U.S History Review Essay Example for Free

U.S History Review Essay It is important to study the history of the U. S because it helps us to learn about the people of America and even about American societies. It also helps us understand how these people or the societies usually behave. This is because history tends to base evidence on analyzing and contemplating about how societies function not only nowadays, but from the past. Examining the history of the U. S can help us understand the changes of the society from the very past up to the state they are in today (Crabtree, 1993). Further, studying U. S history can make us understand Americas’ political progress from the past to date. We thus can be informed on the shape of the politics in the past and the major developments. Moreover we can even look into the factors that caused changes in the various American political parties. Conversely, historical analyses of voter turnout in key American elections and the associated evolution can make us understand some of the problems American people face today. This can also enable us to understand the present political health of the U. S (Steele, 2009). Moreover, we can understand economic changes in America and factors or policies that the government used to see their economy rising. This information can also help any other nation to improve their economy (Crabtree, 1993). Conversely, the cultural values of the American people can be understood by studying the history of U. S. We can understand the issues of the past by having a look at how people used to live in the past ages which serve as a sense of excitement and beauty (Steele, 2009). Studying the history of America can make one grow psychologically. This can broaden one’s mind besides making somebody to understand how they can solve problems as they come using facts that were used by philosophers in the past (The Manhattan Institute). References Crabtree, D. (1993). The Importance of History. Retrieved 8th June 2010, from http://www. mckenziestudycenter. org/society/articles/history. html Steele, D. D. (2009). The Importance of Local History. Charleston, SC: BiblioBazaar, LLC. The Manhattan Institute. Why Study War? Victor Davis Hanson, City Journal Summer 2007. Retrieved 8th June 2010, http://www. city-journal. org/html/17_3_military_history. html

A Cognitive Model of New Data on Human Problem Solving Essay -- Psycho

A Cognitive Model of New Data on Human Problem Solving I. Project Description Cognitive modeling is the creation of models which resemble and explain the way in which humans do things. What makes them so interesting to me is the process though which cognitive scientists go in order to create these models. Cognitive scientists often use a generative theory in creating such models. A generative theory is a theory that explains a set of empirical observations by actually generating them (as opposed to just summarizing them or characterizing them with equations or logic). Thus, a generative theory has to be executable, like a computer program or a "recipe". The system on which I'm basing my work is named Cascade (VenLehn, Jones & Chi, 1991). Cascade was originally developed to explain the cognitive mechanisms involved in the self-explanation effect (Chi et al., 1989; Fergusson-Hessler & de Jong, 1990; Pirolli & Bielaczyc, 1989). Simplifying a bit, the effect shows that people learn more effectively by studying examples when they are careful to explain to themselves as many steps of the example as they can. Students who do not carefully explain worked out example steps do not perform as well on subsequent problems. Cascade models the potential learning mechanisms that cause this effect. I now wish to apply the Cascade model to a new problem domain and a new set of psychological data. Originally, Cascade was written to solve problems in Newtonian physics, the domain used in Chi et al.'s study. Since Cascade was first created additional psychological research has been done in other problem domains. Due to the versatility of Cascade, applying the Cascade model to other problem domains would be beneficial. In the fall of 2000 I... ...nnual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society. Newell, A., & Simon, H. A. (1972). Human Problem Solving. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc. Pirolli, P., & Bielaczyc, K. (1989). Empirical analyses of self-explanation and transfer in learning to program. In G. M. Olson & E. E. Smith (Eds.), Proceedings of the Eleventh Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 450-457). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Renkl, A., Atkinson, R. K., & Maier, U. H. (2000). From studying examples to solving problems: Fading worked-out solution steps helps learning. In L. R. Gleitman & A. K. Joshi (Eds.), Proceedings of the Twenty-Second Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 393-398). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. VanLehn, K., Jones, R. M., & Chi, M. T. H. (1991). A model of the self-explanation effect. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 2, 1-59.

