Educational Psychology News

March 9, 2025

Top Headlines

New Study Examines How Physics Students Perceive Recognition

Mar. 5, 2025 — Experts see peer recognition as important to student success in physics, and a new study gives college-level physics instructors insight into how students perceive the message from their classmates that 'you're good at physics.' Even when women ...

Creativity Boosts Standardized Literacy and Numeracy Test Scores: Australia

Mar. 4, 2025 — A groundbreaking study shows that creativity plays an essential role in academic success, suggesting that students who think outside the box are more likely to excel in literacy and numeracy ...

Teaching Kids How to Become Better Citizens

Mar. 3, 2025 — In our polarized society, a new study offers hope for the future: Even young children can learn to discuss and argue about meaningful problems in a respectful and productive way. Researchers found success in a social studies curriculum for fourth ...

We Need a New Definition of Dyslexia, Research Says

Feb. 25, 2025 — A new definition of dyslexia is needed to more accurately describe the learning disorder and give those struggling with dyslexia the specific support they require, says new ...

Latest Headlines

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Associative Learning: Primary School Children Outperform All Other Age Groups

Feb. 27, 2025 — The ability to make the connection between an event and its consequences -- experts use the term associative learning -- is a crucial skill for ...

Problem-Based Learning Helps Students Stay in School

Feb. 26, 2025 — Education experts are encouraging schools to consider problem-based learning (PBL) in a move to improve engagement and creativity among high school students. New research demonstrates how hands-on, ...

Clashing With Classmates: Off-Putting Traits Spark Enemy Relationships

Feb. 25, 2025 — Making enemies isn't random. Traits like emotional instability, aggression, and disruptive behavior early in life can lead to antagonistic relationships. Research on students aged 9-14 found that ...

How Humans Learn to Optimize Working Memory

Feb. 24, 2025 — Working memory is what allows humans to juggle different pieces of information in short-term scenarios, like making a mental grocery list and then going shopping or remembering and then dialing a ...

Socially Dominant Individuals Are More Confident but Not Necessarily More Competent

Feb. 19, 2025 — Research has found that people who strive for dominance, whether in personal or professional life, are more confident in their decision-making but ...

How the Brain Balances Risk and Reward in Making Decisions

Feb. 19, 2025 — Research in mice identifies brain circuitry that supports certain reward-based ...

Adults Can Learn Absolute Pitch: New Research Challenges Long-Held Musical Belief

Feb. 12, 2025 — It's been a long-held belief that absolute pitch -- the ability to identify musical notes without reference -- is a rare gift reserved for a select ...

Mapmaking in the Mind: How the Brain Builds Mental Maps of the World

Feb. 12, 2025 — Researchers have systematically detailed, step by step, how cognitive maps form in the brain's hippocampus -- a region responsible for learning and ...

School Bans Alone Not Enough to Tackle Negative Impacts of Phone and Social Media Use, Researchers Find

Feb. 5, 2025 — Students attending schools that ban the use of phones throughout the school day aren't necessarily experiencing better mental health and wellbeing, ...

Scientists Discover Brain Mechanism That Helps Us Overcome Fear

Feb. 6, 2025 — Researchers have unveiled the precise brain mechanisms that enable animals to overcome instinctive fears. The study in mice could have implications for developing therapeutics for fear-related ...

Listening for Multiple Mental Health Disorders

Feb. 4, 2025 — Researchers develop machine learning tools that screen for co-morbid anxiety disorders and major depressive disorder using acoustic voice signals. The team spoke to participants with and without ...

COVID Lockdowns Disrupted a Crucial Social Skill Among Preschoolers, Trailblazing Study Finds

Jan. 29, 2025 — Researchers discovered children ages 3 to 5 tested before and after COVID lockdowns had a significant gap in a key cognitive skill, particularly for children from homes with low financial resources ...

New Study Uncovers Key Mechanism Behind Learning and Memory

Jan. 21, 2025 — A breakthrough study sheds new light on how brain cells relay critical information from their extremities to their nucleus, leading to the activation of genes essential for learning and ...

