What a dynamic year 2016 was for Educational Psychology. First, the journal advanced to publishing two more issues per year for a total of 10 annual issues. This enabled the journal to include more high-quality papers and up-to-date research. Second, to better foster the sustainable development of Educational Psychology, a new editorial structure was introduced on 1 April 2016, with eight Associate Editors, an Editorial Board, a team of 117 Consulting Editors and a pool of reviewers. Thanks to the concerted effort and brilliant efficiency of the Associate Editors, Editorial Board members, Consulting Editors, reviewers and authors under both the old and new editorial structures, the journal’s visibility greatly increased as reflected in the improved Impact Factor (from 0.667 in 2014 to 1.157 in 2015). The coverage of the journal in the Social Sciences Citation Index and many other databases and indices proves that its role in the academic arena of educational research is gaining importance.
A review of the papers published in the 10 issues in 2016 highlights the wide range of topics related to learning and education that are included in Educational Psychology. Research in social and emotional learning, assessment, goal, motivation, additional support to students provided by teachers and students, as well as self-efficacy were broadly covered by the 93 high-quality papers in the regular issues of the journal last year. Contributing to the new area of psychometric studies (Kuo & de la Torre, Citation2016), a special issue was also published with five papers addressing innovative approaches to research, practical issues related to the construction of cognitive diagnostic assessments, theories and applications of cognitive diagnosis modelling, and the use of digitally mediated diagnostic assessments. Moreover, as a journal published in the English language, its internationalisation is demonstrated by the many countries from which the manuscripts were submitted. In the past year, scholars from over 390 institutions in 80 countries or regions across different continents chose Educational Psychology as their publication outlet. With the detailed comments made by our resourceful reviewers from more than 260 institutions located in 35 countries or regions, the authors of the manuscripts submitted to the journal gained much inspiration in refining their study reports.
Perpetual research activities and publications are necessary to present the rapid developments in the field of educational psychology and the emerging themes. Thus, Educational Psychology encompasses the latest developments in these areas by including relevant researches in its special and regular issues. For readers interested in the new approaches to second language writing, the recently published special issue of the journal outlines automated writing evaluation, a genre-based approach to writing, and cognitive diagnostic assessment of writing, and serves as a reference for further research in the teaching, learning and assessment in this area (Aryadoust & Riazi, Citation2017). Educational Psychology addresses many new themes as well, among which the psychology of learning of multi-lingual learners and students from different cultural backgrounds and technology-related psychology are two foci. Globalisation introduces the trend of people’s enhanced mobility, resulting in a diverse composition of immigrant students from various countries in the same educational environment. Learning problems, such as adaptation issues in classroom language and adversities in learning, may affect students’ interest towards learning and their performance. At the same time, rapid developments in information technology pose both opportunities and challenges for teaching and learning. In Educational Psychology’s 2016 collection, researches done by Suviste, Kiuru, Palu, and Kikas (Citation2016), Johnson (Citation2016), and Megalakaki, Aparicio, Porion, Pasqualotti, and Baccino (Citation2016) explored these two areas. To delve more deeply into these topics, two special issues dedicated to academic resilience in Asian children and intelligent learning environments are planned for 2017 and 2018, respectively. Please look forward to them for a more comprehensive and in-depth review of these themes.
Apart from special topics, Educational Psychology continues to enrich the literature in numerous research areas. In the current issue are papers focussing on students’ learning strategies. Dual-language programmes, text-based worked examples, group discussions, instructional improvement, inductive reasoning and different reading strategies are identified as effective learning strategies for students (Cai & Zhu, Citation2017; Hilpert & Husman, Citation2017; Hoogerheide, Loyens, Jadi, Vrins, & van Gog, Citation2017; Kuo, Ramirez, de Marin, Kim, & UnalGezer, Citation2017; Resing, Touw, Veerbeek, & Elliott, Citation2017; Stenlund, Jönsson, & Jonsson, Citation2017). In order to know more about how learning strategies influence mathematics learning, and as an extension to the discussion of the special issue guest edited by Kuo and de la Torre (Citation2016), a study found that the use of cognitive diagnostic models to develop learning progressions is feasible and beneficial for learners (Chen, Yan, & Xin, Citation2017).
