Kevin Rathunde’s research while affiliated with University of Utah and other places

What is this page?


This page lists works of an author who doesn't have a ResearchGate profile or hasn't added the works to their profile yet. It is automatically generated from public (personal) data to further our legitimate goal of comprehensive and accurate scientific recordkeeping. If you are this author and want this page removed, please let us know.

Publications (35)


Incorporating the creative arts in an educational presentation about play: a novel strategy for enhancing communication and engagement with parents
  • Article

November 2020

·

2 Citations

International Journal of Play

Kevin Rathunde

·

To engage parents more fully and enhance communication with them about the benefits of play, as well as the importance of play in their own lives, a novel strategy of incorporating the creative arts in a multimedia presentation was adopted. The 50-minute presentation, called ThroughPlay, relied on collaborations with local artists and used the creative arts to help translate ideas about play in more emotionally compelling ways. This article is organized in five parts and addresses: 1) the ideas about play informing the presentation and the challenges of communicating them to parents; 2) how incorporating the arts can lead to a deeper, experiential understanding of play; 3) the steps taken to develop the arts content used in the presentation, along with examples of the artistic content; 4) the effectiveness of the presentation and parents' reactions in their own words; and 5) the benefits of arts-integration for community-engaged play advocates.


Engaging Parents About the Importance of Play: The Impact of a Brief, Arts‐Informed Community Presentation

January 2020

·

3 Citations

Family Relations

Objective This study evaluated the effectiveness of an arts‐informed approach to parent education using a 50‐minute, arts‐informed parent education presentation that integrated the creative arts (e.g., film, photography, music, dance, and design). The focus of the arts‐informed program was to communicate more effectively about the importance of play for child and adult development. Background Arts‐informed or arts‐based educational approaches have been found useful for science outreach because of their potential to enhance affective engagement with information. This raises the question of whether arts‐informed methods could be used to engage and inform parents on research topics relevant for the family. Method The study used analysis of covariance and a pretest–posttest control group design (N = 97). Results One month after attending the arts‐informed presentation, parents of children in early childhood reported greater knowledge about play, support for play, and time spent playing with their child and that their children engaged in more free play. Parents also reported an increase in their amount of flow experience (i.e., states of enjoyable absorption), although they did not report changes in time spent engaging in leisure play. Conclusion These findings are discussed in terms of the utility of arts‐informed approaches for family researchers interested in science outreach and community engagement as well as using the arts to enhance parents' affective engagement with information about play.


An Arts-Informed Parent Education Program About Play: Exploring a New Approach to Science Outreach and Community Engagement

July 2019

·

2 Citations

Journal of Experiential Education

Background: Parent education programs take many forms and attempt to raise parents’ awareness of factors that positively affect child development. Program effectiveness varies greatly depending on whether parents feel engaged and interested by program content. Purpose: This article discusses a novel, “arts-informed” approach to parent education in a program called ThroughPlay. The program was collaboratively developed with local artists and uses a multimedia presentation (e.g., film, photography, music, and design) to translate scientific information about play and human development to public audiences in more visceral and compelling ways. Methodology/Approach: Sections of the article discuss the growing use of the arts for translating science, the benefits of integrating the arts for emotional engagement and education, and how the arts were collaboratively incorporated to create the ThroughPlay presentation. Findings/Conclusions: Consistent with notions of experiential learning and embodied cognition, arts-informed programs are thought to be effective by instigating an intellectually and emotionally engaging learning process. Implications: Arts–science collaborations are emerging at research universities across the country and are increasingly recognized as having great promise for community engagement and science outreach.


