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Positron
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For other uses, see Positron (disambiguation).
Positron (antielectron)
Cloud chamber photograph by C. D. Anderson of the first positron ever identified. A 6 mm lead plate separates the upper and lower halves of the chamber. The deflection and direction of the particle's ion trail indicate the particle is a positron (see below).
Composition
Elementary particle
Statistics
Fermionic
Generation
First
Interactions
Gravity, Electromagnetic, Weak
Symbol

e+
,
β+
Antiparticle
Electron
Theorized
Paul Dirac (1928)
Discovered
Carl D. Anderson (1932)
Mass
me 6969910938355999999♠9.10938356(11)×10−31 kg[1]
6996548579909000000♠5.485799090(16)×10−4 u[1]
6999510998946099999♠0.5109989461(13) MeV/c2[1]
Electric charge
+1 e
+6981160217656499999♠1.602176565(35)×10−19 C[1]
Spin
1/2 (same as electron)
The positron or antielectron is the antiparticle or the antimatter counterpart of the electron. The positron has an electric charge of +1 e, a spin of 1/2 (same as electron), and has the same mass as an electron. When a positron collides with an electron, annihilation occurs. If this collision occurs at low energies, it results in the production of two or more gamma ray photons (see electron–positron annihilation).
Positrons may be generated by positron emission radioactive decay (through weak interactions), or by pair production from a sufficiently energetic photon which is interacting with an atom in a material.
Contents
[hide]
1 History
1.1 Theory
1.2 Experimental clues and discovery
2 Natural production
2.1 Observation in cosmic rays
3 Artificial production
4 Applications
5 See also
6 References
6.1 Notes
6.2 Citations
7 External links
History[edit]
Theory[edit]
In 1928, Paul Dirac published a paper[2] proposing that electrons can have both a positive charge and negative energy. This paper introduced the Dirac equation, a unification of quantum mechanics, special relativity, and the then-new concept of electron spin to explain the Zeeman effect. The paper did not explicitly predict a new particle but did allow for electrons having either positive or negative energy as solutions. Hermann Weyl then published a paper discussing the mathematical implications of the negative energy solution.[3] The positive-energy solution explained experimental results, but Dirac was puzzled by the equally valid negative-energy solution that the mathematical model allowed. Quantum mechanics did not allow the negative energy solution to simply be ignored, as classical mechanics often did in such equations; the dual solution implied the possibility of an electron spontaneously jumping between positive and negative energy states. However, no such transition had yet been observed experimentally. He referred to the issues raised by this conflict between theory and observation as "difficulties" that were "unresolved".
Dirac wrote a follow-up paper in December 1929[4] that attempted to explain the unavoidable negative-energy solution for the relativistic electron. He argued that "... an electron with negative energy moves in an external [electromagnetic] field as though it carries a positive charge." He further asserted that all of space could be regarded as a "sea" of negative energy states that were filled, so as to prevent electrons jumping between positive energy states (negative electric charge) and negative energy states (positive charge). The paper also explored the possibility of the proton being an island in this sea, and that it might actually be a negative-energy electron. Dirac acknowledged that the proton having a much greater mass than the electron was a problem, but expressed "hope" that a future theory would resolve the issue.
Robert Oppenheimer argued strongly against the proton being the negative-energy electron solution to Dirac's equation. He asserted that if it were, the hydrogen atom would rapidly self-destruct.[5] Persuaded by Oppenheimer's argument, Dirac published a paper in 1931 that predicted the existence of an as-yet-unobserved particle that he called an "anti-electron" that would have the same mass as an electron and that would mutually annihilate upon contact with an electron.[6]
Feynman, and earlier Stueckelberg, proposed an interpretation of the positron as an electron moving backward in time,[7] reinterpreting the negative-energy solutions of the Dirac equation. Electrons moving backward in time would have a positive electric charge. Wheeler invoked this concept to explain the identical properties shared by all electrons, suggesting that "they are all the same electron" with a complex, self-intersecting worldline.[8] Yoichiro Nambu later applied it to all production and annihilation of particle-antiparticle pairs, stating that "the eventual creation and annihilation of pairs that may occur now and then is no creation or annihilation, but only a change of direction of moving particles, from the past to the future, or from the future to the past."[9] The backwards in time point of view is nowadays accepted as completely equivalent to other pictures, but it does not have anything to do with the macroscopic terms "cause" and "effect", which do not appear in a microscopic physical description.
Experimental clues and discovery[edit]
Antimatter
Annihilation
Devices[show]
Particle accelerator
Penning trap
Wilson chamber
Antiparticles[show]
Positron
Antiproton
Antineutron
Uses[show]
Positron emission tomography
Fuel
Bodies[show]
ALPHA Collaboration
ATHENA
ATRAP
CERN
RHIC
People[show]
Paul Dirac
Carl David Anderson
Andrei Sakharov
v
t
e
Dmitri Skobeltsyn first observed the positron in 1929.[10] While using a Wilson cloud chamber[11] to try to detect gamma radiation in cosmic rays, Skobeltsyn detected particles that acted like electrons but curved in the opposite direction in an applied magnetic field.
