Because evidence has suggested that individuals who have experienced selective mutism (SM) may become maladapted even after their mutism has improved, this can be an issue for individuals who are in remission. The purposes of the present study were to elucidate specific difficulties of individuals who had experienced selective mutism and to examine the process by which they reached their present state. Individuals who had experienced selective mutism (N=19) were interviewed, after which the interviews were analyzed using a Modified Grounded Theory Approach (M-GTA; a qualitative research method widely used in Japan), and a process model was generated. The model included 5 categories: temperament, negative experiences with selective mutism, maladaptation after remission, improvement in maladaptation, and adaptation, and 21 concepts. It was found that temperament and negative experiences with selective mutism influenced maladaptation after remission, and that maladaptation could lead to adaptation through improvement in maladaptation. The following were found to be useful for improvement: reducing the need to speak, reducing anxiety and tension, and improving speaking skills. The findings of the present study may help individuals who have experienced selective mutism and who have become maladapted to improve their state.

  The purposes of the present study were to develop a scale for measuring co-parenting and gatekeeping after divorce (CGD), to examine the reliability and validity of the scale, and to investigate effects of post-divorce parental co-parenting and gatekeeping on children's adjustment. The participants (N=432) were men and women who had been divorced in the past 9 years. The results indicated that the post-divorce co-parenting and gatekeeping scale had a certain degree of reliability, validity, and configural invariance between custodial parents and non-custodial parents. In addition, a hypothetical model, tested on 166 divorced mothers who were living with their children (ages 2 to 17 years), suggested that conflicting co-parenting was correlated with "total difficulty" on the Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and cooperative co-parenting; on the other hand, conflicting co-parenting was not correlated directly with scores on the Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire, and facilitative gatekeeping was correlated with "total difficulty" scores on the Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire only for participants in the group that included a high reported level of paternal violence prior to the separation. Implications for co-parenting and parent-child relationships following divorce and psychoeducational programs for parents are discussed.

  The present study examines, from the perspective of learners' reasoning, difficulties associated with transforming existing knowledge. According to the rational model, in order to change existing knowledge, learners have to engage in not only intuitive judgment based on their existing knowledge, but also hypothetical judgment based on rules, and then they have to compare those two. However, Sato & Kudo (2015, in Japanese) found that it was difficult for learners to make that comparison. In the present study, after university students were told about the importance and method of hypothetical judgment, they were asked to judge tasks that required reserving intuitive judgment and promoting reasoning based on hypothetical judgment. The results indicated that (a) there was self-contained reasoning for which the starting point of inference originated in intuitive judgment, and which generated an explanation to support the reasoning, and (b) self-contained reasoning was suppressed when it was possible to base hypothetical judgments on the learners' process of reasoning, with the result that the possibility of comparing the processes increased. Effects of conventional teaching strategies and the teaching-learning conditions for achieving knowledge transformation are discussed.

  The present study investigated effects of disadvantageous intergroup situations on the self-esteem of university students in Japan and in the United States. Although previous studies have examined effects of disadvantageous group membership on self-esteem, the reports have not been consistent as to whether the effects are positive or negative. The present study examined whether effects of disadvantageous situations on self-esteem differed between students who tended to perceive social inequalities and those who did not. The participants were Japanese students (38 men, 21 women; average age 20.75, SD=1.50) at a university in Tokyo, and American students (25 men, 31 women; average age 19.79, SD=1.35) at a university in New Jersey. After the participants read a prepared text describing a scenario related to job hunting, they completed a questionnaire. The students in the United States tended to perceive social inequalities. Although disadvantageous situations did not influence the self-esteem of the students in Japan, they negatively influenced the self-esteem of the American students. This tendency did not change when the participants' data were reanalyzed after being divided into groups based on whether or not the participants had reported that they perceived social inequalities.

