Statistics on the success of transformational change efforts within and across organizations consistently indicate a high level of failure, something we can little afford in today's complex world. Transformative learning offers potential for improvement through the practice of intentional dialogue. The purpose of this research study was to develop…

This study evaluated the impact of a school-based program designed to reduce implicit prejudice towards migrants in fifth-grade school children. The program used empathy and perspective taking and direct and indirect contact as strategies to reduce ethnic prejudice. Multiple activities were used, including drawings by migrant children as…

Historically, non-Indigenous researchers have contributed to colonisation by research based on Western positivistic philosophical frameworks. This approach led to disembodying knowledge from Indigenous people's histories, worldviews, and cultural and social practices, thus perpetuating a deficit-based discourse which situates the responsibility of…

Research Findings: In order to investigate the effects of a mindfulness-based intervention on preschooler's social-emotional learning skills, the present pre-post test pilot study assessed prosocial behavior, self-regulation and perspective taking in 21 preschool children, randomly assigned either to the experimental or the control group. Children…

Little is known about how hearing adults learn sign languages. Our objective in this study was to investigate how learners of British Sign Language (BSL) produce narratives, and we focused in particular on viewpoint-taking. Twenty-three intermediate-level learners of BSL and 10 deaf native/early signers produced a narrative in BSL using the…

This study examined students' perspectives on the impact of an animated storyline surrounding the Sustainable Developmental Goals. Qualitative semi-structured interviews were conducted with students who participated in the storyline to gain insight on its impact on their learning experience. Results suggest that animated storylines can provide…

Cultivating inclusive classrooms, where all students are heard, affirmed, and validated, is an equity issue. As an instructional coach and a supervisor of coaches, the author has a moral obligation to work against the system that was designed to and continues to oppress some students and benefit others. This work often brings up difficult…

This study examines how a project-based civics curriculum emphasizing locally relevant issues developed students' civic perspective-taking by creating discursive spaces for students to make connections with content. The underlying aim of the curriculum was to foster deliberative social studies classrooms by developing students' civic…

Despite ample research on empathy development, its social origins have been understudied, particularly in the context of peer relations. This two-wave study of Swedish adolescents (N = 318; M[subscript ageT1] = 16.28, SD = 0.49; 55% females) examined longitudinal associations between youth friendships and empathy. The results showed that…

While we all have our own circumstances and experiences, being able to empathize is critical to recognizing injustice and considering the viewpoints of others in the community. In the human-centric field of biomedical engineering (BME), empathy is imperative to creating inclusive devices or equipment that are equally accessible to all who need…

Several authors have underlined the negative consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health in several populations, including medical students, such as increases in anxiety, depression and burnout symptoms. Furthermore, previous studies showed that anxiety and depressive symptoms are positively associated with affective empathy and…

Jeremy Sawyer recounts that, after Lev S. Vygotsky's death, Jean Piaget conceded the Russian psychologist correctly understood the social origins, functions, and developmental trajectory of children's egocentric speech (now called private speech) but dismissed this work as irrelevant to children's egocentrism or nondifferentiation of perspectives.…

University students of all disciplines are expected to display critical thinking. Critical thinking may, however, be impeded by psychological and sociological factors such as: belief and confirmation biases, framing, social pressure to conform and poor assessment of probability and risk. These factors are rarely, if ever, thoroughly examined in…

In multicultural education, empathy has been regarded as an essential teacher disposition that enables teachers to better understand culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students through perspective-taking. However, less is known about the mechanism that underlies how empathy fosters teachers' competence in supporting CLD students, i.e.,…

Test input has often been taken as a given in test design practice. Nearly all guides for test designers provide extensive coverage of how to design test items but pay little attention to test input. This paper presents the case that test input plays a crucial role in designing tests of soft skills that have rarely been assessed in existing tests.…