University of Haifa

About: University of Haifa is a education organization based out in Haifa, Israel. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Poison control. The organization has 7558 authors who have published 27141 publications receiving 711629 citations. The organization is also known as: Haifa University & Universiṭat Ḥefah.

Distress tolerance and psychopathological symptoms and disorders: A review of the empirical literature among adults.

Abstract: We review theory and empirical study of distress tolerance, an emerging risk factor candidate for various forms of psychopathology. Despite the long-standing interest in and promise of work on distress tolerance for understanding adult psychopathology, there has not been a comprehensive review of the extant empirical literature focused on the construct. As a result, a comprehensive synthesis of theoretical and empirical scholarship on distress tolerance, including integration of extant research on the relations between distress tolerance and psychopathology, is lacking. Inspection of the scientific literature indicates that there are a number of promising ways to conceptualize and measure distress tolerance, as well as documented relations between distress tolerance factors and psychopathological symptoms and disorders. Although promising, there also is notable conceptual and operational heterogeneity across the distress tolerance literature. Moreover, a number of basic questions remain unanswered regarding the associations between distress tolerance and other risk and protective factors and processes, as well as its putative role(s) in vulnerability for and resilience to psychopathology. Thus, the current article provides a comprehensive review of past and contemporary theory and research and proposes key areas for future empirical study of this construct.

Information Overload and the Message Dynamics of Online Interaction Spaces: A Theoretical Model and Empirical Exploration

Abstract: Online spaces that enable shared public interpersonal communications are of significant social, organizational, and economic importance. In this paper, a theoretical model and associated unobtrusive method are proposed for researching the relationship between online spaces and the behavior they host. The model focuses on the collective impact that individual information-overload coping strategies have on the dynamics of open, interactive public online group discourse. Empirical research was undertaken to assess the validity of both the method and the model, based on the analysis of over 2.65 million postings to 600 Usenet newsgroups over a 6-month period. Our findings support the assertion that individual strategies for coping with "information overload" have an observable impact on large-scale online group discourse. Evidence was found for the hypotheses that: (1) users are more likely to respond to simpler messages in overloaded mass interaction; (2) users are more likely to end active participation as the overloading of mass interaction increases; and (3) users are more likely to generate simpler responses as the overloading of mass interaction grows.The theoretical model outlined offers insight into aspects of computer-mediated communication tool usability, technology design, and provides a road map for future empirical research.

A vocabulary-size test of controlled productive ability

Abstract: It is important in the design of the vocabulary component of a teaching program that teachers are able to discover the state of their learners’ vocabulary knowledge. It is also important that researchers can draw on a variety of vocabulary measures to investigate the nature of vocabulary growth. This study focuses on a controlled production measure of vocabulary consisting of items from five frequency levels, and using a completion item type like the following.The garden was full of fra flowers.The controlled-production vocabulary-levels test was found to be reliable, valid (in that the levels distinguished between different proficiency groups) and practical. There was a satisfactory degree of equivalence between two equivalent forms of the test.

Some empirical evidence for the involvement load hypothesis in vocabulary acquisition

Abstract: EFL learners in two countries participated in two parallel experiments testing whether retention of vocabulary acquired incidentally is contingent on amount of task-induced involvement. Short- and long-term retention of ten unfamiliar words was investigated in three learning tasks (reading comprehension, comprehension plus filling in target words, and composition-writing with target words) with varying “involvement loads”—various combinations of need, search, and evaluation. Time-on-task, regarded as inherent to a task, differed among all three tasks. As predicted, amount of retention was related to amount of task-induced involvement load: Retention was highest in the composition task, lower in reading plus fill-in, and lowest in the reading. These results are discussed in light of the construct of task-induced involvement.