Search Results (1,670)

In the contexts of higher education and Education for Sustainable Development, universities face the challenge of preparing professionals capable of addressing complex urban issues related to Sustainable Development Goal 11 (SDG 11). Learning landscapes, grounded in the theory of Multiple Intelligences and Bloom’s Taxonomy, have been proposed as a pedagogical framework to support the development of sustainability competencies and higher-order thinking; however, evidence regarding their applicability and viability in university teaching remains limited. This study examines an exploratory learning landscape–based training experience oriented toward SDG 11, focusing on university faculty perceptions. A design-based research approach with mixed-methods design was employed, emphasizing the co-construction, pilot implementation, and formative assessment of learning landscapes within a technical-scientific faculty development program. The results indicate generally positive faculty perceptions, particularly in terms of satisfaction, perceived learning, and professional development. Participants also reported pedagogical usefulness and perceived potential to enhance student motivation and engagement. However, stable curricular integration emerged as the main challenge, mainly due to design workload and the need for institutional support. Overall, the findings provide initial empirical evidence on the perceived value and limitations of learning landscapes in sustainability-oriented higher education and point to the need for further research and institutional conditions to support their implementation. Full article

Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) has been a viable technology for decades, yet widespread adoption in healthcare and academic settings has remained limited to research. One possible explanation for this is limited understanding about the beliefs around GenAI use amongst faculty and students training in biomedical disciplines that frequently lead to non-physician healthcare careers, including physical therapy (PT), occupational therapy (OT), allied health (AH), and biomedical engineering (BME). Furthermore, no known studies exist assessing differences that may exist across those disciplines. Given the significant number of professionals in those disciplines and the outsized impact they have on the healthcare system, investigating their beliefs around GenAI use is vital before widespread adoption. Accordingly, we investigated the perceptions of GenAI among students and faculty in the aforementioned fields that frequently lead to careers in healthcare. We found that knowledge of GenAI significantly influences comfort with its use completing college coursework including whether respondents believed it contributed to the process of completing that coursework and whether use of GenAI enhances learning. Interestingly, however, there were no statistically significant differences in perceptions of GenAI across disciplines, roles, or institution sizes. Qualitative findings revealed concerns about plagiarism, decline of critical thinking skills, and ethical challenges, while also recognizing GenAI’s potential to enhance learning efficiency and idea generation. Critically, the study results emphasize the need for proper training and guidelines to ensure GenAI is integrated responsibly into healthcare-related education. Full article

The rapid expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) in digital education has transformed gamification from a motivational strategy into a data-driven, adaptive learning paradigm. This systematic review conceptualizes AI-supported gamification as an information-centered ecosystem integrating learning analytics, behavioral modeling, adaptive algorithms, and intelligent feedback mechanisms to enhance cognitive development and critical thinking. Following PRISMA 2020 guidelines, a systematic search was conducted across Scopus, Web of Science, ScienceDirect, Google Scholar, and ResearchGate. Peer-reviewed empirical studies published between 2020 and 2025 were considered. Studies were included if they examined gamification in educational contexts with AI-driven or adaptive system components, while non-educational contexts, duplicates, and non-English publications were excluded. After screening and eligibility assessment, 100 studies were included in the final synthesis. The review examines how AI-driven personalization, neurotechnology, predictive modeling, and generative systems reshape the design and effectiveness of gamified e-learning environments. Architectural patterns identified include recommender systems, real-time behavioral adaptation, affect-aware feedback loops, and algorithmic content generation. Across the reviewed studies, AI-supported gamified systems were frequently associated with increased engagement and moderate improvements in executive functions, higher-order reasoning, and adaptive learning pathways. However, challenges related to system transparency, data governance, algorithmic bias, cognitive load management, and equitable access remain significant. The review was not registered. By framing gamification as an adaptive information system rather than solely a pedagogical intervention, this study proposes a structured taxonomy of AI-driven gamified architectures—including data acquisition, user modeling, predictive analytics, and adaptive feedback layers—and outlines research priorities for scalable, ethically grounded, and data-informed e-learning ecosystems. Full article