Literature Review – Work Choices of Married Women

Literature review The labour supply of women has been the subject of extensive study both in Australia and internationally. 1 Despite this, only a few international and Australian studies have examined the inter-temporal labour supply behaviour of women, and it remains a less understood area of labour supply research (Hyslop 1999). 2 However, study in this area is growing rapidly due to the increasing availability of panel data and improved computational power and techniques. This chapter reviews a selection of studies of inter-temporal labour supply of women in Australian and overseas. Past research Several international studies have examined inter-temporal persistence in labour supply. Shaw (1994) used the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) over the period 1967-1987 to measure persistence in (annual) working hours of white women in the United States. She found evidence of (statistically) significant persistence in an individual’s labour supply even after controlling for other influencing factors — such as wages, the age and number of children and individual health status. Further, the extent of persistence was found to have changed little over the 20 year period studied. Shaw also found that unobserved (time invariant) individual heterogeneity played an important role in the persistence. However, the study did not examine whether the persistence also resulted from unobserved transitory shocks (or errors) that might be serially correlated. Hyslop (1999), also using the PSID data (for the period 1979-1985), examined the dynamics of labour force participation of married women in the United States and found evidence of state dependence. While unobserved individual heterogeneity was found to contribute to the persistence of labour force participation, transitory 1 For a detailed survey of the international literature on women’s labour supply, see Killingsworth (1983), Killingsworth and Heckman (1986) and Heckman (1993). 2 A few studies also examine inter-temporal labour supply behaviour of men, such as Muhleisen and Zimmermann (1994) for Germany and Arulampalam, Booth and Taylor (2000) for the United Kingdom. LITERATURE REVIEW 5 rrors were found to be negatively correlated over time, suggesting that failing to control for serially correlated transitory errors would lead to underestimation of state dependence. The non-labour income of married women, measured by their partner’s earnings, was also found to have a negative effect on their labour force participation. Permanent non-labour income was found to be more important in affecting a woman’s labour force participation than transitory non-labour income. The age and number of young children were also found to have a significant negative effect on the labour force participation decisions of women. Inter-temporal persistence in women’s labour supply was also examined by Lee and Tae (2005) using the first four waves (1998-2001) of the Korean Labour and Income Panel Study. Without considering serial correlation of transitory errors, the authors found that both state dependence and unobserved individual heterogeneity were important in explaining inter-temporal persistence in the labour force participation of women. They also found that the extent of state dependence of labour force participation varied with education, marital status and age. State dependence was found to increase with age, and was higher for married than for single women and higher for women with a junior college level of education relative to those with other levels of education. In the Australian context, very little research exists on the inter-temporal persistence of labour market activity. One study, Knights et al. 2002), examined labour market dynamics of Australian youth (those aged 15-29 years), using the Australian Longitudinal Survey over the period 1985-1988. Dynamic labour market activity of both males and females was analysed separately, with each group being further divided into high and low education groups. High education was defined as the completion of secondary school; with the low education defined as secondary school not being completed. Only two labour force states were examined — employed or not em ployed (binary variable). The authors found that an individual’s employment status in the previous year predicted his/her employment status in the currently year for all the four gender-education groups, suggesting evidence of state dependence of employment status. They also found evidence that unobserved individual heterogeneity was important explanatory factor in the persistence of employment status for all groups examined. Like Lee and Tae (2005), however, Knights et al. (2002) did not examine whether the observed persistence was due to serially correlated transitory errors. Some studies have also examined the effect of serially correlated transitory errors on inter-temporal persistence. Tatsiramos (2008), for example, examined female employment dynamics in seven European countries (Demark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom) to test the effects of fertility had on employment status. State dependence was found in the employment status for 6 WORK CHOICES OF MARRIED WOMEN: DRIVERS OF CHANGE women in all countries after controlling for observed and unobserved individual heterogeneity and serially correlated transitory errors. The magnitude of state dependence as measured by average partial effects was very similar across all the countries studied, with the probability of a women being employed being 31 to 49 percentage points higher if employed in the previous year. Like Hyslop (1999), Tatsiramos (2008) also found that transitory errors are negatively correlated over time for all countries, and only in the case of Denmark, was the serial correlation insignificant. Permanent non-labour income was found to have a significant and negative effect on labour supply for all countries except Denmark and the United Kingdom, where the effect was positive. In case of the Netherlands and Italy, a woman’s transitory non-labour income was also found to decrease labour supply. Summing up Much of the existing literature of the inter-temporal behaviour of labour supply has focused on whether or not a woman is involved in paid work — a binary choice measured as labour force participation or employment status. In contrast, the approach taken in this study is to examine working hours as a measure of labour supply, and thus treat non-employment (those with zero working hours) as a censored outcome. Further, there are no Australian (and few international) studies that have examined both the effect of observed and unobserved individual heterogeneity and serially correlated transitory errors on inter-temporal labour supply. Despite this, studies of labour force participation by Australian women, comprehensively reviewed by Birch (2005), provide a valuable guide to the choice of explanatory variables. Although the estimates vary across studies and are sensitive to model specifications and estimation techniques, some patterns emerge. The studies generally found that increases in a woman’s wages, educational attainment, labour market experience, and the cost of living, all have a positive effect on a woman’s labour supply. Conversely increases in family income and the number of dependent young children had a negative effect. 3 In this study the focus is on hours worked of individuals. The individual level measures are used to obtain corresponding aggregate indicators of labour supply such as the labour force participation rate, the employment rate and total hours worked of all employed persons, and average hours worked per employed person. LITERATURE REVIEW 7