  The present study focused on writers' assumptions about their imaginary audience, examining (a) possible causes of students' difficulties in writing for an imaginary audience, and (b) methods for encouraging students to write for an imaginary audience. In Study 1, a class of eighth graders (23 boys, 20 girls) was asked to produce sentences that would persuade an audience and then to report characteristics of their imaginary audience. Even though the students had been given information about the audience, some students had only a vague conceptualization of the audience, and others assumed that the audience was different from what they had been told. Also, some students who reported that they had specifically assumed that the audience was as they had been told did not direct their sentences to that audience. In Study 2, seventh graders from 2 classes were divided into a control condition (23 boys, 15 girls), in which the students were asked to assume what the characteristics of the audience were, and a visualization condition (25 boys, 16 girls), in which the students were asked to describe the imaginary audience's characteristics. A comparison of the information about the imaginary audience and the students' sentences suggested that the students in the visualization condition made more concrete assumptions about characteristics of the audience than the students in the control condition did. Also, the amount of information in the students' sentences and the persuasiveness of the sentences were greater in the visualization condition. On the other hand, the data indicated that, even for the students in the visualization condition, there was variability of information about the audience in which the information about the audience was elaborated or changed qualitatively while the students were writing.

  Among recent studies on the relations between regulatory focus and specific others, Nagamine et al. (2019; in Japanese) focused on others in competitive situations, showing that relationships with rivals lead to adaptive outcomes in promotion-focused individuals. The present study examined whether relationships with teammates lead to adaptive outcomes in competitive situations for prevention-focused individuals, and whether differences in regulatory focus affect commitment to the team and collective motivation through the influence of relationships with teammates. College student athletes (118 men, 54 women; average age 19.45 years) completed a questionnaire. Analysis of the results indicated that prevention-focused individuals tended to actualize the ought self through their relations with their teammates and had higher levels of normative commitment to the team and collective motivation than promotion-focused individuals did. Actualization of the ought self mediated these associations. The discussion deals with variables associated with regulatory focus and highlights specific issues and future perspectives.

  The present study focused on university students' volunteer activities in elementary and middle schools, examining the students' attitudes and characteristics of their activities as supporters. The students' final case reports described how they offered psychological support and learning assistance to elementary and middle school students with special needs. 5 researchers analyzed 21 students' final case reports. The results indicated that the university students reported that the school children benefited from the support that they received. The supporters' reports described the following 4 practices: active engagement in school volunteer activities; adoption of different attitudes, that is, following or leading depending on the results of observation of the school children's needs and behavior; reflections on school volunteering during and after the volunteer activities; and a team approach with specialists. The case reports were categorized into 3 patterns: balancing all 4 of the practices, associating with the school children without a team approach, and associating with the children with a team approach. An additional 28 case reports that were then categorized were found to fit into 1 of these 3 patterns. Attitudes required in offering support and improvement in volunteers' expertise through provision of support systems by the university are discussed.

  In high school mathematics classes, emphasis is placed on the development of basic conceptual understanding of mathematical expressions; tests and other forms of assessment are required to diagnose students' problems with mathematics from that perspective. However, extensive research has not been published that deals with what exactly would constitute a test that assesses conceptual understanding of mathematical expressions, or how implementation of such a test might contribute to solving mathematics curriculum problems. In the present study, a test was implemented to assess high school students' conceptual understanding of mathematics; the test was proposed by a researcher from a psychological perspective. Specifically, (a) a test was devised to evaluate students' conceptual understanding of high school mathematics, (b) impasses experienced by the students who took the test were analyzed, and (c) their teachers' perceptions of the students' conceptual understanding were examined. The results suggested that the students had some problems understanding basic mathematical concepts and expressions, and that their teachers did not always realize the extent of the students' problems with understanding. These results were fed back to the teachers in group discussions. The teachers reported that they needed to modify their views of students' conceptual understanding and to question the students' understanding through daily assessments and in class. The discussion deals with implications and prospects for future research and learning assessment in mathematics.