Financial support from urban residents represents a potentially important resource for sustaining and expanding public parks, particularly tree-planting initiatives that contribute to biodiversity and human well-being. This study applies the Granular Interaction Thinking Theory (GITT) and Bayesian inference to examine how residents’ perceptions of the consequences of biodiversity loss and their park-visit frequency relate to willingness to donate to tree-planting projects in public parks. Based on survey data from 535 Vietnamese residents, the results indicate that perceived loss of ecological knowledge and more frequent park visitation are associated with higher willingness to donate, whereas perceived health-related losses receive moderate posterior support for a positive association. Perceived reductions in economic growth are positively related to park visitation frequency, which, in turn, is associated with greater willingness to donate. In contrast, perceived losses from nature-based recreation are linked to lower visitation frequency and subsequently weaker willingness to make indirect donations. These findings suggest that communication and engagement strategies that emphasize personally and community-relevant benefits may be associated with stronger financial support intentions for urban tree-planting initiatives. As the study focuses on stated willingness rather than observed financial behavior, the implications pertain to intention-based support rather than realized contributions. Full article

This paper examines the relation between transversal skills, economic education, and financial literacy in modern education. A systematic literature review was conducted in accordance with the PRISMA 2022 methodology, resulting in the selection and analysis of 49 peer-reviewed articles from Scopus and Web of Science. The paper explores theoretical considerations, pedagogical strategies, and the possibility of integrating these fields into educational practice. It identifies three specific points of research interest: firstly, to identify trends in the integration of transversal competencies into economic education; secondly, to assess how transversal skills impact the development of financial literacy; and thirdly, to create recommendations for educational programs and teaching methods. The results highlight that transversal skills—particularly critical thinking, collaboration, being digitally literate, and problem-solving—play an indispensable role in both learning economics and building financial literacy. While students of economic education gain insight into issues such as resource management, market mechanisms, and labor economics, financial literacy provides them with knowledge on personal finance issues, sustainability, and informed decision-making. An original aspect of the research is the attempt to merge transversal skills with economic education and financial literacy within a single framework. The results also indicate future directions of educational reform and point to ways to enhance students’ financial well-being and entrepreneurial capacity. Full article

Suicide is a serious and global health problem, with important consequences for individuals and for society. Understanding health workers’ perspectives is important for understanding how clinicians think about this topic and their attitudes toward and adherence to current guidelines. These findings can also have implications for future directions in guideline development and suicide-prevention policy. The purpose of this study was to investigate health workers’ experiences with and perceptions of suicide risk assessments. We conducted an electronic survey in which we asked health workers (N = 183) 18 questions about their experiences with and opinions about suicide risk assessments, suicide prevention, risk factors for suicide, and questions relating to the Norwegian guidelines for suicide risk assessment. The health workers in this study consisted of psychologists, doctors, nurses, and social workers from three different Norwegian hospitals. We found that the professional groups differed significantly in their responses. We also found significant differences between staff at the different hospitals in how they perceived the risk factors and standardized questions. In general, the respondents were skeptical regarding the emphasis on standardized suicide risk assessments. Furthermore, respondents perceived suicide as at least partly preventable. There were some differences between professions and hospitals. This may be due to cultural and educational aspects. Suicide risk prevention is complex, involving a variety of factors. Methodological limitations should be taken into consideration. Future research should further explore health workers’ concerns about standardized suicide risk assessments. Full article

The present study aimed to examine the inter-relationships among trait-, class-, and study-related boredom, as well as their associations with self-efficacy, self-regulation, critical thinking, academic performance, and engagement among university students. The sample comprised 250 undergraduate psychology students who completed self-report measures assessing academic boredom, critical thinking, self-regulation, academic engagement, and academic performance. Using path analysis, the study revealed that academic boredom was negatively correlated with self-regulation, critical thinking, and self-efficacy. The results further revealed that academic boredom was negatively associated with both academic engagement and performance. However, class-related boredom was negatively associated with engagement but not with performance, whereas study-related boredom was negatively associated with both academic performance and engagement. These findings emphasize the importance of addressing specific types of academic boredom in higher education, as each type appears to play a distinct role in shaping students’ academic experiences and outcomes. The study also highlights the need for interventions that promote self-regulation, critical thinking, and self-efficacy as protective factors to mitigate boredom and enhance academic success. Implications for future research and university policies are discussed. Full article

Infertility treatment often requires patients to self-administer hormonal injections, creating significant physical, logistical, and psychological burdens. While medical technologies have improved pharmacological efficacy and safety, design aspects addressing usability, portability, and emotional distress remain underexplored. This study presents Blloom, a compact self-injection device that integrates ergonomic, thermal, and emotional considerations designed through an interdisciplinary design-thinking framework. This study identified critical user needs related to self-injection anxiety, medication refrigeration, and treatment-related stigma through in-depth, multi-method qualitative design research. The resulting prototype is characterized by one-handed operation, concealed needle delivery, and built-in passive cooling (2–8 °C for up to 8 h). Formative evaluations with patients and clinicians confirmed its improved usability, emotional comfort, and contextual compatibility. At this prototypical stage, medication- and container-specific compatibility, as well as long-term reliability, require further bench testing and clinical validation. Process analysis further revealed how designer–engineer collaboration evolved from empathic exploration to implementation-driven convergence. The findings demonstrate how human-centered design can mitigate the multidimensional burdens of infertility treatment and provide a replicable framework for interdisciplinary innovation in self-managed healthcare devices. Full article