Definition and Examples of Slang in English

Slang is an informal nonstandard variety of speech characterized by newly coined and rapidly changing words and phrases. In his book Slang: The Peoples Poetry (OUP, 2009), Michael Adams argues that slang is not merely a lexical phenomenon, a type of word, but a linguistic practice rooted in social needs and behaviors, mostly the complementary needs to fit in and to stand out. The Characteristics of Slang   The most significant characteristic of slang overlaps with a defining characteristic of jargon: slang is a marker of in-group solidarity, and so it is a correlate of human groups with shared experiences, such as being children at a certain school or of a certain age, or being a member of a certain socially definable group, such as hookers, junkies, jazz musicians, or professional criminals. (Keith Allan and Kate Burridge, Forbidden Words. Cambridge University Press, 2006) The Language of Outsiders   Slang serves the outs as a weapon against the ins. To use slang is to deny allegiance to the existing order, either jokingly or in earnest, by refusing even the words which represent conventions and signal status; and those who are paid to preserve the status quo are prompted to repress slang as they are prompted to repress any other symbol of potential revolution. (James Sledd, On Not Teaching English Usage. The English Journal, November 1965)  The downtrodden are the great creators of slang. . . . Slang is . . . a pile of fossilized jokes and puns and ironies, tinselly gems dulled eventually by overmuch handling, but gleaming still when held up to the light. (Anthony Burgess, A Mouthful of Air, 1992) Standing Out and Fitting In   It is not clear to what extent the slang impulse to enliven speech, the impulse to stand out, mingles with the slang impulse toward social intimacy, the impulse to fit in. At times they seem like oil and water, but at others the social and poetic motivations emulsify into one linguistic practice. . . .  All of us, young and old, black and white, urban and suburban have slang, and, with your eyes closed, we can tell black guys chillaxin with their buddies from young soccer moms dishing out about the latest issue of Jane*. We share more slang than separates us, but what separates us tells us and others where we fit in, or perhaps, where we hope to fit in, and where we dont. . . . As a social marker, though, slang works: you know that youre among the old, tired, gray, and hopeless, rather than hip, vivid, playful, and rebellious, if only in spirit, when you hear no slang. Slang is a tell even in its absence. (Michael Adams, Slang: The Peoples Poetry. Oxford University Press, 2009)   Your mother reads and reads and reads, she wants English, as much as she can get her hands on . . .. Id come late Friday afternoon, it used to be that I would go home with a magazine or two and maybe a paper, but she wanted more, more slang, more figures of speech, the bees knees, the cats pajamas, horse of a different color, dog-tired, she wanted to talk like she was born here, like she never came from anywhere else . . .. (Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Houghton Mifflin, 2005) Modern Slang in London   I love modern  slang. Its as colorful, clever, and disguised from outsiders as slang ever was and is supposed to be. Take bare, for example, one of a number of slang terms recently banned by a London school. It means a lot of, as in theres bare people here, and is the classic concealing reversal of the accepted meaning that you also find in wicked, bad and cool. Victorian criminals did essentially the same with back slang, reversing words so that boy became yob and so on.  