The purpose of this study is to understand the influence of English learning experience and metacognitive language learning strategy training on students¡¦ language learning beliefs and achievement. The sample of this study is 42 third grade students in primary school. The experimental group received metacognitive language learning strategy training while the control group didn¡¦t. The training program lasted for thirteen weeks. The study adopted a pretest-posttest non-equivalent-control-group design. The t-test, analysis of variance and analysis of covariance were adopted to examine the differences between participants¡¦ achievement. The percentage and mean were to describe participants¡¦ beliefs. This study revealed six general findings. First, participants in this study have more realistic expectation and high motivation about learning English. Second, students with English learning experience have better motivation beliefs, higher involvement and greater achievement. They also tend to believe that every individual has English learning abilities. However, students without English learning experience changed their attitude toward learning at the end of this study. Third, the strategy training can improve participants¡¦ beliefs and proved to be useful with other learning materials, but only in difficult test the trained participants get better scores. Fourth, to most beliefs, learning experience has better influence and strategy training affects greater on students with learning experience. Fifth, there is no significant interaction between English learning experience and strategy training on achievement. Finally, metacognitive language learning strategy training can improve participants¡¦ reading abilities, but speaking skill is influenced by learning experience. The conclusion provides suggestions for future development.

This research aimed to explore the current status of junior high school teachers¡¦ adopting interactive whiteboards (hereafter ¡§IWB¡¨) in teaching, and further investigate the teachers¡¦ beliefs and intention to use of IWBs. The research used survey research methodology to examine the Kaohsiung municipal junior high school teachers who had participated IWB teaching courses. There were 238 samples, and the research tool was the questionnaire ¡§Teachers¡¦ Teaching Beliefs and Intention to Use of Interactive Whiteboards.¡¨ In addition, semi-structured interviews were conducted to those who had expressed their willingness to have interviews in the questionnaires in order to supplement the lack of the questionnaire function. Data of the questionnaire sheets were statistically analyzed by SPSS 14.0 for Windows, and the analytical methods included descriptive statistics, average difference analysis, analysis of variances, and other related analytical methods. Qualitative interview data were inductively organized and analyzed. The findings of the research are as follows: 1.About 65% of Kaohsiung municipal junior high school teachers have ever used IWBs. The reason for using IWBs was mainly to increase students¡¦ learning motives. The major problem the teachers faced was that they were unable to find IWB-equipped classrooms. The assistance the teachers hoped to receive was to have an IWB teaching database constructed. 2.The Kaohsiung municipal junior high school teachers¡¦ IWB teaching beliefs were positive, as they generally believed that IWBs were an effective teaching tool integrated with multi-media resources. Thus, IWB teaching could not only trigger students¡¦ attention and learning motives but also promote their learning effects. 3.The Kaohsiung municipal junior high school teachers¡¦ intention to use of IWBs was positive. In general, the teachers believed that it would boost the teachers¡¦ intention to use of the IWB teaching if the teaching material was appropriate, equipment sufficient, or recommendations from other teachers. Some teachers expressed their intention to use of the IWB teaching in the future. 4.The total scale on the teachers¡¦ teaching beliefs showed a better outcome on the teachers with administrative work and those who had the IWB teaching experience; for evaluation level, it indicated better for those who had the IWB teaching experience; for expectation level, it signified better for the spontaneously-learning teachers and those who had the IWB teaching experience; for skill level, it represented better for male teachers, aged 31 to 40, with administrative work and those who had participated more frequently in IWB learning courses. There was no significant difference in cognition and feeling levels. 5.The total scale on the teachers¡¦ intention to use showed a better outcome on the teachers with administrative work and those who had the IWB teaching experience; for decision level, it indicated better for the teachers with administrative work, those who had participated more frequently in IWB learning courses, those who were spontaneous learners, and those who had the IWB teaching experience; for intention level, there was no significant difference. 6.The total scales of the teaching beliefs and of the intention to use showed a remarkable moderate positive correlation.

The Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences at Texas A&M University is in the process of developing an assessment plan for measuring and evaluating each academic degree program (including student learning outcomes) in order to achieve objectives for institutional effectiveness. Assessment is a necessary component of any truly dynamic and progressive educational program. Assessment by evaluation can enhance student learning as well as augment instruction given by the professor. It also allows professors to determine which students reach or exceed learning targets and inform them so students can work to improve their weaknesses. Because there is no assessment plan currently in place for Texas A and M University's Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences, I evaluated results from a previously developed survey that had been given in multiple years to students enrolled in Wildlife Conservation and Management (WFSC 201), an entrance level course of the department. In 2008 I administered the survey to students enrolled in WFSC 201 and to senior-level students enrolled in Conservation Biology and Wildlife Habitat Management (WFSC 406), an upper level course, to evaluate undergraduate students' beliefs on various wildlife issues, interest in animals, and knowledge status of endangered species. The research presented in this thesis contributes a general overview of assessment as it relates to undergraduate degree programs in wildlife and fisheries sciences. The focus was in particular to the evaluation of student conservation issues, animal interest, and species knowledge as it relates to student background (student classification, gender, hometown population size, and participation in youth groups. The results from analyses of responses to specific questions from a survey administered to undergraduates in the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences at Texas A&M University suggest that conservation beliefs and animal interest were highly correlated with gender and hometown population size. Students responding as males and having small hometown population size were more concerned about issues related to land or wildlife usage by humans and students responding as females and having large hometown population sizes were more concerned about issues related to habitat degradation and species viability. Males were also interested in mostly game species and females were interested in those of conservation, domestic, and herptiles. Lastly, the results from the knowledge question suggest that males attain and retain more knowledge of endangered species over females, and this relationship remains the same in non seniors and seniors. These results should be useful to the faculty currently and in the future as they develop an effective departmental assessment plan for the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences at Texas A&M University.

The typical theoretical work on dividend policy suggests five possible imperfections that management should consider. They are taxes, asymmetric information, an incomplete contract, institutional constraints and transaction costs. Different from the typical framework, this dissertation is to study the optimal dividend poly with heterogeneous beliefs among investors. The first model in this study has analyzed investment/dividend policy with heterogeneous beliefs-the full information model in a frictionless economy with divergent types of shareholders. A high dividend policy is optimal with limited endowment for the optimistic investors as the stocks are sold not only to type-o investors, but also to at least one type-p investor holding some shares. A low dividend policy is appropriate with cash dividend D= X0-ao+1 is optimal as the shares are sold only to the type-o investors. Heterogeneous beliefs of investors change dividend policy given the same information even under full information. Following the Miller and Rock (1985) theory, the second model in this dissertation has analyzed heterogeneous beliefs among investors-the two period model in leading to changing a firm¡¦s optimal dividend policy. A firm¡¦s optimal dividend policy is changed not only by the ratio of the pessimistic to optimistic investors, but also heterogeneous beliefs. An increase in the ratio of pessimistic to optimistic investors will result in a higher dividend. On the other hand, as the beliefs of both optimistic and pessimistic investors increase, i.e. a new biotechnology is innovated, a relative low dividend policy is appropriate. Based on the previous analysis, the results show that optimal dividend policy with heterogeneous beliefs among investors in a firm¡¦s earnings exists under heterogeneous beliefs framework. A firm¡¦s optimal dividend policy is different from that of the MM dividend invariance theorem. It is not because of taxes, asymmetric information, incomplete contracts, institutional constraints and traction costs, but heterogeneous beliefs of investors.

This paper desires to research how leader¡¦s beliefs of excellence enterprise influence organizational performance through soft variables¡Ðtaking Herman Miller Company (the thirdest furniture company in the United State) as Example. According to collecting researches of excellence enterprise and information of Herman Miller company, we builded the model of Herman Miller Company. Therefore we can simulate the situation and policies, and find out the relationship between leader¡¦s belief and organizational performance.

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This reserach attemptedbto investigate the epistemological beliefs held by Turkish students through gender, grade level, and fields of the study by using Hofer and Pintrich&#039 / s (1997) Frame work. A total of 1557 sixth, eighth, and tenth grade students from &Ccedil / ankaya district of Ankara participated in the study. Epistemological Beliefs Questionnaire and Demographical Questionnaire were administered to the students in order to determine their epistemological belSiefs and their background caharcteristics. Four main conclusions can be drawn from the current study / epistemological beliefs are multidimensional, epistemological beliefs vary as a function of gender, grade level, and fields of study. Specifically girls were found to have more sophisticated beliefs in justification of knowledge than boys. Results also supproted the idea that epistemological beliefs develops over time.tenth grade students had more sophisticated beliefs in source of knowledge, certainty of knowledge, and development of knowledge compared to sixth and eighth grade students. Besides, findings of the study revealed differences in epistemological beliefs of students across different major fields of the study. The students attending to the mathematics-science fields were fiund to have more sophisticated beliefs about justification of knowledge than the students attending to literature-social science fields.

