Análisis léxico-cognitivo de la influencia de los medios de comunicación en las percepciones de universitarios españoles ante la COVID-19

Spanish Students' Categorical Perceptions of Feminist Movements

Identifying a society's perceptions and, by extension, opinions of a certain social movement can help to understand to what extent the movement has been successful in effecting change. When working to gain such an understanding, a focus on the student population is essential, as their opinions provide insight into the future conditions of society and, thus, into whether the movement has been successful in effecting lasting social change. The present work focusses on the feminist movements and, in line with the above, analyses the perceptions held by a sample of 600 Spanish students enrolled in compulsory secondary, pre-university, and university education. The method employed begins with the use of association tests to extract lexical networks. Then, following a theoretical transformation, the traditional lexical availability index is applied in combination with fuzzy set theory to the sample of lists obtained so as to map the structure of the collective network, a novel approach that results in different levels of compatibility. The highest levels of compatibility reveal the prototypical conceptualisation as well as the sample's shared cognitive perception. The results suggest that although the population under study may have absorbed the feminist movements' messages of equality and respect, distorted perceptions could still remain in certain groups analysed. This work therefore recommends that education centres may wish to consider communicating objective information on the feminist movements specifically to women, as this could ultimately lead to all students fully embracing a feminist awareness distanced from extreme ideologies.

Conceptions of geography and history as school disciplines: an approach from lexical availability

This paper aims to examine students' conceptions of Geography and History as school disciplines at different educational stages. The sample, composed by a total of 73 participants from Primary School (n = 26), Secondary School (n = 29) and Higher Education (n = 18), completed a lexical availability test in Spanish and English or in Spanish and French. The results show that lexical availability increases as the educational stage increases, although the differences are not significant between all of them. The available lexical items on Geography and History, most of which are not shared between the different stages, are very generalist, showing a rigid and formal view of the disciplines. After the analysis carried out, we consider that lexical availability may constitute a valid tool for accessing students' conceptions.

A lexical-cognitive approach to the consequences of the coronavirus crisis for the emotions and perceptions of the Spanish population aged 65 and over

The COVID-19 pandemic has devastated health systems, economies, and societies. Considered a high-risk group, the elderly have been amongst the most affected. Using word association tests, we access the perceptions held by a group of individuals aged 65 and over, pre-stratified by gender and level of education, regarding certain aspects of the situation we now face. We interpret the vocabulary provided during the tests as a network of connections. Thus, we can create the metastructure of the mental lexicon and consider it the reflection of the collective perceptions associated with five cognitive categories: pandemic, old age, society, future, and politics. For this, we use a model that allows us to construct cognitive prototypes based on the theory of fuzzy sets. Previous results warn of the emotional consequences that have affected the entire population. However, we are now also able to prove that the older generation is experiencing unprecedented feelings of loneliness and neglect due to the circumstances. This could exacerbate the worry, fear, and uncertainty imposed on this group by the new normal. Finally, we suggest concrete actions for both health workers in contact with groups of elderly individuals and the research community that generally uses attitudinal surveys.