The other banned words are equally interesting. Extra, for example, mischievously stresses the superfluous in its conventional definition, as in reading the whole book is extra, innit? And that much-disapproved innit? is in fact the nest-ce pas? English has needed since the Normans forgot to bring it with them.  And who would not admire rinsed for something worn out or overused--chirpsing for flirting, bennin for doubled-up with laughter, or wi-five for an electronically delivered high-five? My bad, being new, sounds more sincere than old, tired, Im sorry (Sos never quite cut it).  Mouse potato for those who spend too much time on PCs is as striking as salmon and aisle salmon for people who will insist on going against the flow in crowds or supermarket aisles. Manstanding is what husbands and partners typically do while their wives or partners are actually getting on with the shopping. Excellent. (Charles Nevin, The Joy of Slang. BBC News, October 25, 2013) Old Slang: Grub, Mob, Knock Off, and Clear as Mud   When we refer . . . to food as grub, it is perhaps hard to realize that the word goes back to Oliver Cromwells time; from early 18th century come mob, and also knock off, to finish; and from early 19th century, the sarcastic use of clear as mud. (Paul Beale, editor of Partridges Concise Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English. Routledge, 1991) The Life Span of Slang Words   With the exception of cool, which retains its effectiveness after well over half a century, slang words--groovy, phat, radical, smokin--have a very brief life span in which they can be used to express sincere enthusiasm. Then they revert to irony or, at best, expressions of a sort of mild sardonic approval. (Ben Yagoda, When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It. Broadway Books, 2007)  The latest slang term for defecation, however, is dropping the kids off at the pool, which offers hope for a new generation of euphemistic suburbanites. (William Safire, Kiduage. The New York Times, 2004) Slanguage   The expression slanguage has been in the English language for well over a hundred years and has an entry in reputable dictionaries like the Macquarie and the Oxford. One of its first written appearances was as early as 1879, and since that time it has been in regular use--The slanguage of a sporting reporter is a fearful and wonderful thing, to give just one early example. The word slang has given rise to quite a number of wonderful blended or compounded words, such as slanguage, and many of them have been in the language a very long time. (Kate Burridge, Gift of the Gob: Morsels of English Language History. HarperCollins Australia, 2011) Can O' Beans on Sloppy Slang   Well, said Can o Beans, a bit hesitantly, imprecise speech is one of the major causes of mental illness in human beings. . . .  Ã‚  The inability to correctly perceive reality is often responsible for humans insane behavior. And every time they substitute an all-purpose, sloppy slang word for the words that would accurately describe an emotion or a situation, it lowers their reality orientations, pushes them farther from shore, out onto the foggy waters of alienation and confusion. . . .  Slang possesses an economy, an immediacy thats attractive, all right, but it devalues experience by standardizing and fuzzing it. It hangs between humanity and the real world like a . . . a veil. Slang just makes people more stupid, thats all, and stupidity eventually makes them crazy. Id hate to ever see that kind of craziness rub off onto objects. (Tom Robbins, Skinny Legs and All. Bantam, 1990) The Lighter Side of American Slang I know only two words of American slang: swell and lousy. I think swell is lousy, but lousy is swell. (J.B. Priestley) * Jane was a magazine designed to appeal to young women. It ceased publication in 2007. Pronunciation: slang