Likewise, in 1929 Chung-Yao Chao, a graduate student at Caltech, noticed some anomalous results that indicated particles behaving like electrons, but with a positive charge, though the results were inconclusive and the phenomenon was not pursued.[12]
Carl David Anderson discovered the positron on August 2, 1932,[13] for which he won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1936.[14] Anderson did not coin the term positron, but allowed it at the suggestion of the Physical Review journal editor to which he submitted his discovery paper in late 1932. The positron was the first evidence of antimatter and was discovered when Anderson allowed cosmic rays to pass through a cloud chamber and a lead plate. A magnet surrounded this apparatus, causing particles to bend in different directions based on their electric charge. The ion trail left by each positron appeared on the photographic plate with a curvature matching the mass-to-charge ratio of an electron, but in a direction that showed its charge was positive.[15]
Anderson wrote in retrospect that the positron could have been discovered earlier based on Chung-Yao Chao's work, if only it had been followed up on.[12] Frédéric and Irène Joliot-Curie in Paris had evidence of positrons in old photographs when Anderson's results came out, but they had dismissed them as protons.[15]
The positron had also been contemporaneously discovered by Patrick Blackett and Giuseppe Occhialini at the Cavendish Laboratory in 1932. Blackett and Occhialini had delayed publication to obtain more solid evidence, so Anderson was able to publish the discovery first.[16]
Natural production[edit]
Main article: Positron emission
Positrons are produced naturally in β+ decays of naturally occurring radioactive isotopes (for example, potassium-40) and in interactions of gamma quanta (emitted by radioactive nuclei) with matter. Antineutrinos are another kind of antiparticle produced by natural radioactivity (β− decay). Many different kinds of antiparticles are also produced by (and contained in) cosmic rays. Recent (as of January 2011) research by the American Astronomical Society has discovered antimatter (positrons) originating above thunderstorm clouds; positrons are produced in gamma-ray flashes created by electrons accelerated by strong electric fields in the clouds.[17] Antiprotons have also been found to exist in the Van Allen Belts around the Earth by the PAMELA module.[18][19]
Antiparticles, of which the most common are positrons due to their low mass, are also produced in any environment with a sufficiently high temperature (mean particle energy greater than the pair production threshold). During the period of baryogenesis, when the universe was extremely hot and dense, matter and antimatter were continually produced and annihilated. The presence of remaining matter, and absence of detectable remaining antimatter,[20] also called baryon asymmetry, is attributed to CP-violation: a violation of the CP-symmetry relating matter to antimatter. The exact mechanism of this violation during baryogenesis remains a mystery.[citation needed]
Positron production from radioactive
β+
decay can be considered both artificial and natural production, as the generation of the radioisotope can be natural or artificial. Perhaps the best known naturally-occurring radioisotope which produces positrons is potassium-40, a long-lived isotope of potassium which occurs as a primordial isotope of potassium. Even though a small percent of potassium (0.0117%) it is the single most abundant radioisotope in the human body. In a human body of 70 kg mass, about 4,400 nuclei of 40K decay per second.[21] The activity of natural potassium is 31 Bq/g.[22] About 0.001% of these 40K decays produce about 4000 natural positrons per day in the human body.[23] These positrons soon find an electron, undergo annihilation, and produce pairs of 511 keV gamma rays, in a process similar (but much lower intensity) to that which happens during a PET scan nuclear medicine procedure.[citation needed]
Recent observations indicate black holes and neutron stars produce vast amounts of positron-electron plasma via the jets. Large clouds of positron-electron plasma have also been associated with neutron stars.[24][25][26]
Observation in cosmic rays[edit]
Main article: Cosmic ray
Satellite experiments have found evidence of positrons (as well as a few antiprotons) in primary cosmic rays, amounting to less than 1% of the particles in primary cosmic rays. These do not appear to be the products of large amounts of antimatter from the Big Bang, or indeed complex antimatter in the universe (evidence for which is lacking, see below). Rather, the antimatter in cosmic rays appear to consist of only these two elementary particles, probably made in energetic processes long after the Big Bang.[citation needed]
Preliminary results from the presently operating Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS-02) on board the International Space Station show that positrons in the cosmic rays arrive with no directionality, and with energies that range from 10 GeV to 250 GeV. In September, 2014, new results with almost twice as much data were presented in a talk at CERN and published in Physical Review Letters.[27][28] A new measurement of positron fraction up to 500 GeV was reported, showing that positron fraction peaks at a maximum of about 16% of total electron+positron events, around an energy of 275 ± 32 GeV. At higher energies, up to 500 GeV, the ratio of positrons to electrons begins to fall again. The absolute flux of positrons also begins to fall before 500 GeV, but peaks at energies far higher than electron energies, which peak about 10 GeV.[29] These results on interpretation have been suggested to be due to positron production in annihilation events of massive dark matter particles.[30]
Positrons, like anti-protons, do not appear to originate from any hypothetical "antimatter" regions of the universe. On the contrary, there is no evidence of complex antimatter atomic nuclei, such as antihelium nuclei (i.e., anti-alpha particles), in cosmic rays. These are actively being searched for. A prototype of the AMS-02 designated AMS-01, was flown into space aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery on STS-91 in June 1998. By not detecting any antihelium at all, the AMS-01 established an upper limit of 1.1×10−6 for the antihelium to helium flux ratio.[31]
Artificial production[edit]
Physicists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California have used a short, ultra-intense laser to irradiate a millimeter-thick gold target and produce more than 100 billion positrons.[32] Presently significant lab production of 5 MeV positron-electron beams allows investigation of multiple characteristics such as how different elements react to 5 MeV positron interactions or impacts, how energy is transferred to particles, and the shock effect of GRBs.[33]
Applications[edit]
Certain kinds of particle accelerator experiments involve colliding positrons and electrons at relativistic speeds. The high impact energy and the mutual annihilation of these matter/antimatter opposites create a fountain of diverse subatomic particles. Physicists study the results of these collisions to test theoretical predictions and to search for new kinds of particles.
Gamma rays, emitted indirectly by a positron-emitting radionuclide (tracer), are detected in positron emission tomography (PET) scanners used in hospitals. PET scanners create detailed three-dimensional images of metabolic activity within the human body.[34]
An experimental tool called positron annihilation spectroscopy (PAS) is used in materials research to detect variations in density, defects, displacements, or even voids, within a solid material.[35]
See also[edit]
Beta particle
List of particles
Positronium
Positronic brain
References[edit]
Notes[edit]
Citations[edit]
^ Jump up to: a b c d The original source for CODATA is:
Mohr, P. J.; Taylor, B. N.; Newell, D. B. (2006). "CODATA recommended values of the fundamental physical constants". Reviews of Modern Physics. 80 (2): 633–730. Bibcode:2008RvMP...80..633M. arXiv:0801.0028  . doi:10.1103/RevModPhys.80.633.
Individual physical constants from the CODATA are available at:
"The NIST Reference on Constants, Units and Uncertainty". National Institute of Standards and Technology. Retrieved 2013-10-24.
Jump up ^ Dirac, P. A. M. (1928). "The quantum theory of the electron" (PDF). Proceedings of the Royal Society A. 117 (778): 610. Bibcode:1928RSPSA.117..610D. doi:10.1098/rspa.1928.0023  .
