Russia’s disinformation campaign during the 2016 US presidential election rocked social media companies like Facebook and Twitter to their core. Now, kids attending the Defcon conference are learning how to create their own bot army. But the organizers behind the r00tz Asylum, Defcon’s kid-friendly event, say there’s no cause for alarm. The goal isn’t to launch a new flurry…
As a teenager, Pete Etchells lost his father to motor neuron disease, and often, when the anniversary of his death rolled around, he found solace in playing video games, like hunting for the elusive Time Lost Proto-Drake in World of Warcraft. Gaming started as an escape, but over time, he found those virtual worlds helped…
Chase says that ads created by Persado’s machine learning performed better than ads written by humans, with a higher percent of consumers clicking on them—more than twice as many in some cases. The difference can be as simple as what word choice resonates with consumers. One digital ad written by humans read, “Access cash from the equity…
In a paper entitled “Implicit Theories of Interest: Finding Your Passion or Developing It?”, researches shared five studies that examined the difference between people who subscribe to the fixed theory versus the growth theory of interest. They found that people who believe that interests are fixed are more likely to: Lose interest more quickly in areas…
My team at the Reboot Foundation recently asked a simple question: Is the use of technology in schools associated with increased student outcomes? Based on a study of national and international databases, we uncovered a surprising answer, and our work suggests that there’s actually a pretty weak link between technology and student achievement. Source: Does…
Children of similar cognitive ability have very different chances of educational success; it still depends on their parents’ economic, socio-cultural and educational resources. This contradicts a commonly held view that these days that our education system has developed enough to give everyone a fighting chance. Source: Educational success among children of similar cognitive ability depends…
There was a lot of trial and error in constructing our Reglue systems. Not so much in hardware as that is subject to whatever has been donated. What we realized early on is that handing a kid their first computer with no guidance or pathway, would almost assuredly lead them to less productive websites such…
Dust off those Bic ballpoints and college-ruled notebooks—research shows that taking notes by hand is better than taking notes on a laptop for remembering conceptual information over the long term. The findings are published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. Source: Take notes by hand for better long-term comprehension I…
The future impacts of artificial intelligence (AI) on society and the labour force have been studied and reported extensively. In a recent book, AI Superpowers, Kai-Fu Lee, former president of Google China, wrote that 40 to 50 per cent of current jobs will be technically and economically viable with AI and automation over the next…
The effects of social media use on teenage life satisfaction are limited and probably “tiny”, a study of 12,000 UK adolescents suggests. Family, friends and school life all had a greater impact on wellbeing, says the University of Oxford research team. It claims its study is more in-depth and robust than previous ones. Source: Social…