This perspective piece explores the transformative potential and associated challenges of large language models (LLMs) in education and how those challenges might be addressed utilizing playful and game-based learning. While providing many opportunities, the stochastic elements incorporated in how present LLMs process text, requires domain…

In educational research, there is the general trade-off that empirical evidence should be generalizable to be applicable across contexts; at the same time, empirical evidence should be as specific as possible to be localizable in subject-specific educational interventions to successfully transfer the empirical evidence to educational practice.…

In 2006, after receiving the Division 15 Career Award, Alexander delivered a keynote address entitled "Evolution of a Learning Theory: A Case Study." This presentation was a clarion call for greater respect for and attention to scientific speculation in educational psychology as a critical component in theory building. To build her case,…

School victimization issues remain largely unresolved due to over-reliance on unidimensional conceptions of victimization and data from a few developed OECD countries. Thus, support for cross-national generalizability over multiple victimization components (relational, verbal, and physical) is weak. Our substantive-methodological synergy tests the…

Desirable difficulties are learning conditions that are often experienced as effortful, but have a positive effect on learning results and transfer of knowledge and skills (Bjork & Bjork, 2011; Bjork, 1994). Learners often do not appreciate the beneficial effects of desirable difficulties, and the negative experiences of high effort and…

The literature on cognitive processing and strategic processing is murky with regard to how these types of processing influence learning. One reason for this is that the frameworks used to investigate these relations have separately focused on different aspects related to cognitive processing with little integration between them. To address these…

Integration is a valuable yet underutilized process in scientific literatures, including the achievement motivation literature. In this piece, we advocate for and illustrate the benefits of giving integration a central place within the achievement motivation literature. We pay particular attention to the hierarchical model of achievement…

Translating ideas into acceptable sentence is an essential writing production process. Limited sentence construction skills can hinder young writers from expressing ideas as intended or creating sentences that are comprehensible to their audiences. This may also limit other writing production processes, as young writers must devote considerable…

The present study uses doubly latent models to estimate the effect of average mathematics achievement at the class level on students' subsequent mathematics achievement (the "Peer Spillover Effect") and mathematics self-concept (the "Big-Fish-Little-Pond-Effect; BFLPE"), controlling for individual differences in prior…

Although cognitive load (CL) and self-regulated learning (SRL) have been widely recognized as two determinant factors of students' performance, the integration of these two factors is still in its infancy. To further specify why and how CL links with SRL, we first conducted an overview to describe the multiple dimensions of cognitive load (i.e.,…

The use of realistic visualizations has gained considerable interest due to the proliferation of virtual reality equipment. This review is concerned with the theoretical basis, technical implementation, cognitive effects, and educational implications of using realistic visualizations. Realism can be useful for learners, but in several studies,…

Teaching the contents of study materials by providing explanations to fellow students can be a beneficial instructional activity. A learning-by-teaching effect can also occur when students provide explanations to a real, remote, or even fictitious audience that cannot be interacted with. It is unclear, however, which underlying mechanisms drive…

Notwithstanding its crucial role in facilitating desired outcomes of schooling, educational psychology researchers have recognized the conceptual haziness of student engagement as a multidimensional construct. With the main purpose of refining its conceptual definition, this paper aims to attain the following four goals. First, we seek to…

While the importance of reading development for understanding Chinese literacy acquisition and impairment is well documented, what underlies Chinese spelling development is not well understood. Although some spelling development theories have been proposed and have provided rich and detailed descriptions of the processes and skills involved in…

Previous research has shown that three comparison types are involved in the formation of students' academic self-concepts: social comparisons (where students compare their achievement with their classmates), dimensional comparisons (where students compare their achievement in different subjects), and temporal comparisons (where students compare…