Jump up ^ Weyl, H. (1929). "Gravitation and the Electron" (PDF). PNAS. 15 (4): 323–334. Bibcode:1929PNAS...15..323W. PMC 522457  . PMID 16587474. doi:10.1073/pnas.15.4.323.
Jump up ^ Dirac, P. A. M. (1930). "A theory of electrons and protons" (PDF). Proceedings of the Royal Society A. 126 (801): 360. Bibcode:1930RSPSA.126..360D. doi:10.1098/rspa.1930.0013  .
Jump up ^ Close, F. (2009). Antimatter. Oxford University Press. p. 46. ISBN 978-0-19-955016-6.
Jump up ^ Dirac, P. A. M. (1931). "Quantised Singularities in the Quantum Field" (PDF). Proceedings of the Royal Society A. 133 (821): 60. Bibcode:1931RSPSA.133...60D. doi:10.1098/rspa.1931.0130  .
Jump up ^ Feynman, R. (1949). "The theory of positrons". Physical Review. 76 (6): 749. Bibcode:1949PhRv...76..749F. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.76.749.
Jump up ^ Feynman, R. (1965-12-11). The Development of the Space-Time View of Quantum Electrodynamics (Speech). Nobel Lecture. Retrieved 2007-01-02.
Jump up ^ Nambu, Y. (1950). "The Use of the Proper Time in Quantum Electrodynamics I". Progress of Theoretical Physics. 5 (1): 82. Bibcode:1950PThPh...5...82N. doi:10.1143/PTP.5.82  .
Jump up ^ Close, F. (2009). Antimatter. Oxford University Press. pp. 50–52. ISBN 978-0-19-955016-6.
Jump up ^ Cowan, E. (1982). "The Picture That Was Not Reversed". Engineering & Science. 46 (2): 6–28.
^ Jump up to: a b Merhra, J.; Rechenberg, H. (2000). The Historical Development of Quantum Theory, Volume 6: The Completion of Quantum Mechanics 1926–1941. Springer. p. 804. ISBN 978-0-387-95175-1.
Jump up ^ Anderson, C. D. (1933). "The Positive Electron". Physical Review. 43 (6): 491–494. Bibcode:1933PhRv...43..491A. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.43.491  .
Jump up ^ "The Nobel Prize in Physics 1936". Retrieved 2010-01-21.
^ Jump up to: a b Gilmer, P. J. (19 July 2011). "Irène Jolit-Curie, a Nobel laureate in artificial radioactivity" (PDF). p. 8. Retrieved 13 July 2013.
Jump up ^ "Atop the Physics Wave: Rutherford Back in Cambridge, 1919–1937". Rutherford's Nuclear World. American Institute of Physics. 2011–2014. Retrieved 19 August 2014.
Jump up ^ Palmer, J. (11 January 2011). "Antimatter caught streaming from thunderstorms on Earth". BBC. Archived from the original on 12 January 2011. Retrieved 11 January 2011.
Jump up ^ Adriani, O.; et al. (2011). "The Discovery of Geomagnetically Trapped Cosmic-Ray Antiprotons". The Astrophysical Journal Letters. 737 (2): L29. Bibcode:2011ApJ...737L..29A  . arXiv:1107.4882  . doi:10.1088/2041-8205/737/2/L29  .
Jump up ^ Than, K. (10 August 2011). "Antimatter Found Orbiting Earth—A First". National Geographic Society. Retrieved 12 August 2011.
Jump up ^ "What's the Matter with Antimatter?". NASA. 29 May 2000. Archived from the original on 4 June 2008. Retrieved 24 May 2008.
Jump up ^ "Radiation and Radioactive Decay. Radioactive Human Body". Harvard Natural Sciences Lecture Demonstrations. Retrieved 2011-05-18.
Jump up ^ Wintergham, F. P. W. (1989). Radioactive Fallout in Soils, Crops and Food. Food & Agriculture Organization. p. 32. ISBN 978-92-5-102877-3.
Jump up ^ Engelkemeir, D. W.; Flynn, K. F.; Glendenin, L. E. (1962). "Positron Emission in the Decay of K40". Physical Review. 126 (5): 1818. Bibcode:1962PhRv..126.1818E. doi:10.1103/PhysRev.126.1818.
Jump up ^ Electron-positron Jets Associated with Quasar 3C 279
Jump up ^ "Vast Cloud of Antimatter Traced to Binary Stars". NASA.
Jump up ^ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sw-og52UUVg start FOUR minutes into video: Sagittarius produces 15 billion tons/sec of electron-positron matter
Jump up ^ Accardo, L.; et al. (AMS Collaboration) (2014). "High Statistics Measurement of the Positron Fraction in Primary Cosmic Rays of 0.5–500 GeV with the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on the International Space Station" (PDF). Physical Review Letters. 113: 121101. Bibcode:2014PhRvL.113l1101A. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.113.121101.
Jump up ^ Schirber, M. "Synopsis: More Dark Matter Hints from Cosmic Rays?". American Physical Society. Retrieved 21 September 2014.
Jump up ^ "New results from the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on the International Space Station" (PDF). AMS-02 at NASA. Retrieved 21 September 2014.
Jump up ^ Aguilar, M.; et al. (2013). "First Result from the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on the International Space Station: Precision Measurement of the Positron Fraction in Primary Cosmic Rays of 0.5–350 GeV". Physical Review Letters. 110 (14): 141102. Bibcode:2013PhRvL.110n1102A. PMID 25166975. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.110.141102.
Jump up ^ Aguilar, M.; et al. (AMS Collaboration) (2002). "The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) on the International Space Station: Part I – results from the test flight on the space shuttle". Physics Reports. 366 (6): 331–405. Bibcode:2002PhR...366..331A. doi:10.1016/S0370-1573(02)00013-3.
Jump up ^ Bland, E. (1 December 2008). "Laser technique produces bevy of antimatter". MSNBC. Retrieved 6 April 2016. The LLNL scientists created the positrons by shooting the lab's high-powered Titan laser onto a one-millimeter-thick piece of gold.