Computational thinking (CT) is increasingly being integrated into educational curricula alongside mathematical thinking (MT) within science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. Physical computing devices now support low-code programming approaches aligned with Sustainable Development Goal 4 (Quality Education) by helping to create engaging and inclusive learning environments for learners, particularly P–12 students and their teachers. However, the use of such devices for low-code programming remains underexplored and insufficiently evaluated. This study investigates the application of low-code programming using a specific physical computing device, the micro:bit, within a gamified context to foster perceive readiness for CT in sustainable mathematics education for P–12 students, while also considering the perspectives of pre-service teachers (PSTs). PSTs often lack adequate preparation to teach related concepts and to manage the affective dimensions that influence learning. Findings indicate that positive emotions increased and negative emotions decreased, except for frustration and boredom, following the intervention. Additionally, interest in and engagement with the development perceive readiness for CT and MT improved among PSTs within a sustainable (STEA)Mathematics education framework. These results suggest that the proposed approach helps address existing gaps and may be adapted across diverse academic and professional domains, supporting continuous knowledge acquisition under both predictable and uncertain conditions. Full article

Sustainability education increasingly calls for innovative learning environments that help learners recognize ecological interdependencies and challenge anthropocentric worldviews. Everyday multispecies relationships, such as with companion animals, often underexplored, offer opportunities for cultivating ecological literacy and care. This paper introduces Augmented Ecological Relating (AER), an approach that combines Augmented Reality (AR) with embodied inquiry to explore multispecies perspectives. Going beyond embodied inquiry, AER specifies how digital augmentation can systematically support learners’ iterative noticing, ethical reasoning, and action within everyday multispecies ecosystems. We draw on a virtual summer workshop for adolescents in which participants used AR filters simulating dog and cat vision to investigate their pets’ sensory worlds. We used qualitative case study methods to examine how AR tools mediated human youths’ noticing, inquiry, and reflection. We found that the AR filters used in the study’s context enabled participants to critically reconsider pet behaviors within home ecologies. Participants recognized companion animals as ecological beings with distinct sensory experiences, explored interconnections among humans, animals, and environments, and reflected on ethical responsibilities in multispecies relationships. Through iterative inquiry, youth moved beyond companionship to sustainability-oriented perspectives grounded in relational care, systems thinking, and practical action. By embedding digital augmentation into everyday contexts, AER enabled learners to engage with more-than-human perspectives, fostering ecological awareness, ethical reflection, and sustainability literacy in accessible, meaningful ways. Full article

For communities on the margins of hostile or indifferent power structures, the political order can be experienced as a force whose acts are not motivated by reasons in accord with recognizable norms. Power, then, as a social phenomenon, is naturalized in the sense that it is dehumanized. Derrida explored some of this territory in his final seminar, the Beast and the Sovereign. Power becomes a latent animality, structuring social life as it removes itself from mechanisms of accountability. At the same time, the Black church ritual, in the United States and elsewhere, provides an experience of a self-sustaining power, whose invisibility is taken as coextensive with its omnipresence. The act of worship becomes a project of counter-habituation whereby power can be constituted as just and life-affirming. Simone Weil’s spiritual writings on the necessity of God’s love can be of some assistance here, but her concern with “decreation” is on its face a self-erasing theological enterprise, the sociopolitical implications of which would seem to put it at odds with a movement, among marginalized people, toward increased recognition. A look at the relation between Weil’s writing method—which I analyze as a kind of endophrasis—and Edmund Husserl’s transcendental understanding of the self provides a way to reorganize our understanding of the sociocultural project supported by the ritual. To grasp the counter-habituating project of the ritual, we must see it as founded in non-linguistic thinking and post-linguistic acts. These acts are, in part, improvisational, which is a key to habituating the recognition of higher-order necessity through free activity. They bring the worshiper “through” culturally determined linguistic acts to another kind of experience, in which the freedom to worship an invisible God is manifest. Full article

