The primary purpose of this study was to determine if relationships exist among the constructs of field dependence, simultaneous processing and sequential processing. The interrelationships among these constructs and ability and achievement were also explored. Regression and discriminant analyses, as well as t-tests were used in the statistical treatment of the data.The 56 student subjects, equally divided by sex, were randomly selected from sixth-grade classrooms in a suburban school corporation in central Indiana. The GEFT and the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC) were administered. Results from the comprehensive Test of Basic Skills (CTBS) and the Test of Cognitive Skills (TCS) were obtained from school personnel.Overall, there were higher correlations among individual and among group tests than were found between the two types of tests. The GEFT, whether treated as a continuous or categorical variable, was found to correlate significantly with group-administered tests of ability and achievement. The TCS and the CTBS were also found to be significantly related. Intercorrelations among selected Global Scales of the K-ABC were significant. There were no significant zero-order correlations between the K-ABC processing scales and the TCS. There were significant correlations between the K-ABC Achievement measure and group-administered tests of both ability and achievement. While the Achievement Scale of the K-ABC had a significant positive relationship with the LEFT, results of a t-test revealed no significant difference between the performance of field dependent and field independent subjects on the Achievement Scale. A significant positive relationship was found between the GEFTand the Simultaneous Processing Scale as well as the Mental Processing Composite. However, in a regression analysis the principal component of the linear composite was the Simultaneous Scale.

published_or_final_version / Social Work / Master / Master of Social Work

This study set out to investigate how students construct their identities. Throughout their socialisation into academia, students are confronted with the paradox of learning as they negotiate the opposing discourses of enslavement and mastery that construct higher education. Utilising a critical discursive psychology approach this research aimed to examine the implications this paradox holds for the development of students’ identities. In-depth interviews with five master’s degree students allowed for an examination of the linguistic resources available for students to draw on in constructing their accounts of student-hood. Analysis of the interpretive repertoires and ideological dilemmas in the text revealed the uptake of contradictory subject positions in participants’ navigation of academic discourse. In order to address the inconsistencies associated with these conflicting ways of being a student, participants ‘worked’ a face in their interactions with academic discourse. Their face-work served to address the paradox by integrating the contradictory positions evident in their accounts. It is in the agency displayed in the integration of these disparate positions that the emancipating student is revealed. / Psychology / M.A. (Research Consultation)

This study set out to investigate how students construct their identities. Throughout their socialisation into academia, students are confronted with the paradox of learning as they negotiate the opposing discourses of enslavement and mastery that construct higher education. Utilising a critical discursive psychology approach this research aimed to examine the implications this paradox holds for the development of students’ identities. In-depth interviews with five master’s degree students allowed for an examination of the linguistic resources available for students to draw on in constructing their accounts of student-hood. Analysis of the interpretive repertoires and ideological dilemmas in the text revealed the uptake of contradictory subject positions in participants’ navigation of academic discourse. In order to address the inconsistencies associated with these conflicting ways of being a student, participants ‘worked’ a face in their interactions with academic discourse. Their face-work served to address the paradox by integrating the contradictory positions evident in their accounts. It is in the agency displayed in the integration of these disparate positions that the emancipating student is revealed. / Psychology / M.A. (Research Consultation)