Play, Flow, and Tailoring Identity in Middle Adulthood

September 2017

·

7 Citations

Identity provides a sense of meaning and direction in life by helping to clarify our role in the world and connection to others (Erikson EH: Identity: youth and crisis. Norton, New York, 1968). However, identity is not a static achievement; it evolves over time. As life circumstances change, so must the ensemble of goals, values, and beliefs that form the self and identity around which our lives revolve. There are numerous circumstances in midlife that can initiate identity change, including traumatic events (McAdams DP: The stories we live by: personal myth and the making of the self. Morrow, New York, 1993), debilitating illness (Ellis C: Qual Health Res 9(5):669–683, 1999), and challenges encountered at home or at work. In the absence of events that force change, however, identity growth depends on the willingness of the person to voluntarily step outside their comfort zone to engage in challenges sufficient to require a reorganization of priorities and goals. It is this self-initiated aspect of identity change that we focus on in this chapter, especially in relation to the use of intrinsically motivated leisure pursuits that are based on the human capacity for lifelong play (Graham KL, Burghhardt GM: Quart Rev Biol 85(4):393–418, 2010; Montagu A: Growing young. Bergin & Garvey, Boston, 1989). After articulating a framework for thinking about play, flow experience, and identity development, the chapter focuses on three men in middle adulthood who, despite having favorable life circumstances, elected to engage challenging leisure-play pursuits that helped tailor their identities and promote successful aging.


Adolescent Happiness and Family Interaction

April 2014

·

17 Citations

Few family studies have investigated the subjective rewards that adolescents experience at home, which may build toward positive developmental outcomes. This despite the fact that extensive research into optimal experiences (interest, flow, intrinsic motivation, peak experiences) suggest they are among the most important influences on growth, such as the full utilization of potential, and the achievement of a sense of self-determination and creativity. © 2014 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht. All rights reserved.


Understanding Optimal School Experience: Contributions from Montessori Education

April 2014

·

10 Citations

Teachers College Record

After summarizing the results from two studies the author conducted in Montessori middle schools, the chapter discusses nine characteristics of Montessori education in relation to various theoretical perspectives on education and development. The first three characteristics discussed-freedom of choice, eliminating grades, and learning by doing-are examined in relation to contemporary theories of motivation and education. Three lesser known characteristics-deep concentration, prepared environments, and habits of self-regulation-are discussed in the context of the flow theory of optimal experience. Finally, three facets of Montessori education that are perhaps the least understood and recognized-movement, aesthetic order, and the importance of nature-are considered in light of emerging perspectives on embodied knowledge. Examples of how each characteristic can be applied in the classroom are drawn from the author's observations and research in Montessori middle schools.


The Development of the Person: An Experiential Perspective on the Ontogenesis of Psychological Complexity

April 2014

·

80 Citations

The purpose of this chapter is to review briefly the most valued traits of personhood recognized in our culture as well as in others. We shall claim that the trait of psychological complexity meets the specifications for the central dimension of personhood. Then we shall examine how complexity unfolds through the life cycle, beginning with its manifestations in old age. By starting at the end of the life span and working our way back to childhood, it will be easier to recognize the patterns that are more likely to result in a successful unfolding of the potentialities for personhood. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)


Figure 1. Quadrant by Setting for Study 1.
Table 1 . Descriptive Statistics for Interest in Learning and Value of Learning From Pre- Course to Post-Course.
Table 2 . Overview of Design and Timing for Study 2 Hypothesis Tests.
Table 3 . Descriptive Statistics for Study 2 Hypothesis Test 2. Time 1 M (SE) Time 2 M (SE) Time 3 M (SE)
Fostering Experiential Self-Regulation Through Outdoor Adventure Education
  • Article
  • Full-text available

February 2014

·

23 Citations

Journal of Experiential Education

·

·

Kevin Rathunde

·

[...]

·

Sheila Baynes

Learners thrive when they have the capacity to regulate interest and goal direction. Through direct experiences that are interesting and goal-relevant, learners can internalize and better understand their own agency in the learning process. This article further examines this premise in an outdoor adventure education (OAE) context through two interrelated studies. The aim of the first study was to investigate the potential of OAE to afford more frequent experiences that are interesting and goal-relevant. The aim of the second study was to build on the findings from the first study and determine if exposure to OAE programs might lead to more self-directed learning. The results partially support the premise that OAE can foster experiential self-regulation.

