Gender Stereotype Threat Undermines Dance Performance and Learning in Boys.

The objective of the present study was to examine the effects of gender stereotype on the performance and learning of a classical ballet pirouette in 11-year-old boys. Participants in the stereotype threat (ST) group were informed that, in general, boys tend to show worse results when completing the pirouette task in comparison to girls. Participants in the stereotype lift (SL) group were told that girls tend to show worse results in comparison to boys. The control group did not receive stereotype instructions. The results demonstrated worse performance during practice and retention (next day) for the ST group relative to the SL and control groups; the SL and control groups did not differ. The findings indicate that gender stereotype threat can undermine motor performance and learning in boys.

Effects of Gender Stereotypes on Balance Performance and Learning in Men.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of gender stereotypes on the performance and learning of a balance task in men. Before practice, forty-eight participants received instructions involving the comparison of balance between males and females: males normally perform worse than females (stereotype threat condition - ST), females usually perform worse than males (stereotype lift condition - SL), or no instructions regarding gender stereotypes (control condition). One day later, they performed a retention test. The results show that the SL group outperformed the other groups during practice, but not retention. ST participants reported lower perceived competence. The findings show that gender stereotypes can affect perceptions of competence and balance performance, but not balance learning, in men.

Explicit and implicit activation of gender stereotypes additively impair soccer performance and learning in women.

AbstractStudies involving the manipulation of instructions regarding the negative characteristics of a group or comparisons with members of another group (explicit activation of stereotypes) have shown that age, weight, and gender stereotypes can be harmful to motor performance and learning. To date, however, no study has observed whether implicit stereotype threats, such as the sex of the coach or experimenter, can also influence the acquisition of motor skills. In the present study, the individual and combined impact of implicit and explicit influences of gender stereotype on women's soccer performance and learning was examined. In a 2 × 2 design, 60 women were divided into four groups according to the presence or absence of explicit (ES) and implicit (IS) stereotypes: ES/IS, ES, IS, and control. The groups with implicit activation practiced in the presence of a male experimenter. The groups with explicit activation received instructions activating the gender negative stereotype. The control group practiced without stereotype activations. The results showed that both explicit and implicit activation additively impaired soccer performance and learning, with both main effects being significant for practice and retention. The ES/IS group showed lower scores on the task relative to the other groups, while the ES and IS groups showed worse scores compared with the control group. The findings suggest that stigmatised populations may be forced to cope with more than one social identity threat while learning sport motor skills and indicate the importance of further studies testing strategies to minimise the deleterious effects of negative stereotypes.

Agir educativo-comunicativo na relação de assistentes sociais com familiares e usuários: a integralidade no cuidado em saúde mental / Educational-communicative action in the relationship of social workers with family and users: integrality in mental health care

Resumo Este trabalho tem por objetivo provocar reflexões sobre o potencial das relações humanas para o cuidado em saúde mental a partir da articulação entre o agir educativo de Paulo Freire e o agir comunicativo de Jürgen Habermas, propondo um construto teórico denominado "agir educativo-comunicativo" na relação das/dos assistentes sociais com familiares e usuárias/os no processo de trabalho desenvolvido em Centros de Atenção Psicossocial. O construto teórico do agir educativo-comunicativo emergiu de categorias fundamentais, tais como: a escuta, o diálogo, a linguagem, a cultura, a horizontalidade e a educação. Além das categorias que emergem da relação entre Habermas e Freire, é possível acrescentar ainda o cuidado, enquanto categoria também fundamental para o agir educativo-comunicativo. A partir dos preceitos antimanicomiais, o agir educativo-comunicativo tem potencial para fortalecer os vínculos familiares e comunitários enquanto intervenção técnico-operativa do serviço social. Para tanto, faz-se necessária uma intervenção potente de educação permanente em saúde com as/os assistentes sociais, no sentido de fortalecer os princípios antimanicomiais na prática profissional, de ampliar a perspectiva histórica sobre a Reforma Psiquiátrica e de fomentar um conceito de educação que seja emancipadora e, por consequência, antimanicomial, baseada no projeto ético-político da profissão.

