This chapter summarizes the results of nearly 100 years of research on school-based social and emotional learning (SEL). The SEL field has grown out of research in many fields and subfields with which educators, researchers, and policymakers are familiar, including the promotion of social competence, bullying prevention, prevention of drug use and abuse, civic and character education, emotional intelligence, conflict resolution, social skills training, and 21st-century skills. The chapter begins with a historical summary of theoretical movements and research trends that have led to today's inclusion of SEL as part of many schools' curricula, policies, and practices. Contemporary approaches that represent current policy and societal concerns are discussed in comparative terms. Based on the converging research evidence, this chapter identifies design elements and implementation quality characteristics of effective approaches to SEL. Recommendations for future practice, policy, and research are provided.
<p>Mindfulness has been associated with better psychological and physical health; although, the mechanisms of these benefits are poorly understood. We explored the role of mindfulness in stress-health pathways among undergraduates at a large public university. Participants reported on demographic and academic variables and completed data collection at two time points during the academic semester, approximately one month apart. At each collection, measures of mindfulness, perceived stress, and psychological well-being were gathered. Students provided two days of home-based saliva collection for assessment of cortisol. Mean scores were computed for each of the measures, over the two assessments. Hierarchical multiple regressions adjusting for GPA, hours of paid employment per week, minority status, and living situation explored the impact of mindfulness in our stress-health model. Students with higher dispositional mindfulness reported significantly less perceived stress and had lower overall mean diurnal cortisol. Mindfulness was associated with greater psychological well-being. Exploratory analyses suggested that future research should explore the potential mediating or moderating relationships between mindfulness, perceived stress, and cortisol. Findings suggest that mindfulness may help attenuate both psychological and physiological stress responses to college stress.</p>
In this chapter, Daniel Barbezat (Professor of Economics, Amherst College and Executive Director, The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society) and Allison Pingree (Director of Professional Pedagogy, Harvard University) provide an overview of the definition, intention, and benefits of contemplative exercises, and approaches to fostering these practices through university teaching and learning centers, with a cautionary note on possible problems, in hopes that these descriptions will stimulate interest and inquiry into contemplative and introspective exercises and enable further investigation and discovery.
BackgroundNursing students will graduate into stressful workplace environments and resilience is an essential acquired ability for surviving the workplace. Few studies have explored the relationship between resilience and the degree of innate dispositional mindfulness, compassion, compassion fatigue and burnout in nursing students, including those who find themselves in the position of needing to work in addition to their academic responsibilities.
Aim
This paper investigates the predictors of resilience, including dispositional mindfulness and employment status of third year nursing students from three Australian universities.
Design
Participants were 240 undergraduate, third year, nursing students. Participants completed a resilience measure (Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale, CD‐RISC), measures of dispositional mindfulness (Cognitive and Affective Mindfulness Scale Revised, CAMS‐R) and professional quality of life (The Professional Quality of Life Scale version 5, PROQOL5), such as compassion satisfaction, compassion fatigue and burnout.
Method
An observational quantitative successive independent samples survey design was employed. A stepwise linear regression was used to evaluate the extent to which predictive variables were related each to resilience.
Results
The predictive model explained 57% of the variance in resilience. Dispositional mindfulness subset acceptance made the strongest contribution, followed by the expectation of a graduate nurse transition programme acceptance, with dispositional mindfulness total score and employment greater than 20 hours per week making the smallest contribution. This was a resilient group of nursing students who rated high with dispositional mindfulness and exhibited hopeful and positive aspirations for obtaining a position in a competitive graduate nurse transition programme after graduation.
In Building Academic Success on Social and Emotional Learning: What does the Research Say? Zins and his colleagues presented a new way to conceptualize the impact of social and emotional learning programs on students' school success by broadening the concept to include students' attitudes, behaviors, and performance. To build on Zins' ideas, we (a) briefly review research examining the impact of 262 social and emotional learning (SEL) programs on a number of outcomes that assessed school attitudes, behaviors, and performance; and (b) suggest additional avenues for research of SEL interventions.
This special issue of Public Culture explores forms of environmental image making and visualization in the context of the Anthropocene. The essays aim to spark dialogue about how visual technologies and media—from satellite imaging and military simulation to animation and infographics—are shaping contemporary perceptions of both ecological risks and environmental movements. With contributions from Allison Carruth, Elizabeth DeLoughrey, Ursula K. Heise, Heather Houser, Robert P. Marzec, Nicholas Mirzoeff, and Rob Nixon, the issue investigates new horizons of cultural history, critical theory, and media studies within the environmental humanities.
This preliminary study sought to explore the link between depression, experiential avoidance and mindfulness in people with a spinal cord injury (SCI). We surveyed patients listed on the SCI database at Royal Perth Hospital who had experienced an injury over the last 10 years. Respondents (62) completed a questionnaire including the depression subscale of the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale, the Acceptance and Action Questionnaire (AAQ-2; Bond et al., 2007) and the Mindful Attention Awareness Scale (MAAS; Brown & Ryan, 2003). Thirty per cent of participants scored above the cut-off for possible depression, with equal numbers experiencing mild, moderate or severe depression. Mindfulness and experiential avoidance were significantly associated with depression, and were intercorrelated. Further, regression analysis indicated that experiential avoidance mediated the relationship between depression and mindfulness. Our preliminary data suggest that individuals with SCI who are more mindful use less avoidance and have a more positive mood. These results indicate further work in this area is warranted.