Download

The Organization of Energy in Play and Work: Dewey's Philosophy of Experience and the Everyday Lives of Teenagers

June 2013

·

4 Citations

Loisir et Société / Society and Leisure

This article examines Dewey's philosophy of experience in order to: 1) evaluate the positions of segmentation and holism in regards to the roles of play and work in everyday life; and 2) generate a model that can be used to investigate the daily lives of teenagers. Dewey's experiential analysis suggests how play and work can be distinguished without losing sight of the essential qualities that both activities share (i.e. spontaneity and goal-direction). A model is proposed that articulates how exaggerated distinctions between play and work lead to states of divided attention that are detrimental to an individual's organization of energy. Data from a recent study of teenagers is used to test one implication of the model, namely, that extreme amounts of “drudgery” in productive work (i.e. high goal-direction and low spontaneity) lead to excessive amounts of “fooling” during leisure time (i.e. high spontaneity and low goal-direction). The Experience Sampling Method—a technique that uses electronic pagers to sample experience in natural settings—was used to operationalize the relevant variables. Results showed that the teenagers who reported the most drudgery while doing schoolwork also reported spending more time doing passive leisure activities. These findings are discussed in terms of the importance of socializing attentional habits in adolescence that will prepare youg people for adulthood, without leading them into patterns that disrupt the continuity of everyday life.


Experiential Wisdom and Lifelong Learning

June 2013

·

2 Citations

This chapter explores the self-regulative concept of “experiential wisdom,” or the notion that creativity and lifelong learning are enhanced by the capacity to make experiential course corrections that lead to states of interest and flow experience. A person with experiential wisdom recognizes that these heightened states are more likely to occur when an affectively charged intuitive mode works in synchrony with a deliberative rational mode and is better able to cultivate situations where the interrelation of these two modes is optimized. The first part of this chapter provides a broad framework for thinking about experiential wisdom. It addresses implicit assumptions of the proposed model, the relationship of experiential wisdom to broader theories of human development, and the necessary conditions in childhood that facilitate the emergence of experiential wisdom in adulthood. The second part of this chapter explores in more detail the dynamics at work as a person negotiates a person–environment fit that is more conducive to optimal experience, namely, the flexible interoperation of spontaneous/intuitive and selective/rational modes of attention. Finally, part three of this chapter illustrates experiential wisdom by drawing on past interviews with three distinguished individuals—poet Mark Strand, social scientist Donald Campbell, and medical researcher Jonas Salk. It is argued that the experiential wisdom of these three helped keep them engaged on a path of creativity and lifelong learning.


Citations (30)


... Positive parental support is essential to the success of an athlete's career [53]. A study [54] found a correlation between parental support and children's enthusiasm and enjoyment of swimming. By this, other studies indicate that parents of dedicated athletes are typically pleased and delighted to be able to attend competitions or tournaments, and frequently accompany their children to training sessions [55,56]. ...

Reference:

Model for Explaining Factors Influencing Achievement of Female Aquatic Athletes in West Java: A Path Analysis
Incorporating the creative arts in an educational presentation about play: a novel strategy for enhancing communication and engagement with parents
  • Citing Article
  • November 2020

International Journal of Play

... Serious games are meant to test players in some way. These challenges should affect players' cognitive endowments, knowledge, attitudes, health, or mental well-being (Csikszentmihalyi & Rathunde, 1990). For these reasons, GBL can effectively improve students' knowledge by increasing motivation and engagement in learning. ...

The psychology of wisdom: an evolutionary interpretation
  • Citing Chapter
  • April 1990

... Therefore, the integration of traditional folk games into kindergarten education is of great significance in promoting the extensive development of young children's bodies and minds. Literature [15] reveals that parents of young children who participate in the art coming program of learning promote the parents' understanding of the world of young children, increase the knowledge of the game and the time to participate in the game of young children, which has a positive significance for the healthy physical and mental growth of young children. Literature [16] examined the embedding of the world of play into the classroom of teaching young children, pointing out that this model motivates and interests young children in English language learning and that this impact and influence is sustainable. ...

