The purpose of this study was to investigate the factors predicting academic proficiency (AP), the specialised domains required for performing academic tasks, among Russian speaking (L1) immigrants currently studying Hebrew as a second language (L2) and English as a third language (L3) in Israeli schools. Specifically, the study examined the…

Increasing media use among adolescents and its significant influence on health behavior warrants in-depth understanding of their response to media content. This study developed the concept and tested a model of Media Health Literacy (MHL), examined its association with personal/socio-demographic determinants and reported sources of health…

School bullying is a worldwide worrisome phenomenon that occurs within a broad context in which pupils and teachers can either reinforce or undermine violent behavior through interaction. Based on a nationally representative sample of students in Israel, this study examined patterns in student perceptions of student and teacher responses to school…

Religion could play a positive role in intergroup relations. However, this potential is usually overlooked and religion is often perceived as divisive and polarizing, perhaps even a source of intergroup conflict. This study examined religion as a possible tool for achieving positive intergroup encounters. A randomized control trial research design…

Functions are all around us, disguised as actions on concrete objects. Composition of functions, too, is all around us, because these actions can be performed in succession, the output of one serving as the input for the next. In terms of Gray and Tall's (2001) "embodied objects" or Lakoff and Nunez's (2000) "mathematical idea…

The development of intimate same- and other-sex friendships in Arab children and adolescents in Israel was investigated in relation to their perceived parenting styles. It was hypothesized that girls would show higher levels of intimacy than boys, and that cross-sex intimacy in both groups would increase with age, whereas same-sex intimate…

This article reports findings obtained from a large-scale national study (299 schools; 2761 students) that examined academic achievements of immigrants in Israeli schools. It focused on two distinct groups of immigrant students--those from the former USSR and from Ethiopia, in two subject areas--mathematics and academic language (Hebrew), and in…

Children exposed to violent war-like and repeated political violence often experience a continued threat to life and their sense of safety, as well as a disruption of daily functioning. The purpose of the study was to examine the psychological impact of exposure to Israeli occupation on Palestinian school children in the West Bank and Gaza,…

Background: Great efforts are made to develop and implement contact activities for groups in conflict, yet studies of effects of planned contact interventions yielded mixed results. Previous attempts to explain why contact interventions do not fulfill their promise focused on the contact itself. However, the main focus of the present study was the…

The present study examines the correlates of indirect and verbal victimization by peers at school. The research is based on a nationally representative sample of 16,604 students in grades 7 through 11 in 324 schools across Israel. Self-administrated anonymous questionnaires were completed during class. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to…

This paper presents an initial attempt to define structure sense for high school algebra and to test part of this definition. A questionnaire was distributed to 92 eleventh grade students in order to identify those who use structure sense. Presence and absence of brackets was examined to see how they affect use of structure sense. The overall use…

Investigated the relationship among self-enhancement, modesty, and vertical and horizontal collectivism-individualism, surveying high school students from Singapore, urban Israel, and Israeli kibbutzes. Modesty was highest and self-enhancement lowest among Singaporeans. Modesty related positively to vertical collectivism and negatively to…

Intimacy in adolescent friendships was studied with 288 Israeli 7th, 9th, and 11th graders who completed questionnaires about perceived friendship intimacy and with 137 Israeli ninth graders who completed a questionnaire on individual differences in friendship intimacy. Results underscore the salience of intimacy for peer relationships during the…

Describes on Israeli English-as-a-Foreign-Language teacher's experience with a multimedia project in Grade 11 5-point Bagrut classes and with Grade 10 native speakers. (Author/VWL)

Assessed the relative contribution of gender and gender role orientation to empathy and its development in 119 Israeli 8th and 11th graders. When the contribution of masculinity/femininity was covaried, empathy was found unrelated to gender. Findings are discussed in terms of socialization of emotions and gender role orientation. (SLD)