Can you heal cancer naturally with a raw vegan diet, meditation and yoga? Amanda did!Cervical cancer is the second most common cancer among women and almost 4,000 cases were fatal just last year. Conventional treatments for cervical cancer include chemotherapy, radiation, surgeries, hysterectomies, or the removal of lymph nodes and ovaries. Treatments like this often leave the woman infertile.
When Amanda Deming was diagnosed with cervical cancer she was determined to cure herself naturally through a raw vegan diet, meditation, and yoga. Without any conventional treatment she is now cancer-free.
Amanda stopped by The Food Heals Podcast to share her healing story, give her tips for what to do if you or a loved one is diagnosed with cancer and why it is just as important to read your wine labels as it is to read you food labels!
Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) has been shown to be an effective treatment for mood and anxiety disorders. Little is known, however, about the specific psychological skills that may improve with MBCT. The present study investigated the relationship between history of MBCT and emotion regulation ability. Specifically, we examined cognitive reappraisal ability (CRA) in a sample of individuals with a history of MBCT compared with two control groups: a group without a history of any type of therapy and a group with a history of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). Groups were matched on key variables including age, sex, education, working memory, emotional reactivity, and life stress. CRA was measured using a standardized laboratory challenge. Results indicated that participants with a history of MBCT demonstrated higher CRA than both the no-therapy control group and the CBT control group. These results suggest that, by guiding people to accept thoughts and feelings without judgment and to focus on the present moment, MBCT may lay the foundation for increased CRA.
This article presents findings from a meta-analysis of 213 school-based, universal social and emotional learning (SEL) programs involving 270,034 kindergarten through high school students. Compared to controls, SEL participants demonstrated significantly improved social and emotional skills, attitudes, behavior, and academic performance that reflected an 11-percentile-point gain in achievement. School teaching staff successfully conducted SEL programs. The use of 4 recommended practices for developing skills and the presence of implementation problems moderated program outcomes. The findings add to the growing empirical evidence regarding the positive impact of SEL programs. Policy makers, educators, and the public can contribute to healthy development of children by supporting the incorporation of evidence-based SEL programming into standard educational practice.
This article presents findings from a meta-analysis of 213 school-based, universal social and emotional learning (SEL) programs involving 270,034 kindergarten through high school students. Compared to controls, SEL participants demonstrated significantly improved social and emotional skills, attitudes, behavior, and academic performance that reflected an 11-percentile-point gain in achievement. School teaching staff successfully conducted SEL programs. The use of 4 recommended practices for developing skills and the presence of implementation problems moderated program outcomes. The findings add to the growing empirical evidence regarding the positive impact of SEL programs. Policy makers, educators, and the public can contribute to healthy development of children by supporting the incorporation of evidence-based SEL programming into standard educational practice.
This issue brief was written to assist state policymakers in better understanding how social and emotional learning (SEL) can help students to be college and career ready. The brief provides a short description of what SEL is, why it is needed, and what it looks like in practice. In addition, examples of standards that support SEL at the federal and state levels, current SEL initiatives and programs, and outcomes and measures that can be used to assess SEL programming are described. A list of resources is included at the end of this brief for policymakers who are interested in learning more. The framework used in this brief aligns with the "College and Career Development Organizer," developed by the National High School Center (National High School Center, 2012). In the following sections, we describe how SEL fits into each of the three strands focused on (1) goals and expectations for college and career readiness, (2) pathways and supports for college and career preparation, and (3) outcomes and measures for college and career success. In the first section of the brief, we describe what high school graduates should know and be able to do. In the second section, we discuss what policies, programs, and structures will help high school graduates meet expectations. And, in the third section, we describe how we know when high school graduates meet expectations.
Armitage, D., C. Béné, A. T. Charles, D. Johnson, and E. H. Allison. 2012. The interplay of well-being and resilience in applying a social-ecological perspective. Ecology and Society 17(4): 15. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-04940-170415
CJSF’s Allison R. Brown speaks with David Osher, Vice President and Institute Fellow at the American Institutes for Research, about social-emotional learning and its impact on students and teachers alike over the years.
Land systems are the result of human interactions with the natural environment. Understanding the drivers, state, trends and impacts of different land systems on social and natural processes helps to reveal how changes in the land system affect the functioning of the socio-ecological system as a whole and the tradeoff these changes may represent. The Global Land Project has led advances by synthesizing land systems research across different scales and providing concepts to further understand the feedbacks between social-and environmental systems, between urban and rural environments and between distant world regions. Land system science has moved from a focus on observation of change and understanding the drivers of these changes to a focus on using this understanding to design sustainable transformations through stakeholder engagement and through the concept of land governance. As land use can be seen as the largest geo-engineering project in which mankind has engaged, land system science can act as a platform for integration of insights from different disciplines and for translation of knowledge into action.
From fires and hurricanes, to confrontational politics — with all that's been going on, it's no wonder the American Psychological Association found an increase in Americans' stress levels over the last year.Our constant checking of smartphones — with the bombardment of news and social media — can amp up our anxiety. So, why not use your device to help you disconnect?
People are increasingly turning to mindfulness mediation to manage health issues, and meditation classes are being offered through schools and hospitals.
People are increasingly turning to mindfulness mediation to manage health issues, and meditation classes are being offered through schools and hospitals.But doctors have questioned whether this ancient Eastern practice really offers measurable health benefits. A fresh review of the evidence should help sort that out.
Silence is a beautiful thing. But Robert DeMong has accepted that he'll likely never experience it again.He's got a condition called tinnitus, which means a ringing sound travels with him everywhere he goes, including to bed at night.
It came on suddenly about five years ago. And he says it threw him into depression. "It was like an ugly monster inside my head," recalls DeMong. "I couldn't sleep at night."
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