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This chapter examines the influence of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy on some of the most important Supreme Court decisions of the past three decades. Mobilizing the epistemic community framework, it demonstrates how network members, acting as amici curiae, litigators, academics, and judges worked to transmit intellectual capital to Supreme Court decision makers in 12 federalism and separation of powers cases decided between 1983 and 2001. It finds that Federalist Society members were most successful in diffusing ideas into Supreme Court opinions in cases where doctrinal distance was greatest; that is, cases where the Supreme Court moved the farthest from its established constitutional framework.

This paper aims to understand how social finance and impact measurement experts include stakeholders' voices in valuations of social and environmental impact.

The paper used the content analysis of an online discussion forum where experts discussed impact valuation approaches.

Many experts seek impact valuations that take into account the experiences of those whose lives are most affected. Ideally, these accounts need to be emic to (in the language of) those stakeholders, and polyvocal (representing many different stakeholders' voices). However, these experts also seek to effect systemic change by encouraging mainstream financial markets to use social and environmental valuations in their decision-making. These experts consider full plurality too complex to be useable by financial markets, so the experts argue in favor of etic valuations (stated in the language of investors), to appeal to mainstream finance, while endeavoring nonetheless to represent multiple stakeholders' voices. The authors identify two discursive strategies used to resolve this tension: effacing of differences between diverse stakeholders, and overstating the universality of money as a common language.

The terms emic and polyvocal provide experts with nuanced ways to understand “stakeholder voice.” The authors hope these nuances inspire new insights and strategies and help the community with their goal of bridging to mainstream finance.

The paper presents a theoretical framework for describing plurality in impact valuations and examines the challenges of bridging from social finance, which seeks to give voice and representation to those whose lives are most affected, to mainstream finance.

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected educational systems worldwide, forcing them to abruptly shift from face-to-face to online teaching and learning. This case study illustrates how a traditional lecture-based activity for undergraduate students in a Management of Health Service Organizations program was transformed into an argumentation-based learning activity using the technique of digital concept mapping and was deployed in an online format during the COVID-19 lockdown.

The students were tasked with solving an ill-structured problem bearing significance for their future professional lives and connected to the contents of their course (entitled “Assimilation of service quality in health systems”). The activity was composed of two phases. In Phase 1, participants were asked to provide five arguments to establish their proposed solution to the problem by using a concept map on a digital platform (Mindomo). In Phase 2, they were asked to substantiate their arguments. Reflective journals were used to ascertain how the participants viewed the activity. Thematic analysis was used to analyze the qualitative data by searching for themes demonstrating different epistemological positions.

Six themes were inductively derived from the students' reflections: (1) transitioning from passive to active learning; (2) generating epistemic change; (3) social perspective-taking; (4) domain-based knowledge; (5) prior knowledge and experience; and (6) online collaboration with other students. Episodes, thoughts and feelings expressed by the students were reported so as to increase the reliability of the recurrent and common themes.

This study mainly shows that combining constructivist teaching and learning tools with advanced technology in an online course enables the development of lifelong learning capabilities among students in the health management professions.

Criticisms of naturalistic coherentism are suggested that are not raised by its critics in the literature. The rejection of traditional foundationalism does not necessarily entail the acceptance of coherentism. Coherentism can be seen as another version of foundationalism. Most interestingly, Evers and Lakomski’s stance on “strong vs weak” naturalism seems to be vague. Then, in closing, it is suggested that a recent theory in epistemology termed “foundherentism” might provide some avenues for the further development of naturalistic coherentism, such as by emphasising empirical input in coherentism and adopting a weak version of naturalism.

Highly developed and agile learners who can clearly convey and call on their skills are sought in all walks of life. Diverse demand for these capacities has called attention to how the skills and knowledge gained during doctoral study can be conveyed, translated and leveraged in non-academic settings; however, the complex learning reality underneath doctoral development is challenging to convey.

The data set for this particular analysis was obtained from 245 in-depth telephone interviews with PhD candidates collected prior to COVID-19. Candidates were asked about learning processes, challenges and changes, and both the questions and thematic analysis were guided by theories of doctoral development and transformational learning.

For many participants, learning and development were not familiar topics, while a small proportion deflected questions about learning altogether. One fifth of participants presented rich and lucid accounts of learning in which cognisance of complexity, metacognitive processes and transformational experiences were embedded and multiple avenues of development were in evidence. They were well-placed to convey the complexion of doctoral development. Candidates more deeply engaged in learning also commented more about changes they noticed in themselves. The most identified avenue of development was in understanding and approach to knowledge.

Candidate communication about learning and development is an under-explored dimension of doctoral experience and skill that is relevant to advancing knowledge about doctoral development and illuminating graduate potential both within and outside academe. This must constitute a key element of the re-vitalisation of the doctorate post-pandemic. The salience of framing transferable skills within a learning development perspective is discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce this special issue, which contains selected papers from the 13th Annual European Learning Styles Information Network (ELSIN) conference held in Ghent, Belgium in June 2008. One of the key aims of ELSIN is to promote understanding of individual learning and cognitive differences through the dissemination of international multidisciplinary research about learning and cognitive styles and strategies of learning and thinking.

Three papers within this special issue consider how style differences can inform the development of e‐learning opportunities to enhance the learning of all (Vigentini; Kyprianidou, Demetriadis, Pombortsis and Karatasios; Zhu, Valcke and Schellens). The influence of culture on learning is also raised in the paper of Zhu et al. and those of Sulimma and Eaves which both focus more directly on cultural influences on style, learning and teaching.