Jump up ^ https://lasers.llnl.gov/workshops/user_group_2012/docs/7.3_chen.pdf Lab production of 5MeV positron-electron beams
Jump up ^ Phelps, M. E. (2006). PET: physics, instrumentation, and scanners. Springer. pp. 2–3. ISBN 0-387-32302-3.
Jump up ^ "Introduction to Positron Research". St. Olaf College.
External links[edit]
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Positrons.
What is a Positron? (from the Frequently Asked Questions :: Center for Antimatter-Matter Studies)
Website about positrons and antimatter
Positron information search at SLAC
Positron Annihilation as a method of experimental physics used in materials research.
New production method to produce large quantities of positrons
Website about antimatter (positrons, positronium and antihydrogen). Positron Laboratory, Como, Italy
Website of the AEgIS: Antimatter Experiment: Gravity, Interferometry, Spectroscopy, CERN
Synopsis: Tabletop Particle Accelerator ... new tabletop method for generating electron–positron streams.
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Character education
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Character education is an umbrella term loosely used to describe the teaching of children in a manner that will help them develop variously as moral, civic, good, mannered, behaved, non-bullying, healthy, critical, successful, traditional, compliant or socially acceptable beings. Concepts that now and in the past have fallen under this term include social and emotional learning, moral reasoning and cognitive development, life skills education, health education, violence prevention, critical thinking, ethical reasoning, and conflict resolution and mediation.[1] Many of these are now considered failed programs, i.e. "religious education", "moral education", "values clarification".[2]
Today, there are dozens of character education programs in, and vying for adoption by, schools and businesses.[3] Some are commercial, some non-profit and many are uniquely devised by states, districts and schools, themselves. A common approach of these programs is to provide a list of principles, pillars, values or virtues, which are memorized or around which themed activities are planned.[4] It is commonly claimed that the values included in any particular list are universally recognized. However, there is no agreement among the competing programs on core values (e.g., honesty, stewardship, kindness, generosity, courage, freedom, justice, equality, and respect) or even how many to list. There is also no common or standard means for assessing, implementing or evaluating programs.[5]
Contents
1 Terminology
2 In-school programs
3 History
3.1 Understanding character
3.1.1 Psychic arts
3.1.2 Race character
3.1.3 Generational character
3.2 Developing character
3.2.1 Eastern philosophy
3.2.2 Western philosophy
3.2.3 Contemporary views
3.3 History of character education in U.S. schools
3.3.1 The colonial period
3.3.2 Nineteenth century
3.3.3 Mid-twentieth century
3.3.4 Character education movement of the 1980s
3.3.5 21st century developments
3.4 Modern scientific approaches
4 Issues and controversies
4.1 Scientific studies
4.2 Functional and ideological problems
5 See also
6 References
7 Further reading
8 External links
Terminology[edit]
"Character" is one of those overarching concepts that is the subject of disciplines from philosophy to theology, from psychology to sociology—with many competing and conflicting theories.
Character as it relates to character education most often refers to how 'good' a person is. In other words, a person who exhibits personal qualities like those a society considers desirable might be considered to have good character—and developing such personal qualities is often seen as a purpose of education. However, the various proponents of character education are far from agreement as to what "good" is, or what qualities are desirable. Compounding this problem is that there is no scientific definition of character. Because such a concept blends personality and behavioral components, scientists have long since abandoned use of the term "character" and, instead, use the term psychological motivators to measure the behavioral predispositions of individuals. With no clinically defined meaning, there is virtually no way to measure if an individual has a deficit of character, or if a school program can improve it.
The various terms in the lists of values that character education programs propose—even those few found in common among some programs—suffer from vague definitions. This makes the need and effectiveness of character education problematic to measure.
In-school programs[edit]
There is no common practice in schools in relation to the formation of pupils' character or values education.[6] This is partly due to the many competing programs and the lack of standards in character education, but also because of how and by whom the programs are executed.
Programs are generally of four varieties:[4] cheerleading, praise and reward, define and drill, and forced formality. They may be used alone or in combination.
1) Cheerleading involves multicolored posters, banners, and bulletin boards featuring a value or virtue of the month; lively morning public-address announcements; occasional motivational assemblies; and possibly a high-profile event such as a fund-raiser for a good cause.
2) Praise-and-reward approach seeks to make virtue into habit using "positive reinforcement". Elements include "catching students being good" and praising them or giving them chits that can be exchanged for privileges or prizes. In this approach, all too often, the real significance of the students' actions is lost, as the reward or award becomes the primary focus.
3) Define-and-drill calls on students to memorize a list of values and the definition of each. Students' simple memorization of definitions seems to be equated with their development of the far more complex capacity for making moral decisions.
4) Forced-formality focuses on strict, uniform compliance with specific rules of conduct, (i.e., walking in lines, arms at one's sides), or formal forms of address ("yes sir," "no ma'am"), or other procedures deemed to promote order or respect of adults.
"These four approaches aim for quick behavioral results, rather than helping students better understand and commit to the values that are core to our society, or helping them develop the skills for putting those values into action in life's complex situations." [4]
Generally, the most common practitioners of character education in the United States are school counselors, although there is a growing tendency to include other professionals in schools and the wider community. Depending on the program, the means of implementation may be by teachers and/or any other adults (faculty, bus drivers, cafeteria workers, maintenance staff, etc.); by storytelling, which can be through books and media; or by embedding into the classroom curriculum. There are many theories about means, but no comparative data and no consensus in the industry as to what, if any, approach may be effective.[7]
History[edit]
It has been said that, "character education is as old as education itself". Indeed, the attempt to understand and develop character extends into prehistory.
Understanding character[edit]
Psychic arts[edit]
Since very early times, people have tried to access or "read" the pre-disposition (character) of self and others. Being able to predict and even manipulate human behavior, motivations, and reactions would bestow obvious advantages. Pre-scientific character assessment techniques have included, among others: anthropometry, astrology, palmistry, metoposcopy, and chiromancy. These approaches have been scientifically discredited although they continue to be widely practiced.
