The Great Gatsby curve shows societies with higher levels of economic inequality to exhibit lower levels of intergenerational mobility, with such mobility influenced by educational opportunities. Hong Kong features one of the world’s largest degrees of economic inequality, but has also witnessed a substantial expansion in tertiary education in the past two decades. This paper investigates the change in intergenerational earnings mobility and returns to education in Hong Kong over time. Data were drawn from the 1996, 2006 and 2016 Hong Kong Population By-Censuses. Instrumental variables regression was performed to estimate the change in the average level of such mobility, and instrumental variables quantile regression to estimate the change in the non-linear pattern of intergenerational mobility and returns to education. The findings show the average level of intergenerational mobility has been improved, with intergenerational elasticity decreasing from 0.37 in 1996 to 0.26 in 2006 and 0.23 in 2016. However, intergenerational economic transmission among high-earners remains persistently strong. Examination of the non-linear pattern shows that it is the reproduction of wealth rather than the reproduction of poverty that has led to intergenerational persistence in Hong Kong. A similar pattern was observed in 1996, 2006 and 2016. Returns to non-degree tertiary education were similar across the earnings distribution in 1996 and 2016 but more valuable for low-earners in 2006. Degree-level tertiary education is persistently more valuable for high- than low-earners, which exacerbated earnings inequality in 1996, 2006 and 2016.
[Copyright of Social Indicators Research is the property of Springer Netherlands. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11205-018-1968-2]

The study reported in this paper adopted both direct (a large-scale questionnaire survey) and indirect (a verbal-guise test) measures to investigate gender differences in second language (L2) learners’ attitudes towards different English varieties in secondary schools in Hong Kong. The investigation considered various factors affecting students’ attitudes to language including their affective feelings, cultural identity, awareness of language variations, experience of language use, perceived intelligibility of English accents and, more importantly, situational language choices. Consistent with previous studies, the findings suggest that the female learners were more positively oriented towards native speaker (NS) pronunciation and tended to adopt it as their teaching model and learning target; they also had greater confidence than males in their ability to understand British English pronunciation. However, their greater sensitivity to NS standards was found to be limited to high-stakes English-speaking contexts. In contrast, male learners had greater tolerance or acceptance of local pronunciation. This paper concludes by discussing the implications of L2 learners’ gender differences in attitudes for English language education and the design of English language teaching materials and assessments.
[Copyright of System is the property of Pergamon Press. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2018.04.010]

Passion and perseverance for long-term goals or grit has been linked to various indices of educational success such as academic achievement, engagement, and motivation. Despite the nascent evidence regarding the beneficial impact of grit, previous investigations adopted a variable-centered approach which could not explore how individuals with different profiles of grit may differ in terms of academic outcomes. The current research aimed to build on the existing grit literature through examining the linkage of grit to test emotions using a person-centered approach among 1,051 Hong Kong Chinese primary school students. Results of cluster analyses showed that there were three naturally-occurring profiles of grit (Cluster 1 = High Perseverance and High Consistency; Cluster 2 = High Perseverance and Low Consistency; Cluster 3 = Low Perseverance and High Consistency) in the present study. Results of the multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) demonstrated that students who belonged to Cluster 2 had the highest scores on hope and lowest scores on anxiety and shame. The results imply that espousing high perseverance of effort and low consistency of interest is associated with higher levels of positive activating emotions and reduced levels of negative activating emotional states when taking academic tests. Copyright © 2018 The Author(s).

The Self-Report Family Inventory (SFI) is a 36-item scale developed by Beavers, Hampson, and Hulgus (1990) to assess competent and dysfunctional family functioning. While the SFI is widely tested in the areas of counselling psychology and clinical psychology, considerably less effort has been allocated to examine its psychometrics in educational settings. By using both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses (EFA and CFA) based on previous research, this study aimed to validate the Chinese version of SFI (C-SFI, Shek, 1998) with a sample of Hong Kong secondary students with special educational needs (SEN). The key purpose was to provide a useful tool to assess family functioning of this vulnerable population of students to inform practice improvement to cater for their needs. Consistent with Shek’s studies in typically developed students, the results of EFA showed a two-factor pattern. CFA results provided further evidence showing the best model fit indices were for the two-factor solution (i.e., family health and family pathology) compared with other competing models. This study also developed a short form (8 items instead of 36) of the C-SFI, which would be regarded as a parsimonious screening tool for researchers and practitioners to test family functioning of SEN students.家庭自我報告量表 (SFI) 是由 Beavers, Hamson, 及 Hulgus 在 1990 年編製的評估家庭功能狀況的量表。雖然該量表被廣泛應用於輔導心理學和臨床心理學，然而在教育領域的應用卻鮮有報導。本研究在已有研究的基礎上，通過探索性因素分析和驗證性因素分析評估中文版 SFI (C-SFI, Shek, 1998) 在香港有特殊學習需要中學生群體中的信度和效度。研究的主要目的是為有特殊教育需要學生這一弱勢群體提供一個有用的家庭功能評估工具。並在了解他們家庭功能的基礎上，為改進幫扶這一特殊需要群體的實踐提供指導作用。探索性因素分析結果生成兩個因素，這與已有的在香港普通學生中的研究結果一致。驗證性因素分析進一步提供了兩因素模型相關的擬合指數。本研究在原中文問卷的基礎上(36 條題項)，發展了一個簡化版 SF-C-SFI(8 條題項)。簡化版的兩因素與原版對應的兩因素之間的相關係數較高，達到 r=.92 以及 r=.94。 本研究初步為研究者和實踐者提供一個簡化版的篩查工具，用以評估殘疾學生的家庭功能。 Copyright © 2017 The Special Education Society of Hong Kong Ltd.

