Can changes in teacher pay encourage more able individuals to enter the teaching profession? So far, studies of the impact of pay on the aptitude distribution of teachers have provided mixed evidence on the extent to which altering teacher salaries represents a feasible solution to the teacher quality problem. Using a unique dataset of test scores for everyone admitted into an Australian univer...

Recently the electorate in some states has voted to eliminate the use of racial preferences in college admissions. However, many voters still favor fair and just means for promoting ethnic diversity in higher education. In light of these new conditions, researchers are interested in finding alternative measures of merit that can be used in the admissions process. One approach to admissions that...

The study of individual differences encompasses broad constructs including intelligence, creativity, and personality. However, substantially less research is devoted to the study of specific aptitudes in spite of their importance to educational, occupational, and avocational success. We sought to determine subcortical brain structural correlates of several broad aptitudes including Math, Vocabu...

As language rhythm relies partly on general acoustic properties, such as intensity and duration, mastering two languages with distinct rhythmic properties (i.e., stress position) may enhance musical rhythm perception. We investigated whether competence in a second language (L2) with different rhythmic properties than a L1 affects musical rhythm aptitude. Turkish early (TELG) and late learners (...

Skilled jazz musicians are adept at coordinating their musical actions to produce an auditory outcome that is more than the sum of its parts. Whereas previous studies have investigated the cognitive mechanisms supporting ensemble music production, the present study focuses on the perception of this collaboration. The stimuli in this study were recorded duets of improvised New Orleans jazz stand...

OBJECTIVE Brain-computer interface (BCI) provide a non-muscular communication channel for patients with impairments of the motor system. A significant number of BCI users is unable to obtain voluntary control of a BCI-system in proper time. This makes methods that can be used to determine the aptitude of a user necessary. METHODS We hypothesized that integrity and connectivity of involved whi...

International research suggests that differences in teacher performance can explain a large portion of student achievement. Yet little is known about how the quality of the Australian teaching profession has changed over time. Using consistent data on the academic aptitude of new teachers, we compare those who have entered the teaching profession in Australia over the past two decades. We find ...

In this study, we explored the impact of the decision agency (Student vs. Tutor) and granularity (Problem vs. Step) across students with different levels of incoming competence (High vs. Low). Students were randomly assigned to four conditions and split into High and Low groups based on their pre-test scores. All students used the same Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) called Pyrenees, followed...