Race character[edit]
The concept of inherited "race character" has long been used to characterize desirable versus undesirable qualities in members of groups as a whole along national, tribal, ethnic, religious and even class lines. Race character is predominantly used as a justification for the denigration and subsequent persecution of minority groups, most infamously, justifying European persecution of Native Americans, the concept of slavery, and the Nazis' persecution of Jews. Though race character continues to be used as a justification for persecution of minorities worldwide,[8] it has been scientifically discredited and is not overtly a component of modern character education in western societies.
Generational character[edit]
Particularly in modern liberal republics, social and economic change is rapid and can result in cognitive stress to older generations when each succeeding generation expands on and exhibits their own modes of expressing the freedoms such societies enjoy.
America is a prime example. With few traditions, each generation exhibites attitudes and behaviors that conservative segments of preceding generations uneasily assimilate. Individual incidents can also produce a moral panic. Cries about loss of morals in the succeeding generation, overwhelmingly unsubstantiated,[9] and calls for remediation have been constant in America since before its founding. (It should be expected that—in a free country that supports children's rights—this trend will continue apace.)
Developing character[edit]
Eastern philosophy[edit]
Eastern philosophy views the nature of man as initially quiet and calm, but when affected by the external world, it develops desires. When the desires are not properly controlled and the conscious mind is distracted by the material world, we lose our true selves and the principle of reason in Nature is destroyed. From this arise rebellion, disobedience, cunning and deceit, and general immorality. This is the way of chaos. Confucianism stands with Taoism as two of the great religious/philosophical systems of China.
A hallmark of the philosophy of Confucius is his emphasis on tradition and study. He disparages those who have faith in natural understanding or intuition and argues for long and careful study. Study, for Confucius, means finding a good teacher, who is familiar with the ways of the past and the practices of the ancients, imitating his words and deeds. The result is a heavy scheme of obligations and intricate duties throughout all of one's many social roles. Confucius is said to have sung his sayings and accompanied himself on a 'qin' (a kind of zither). According to Confucius, musical training is the most effective method for molding the moral character of man and keeping society in order. He said: "Let a man be stimulated by poetry, established by the rules of propriety, perfected by music." [10]
The theme of Taoism[11] is one of harmony with nature. Zhuangzi was a central figure in Taoist philosophy. He wrote that people develop different moral attitudes from different natural upbringings, each feeling that his own views are obvious and natural, yet all are blinded by this socialization to their true nature. To Zhuangzi, pre-social desires are relatively few and easy to satisfy, but socialization creates a plethora of desires for "social goods" such as status, reputation, and pride. These conventional values, because of their comparative nature create attitudes of resentment and anger inciting competition and then violence. The way to social order is for people to eliminate these socialized ambitions through open-minded receptivity to all kinds of voices—particularly those who have run afoul of human authority or seem least authoritative. Each has insights. Indeed, in Taoist moral philosophy, perfection may well look like its opposite to us. One theme of Zhuangzi's that links Taoism to the Zen branch of Buddhism is the concept of flow, of losing oneself in activity, particularly the absorption in skilled execution of a highly cultivated way. His most famous example concerns a butcher who carves beef with the focus and absorption of a virtuoso dancer in an elegantly choreographed performance. The height of human satisfaction comes in achieving and exercising such skills with the focus and commitment that gets us "outside ourselves" and into such an intimate connection with our inborn nature.
Western philosophy[edit]
The early Greek philosophers[12] felt that happiness requires virtue and hence that a happy person must have virtuous traits of character.
Socrates identifies happiness with pleasure and explains the various virtues as instrumental means to pleasure. He teaches, however, that pleasure is to be understood in an overarching sense wherein fleeing battle is a momentary pleasure that detracts from the greater pleasure of acting bravely.
Plato wrote that to be virtuous, we must both understand what contributes to our overall good and have our spirited and appetitive desires educated properly and guided by the rational part of the soul. The path he prescribes is that a potentially virtuous person should learn when young to love and take pleasure in virtuous actions, but he must wait until late in life to develop the understanding of why what he loves is good. An obvious problem is that this reasoning is circular.
Aristotle is perhaps, even today, the most influential of all the early Western philosophers. His view is often summarized as 'moderation in all things'. For example, courage is worthy, for too little of it makes one defenseless. But too much courage can result in foolhardiness in the face of danger. To be clear, Aristotle emphasizes that the moderate state is not an arithmetic mean, but one relative to the situation: sometimes the mean course is to be angry at, say, injustice or mistreatment, at other times anger is wholly inappropriate. Additionally, because people are different, the mean for one person may be bravery, but for another it is recklessness.
For Aristotle, the key to finding this balance is to enjoy and recognize the value of developing one’s rational powers, and then using this recognition to determine which actions are appropriate in which circumstances.
The views of nineteenth-century philosophers were heavily indebted to these early Greeks. Two of them, Karl Marx and John Stuart Mill,[13] had a major influence on approaches to developing character.
Karl Marx applies Aristotle's conclusions in his understanding of work as a place where workers should be able to express their rational powers. But workers subject to capitalist values are characterized primarily by material self-interest. This makes them distrustful of others, viewing them primarily as competitors. Given these attitudes, workers become prone to a number of vices, including selfishness, cowardice, and intemperance.
To correct these conditions, he proposes that workers perform tasks that are interesting and mentally challenging—and that each worker help decide how, and to what ends, their work should be directed. Marx believes that this, coupled with democratic conditions in the workplace, reduces competitive feelings among workers so they want to exhibit traditional virtues like generosity and trustfulness, and avoid the more traditional vices such as cowardice, stinginess, and self-indulgence.
John Stuart Mill, like Marx, also highly regarded development of the rational mind. He argued that seriously unequal societies, by preventing individuals from developing their deliberative powers, affect individuals' character in unhealthy ways and impede their ability to live virtuous lives. In particular, Mill argued that societies that have systematically subordinated women have harmed men and women, and advised that the place of women in families and in societies be reconsidered.
