How do different background variables predict learning outcomes?

This article is a part of a research project aimed to find out how different background variables are related to learning outcomes in school subject Sloyd as found in the national evaluation of the Finnish National Board of Education. Results from this larger research project were previously published in this journal, where pupils’ readiness for Self-Regulated Learning were reported. Since then, pupils’ experiences of classroom techniques, attitudes towards the subject, leisure time interests and learning within the two domains of the subject (Technical Domain and Textile Domain, as the subject is usually divided in Finland) have been studied and results have been published in different journals. In this article, a new Structural Equation Model concludes the previous results. The new model highlights two paths of how the use of different learning orientations can predict successful learning outcomes. These paths can be followed using two pedagogical models: the Exploratory Production Approach and the Domain Specific Approach. Experiencing Learner-Centred Learning predicts positive attitudes and success in Exploratory Production activities. Experiencing Collaborative Learning predicts success in domain specific learning outcomes. Success in Exploratory Production predicts successful learning outcomes in both domains. The conclusion is that regulatory knowledge, “why”, is related to production activities and it is processed prior to domain specific knowledge, “what” and “how”. To develop the subject and pedagogy for schools and teacher training, it is not important to follow an approach defined by the domains (technical or textile). It is more important to teach pupils how to manage in the modern technological world and to understand why they need to be able to improve their life-world through Exploratory Production activities.     

Geosocial Lives in Topological Polis: Mohamed Bouazizi as a Political Agent

Geopolitical events and developments can hardly be detached from the mundane lives where people confront politicised and politicising matters, share meaningful experiences, build attitudes, and take action. To contribute to understanding how large-scale geopolitics connect with the everyday, this article draws attention to political subjectivity as the condition of possibility of political agency and polis as the geosocial context of political life as experienced, conceived, and practised. Empirically, the paper engages with the tragic end of Mohamed Bouazizi’s life and scrutinises his role in the events and developments generally known as the Arab Spring. Our analysis contests both the dominant interpretation that postulates political import to his acts, and the alternative account that underscores his apolitical stance. Instead, we propose that the international politicisation of Mohamed Bouazizi’s agency unfolded as an accomplishment of many individual and collective actors, including Bouazizi himself in his struggle to cope with emergent aspects of his everyday life.     

Using Tucker’s theorem of the alternative to simplify,review and expand discrete arbitrage theory

For valuing derivatives and other assets in securities and commodities markets, arbitrage pricing theory has been a major approach for decades. This paper derives fundamental arbitrage pricing results in finite dimensions in a simple unified framework using Tucker’s theorem of the alternative. Frictionless results, that is perfect market results, plus imperfect market results such as those with dividends, periodic interest payments, transaction costs, different interest rates for lending and borrowing, shorting costs and constrained short selling are presented. While the results are mostly known and appear in various places, our contribution is to present them in a coherent and comprehensive fashion with very simple proofs. The analysis yields a simple procedure to prove new results and some are presented for cases with imperfect market frictions.     

Performance measurement in universities: ambiguities in the use of quality versus quantity in performance indicators

Performance measurement (PM) is now common in Western universities. This is also the case in Finland, where a new funding scheme was implemented to ensure that quality was included in universities’ PM. However, this paper shows that the quality indicators in use are, in practice, quantitative. The paper is based on a large survey and has implications for university PM systems in Finland and internationally.     

A Missing Citizen? Issue Based Citizenship in City-Regional Planning

City regions are significant sites of economic development, policymaking, and everyday living. Yet in many countries they are weakly institutionalized and therefore lack established democratic practices. This article is based on a study exploring citizen participation in city-regional planning in Finland, where traditional participatory means have largely failed to invite and involve citizens. The analysis approaches city regions relationally, as evolving processes with a changing spatial shape and scope. Through the notion of lived citizenship, including the dimensions of status, practices and acts, the article reveals how the dominant ideas of citizenship in city-regional planning hide from view elements that are significant for citizen participation. Whereas people's rights to participation can largely be fulfilled on a territorial basis in municipalities and states through legal membership in political communities, in the context of weakly institutionalized city-regional planning such status-based forms of participation are typically not available. This vagueness has created an image of a missing city-regional citizenry, which the article sets out to challenge and rework through the notion of issue-based participation as lived citizenship.     

How are students’ attitudes related to learning outcomes?

This article is a part of a research project aimed to find out how different background variables are related to learning outcomes in technology education related to the school subject Sloyd (craft). The research question of this article is: “How are ninth grade students’ attitudes towards the subject related to their learning outcomes?” The empirical data (n = 4792) was collected by stratified sampling from 152 secondary schools as a part of the Finnish National Board of Education (FNBE) assessment. A shortened Finnish version of the Fennema–Sherman attitude test was carried out in a narrowed sample (n = 1548). The three attitude factors for learners were ‘Liking Sloyd as a school subject’, ‘Experiencing Utility in Sloyd’ and ‘Self-concept in Sloyd’. Structural equation modelling revealed that ‘Experiencing Utility’ predicts learning outcomes while ‘Liking’ and ‘Self-concept’ were interveners. The results suggest more learner-centred pedagogics for developing technology education.     

The effectiveness of personalized marketing in online banking: A comparison between search and experience offerings

This study reports the results of personalized online promotions in a context where personalization has not been researched before – in online banking. Genuine online bank customers were shown personalized banner advertisements when they logged in to their online bank account. Three financial offerings consisting of different search and experience attributes were promoted to three groups of customers. We examined the attention, elaboration and choice measures, and compared the effectiveness of personalized banners to default banners, and the online promotions to direct-mail promotions. Despite the goal-directed routines that reflect the dominant customer behaviour in online banking, personalized banners attracted more attention than default banners. Furthermore, messages that promote fairly simple search-type offerings that are easy to apply and are linked to the context in which the promotion occurs are more effective than messages that do not fulfil these criteria. The results offer implications both for research and practice.