This study investigated the conceptualization of children's socioemotional competence among parents and teachers of preschool children in Hong Kong, China. Focus groups were conducted with 16 parents and 18 teachers from three preschools. Thematic content analysis revealed that, reflecting the cultural as well as contextual characteristics of Hong Kong, parents and teachers expected socioemotionally competent children to master skills in emotion understanding, emotion expressivity, emotion regulation, relationship building, conflict management, and inhibitory control and cognitive flexibility. There was diversity within parents' and teachers' interpretations of the characteristics of emotionally regulated and socially skilled children. Findings highlighted the ecosystemic nature of societal ideas about children's developmental competence, demonstrated the utility of qualitative research in exploring these ideas in culturally sensitive manners, and called for the mobilization of parents and teachers as research-informed scaffolders of holistic development of children. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Valid feedback is essential for the administrators, educators, parents and, of course, for children to be able to steer their development in a sustainable way. Key influential theorists such as Montessori, Piaget, Vygotsky, and others all used observations extensively to understand how children learn and use knowledge about children's learning to improve pedagogies and children's lives. However, most adults including teachers in the ECEC settings have not always observed children and tracked their growth. Based on the research and professional development programs conducted in Finland, Taiwan and Hong Kong with more than 100,000 observations, we found some relationships between young children's involvement, adaptation and agency in early childhood settings through systematic observations. We will introduce observation strategies with video clips and demonstrate our latest mobile application for observation for practitioners to contribute to a big data pool aimed to enhance the teaching quality in ECEC settings. Copyright © 2018 EARLI.

The changes in maternal involvement during the transition to primary school and the bidirectional relations between maternal involvement and school adjustment were explored in this study using a two-wave longitudinal design with a 8-month interval. The participants were children (mean age: 5 years 10.39 months at Time 1 and 6 years 4.98 months at Time 2), mothers, and kindergarten and primary school teachers from 324 and 247 Hong Kong middle- and upper-middle-class families at Time 1 and Time 2, respectively. Approximately three months before the children finished kindergarten (Time 1), and 3 months after they entered primary school (Time 2), mothers and teachers reported on the mothers' involvement and teachers rated the children's school adjustment. Data related to children's school adjustment were also collected in a child assessment session. Results revealed that mothers' involvement in language and cognitive activities during kindergarten predicted better school adjustment after the school transition. Mothers were also more involved at their children's primary schools when their children demonstrated lower cognitive skills in kindergarten. The findings highlight the importance of examining both home-based and school-based involvement over time during the transition to primary school and the bidirectional relations between maternal involvement and children's school adjustment. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Although the contribution of family support and peer support to university adjustment has been examined separately, few attempts have been made to explore the mechanism underlying this relation. This is the first study in the Asian context to test the role of self-esteem in mediating the effect of social support on first-year university adjustment outcomes. Self-esteem is a measure of one's positive or negative attitudes toward oneself (Rosenberg, 1965). Higher self-esteem is vital to a variety of developmental outcomes in early adulthood, such as the transition to university, whereas lower self-esteem has been related to poorer adjustment (Hickman, Bartholomae, & McKenry, 2000). Perceived self-esteem stems from social attachments to others that reflect positively on oneself and provide interpersonal support (Friedlander, Reid, Shupak, & Cribbie, 2007). High self esteem developed as a result of social support from family and peers may increase individuals' belief in their ability to solve problems, leading to better university adjustment. The authors hypothesized that self-esteem mediates the impact of family support and peer support on university adjustment. The participants in this study were 418 first year university students (mean age 19.94 years; 65% female) at an education university in Hong Kong, China, offering mainly education related subjects. As expected, findings showed that first-year university students receiving greater family and peer support reported better adjustment outcomes overall, which provides additional evidence of the universally beneficial effects of multiple support figures on university adjustment. Such findings corroborate the previous argument that parental support plays an important role throughout adolescence and early adulthood, even as reliance on support from peers increases.
[Copyright of Journal of College Student Development is the property of The Johns Hopkins University Press.]

繼介紹了香港教育的均衡教育後,本文主要介紹並討論香港教育中的最重要一環,即價值觀教育。以前,香港教育對此重視得不多,現在隨著教育的現代化與國際化,價值觀教育己被公認為是教育的一個核心部分,尤為重要。

繼介紹了香港教育的均衡教育後,本文主要介紹並討論香港教育中的最重要一環,即價值觀教育。以前,香港教育對此重視得不多,現在隨著教育的現代化與國際化,價值觀教育己被公認為是教育的一個核心部分,尤為重要。