Contemporary views[edit]
Because women and men today may not be well-positioned to fully develop the capacities Aristotle and others considered central to virtuous character, it continues to be a central issue not only in ethics, but also in feminist philosophy, political philosophy, philosophy of education, and philosophy of literature. Because moral character requires communities where citizens can fully realize their human powers and ties of friendship, there are hard questions of how educational, economic, political, and social institutions should be structured to make that development possible.[citation needed]
Situationism
Impressed by scientific experiments in social psychology, "situationist" philosophers argue that character traits are not stable or consistent and cannot be used to explain why people act as they do. Experimental data shows that much of human behavior is attributable to seemingly trivial features of the situations in which people find themselves. In a typical experiment, seminary students agreed to give a talk on the importance of helping those in need. On the way to the building where their talks were to be given, they encountered a confederate slumped over and groaning. Ironically, those who were told they were already late were much less likely to help than those who were told they had time to spare.
Perhaps most damning to the traditional view of character are the results of the experiments conducted by Stanley Milgram in the 1960s and Philip G. Zimbardo in 1971. In the first of these experiments,[14] the great majority of subjects, when politely though firmly requested by an experimenter, were willing to administer what they thought were increasingly severe electric shocks to a screaming "victim." In the second, the infamous Stanford prison experiment,[15] the planned two-week investigation into the psychology of prison life had to be ended after only six days because the college students who were assigned to act as guards became sadistic and those who were the "prisoners" became depressed and showed signs of extreme stress. These and other experiments are taken to show that if humans do have noble tendencies, they are narrow, "local" traits that are not unified with other traits into a wider behavioral pattern of being.
History of character education in U.S. schools[edit]
The colonial period[edit]
As common schools spread throughout the colonies, the moral education of children was taken for granted. Formal education had a distinctly moral and religion emphasis. In the Christian tradition, it is believed that humans are flawed at birth (original sin), requiring salvation through religious means: teaching, guidance and supernatural rituals. This belief in America, originally heavily populated by Protestant immigrants, creates a situation of a-priori assumption that humans are morally deficient by nature and that preemptive measures are needed to develop children into acceptable members of society: home, church and school.
Character education in school in the United States began with the circulation of the New England Primer. Besides rudimentary instruction in reading, it was filled with Biblical quotes, prayers, catechisms and religiously charged moral exhortations. Typical is this short verse from the 1777 edition:[16]
Good children must,
Fear God all day, Love Christ alway,
Parents obey, In secret pray,
No false thing say, Mind little play,
By no sin stray, Make no delay,
In doing good.
Nineteenth century[edit]
As the young republic took shape, schooling was promoted for both secular and moral reasons. By the time of the nineteenth century, however, religion became a problem in the schools. In the United States, the overwhelming dominant religion was Protestantism. While not as prominent as during the Puritan era, the King James Bible was, nevertheless, a staple of U.S. public schools. Yet, as waves of immigrants from Ireland, Germany, and Italy came to the country from the mid-nineteenth century forward, they reacted to the Protestant tone and orthodoxy of the schools. Concerned that their children would be weaned from their faith, Catholics developed their own school system. Later in the twentieth century, other religious groups, such as Jews, Muslims, and even various Protestant denominations, formed their own schools. Each group desired, and continues to desire, that its moral education be rooted in its respective faith or code.
Horace Mann, the nineteenth-century champion of the common schools, strongly advocated for moral education. He and his followers were worried by the widespread drunkenness, crime, and poverty during the Jacksonian period they lived in. No less troubling were the waves of immigrants flooding into cities, unprepared for urban life and particularly unprepared to participate in democratic civic life.
The most successful textbooks during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were the famed McGuffey Readers, fostering virtues such as thrift honesty, piety, punctuality and industry. McGuffey was a theological and conservative teacher and attempted to give schools a curriculum that would instill Presbyterian Calvinist beliefs and manners in their students.
Mid-twentieth century[edit]
During the late-nineteenth-century and twentieth-century period, intellectual leaders and writers were deeply influenced by the ideas of the English naturalist Charles Darwin, the German political philosopher Karl Marx, the Austrian neurologist and founder of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud, and by a growing strict interpretation of the separation of church and state doctrine. This trend increased after World War II and was further intensified by what appeared to be changes in the nation's moral consensus in the late 1960s. Educators and others became wary of using the schools for moral education. More and more this was seen to be the province of the family and the church.
Still, due to a perceived view of academic and moral decline, educators continued to receive mandates to address the moral concerns of students, which they did using primarily two approaches: values clarification and cognitive developmental moral education.[17]
Values clarification. Values change over time in response to changing life experiences. Recognizing these changes and understanding how they affect one's actions and behaviors is the goal of the values clarification process. Values clarification does not tell you what you should have, it simply provides the means to discover what your values are. This approach, although widely practiced, came under strong criticism for, among other things, promoting moral relativism among students.
Cognitive-developmental theory of moral education and development sprang from the work of the Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget and was further developed by Lawrence Kohlberg. Kohlberg rejected the focus on values and virtues, not only due to the lack of consensus on what virtues are to be taught, but also because of the complex nature of practicing such virtues. For example, people often make different decisions yet hold the same basic moral values. Kohlberg believed a better approach to affecting moral behavior should focus on stages of moral development. These stages are critical, as they consider the way a person organizes their understanding of virtues, rules, and norms, and integrates these into a moral choice.
Character education movement of the 1980s[edit]
The impetus and energy behind the return of a more didactic character education to American schools did not come from within the educational community. It continues to be fueled by desire from conservative and religious segments of the population for traditionally orderly schools where conformity to "standards" of behavior and good habits are stressed.[18] State and national politicians, as well as local school districts, lobbied by character education organizations, have responded by supporting this sentiment.[19] During his presidency, Bill Clinton hosted five conferences on character education. President George W. Bush[20] expanded on the programs of the previous administration and made character education a major focus of his educational reform agenda.
21st century developments[edit]
Grit is defined as perseverance and commitment to long-term goals. It is a character attribute associated with University of Pennsylvania professor Angela Duckworth who wrote about her research in a best-selling book[21] and promoted it on a widely watched Ted Talks video.[22]. Initially, lauded as a breakthrough discovery of the "key character ingredient"[23] to success and performance, it soon came under wide criticism and has been exposed, like other character interventions, as suspect as a character construct, and where attempts have been made to implement it in school programs, shows no more than a weak effect, if any. Moreover, the original data was misinterpreted by Duckworth.[24] Additionally, the construct of grit ability ignores the positive socio-economic pre-requisites necessary to deploy it. [25]
Modern scientific approaches[edit]
Today, the sciences of social psychology, neuropsychology and evolutionary psychology have taken new approaches to the understanding of human social behavior.
