مطالب

Over the years, teachers are considered as one of the most influential factors, which play an important role in pedagogical and educational settings. Numerous research studies have been done about teachers and their performance in the classrooms. Among the investigated factors motivation, anxiety, burnout can be considered as having higher importance concerning related literature. Therefore, the present study sheds light on their interaction and relationship with Iranian language teachers’ performance. To this purpose, 80 male and female English teachers with at least 10 years of teaching experiences were selected in Neyshabur, and their motivation, anxiety, and burnout were examined through filling out the related questionnaires. The design of the study was correlational, focusing on the correlation between each two variables. The data analysis showed that there is a significant correlation between teachers’ burnout and the research factors such as their motivation and anxiety. Finally, some pedagogical implications of the study concerning the improvement of teachers’ performance at schools are presented. The findings of the present study put much emphasis on designing and administrating teacher-training programs with especial regard to psychological traits such as language teachers’ motivation and anxiety to reduce the probable great burnout, which the majority of language teachers may feel after several years of teaching experiences.

This study aimed to determine the university students’ level of social presence, preferred synchronous learning tool, and learning performance and their differences according to sex, age, year, major, Blackboard experience, and perceived computer literacy. The relationship between students’ social presence, preferred synchronous tool, and learning performance was also determined. The respondents were 29 students enrolled in the ESL online elective class, Global Business Communication, at a university in South Korea. There were two sets of online surveys used in this study. The statistical tools used in this study were the mean, Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test, Mann-Whitney Test, and Kruskal-Wallis Test. The results showed that the students maintained a Moderately High level of social presence throughout the duration of the course, chose KakaoTalk as their preferred synchronous learning tool, and concluded the course with an overall average grade, or learning performance level of “B”. There was a significant difference regarding the students’ learning performance when they were classified according to Blackboard experience; and no significant relationship existed between the students’ social presence, preferred synchronous tool, and learning performance.

The present study aimed to investigate the concept of “Teacher Education” from a hermeneutic point of view. This view was selected since there were rare cases in the whole literature related to teacher education. On the other hand, defining a hermeneutic model could be expected to provide a more objective and tangible of teacher education nature and its configuration in the minds of those who directly deal with or discuss it. The main question for which this study tried to find an answer was whether it was possible to present a hermeneutic model for giving an operational definition to teacher education. To answer the question, the study followed a survey-qualitative methodology: first the concept of teacher education was investigated through archival scrutiny and its definition deficiencies were determined. Next, the same procedure was followed for the hermeneutics concept. The data of the study were analyzed via non-statistical comparative analysis, and it was concluded that it was possible to define teacher education hermeneutically; however, the vastness of the issue needed more survey.

Spillovers have attracted wide attention in the areas of research in economics during the past decades. The reason for the interest in the topic lies in their important role in endogenous growth theory and the explanation of productivity growth. This paper investigates the spatial spillover of different types of public infrastructure on economic growth across EU-28 NUTS-II regions during 1995-2015. Particularly, we developed the previous studies by consedeing spillover in all types of the GDP sector composition including agriculture, industry, and services. The spatial Durbin panel data model is employed to consider spatial spillovers of both public infrastructure and economic growth. Empirical results show the positive spatial spillovers of communication infrastructure in all the sectors. The spillover effect of transport infrastructure is positive in the service and agricultural sector, whereas it is negative in the industry sector. Moreover, the spillover effect of local infrastructure is insignificant in all three sectors. Finally, we find significant evidence of positive geographical spillovers of economic growth implying spatially-growth dependency of regions to growth rate of neighboring regions. JEL Classification: H54, O47, C21

Crude oil is the most traded commodity in the world and its market has great influences on the global economy and macroeconomic activities. The present study seeks to analyze Iran's policy for oil production and export within the framework of an intra-OPEC bargaining game.  This analysis helps to review Iran’s oil policy and to propose an appropriate strategy in the new circumstances. The analysis of strategic relations shows that OPEC members can be divided into two groups of saver and spender countries. This categorization is due to economic, demographic, and petroleum differences among OPEC countries. OPEC members are different in terms of discount rates, impatience, and the urgent need for oil revenues too. The authors of this study have tried to model the relationship between oil quotas/production and demographic, economic, and oil variables based on the Intra-OPEC bargaining game. The model estimated for the period 2001-2019. The results indicated a strong and significant relationship between the ratio of oil production to oil reserves and demographic, economic, and oil variables. Bargaining between the two groups can largely determine the behaviors of OPEC and its members. The model estimation suggested that the oil market faces a tendency towards faster production and export in response to the shift in world oil market outlook. The results suggest that Iran's oil production capacity, the market share of Iran and recovery rates should be upgraded. Finally, the current role of Iran in OPEC does not fit into its economic needs and should be reviewed based on the above results. The study indicated that the inherent heterogeneity in OPEC still helps Iran plan to achieve its historic quota and position in OPEC. JEL Classification: C07, D74, L13, L16.