Pupil Size in Sleep Reveals How Memories Are Sorted, Preserved

Jan. 1, 2025 — Researchers have found the pupil is key to understanding how, and when, the brain forms strong, long-lasting ...

Machine Psychology: A Bridge to General AI?

Dec. 19, 2024 — Artificial intelligence that is as intelligent as humans may become possible thanks to psychological learning models, combined with certain types of ...

Dyslexia Genetics Linked to Brain Structure

Dec. 18, 2024 — Dyslexia is a common learning difficulty in which genes often play a role. How do genes associated with dyslexia relate to brain structure in the general population? In a large-scale study, a team of ...

Can Lab-Grown Neurons Exhibit Plasticity?

Dec. 16, 2024 — This bioengineering breakthrough has found a way to make neurons grown in a dish react just like the real ...

Education Scholar Calls for Ecological Shift to 'School Within a School' to Give Students Autonomy Needed for Success

Dec. 12, 2024 — An international education expert, argues in a new study for an ecological shift to a 'school within a school' approach that would give students, teachers and parents the ability to guide ...

Resolving Ambiguity: How the Brain Uses Context in Decision-Making and Learning

Dec. 10, 2024 — Life can be tricky. We have so many decisions to make. It's a good thing we have an orbitofrontal cortex and hippocampus to help us. These areas of the brain work together to help us sort ...

Sculpting the Brain (Without Chisel or Scalpel)

Dec. 10, 2024 — Researchers report that they have successfully tested a novel approach for teaching the human brain to learn through external manipulation and neural feedback -- what they call the ...

Could Online Technology Be a Clue as to Why Boys in Norway Are Outperforming Girls in Learning English as a Second Language?

Dec. 8, 2024 — Bucking conventionality, boys in Norway are making early gains in reading English as a second language and even outperforming girls at age 10 and 13 -- a new a study of more than one million students ...

To Remember Conversations, Keep Making New Brain Cells

Dec. 5, 2024 — A new study provides the first cellular evidence that making new brain cells in adults supports verbal learning and memory, which enables people to have conversations and to remember what they hear. ...

Unlocking the Science of Sleep: How Rest Enhances Language Learning

Dec. 5, 2024 — Sleep is critical for all sorts of reasons, but a team of international scientists has discovered a new incentive for getting eight hours of sleep every night: it helps the brain to store and learn a ...

Preschool Education: A Key to Supporting Allophone Children

Nov. 28, 2024 — A Canadian study reveals that allophone children often face learning and communication difficulties in kindergarten, which can negatively impact their educational ...

Brain Stimulation Effectiveness Tied to Learning Ability, Not Age

Nov. 27, 2024 — A study reveals that the effectiveness of brain stimulation on motor skills is determined by an individual's learning ability rather than age, highlighting the need for a more personalized ...

Need a Landing Pad for Helicopter Parenting? Frame Tasks as Learning

Nov. 22, 2024 — Parents are much less likely to intervene when their young children are getting dressed or performing other simple chores if those tasks are framed as learning opportunities, according to a new ...

Animal Characters Can Boost Young Children's Psychological Development

Nov. 22, 2024 — A study has shown that iconic characters such as Peter Rabbit -- or Toad and Ratty from The Wind in the Willows -- can also play an important role in the development of children's theory of mind ...

Snoring Linked to Behavioral Problems in Adolescents Without Declines in Cognition

Nov. 21, 2024 — Adolescents who snore frequently were more likely to exhibit behavior problems such as inattention, rule-breaking, and aggression, but they do not have any decline in their cognitive abilities, ...

Confidence Drives Feedback-Seeking Behavior: Insights Into Learning and Motivation

Nov. 21, 2024 — New research reveals how low confidence drives feedback-seeking, enhancing learning with insights for education and rehabilitation ...

How Children Learned for 99% of Human History

Nov. 19, 2024 — Unlike kids in the United States, hunter-gatherer children in the Congo Basin have often learned how to hunt, identify edible plants and care for babies by the tender age of six or seven. This rapid ...