Personality and social psychology is a scientific method used by health professionals for researching personal and social motivators in and between the individual and society, as well as applying them to the problems people have in the context of society.[26] Personality and social psychologists study how people think about, influence, and relate to one another. By exploring forces within the person (such as traits, attitudes, and goals) as well as forces within the situation (such as social norms and incentives), they seek to provide insight into issues as wide-ranging as prejudice, romantic attraction, persuasion, friendship, helping, aggression, conformity, and group interaction.
Neuropsychology addresses how brain regions associated with emotional processing are involved in moral cognition by studying the biological mechanisms that underlie human choices and behavior. Like social psychology, it seeks to determine, not how we should, but how we do behave—though neurologically. For instance, what happens in the brain when we favor one response over another, or when it is difficult to make any decision? Studies of clinical populations, including patients with VMPC (ventromedial prefrontal cortex) damage, reveal an association between impairments in emotional processing and impairments in moral judgement and behavior.[27] These and other studies conclude that not only are emotions engaged during moral cognition, but that emotions, particularly those mediated by VMPC, are in fact critical for morality.
Other neurological research is documenting how much the unconscious mind is involved in decision making.[28] According to cognitive neuroscientists, we are conscious of only about 5 percent of our cognitive activity, so most of our decisions, actions, emotions, and behavior depends on the 95 percent of brain activity that goes beyond our conscious awareness. These studies show that actions come from preconscious brain activity patterns and not from people consciously thinking about what they are going to do.
Evolutionary psychology,[29] a new science, emerged in the 1990s to focus on explaining human behavior against the backdrop of Darwinian processes. This science considers how the biological forces of genetics and neurotransmissions in the brain influence unconscious strategies and conscious and proposes that these features of biology have developed through evolution processes. In this view, the cognitive programs of the human brain are adaptations. They exist because this behavior in our ancestors enabled them to survive and reproduce these same traits in their descendants, thereby equipping us with solutions to problems that our ancestors faced during our species' evolutionary history. Ethical topics addressed include altruistic behaviors, deceptive or harmful behaviors, an innate sense of fairness or unfairness, feelings of kindness or love, self-sacrifice, feelings related to competitiveness and moral punishment or retribution, and moral "cheating" or hypocrisy.
Issues and controversies[edit]
Scientific studies[edit]
The largest federal study, to-date, a 2010 report released under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Education found that the vast majority of character education programs have failed to prove their effectiveness, producing no improvements in student behavior or academic performance.[7] Previous and current research on the subject fails to find one peer-reviewed study demonstrating any scientifically validated need for[9] or result from character education programs. Typically, support is attested to by referring to "correlations" (e.g., grades, number of disciplinary referrals, subjective opinion, etc.).[30][31]
Functional and ideological problems[edit]
1) An assumption that "character" is deficient in some or all children[32]
2) Lack of agreement on what constitutes effectiveness [33]
3) Lack of evidence that it does what it claims[31][34][7]
4) A conflict between what good character is and the way that character education proposes to teach it[32][35]
5) Differing standards in methods and objectives. Differing standards for assessing need and evaluating results. Some attempts have been made.[36]
6) Supportive "studies" that overwhelmingly rely on subjective feedback (usually surveys) from vested participants[7]
7) Programs instituted towards ideological and/or religious ends[20][37][38]
8) The pervasive problem of confusing morality with social conformity[4][39][40][41]
9) There are few if any common goals among character education programs. The dissensions in the list of values among character education programs, itself, constitutes a major criticism that there is anything to character education that is either fundamental or universally relevant to students or society.[42]
10) It might be said that there is agreement in as much as what values do not find inclusion on lists of core values. Not found, even though they are fundamental to the success of modern democratic societies, are such noted values as independence, inventiveness, curiosity, critical thinking, skepticism, and even moderation. "Take chances, make mistakes, get messy!" the famous saying by Ms. Frizzle on the much celebrated TV show, The Magic School Bus,[43] embodies values that would be antithetical to those found on today’s character education lists.
See also[edit]
Values education
References[edit]
Jump up ^ "Character Education: An Historical Overview".
Jump up ^ Wanda Robinson-Lee (2008). A Framework for Understanding Character Education in Middle Schools. ProQuest. pp. 32–. ISBN 978-0-549-51817-4.
Jump up ^ "Character Education: Organizations and Initiatives".
^ Jump up to: a b c d "What's Right and Wrong In Character Education Today". ...too many programs that say they are developing character and call themselves "character education" are aimed mostly at promoting good manners and compliance with rules, not at developing students of strong, independent character.
Jump up ^ "Leading Children Beyond Good and Evil (Includes a list of conflicting "pillars" among competing character education programs.)".
Jump up ^ Revell, Lynn; Authur, James (March 2007). "Character Education in Schools and the Education of Teachers". Journal of Moral Education. 36 (1): 79–92. There is no common practice in relation to the formation of pupils' character or values education in schools in relation to teacher training.
^ Jump up to: a b c d "Efficcacy of Schoolwide Programs to Promote Social and Character Development and Reduce Problem Behavior in Elementary School Children" (PDF). The Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. 2007. The Teacher Report on Student was a self-administered survey completed by teachers. The survey took approximately 15 minutes. Even then, the study found that the vast majority of character education programs failed to prove their effectiveness over 3 years, some were detrimental.
Jump up ^ Howard Adelman (Editor), Astri Suhrke (Editor) (2000). The Path of Genocide. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 0-7658-0768-8. CS1 maint: Extra text: authors list (link)
^ Jump up to: a b "Character Education After the Bandwagon has Gone?" (PDF).
Jump up ^ Confucius. Analects. pp. chapter 8, verse 8.
Jump up ^ "Taoism". Standford University.
Jump up ^ "Moral Character: Some ancient Greek views". Standford University.
Jump up ^ "Moral Character: Marx and Mill". Standford University.
