Teen spirit in the lab

Sounds like teen spirit: Computational insights into the grounding of everyday musical terms

The diversity of symbolic dimensions along which we think about music in our everyday listening experience is puzzling. Songs are commonly said to be “energetic”, to make us “sad” or ”nostalgic”, to sound “like film music”, to be perfect to “drive a car on the highway” among many other similar metaphors. Such descriptions are generally considered as well-defined sensory constructs, strongly cou...

Reading English in the Computer Lab

The present study compares the performance of two TEFL reading classes: one taking place in a regular classroom and the other held in a computer lab, with the learners practicing reading online. The results of an independent samples t-test showed that the difference between the learners’ scores on their reading comprehension post-tests and pretests did not differ statistically significantly fro...

Recollecting the Spirit of Jihad

The amazing teen brain.

Science suggests ways to promote growth while preventing disaster Behold the American teenager, a lump in a hoodie who's capable of little more than playing "Grand Theft Auto," raiding the liquor cabinet, and denting the minivan, thanks to a brain so unformed that it's more like a kindergartner's than a grown-up's. That's the message that seemed to emerge from the past decade's neuroscientific ...

The Spirit of Teaching