream and downstream from five wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) in the Meuse watershed. After the exposure, a battery of biomarkers was measured and results were compiled in an Integrated Biomarker Response (IBR) for each species. A multispecies IBR value was then proposed to assess the quality of the receiving environment upstream the WWTPs. The effluent toxicity was variable according to the caged species and the WWTP. However, the calculated IBR were high for all species and upstream sites, suggesting that the water quality was already downgraded upstream the WWTP. This contamination of the receiving environment was confirmed by the multispecies IBR which has allowed to rank the rivers from the less to the most contaminated. This study has demonstrated the interest of the IBR in the assessment of biological impacts of a point-source contamination (WWTP effluent) but also of the receiving environment, thanks to the use of independent references. Moreover, this study has highlighted the complementarity between the different species and has emphasized the interest of this multispecies approach to consider the variability of the species exposition pathway and sensibility as well as the mechanism of contaminants toxicity in the final diagnosis.

Toxic effects of a mixture of five pharmaceutical drugs assessed using Fontinalis antipyretica Hedw.

The potential health risks associated with the pharmaceuticals released into the environment through effluents from sewage treatment plants have become a major cause for concern. Owing to the lack of effective indicators, monitoring the concentration of these pollutants in the aquatic environment is challenging. The aim of this study was to assess the toxicity of a mixture of five pharmaceutical drugs (paracetamol, carbamazepine, diclofenac, irbesartan, and naproxen) using the aquatic moss Fontinalis antipyretica as a bioindicator and bioaccumulator. We examined the effects of the drug mixture on the cellular antioxidant system, chlorophyll content, and morphological traits of F. antipyretica. The plant was exposed for 5 months to three concentrations of the mixture, including the environmental concentration (MX1), and 10- (MX10) and 100-times (MX100) the environmental concentration. The results showed that only carbamazepine and irbesartan were accumulated by the species. The bioconcentration level increased with exposure time, with the maximum uptake at the 4th month of exposure. The increase in bioaccumulation with exposure time was more evident in plants exposed to MX100. Analysis of the activity of antioxidant enzymes showed that superoxide dismutase (SOD, EC 1.15.1.1.) and catalase (EC 1.11.1.6.) were highly sensitive to the drug mixture. The activity of the enzymes was significantly higher in plants exposed to MX100; however, the activity of guaiacol peroxidase (GPX, EC 1.11.1.7.) was not significantly affected. Plants exposed to MX10 and MX100 had significantly lower total chlorophyll content and chlorophyll a/b ratio compared with those of plants in the control group; however, photosynthetic activity was restored after 5 months of exposure. The morphological characteristics of F. antipyretica were less sensitive to the treatment conditions.

The Illusion of Knowing in College: A Field Study of Students with a Teacher-Centered Educational Past.

In the present study, the tendency to overestimate performance (illusion of knowing) was examined in college students whose educational past experiences had emphasized verbatim learning. Female students enrolled in core curriculum classes were sampled. Classes taught by the same instructor were randomly assigned to a self-assessment practice condition, where students predicted their test and class performance and were asked to reflect on discrepancies between predictions and actual performance, or to a control condition. At the end of the semester, irrespective of condition, as performance declined on the final test, predictions of final test grades became more inflated, but less confident, indicating that students were aware of their own deficiencies. Overall, students in the practice condition displayed not only greater prediction accuracy, but also greater final test performance than students in the control condition. Practice, however, benefited the most self-assessment accuracy of students whose final test grades were just above the passing grade. Although the responses to self-assessment practice of students with a teacher-centered educational past were largely similar to the responses of students from Western countries reported in the extant literature, differences in impact and meaning could be inferred.

Prevalence and risk factors of hepatitis B and C virus infections among the general population and blood donors in Morocco.

BACKGROUND: Viral hepatitis is a serious public health problem affecting billions of people globally. Limited information is available on this issue in Morocco. This cross-sectional study was undertaken with the aim of determining the seroprevalence and risk factors of hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) among the general population and among blood donors. METHODS: Blood samples from volunteers, have been screened with ELISA tests for detecting the hepatitis-B surface antigen (HBsAg) and anti-HCV. Within the seroreactive patients for HCV in the general population, RT-PCR was performed by the Cobas Ampliprep/Cobas Amplicor. RESULTS: HCV and HBV-seropositivity was documented in 1.58% and 1.81% out of 41269 and 23578 participants respectively from the general population. Two patients were found to be co-infected. HCV-RNA was detected by PCR in 70.9% of the 195 anti-HCV positive subjects. The anti-HCV prevalence was not different among males and females (P = 0.3). It increased with age; the highest prevalence was observed among subjects with >50 years old (3.12%). Various risk factors for acquiring HCV infection were identified; age, dental treatment, use of glass syringes and surgical history. In addition to these factors, gender and sexual risk behaviors were found to be associated with higher prevalence of hepatitis B. The HBV positivity was significantly higher among males than females participants in all age groups (P < 0.01). The peak was noticed among males aged 30-49 years (2.4%). None of the 152 persons younger than 20 years had HBsAg or anti-HCV. The prevalence of anti-HCV and HBsAg among 169605 blood donors was 0.62% and 0.96% respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Our study provided much important information concerning hepatitis B and C prevalence and risk factors; it confirmed the intermediate endemicity for HCV infection and pointed to a decreasing trend of HBV incidence, which might reclassify Morocco in low HBV endemicity area. This could be attributed primarily to the universal HBV vaccination among infants and healthcare workers over the past 13 years. HCV and HBV infections in the present survey were mainly associated with nosocomial exposures. Prevention and control of HBV infection are needed to reduce HBV transmission between adults.

Medical surveillance programme for diisocyanate exposure.

OBJECTIVES: Surveillance programmes for occupational asthma should reduce the severity of asthma both at the time of diagnosis and after removal from exposure as well as costs related to functional impairment. The aim of this study was to compare the severity and cost of diisocyanate-induced occupational asthma in workers participating in a surveillance programme and in twice the number of workers diagnosed after being referred by their physician. METHODS: Answers to a self-administered questionnaire led to possible referral for further assessment that included methacholine testing and specific inhalation challenges as the gold standard for confirming occupational asthma. Results Of the 2897 workers who participated, 182 (6.3%) had a positive questionnaire. 79/182 (43%) were referred for further medical assessment and 20 had confirmed occupational asthma by specific inhalation testing. At the time of diagnosis, the 20 screened subjects had a mean PC(20) of 3.35 mg/ml as compared to 1.50 mg/ml (p = 0.05) in the 66 controls. Two years after diagnosis and removal from exposure, the 20 subjects screened had a mean PC(20) of 4.81 mg/ml compared to 1.67 mg/ml (p = 0.03) in controls. Clinical remission occurred in 34% of the screened group compared to 16% of the control group (p = 0.02). The median costs for functional impairment were $C11,900 in screened subjects and $C19,600 in controls (p = 0.04). CONCLUSIONS: Subjects with occupational asthma screened by a medical surveillance programme have a better outcome both at the time of diagnosis and 2 years after removal from exposure, with lower compensation costs compared to controls.