Jump up ^ Thomas Blass (2004). The man who shocked the world: the life and legacy of Stanley Milgram. Basic Books. ISBN 0-7382-0399-8.
Jump up ^ "Stanford Prison Experiment: A Simulation Study of the Psychology of Imprisonment Conducted at Stanford University".
Jump up ^ "The New England Primer: 1777 edition".
Jump up ^ "Moral Development and Moral Education: An Overview" (PDF).
Jump up ^ Kohn, Alfie. "How Not to Teach Values". Character education rests on three ideological legs: behaviorism, conservatism, and religion.
Jump up ^ "Character Counts! Coalition (US)" (PDF). The focus on political lobbying has created state and national government imprimaturs that make the program look like a government initiative. The presidential declaration of a National Character Counts! Week is a triumph of marketing.
^ Jump up to: a b "George W, Bush, National Character Counts Week Proclamation, 2001". White House. A chilling document wherein the conservative ideologies and politics of militarism, retributive war, churches, patriotism, faith, morality and virtue - as opposed to evil - are all conflated with character education for Character Counts! week)
Jump up ^ Duckworth, Angela (May 3, 2016). Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. Scribner. ISBN 978-1501111105.
Jump up ^ "Grit! The power of passion and perseverance Talks". TED Talks.
Jump up ^ "Grit: The key ingredient to your kids' success". Washington Post.
Jump up ^ Credé, M.; Tynan, M.C.; Harms, P. D. (September 2017). "Much ado about grit: A meta-analytic synthesis of the grit literature". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 113. doi:10.1037/pspp0000102.
Jump up ^ Rose, Mike (May 14, 2015). "Why teaching kids to have 'grit' isn't always a good thing". Washington Post.
Jump up ^ "What is a Social/Personality Psychology?". Society for Personality and Social Psychology.
Jump up ^ "Investigating emotion in moral cognition: a review of evidence from functional neuroimaging and neuropsychology". British Medical Bulletin. 84 (1): 69–79. December 1, 2007.
Jump up ^ "Unconscious Decisions". Scientific American.
Jump up ^ "Evolutionary Psychology". Standford University.
Jump up ^ "Moral Education - A Brief History of Moral Education, The Return of Character Education, Current Approaches to Moral Education". Evaluation and assessment in character and moral education is best described as a work in progress. The field is held back by the lack of an accepted battery of reliable instruments, a lack of wide agreement on individual or schoolwide outcomes, and by the short-term nature of most of the existent studies. Complicating these limitations is a larger one: the lack of theoretical agreement of what character is.
^ Jump up to: a b Davis, Michael (2003). "What's Wrong with Character Education?". American Journal of Education. 110: 32. doi:10.1086/377672.
^ Jump up to: a b Fabes, Richard A.; et al. (1989). Effects of Rewards on Children's Prosocial Motivation: A Socialization Study. Developmental Psychology. In a troubling study conducted by Joan Grusec at the University of Toronto, young children who were frequently praised for displays of generosity tended to be slightly less generous on an everyday basis than other children were.
Jump up ^ "Evaluating character education programs and missing the target: A critique of existing research". Educational Research Review. 1 (2): 148–156. 2006. doi:10.1016/j.edurev.2006.08.001.
Jump up ^ Greenburg, Barry; Fain, Stephen. "An Exploratory Study of the Impact of the Character Education Program within the Dade County Public School System". There was no measurable differences in character building between those students in the program and those not in it.
Jump up ^ "A Critique of Character Counts! as a Curriculum Model for Explicit Moral Instruction in Public Schools" (PDF). Augusta State University.
Jump up ^ "Character Education Quality Standards" (PDF). Character Education Partnership.
Jump up ^ Yu, Tianlong (2004). In the Name of Morality: Character Education and Political Control. Peter Lang. ISBN 9780820467252. Yu finds unfavorable similarities between the current character education movement in America with his own experience of Chinese cultural education and re-education.
Jump up ^ Talvi, Silja J.A. "Cult of Character: How the 'secular' Character Training Institute is working to build evangelist Bill Gothard's vision of a First-Century Kingdom of God – one city, one state, one school board, one police force and one mind at a time". InTheseTime.
Jump up ^ Dune, Jonathan (1997). "A Critique of Research Evaluating Moral Education Interventions". Archived from the original on 2000-01-09. The problem of confusing morality with social conformity cannot be ignored. Students in times of slavery, pogroms, or other prejudice would be emulating community values by participating in cruelty and social injustice. We can never assume that our society is free from such injustices, because we may be blinded ourselves by social acceptability. Therefore, true moral education must empower students with the ability to deconstruct social norms in terms of universal values of social justice—in this way moral education can also gain a powerful ally in the multicultural education movement.
Jump up ^ Juhasz, Joseph; Shepard, Lester. "The Character Education Dilemma". ...the culture also inculcated a great variety of contrary values, norms, and customs in the young, such as hatred and intolerance for different ethnicities, faiths, and sexual orientations; it sanctioned—not to say glorified—murder, slavery, torture, and oppression. The social ethos in fact instilled and promoted a two-sided moral code whereby values could be readily converted into antivalues: the virtues of the individual, family, clan, group, or nation—the insiders—were seen as the vices of the other, the one or ones outside it. The same act as performed by me showed courage; by my enemy, cowardice. And so down the line, creating a jungle of contradictions.
Jump up ^ Whitley, Joseph Garland. "Reversing the Perceived Moral Decline in American Schools: A Critical Literature Review of America's Attempt at Character Education (Covers the range of critiques from lack of pre-assessment and no evidence of effectiveness, to the damages of rewarding behavior and flaws in implementation)". College of William and Mary, School of Education. The entire character education movement is a knee-jerk reaction of conservatives in America to the economic situation of poor students in school
Jump up ^ Smagorinsky, Peter; Taxel, Joel (2005). The Discourse of Character Education - Culture Wars in the Classroom. Psychology Press. ...the movement lacks either a theoretical perspective or a common core of practice.
Jump up ^ "Magic School Bus Wins NEA Award".
Further reading[edit]
Arthur, J. (2003). Education with Character, New York: Routledge Falmer
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