Abstract This work aims to provoke reflections on the potential of human relations in mental health care by articulating Paulo Freire's educational action and Jürgen Habermas's communicative action, proposing a theoretical construct called "educative-communicative action" for the relationship of social workers with family members and users of Psychosocial Care Centers. The theoretical construct of educational-communicative action emerged from fundamental categories, such as: listening, dialogue, language, culture, horizontality and education. In addition to the categories that emerge from the relation between Habermas and Freire, care can also be added as a fundamental category for the educational-communicative action. From the anti-asylum precepts, the educational-communicative action has the potential to strengthen family and community bonds, as an operative technical intervention of social work. To do this, a potent permanent health education intervention is needed among the social workers in order to strengthen the anti-asylum principles in professional practice, to broaden the historical perspective on the Psychiatric Reform and to encourage a concept of education that is emancipatory and, consequently, anti-asylum, based on the ethical-political project of the profession.

Conceptions of Ability Influence the Learning of a Dance Pirouette in Children.

Conceptions of ability induced by instructions or feedback have been shown to influence motivation, reactions to failure, and learning in various populations. Few studies, however, have examined such effects on motor learning. The present study investigated the influence of conceptions of ability on the learning of a dance pirouette in 10-year-old children. Two groups of participants were given either acquirable-skill (AS) or inherent-ability (IA) instructions before they began practicing the dance skill. All participants performed 15 practice trials of a (right) pirouette in which the objective was to rotate as far as possible in a circle divided into eight equal sections, where the dependent variable was the number of sections rotated. One day later participants completed retention and transfer (left pirouette) tests, five trials of each, without ability conception instructions. The induced conceptions of ability affected children's motor learning differently, with AS participants consistently scoring higher. These results demonstrate the advantage of using acquirable versus inherent conceptions of ability to promote the learning of dance skills in particular and add to the growing body of research demonstrating the importance of socio-cognitive-affective variables in motor performance and learning generally.

Temporal-Comparative Feedback Facilitates Golf Putting.

The present experiment investigated the influence of temporal-comparative feedback in young adults learning a sport motor skill. A positive temporal-comparative feedback group and a control group practiced putting golf balls to a target from a distance of 150 cm and received augmented feedback (deviation in cm) in addition to their intrinsic visual feedback. The temporal-comparative feedback group was given additional feedback after each block of 10 trials, suggesting that their average performance was better than it was in the previous block. One day after the practice phase a retention test was performed, to observe learning effects. The results showed that positive temporal-comparative feedback enhances the learning of a putting golf task. Greater putting accuracy was observed on the retention test for the temporal comparison group relative to the control group. Questionnaire results also indicated that participants in this group reported higher perceived competence at the end of practice relative to control participants. The findings provide further indication that temporal comparison affects the learning of motor skills and highlight the important motivational role of feedback in motor learning.

Triple play: Additive contributions of enhanced expectancies, autonomy support, and external attentional focus to motor learning.

In the OPTIMAL theory of motor learning [Wulf, G., & Lewthwaite, R. (2016). Optimizing performance through intrinsic motivation and attention for learning: The OPTIMAL theory of motor learning. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 23, 1382-1414], 3 factors are postulated to facilitate learning: enhanced expectancies (EE) for performance, autonomy support (AS), and an external focus (EF) of attention. In 3 recent studies, combinations of 2 of these variables resulted in superior learning relative to the presence of only 1 variable, or none. We examined whether the combination of all 3 factors would enhance learning relative to combinations of 2 factors. Our design included EE-AS, EE-EF, AS-EF, and AS-EE-EF groups. Participants threw balls at a target with their non-dominant arm. In the EE conditions, they received positive social-comparative feedback. In the AS conditions, they were allowed to throw with their dominant arm on trial blocks chosen by them. In the EF conditions, participants were asked to focus on the target. On a delayed retention test, the AS-EE-EF group outperformed all other groups. The findings provide evidence that enhanced expectancies, autonomy support, and an external focus can contribute in an additive fashion to optimize motor learning.