A number of key themes permeate the studies included in this special edition such as: the nature of styles; the intrinsic difficulty of isolating style variables from other variables impacting on performance; inherent difficulties in choosing the most appropriate style measures; the potential of e‐learning to attend to individual learning differences; the role of culture in informing attitudes and access to learning; the development of constructivist learning environments to support learning through an understanding of individual differences and most importantly how one can apply such insights about individual differences to inform and enhance instruction.

The papers in this special issue contribute to enhanced knowledge about the value of style differences to design constructive learning environments in multicultural and e‐learning contexts.

The internet and search engines dominate within people’s information acquisition, especially among the younger generations. Given this trend, this study aims to explore if information and communication technology (ICT) practices, internet reliance and views of knowledge and knowing, i.e. epistemic beliefs, interact with each other. Everyday practices and conceptions among beginning undergraduate students are studied as a challenge for higher education.

The study builds upon survey-based quantitative data operationalising students’ epistemic beliefs, their internet reliance and their ICT practices. The survey items were used to compute subscales describing these traits, and the connections were explored using correlations analysis.

The results suggest that the more beginning undergraduate students rely on internet-based information, the more they are inclined to epistemic beliefs where knowledge is regarded as certain, unchanging, unambiguous and as being handed down by some authority.

The approach used in the study applies to the sample used, and further research is required to test the applicability of the approach on larger samples.

The study highlights the risk of everyday information practices being transferred into the educational context.

Ignorance of these changes may pose a risk for knowledge building on different educational levels and in a longer perspective, a threat to democracy.

While there is some research on epistemic beliefs in relation to internet-based information, studies approaching the problem over a possible connection between epistemic beliefs and internet reliance are scarce. In addition, this study implies a conceptual bridge between epistemic beliefs and internet reliance over the concept of algorithmic authority.

This paper aims to analyze some of the epistemically pernicious effects of the use of the internet and social media. In light of this analysis, it introduces the concept of epistemic pornography and argues that epistemic agents both can and should avoid consuming and sharing epistemic pornography.

The paper draws on research on epistemic virtue, cognitive biases, social media use and its epistemic consequences, fake news, paternalistic nudging, pornography, moral philosophy, moral elevation and moral exemplar theory to analyze the epistemically pernicious effects of the internet and social media.

There is a growing consensus that the internet and social media activate and enable human cognitive biases leading to what are here called “failures of epistemic virtue.” Common formulations of this problem involve the concept of “fake news,” and strategies for responding to the problem often have much in common with paternalistic “nudging.” While fake news is a problem and the nudging approach holds out promise, the paper concludes that both place insufficient emphasis on the agency and responsibility of users on the internet and social media, and that nudging represents a necessary but not sufficient response.

The essay offers the concept of epistemic pornography as a concept distinct from but related to “fake news” – distinct precisely because it places greater emphasis on personal agency and responsibility, and following recent literature on moral elevation and moral exemplars, as a heuristic that agents might use to economize their efforts at resisting irrational cognitive biases and attempting to live up to their epistemic duties.

Learners’ dispositional attributes form the foundations for their learning behaviour and therefore academic outcomes. This study aims to explore the dispositional attributes of postgraduate learners in coursework programs, and to understand the relationships between dispositional attributes and academic achievement at this level.

This study profiled the dispositions towards learning of 880 Master’s students in Australia, reported in an online survey. Statistical analysis was used to explore the possibility of underlying dispositional dimensions and latent clusters of participants within the cohort.

The profile of the cohort overall was as expected for an elite academic group, yet there was substantial variation between individuals. Cluster analysis identified three groups of students with meaningfully different dispositional profiles. Exploratory factor analysis revealed two underlying dispositional dimensions, representing epistemic and agentic attributes. Epistemic attributes were most closely related to academic achievement.

It is argued that students at Master’s level typically possess the agentic attributes necessary for effective self-regulation. At this level, therefore, epistemic attributes are more relevant for differentiating between higher and lower achieving students. The attainment of sophisticated epistemic attributes is in line with the stated goals of postgraduate education. This supports the explicit teaching of metacognitive and epistemic skills within postgraduate degrees.

This study contributes a detailed analysis of Master’s students’ dispositional profiles. Two underlying dispositional dimensions are identified, representing agentic and epistemic attributes. The importance of epistemic attributes for postgraduate academic achievement identifies an opportunity for targeted interventions to raise the quality of learning at this level.

Evaluation of research is a core function of academic work, yet there has been very little theoretical development about what it means to ‘know’ in relation to judgements made in examination of doctoral research. This chapter addresses the issue by reflecting on findings from three projects aimed at enhancing understanding of doctoral examination. In order to progress understanding about knowledge judgements in the doctoral research context, the chapter draws on two key contributions in the field of knowledge and knowing, namely, Habermas’ cognitive interests and Chinn, Buckland and Samarapungavan’s notion of epistemic cognition. It examines the common ground between the two bodies of theory, drawing illustratively on empirical work in the field of doctoral examination. The comparison of the Habermasian theory of cognitive interests with Chinn et al.’s notion of epistemic cognition led to the conclusion that there were areas of overlap between the two conceptual schemas that could be utilised to advance research into doctoral examination in higher education. Habermas’ cognitive interests (which underpin his ways of knowing theory) offer a conceptual lens that facilitates analysis of the interaction of ontological and epistemic components of knowledge production. Chinn et al.’s notion of epistemic cognition allows for finer grained analysis of aspects of the cognitive work involved in knowledge rendition. This work is particularly pertinent in an era that sees the boundaries of the disciplines being challenged by the need for new perspectives and cross-disciplinary approaches to solving complex problems.