The purpose of this study was to explore the relationships between career resilience and career beliefs among employees in Taiwan. This study also examined whether selected demographic variables had effects on career resilience and career beliefs. A pilot study involving 178 participants was conducted in Taiwan to validate the instruments used in the main study. Twenty items were selected for measuring career resilience. These items were taken from London's Career Motivation Inventory (1993b), Noe, R. A., Noe, A. W., and Bachhuber's measures of career motivation (1990), and Michigan's Career Resilience Scale (Bice, 1999, January 24-30). Forty-nine items consisting of 10 subscales in the Career Beliefs Scale were adopted from Yang's Chinese Career Beliefs Inventory-Form B (1996). The study had 578 current employees from diverse work settings in Taiwan. Career resilience scores were negatively correlated with the total career beliefs scores (r = -.22, p less then .01), which indicated that participants who were higher on career resilience tended to possess fewer irrational career beliefs. Career resilience scores were negatively correlated with belief in fate, avoidance of decision making, the belief that some occupations are more prestigious than others, possessing sex role stereotypes, assuming other's help can determine the best choice, and the belief that salary is the primary concern when making career choices. Career resilience scores were positively correlated with the belief that one should find the best-fit career and that work is very important in one's life. However, the magnitudes of coefficients were small (the absolute r values were all less than .40). The results of ANOVA showed that gender, education, type of institution, recent participation in training/educational activities, and supervisory experience yielded statistically significant main effects in career resilience scores. Additionally, there was a significant interaction effect on career resilience for gender by education. MANOVA results showed that gender, age, educational levels, types of institutions, supervisory experience, career change, and recent participation in training activities yielded statistically significant differences among career beliefs. Discriminant analyses were applied to further investigate the differences among the 10 career belief subscales for the significant demographic variables.

In June 2013, the American Medical Association (AMA) made the highly controversial decision to designate obesity a disease. Proponents predicted the decision would lead to reduced weight-related stigma, whereas opponents predicted designating a third of the population as “diseased” would exacerbate stigma. To determine the effects of defining obesity as a disease on explicit and implicit weight-biased attitudes and explicit weight-biased beliefs, female undergraduate students (N = 146) were randomly assigned to one of two groups: disease or lifestyle. Participants in the disease group (n = 71) were asked to read an article describing obesity as a disease caused by biology and genes; participants in the lifestyle group (n = 75) read an article describing obesity as the result of personal choices, including over-consumption of food and inactivity. Explicit weight-biased attitudes and beliefs were measured pre- and post-exposure to the article. Change in beliefs about the controllability of weight was examined as a potential meditator of the relationship between group and explicit weight-biased attitudes; and body mass index (BMI), health orientation, and fitness orientation were examined as potential moderators. Results revealed a significant interaction between group and time on weight-biased beliefs. Participants in the disease group exhibited stronger beliefs that obesity is outside a person’s control from pre- to post-exposure, whereas participants in the lifestyle group exhibited a weakening in these beliefs over the same time period. Contrary to hypotheses, this change in beliefs about the controllability of weight did not extend to weight-biased attitudes.

Before entering school, children begin their science learning with their parents at home. This study proposes that parents' beliefs and actions regarding science shape their children's knowledge and skills that they then bring to school. Studying parents' beliefs about and practices with their children within the topic area of science provided insight into their influence in helping their children make sense of the world. Therefore, the purpose of this study aimed to investigate parents' beliefs about children's science learning and their actions in facilitating their children's science learning when they visited a science museum from socio-cultural perspectives. To investigate this, a qualitative case study examining nine Taiwanese parents of kindergarteners was conducted. The study was conducted in two parts. Data sources included field notes, parent interviews, and documents such as pictures of the equipment these parents bought for their children. First, through interviews with parents, their beliefs about their children's science learning were identified and examined. Four parts including parents' gendered science beliefs, parents' perceived importance of science learning, parents' beliefs about how science learning should proceed, and parents' beliefs about their engagement in science learning were found. Part two of the study examined how these nine parents' beliefs guided them in making decisions when they interacted with their children in a science museum through observations and follow-up interviews. In most cases, parents' beliefs appeared to be important resources for helping them find a proper way to interact with their children. Three issues including the person who took the lead at the family visits, the quantity of parents' intervention, and the scaffolding strategies these parents employed were found in their interactions with their children. Parents were aware of why they behaved in particular ways: because of their beliefs. Based on the findings, the researcher suggested that parents' beliefs were an important mechanism for influencing children's science learning. A seemingly simple behavior, such as letting children explore one object longer than others, might reflect what was recognized as important in their beliefs. Lastly, the implications for early childhood educators, parents of young children, and future research were provided. / text