Scholarly works in the area of emotion and the psychology of learning are also in the spotlight of the current issue. Also investigating mathematics learning, Holm, Hannula, and Björn (Citation2017) determined that the interactive effect between mathematics performance and gender on mathematics-related emotions among adolescents was significant. In the research carried out by Inglés et al. (Citation2017), a wider examination of the relationship between emotion and learning strategies identified four differentiated emotional intelligence profiles through cluster analysis. Taking a micro perspective in emotion studies, Burkitt (Citation2017) found that expressive content in a communication condition was greater than in a reference condition and impacted differentially on the strategies used between drawings. From an overview of the 10 papers, this issue is indeed thought-provoking in relevant research.
To wrap up my review and above introduction, the unceasing strong support from authors and reviewers gives rise to the many interesting and up-to-standard papers that are worthy of publication, but unfortunately not all can be accommodated in the journal’s limited space. In fact, I believe that this can encourage each one of us to strive to produce excellent papers in order to be included in the collection of Educational Psychology. While the year of 2016 was fruitful and worthy of a celebration for the journal, the editorial members and I will not be complacent. We will maintain our momentum and enhance the quality of Educational Psychology in 2017 and the years ahead.
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References
- Aryadoust, V., & Riazi, M. (2017). Role of assessment in second language writing research and pedagogy [Special issue]. Educational Psychology, 37, 1–7.
- Burkitt, E. (2017). The effects of task explicitness to communicate on the expressiveness of children’s drawings of different topics. Educational Psychology, 37, 219–236.
- Cai, Y., & Zhu, X. (2017). Learning strategies and reading literacy among Chinese and Finnish adolescents: Evidence of suppression. Educational Psychology, 37, 192–204.
- Chen, F., Yan, Y., & Xin, T. (2017). Developing a learning progression for number sense based on the rule space model in China. Educational Psychology, 37, 128–144.
- Hilpert, J. C., & Husman, J. (2017). Instructional improvement and student engagement in post-secondary engineering courses: the complexity underlying small effect sizes. Educational Psychology, 37, 157–172.
- Holm, M. E., Hannula, M. S., & Björn, P. M. (2017). Mathematics-related emotions among Finnish adolescents across different performance levels. Educational Psychology, 37, 205–218.
- Hoogerheide, V., Loyens, S. M. M., Jadi, F., Vrins, A., & van Gog, T. (2017). Testing the model-observer similarity hypothesis with text-based worked examples. Educational Psychology, 37, 112–127.
- Inglés, C. J., Martínez-Monteagudo, M. C., Pérez Fuentes, M. C., García-Fernández, J. M., del Mar Molero, M., Suriá-Martinez, R., & Gázquez, J. J. (2017). Emotional intelligence profiles and learning strategies in secondary school students. Educational Psychology, 37, 237–248.
- Johnson, G. M. (2016). The influence of student learning characteristics on purchase of paper book and eBook for university study and personal interest. Educational Psychology, 36, 1544–1559.10.1080/01443410.2014.1002831
- Kuo, B.-C., & de la Torre, J. (2016). Editorial [Special issue]. Educational Psychology, 36, 1047–1048.10.1080/01443410.2016.1188252
- Kuo, L.-J., Ramirez, G., de Marin, S., Kim, T.-J., & UnalGezer, M. (2017). Bilingualism and morphological awareness: A study with children from general education and Spanish-English dual language programs. Educational Psychology, 37, 94–111.
- Megalakaki, O., Aparicio, X., Porion, A., Pasqualotti, L., & Baccino, T. (2016). Assessing visibility, legibility and comprehension for interactive whiteboards (IWBs) vs. computers. Educational Psychology, 36, 1631–1650.10.1080/01443410.2015.1025706
- Resing, W. C. M., Touw, K. W. J., Veerbeek, J., & Elliott, J. G. (2017). Progress in the inductive strategy-use of children from different ethnic backgrounds: A study employing dynamic testing. Educational Psychology, 37, 173–191.
- Stenlund, T., Jönsson, F. U., & Jonsson, B. (2017). Group discussions and test-enhanced learning: Individual learning outcomes and personality characteristics. Educational Psychology, 37, 145–156.
- Suviste, R., Kiuru, N., Palu, A., & Kikas, E. (2016). Classroom management practices and their associations with children’s mathematics skills in two cultural groups. Educational Psychology, 36, 216–235.10.1080/01443410.2014.993927