A produção do conhecimento em Educação Física e suas subáreas: um panorama a partir de periódicos nacionais da área / Scientific publications in physical education and related areas: a snapshot based on brazilian journals in the field

Esse artigo descreve a produção do conhecimento em Educação Física em periódicos brasileiros da área, agrupando esses produtos em subáreas, verificando sua relação com a Pós-Graduação e a distribuição geográfica dos autores com base na sua afiliação institucional, a partir do último número disponível de cada periódico. Trata-se de análise documental, com dados extraídos do website dos 12 periódicos científicos da Educação Física classificados nos estratos B2, ou superior do WebQualis da CAPES de 2014. O último número disponível de cada periódico foi avaliado e os artigos publicados foram categorizados em subáreas, descritas a seguir. Foram analisa-dos 163 artigos relacionados à área da Educação Física, distribuídos nas seguintes subáreas: Pedagógica e Sociocultural = 42,9%, Treinamento Físico e Fisiologia = 26,5%, Atividade Física e Saúde = 20,4%, Comportamento Motor = 10,2%. Pelo menos um autor dos artigos estava vinculado a um Programa de Pós-Graduação em Educação Física em 99 (60,7%) dessas publicações. A maioria das publicações são oriundas de programas com conceito quatro e cinco da CAPES. Assinala-se a importância de os Programas de Pós-Graduação com conceitos superiores a quatro publicarem com maior frequência em revistas brasileiras, a fim de fortalecer os periódicos nacionais e auxiliar na consolidação da área da Educação Física no país.

This article described publications related with Physical Education in Brazilian scientific journals, grouped publications by sub-area and verified its connection with specific graduation programs and geographical distribution of authors' institutional affiliation based on the last available number of each periodical. Data were extracted from the website of 12 scientific journals that publish Physical Education related articles and are classified as B2 or higher in the WebQualis system proposed by CAPES in 2014. The most recent issue of each journal was evaluated and the articles were classified into sub-areas described below. We analyzed 163 articles related with Physical Education distributed in the following subareas: Pe-dagogic and Sociocultural = 49.2%, Physical Training and Physiology = 26.5%, Physical Activity and Health = 20.4%, Motor Behavior = 10.2%. In 99 publications (60.7%) at least one author was a postgraduate program member. Most publications were from postgraduate programs with scores of four or five (scores range from three to seven). In order to strengthen national journals and help to consolidate the area of Physical Education in the country we emphasize the importance of post-graduation programs with concepts above 4 to publish more frequently in Brazilian journals.

Additive benefits of autonomy support and enhanced expectancies for motor learning.

Two factors that have been shown to facilitate motor learning are autonomy support (AS) and enhanced expectancies (EE) for performance. We examined the individual and combined influences of these factors. In a 2 × 2 design, participants learning a novel motor skill (throwing with the non-dominant arm) were or were not provided a choice (AS) about the ball color on each of 6 10-trial blocks during practice, and were or were not given bogus positive social-comparative feedback (EE). This resulted in four groups: AS/EE, AS, EE, and C (control). One day after the practice phase, participants completed 10 retention and 10 transfer trials. The distance to the target--a bull's eye with a 1m radius and 10 concentric circles--was 7.5m during practice and retention, and 8.5m during transfer. Autonomy support and enhanced expectancies had additive advantages for learning, with both main effects being significant for retention and transfer. On both tests, the AS/EE group showed the greatest throwing accuracy. Also, the accuracy scores of the AS and EE groups were higher than those of the C group. Furthermore, self-efficacy measured after practice and before retention and transfer was increased by both AS and EE. Thus, supporting learners' need for autonomy by given them a small choice--even though it was not directly related to task performance--and enhancing their performance expectancies appeared to independently influence learning.