Eating disorders (EDs) disproportionately affect women and are associated with substantial morbidity, chronicity, and mortality. While established psychological models focus on the content of maladaptive cognitions related to body weight, shape, and eating behaviors, growing evidence suggests that additional process-level mechanisms contribute to symptom persistence and treatment resistance. Metacognitive models emphasize how individuals relate to their thoughts, emotions, and internal experiences, highlighting maladaptive beliefs about thinking and the resulting cognitive–attentional patterns (e.g., repetitive negative thinking, self-focused attention, and inflexible attentional control) as potential maintaining factors across psychopathology. This narrative review synthesizes the theoretical and empirical literature on metacognitive dysfunction in EDs, with a focus on mechanisms that may be particularly relevant for women. We integrate epidemiological data and gender-sensitive frameworks, and review evidence on metacognitive beliefs and cognitive–attentional syndrome (CAS)-related processes across anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge-eating disorder. Overall, studies indicate that dysfunctional beliefs about the uncontrollability and danger of thoughts, alongside perseverative cognitive styles, are associated with greater ED symptom severity. We discuss diagnosis-relevant patterns as clinically useful heuristics, interactions with sociocultural and emotional vulnerability factors, and implications for assessment, treatment integration, and prevention. The evidence base is largely correlational and derived from predominantly female samples, underscoring the need for longitudinal research and studies that explicitly test sex/gender as a moderator. Full article

In Philippine state universities and colleges (SUCs), faculty are mandated to balance instruction, research, and extension as “trifocal” functions. Yet, research often competes with heavy teaching loads, administrative work, and community engagement, especially in science disciplines that demand laboratory-based and fieldwork. This qualitative multiple-case study examined how twelve science faculty members across academic ranks in a Philippine SUC system enact the research function within their trifocal roles. Drawing on semi-structured interviews, institutional and policy documents, and cross-case analysis, this study employed a case study design through the lens of systems thinking to identify how research function is embedded in institutional structures and professional life-worlds. Findings show that faculty construct research as (1) a catalyst that propels instruction and anchors extension programs; (2) a strategic requirement intertwined with promotion and career progression; and (3) a relational and infrastructural practice dependent on collegial networks, mentoring, and institutional support systems. Feedback loops link these themes wherein research output fuels promotion and time protection, which, in turn, shape opportunities for further research and mentoring. Additionally, verbatim accounts reveal how faculty members navigate structural pressures, such as bureaucratic processes and workload policies, while framing research as a moral and professional responsibility. This article argues that designing research support in SUCs requires moving beyond compliance-driven metrics to system-level arrangements that honor research as a form of scholarly work deeply connected with teaching quality and community impact. Implications are suggested for workload policy, mentoring, and research-capable learning environments in the Philippines and comparable higher education contexts. Full article

This paper presents the findings of a study on computer science teachers’ views regarding the reform of the computer science curriculum and its implementation in Greek model and experimental lower secondary schools (called Gymnasiums). Research data were collected through interviews with 19 computer science teachers who implemented the new curriculum in 12 model or experimental junior high schools. The results showed that the teachers acknowledged the important role of the computer science curriculum, which is perceived as a tool guiding their instruction. They have also understood and adopted, to a large extent, many elements of the instructional framework proposed by the new curriculum: (a) student-centred teaching approaches; (b) learning activities that promote students’ active participation, inquiry, and collaborative learning; (c) focus on the expected students’ learning outcomes related to developing a range of computational competences such as digital skills, computational thinking, problem-solving skills, creativity, and collaboration; and (d) students’ assessment is constructively aligned with the anticipated learning outcomes, including the learning activities implemented as well as their digital-computational creations. Full article

Virtual reality offers unprecedented experiences and serves as a new learning tool. However, limited research has examined how this novel visual experience influences cognitive processes. This study described a conceptual theoretical framework of visual cognition, organizing cognition into four links: memory, analogy, logical thinking, and creative thinking. A between-subjects experiment was conducted with 54 college students, who were randomly assigned to a VR (N = 27) or a PC group (N = 27) to learn unfamiliar Mars-related content. Participants completed two learning sessions followed by cognitive tests after each session. Single-channel EEG was recorded at Fp1 during learning, together with proprietary attention and meditation metrics. EEG data were filtered, denoised using wavelet thresholding, and analyzed via short-time Fourier transform to calculate power spectral density and examine the differences in relative power. Results showed that the VR group performed significantly worse on second-session memory tests (p = 0.013). Besides, the VR group exhibited significantly lower meditation levels (p = 0.049) and reduced attention. EEG analysis revealed a significant decrease in the theta band (p = 0.010) and a significant increase in the beta band (p = 0.013). These findings suggest that, within the scope of this study, VR environments without prior knowledge may negatively affect attention, meditation, and memory performance, and provide preliminary evidence that VR is not automatically beneficial for novice learners. Full article