Engaging Parents About the Importance of Play: The Impact of a Brief, Arts‐Informed Community Presentation
  • Citing Article
  • January 2020

Family Relations

... Students gather natural materials, referred to as 'local,' which include bio-ecological elements such as plants, branches, wood pieces, leaves, and stones. These items are brought into the classroom, organized on shelves, and integrated into daily learning activities, particularly within science and art (Russell, 2014;Yates, 2024;Rathunde, 2014;Rinke et al., 2013). For example, leaves collected from the environment might be used for artistic projects, such as creating stamps, studying symmetries, or learning botany by comparing them to the cards in the 'Botany Cabinet'. ...

Understanding Optimal School Experience: Contributions from Montessori Education
  • Citing Article
  • April 2014

Teachers College Record

... Additionally, integrating observations with relevant models of science, while coordinating the epistemological significance for what counted as an answer, was not a trivial task. A number of developmental models underscore the mental and emotional challenge of these tasks for students (Csikszentmihalyi & Rathunde, 1998;Fischer & Bidell, 2007;Grannot & Parziale, 2002;Fischer, Yan, & Stewart, 2003). ...

The development of the person: an experiential perspective on the ontogenesis of psychological complexity
  • Citing Article
  • January 1998

... EE replaces lectures and evaluation with a semi-structured, apprentice-style education that is highly successful (Christian, McCarty, and Brown 2021;Cook and Cutting 2014;DiConti 2004;Katula and Threnhauser 1999;Roberts 2015;Stehno 1986), despite faculty resistance (Erickson 2013). EE can facilitate student enjoyment and lifelong learning (Sibthorp et al. 2011), enhance critical thinking (Savage and Wehman 2014), retain student researchers (Monroe, Mailander, and Lima 2006), and support students from historically excluded backgrounds (Roberts 2018). ...

Experiential Education and Lifelong Learning: Examining Optimal Engagement in College Students

Journal of Experiential Education

... Educational materials and physical classrooms are designed by Montessori herself as affordances for perceptual and active exploration and for driving attention [89,100,128,[136][137][138][139][140][141][142][143]. The MM can be structured around four core ideas that, might be worth noting here, are the same and with roughly the same meaning as the related adopted by the AIF: intrinsic motivation, attention, precision and error control [139,144,145]. At the bottom, there is the intrinsic motivation of the child to act, exploring and freely choosing tasks. ...

Montessori and Embodied Education
  • Citing Chapter
  • January 2009

... 358). Rathunde and Csikszentmihalyi (1991) found that adolescents in families that balanced family togetherness with individual autonomy-termed "complex families" (p. 144) because they rate highly in both integration and differentiation-reported greater happiness in going about day-to-day tasks at home. ...

Adolescent Happiness and Family Interaction
  • Citing Article
  • April 2014

... A investigação tem demonstrado conexões claras entre a participação em programas de outdoor training e o desenvolvimento das cinco competências-chave da aprendizagem social e emocional, havendo, também, estudos que assinalam um aumento nas competências de autoconhecimento como a autoeficácia (e.g., Opper et al., 2014) e a autoconfiança, autoestima e autoconceito (e.g., Cooley et al., 2014); nas competências de consciência social como a coesão social (e.g., Cooley et al., 2015;Greffrath et al., 2013) e a perceção e gestão das emoções dos outros (e.g., Fernández-Gámez et al., 2018); nas competências de autogestão como, por exemplo, a gestão de stress (e.g., Fernández-Gámez et al., 2018;Mutz & Muller, 2016), autorregulação (Sibthorp et al., 2015) e resiliência (Whittington et al., 2016); nas competências de tomada de decisão, especialmente nas competências de resolução de problemas (Ang et al., 2014;Collins et al., 2016;Opper et al., 2014); e nas competências de gestão das relações, como no desenvolvimento de redes sociais (Austin et al., 2010), na integração social (Lathrop et al., 2012), no trabalho de equipa e na comunicação (Cooley et al., 2014). Uma revisão da literatura nesta área, realizada por Bell et al. (2014), ilustra um impacto positivo deste tipo de programas no aumento da média de notas, na diminuição do abandono escolar e no aumento dos níveis de desenvolvimento dos alunos participantes (Bell et al., 2014). ...

Fostering Experiential Self-Regulation Through Outdoor Adventure Education

Journal of Experiential Education