RETRACTED REVIEW: Byzantium and the Emergence of Muslim-Turkish Anatolia,ca. 1040-1130

Retracted Article: Byzantium and the Emergence of Muslim-Turkish Anatolia, ca. 1040-1130

We, the Editors and Publisher of Al-Masāq: Journal of the Medieval Mediterranean, have retracted the following book review:

Spyros P. Panagopoulos, ‘Byzantium and the Emergence of Muslim-Turkish Anatolia, ca. 1040-1130’, Al-Masāq: Journal of the Medieval Mediterranean, 31:2, 2019, pp. 249-250, DOI 10.1080/09503110.2019.1614313

Subsequent to publication it has been determined that this book review contains significant overlap with:

Nicholas Morton, ‘Alexander D. Beihammer: Byzantium and the emergence of Muslim-Turkish Anatolia, ca. 1040–1130 (Birmingham Byzantine and Ottoman Studies 20)’, Journal of Transcultural Medieval Studies, 5:1, 2018, pp. 167–169, DOI 10.1515/jtms-2018-0008

which was not cited nor otherwise acknowledged.

As a result, the Editors of Al-Masāq: Journal of the Medieval Mediterranean and the publishers Taylor & Francis have decided to retract the review from publication. We have been informed in our decision-making by our policy on publishing ethics and integrity and the COPE guidelines on retractions.

The retracted book review will remain online to maintain the scholarly record, but it will be digitally watermarked on each page as “Retracted”.     

Changing the attitudes of high school students towards intellectual disabilities: the contribution of a social coexistence programme

Students’ attitudes towards peers with intellectual disabilities are mostly negative, and negative attitudes appear more among secondary education students than any other age group. Social coexistence programmes are intervention programmes implemented by school psychologists to manage and change negative attitudes and enforce social interaction with students with disabilities. The research sample consisted of 193 public high school students in Greece who were given the Chedoke–McMaster Attitudes Toward Children with Handicaps (CATCH) Scale. The study aimed to explore whether there is a change in the attitudes of high school students towards peers with intellectual disabilities after participation in a social coexistence programme. The findings showed that students who participated in the programme had more positive attitudes towards people with intellectual disabilities after the completion of the programme. The above findings confirm the research on the possibility of changing attitudes of secondary school students towards peers with disabilities and reinforce the need for the systematic development of social coexistence programmes for the entire student population. Future research should focus on the benefits of students with disabilities from their participation in social coexistence programmes.     

Consistency and moral integrity: A self-determination theory perspective

ABSTRACT

If acting morally can be viewed as acting consistently with a moral principle or rule, then being a person with moral integrity can be viewed as consistently applying moral principles or rules across different types of situations. We advance a view of moral integrity that incorporates three distinct, but interrelated, types of moral consistency: cognitive, emotional and motivational moral consistency. Our approach is based on Self-Determination Theory, a motivational theory that can explain when a moral rule becomes the primary motive for behavior. We argue that moral integrity is achieved when a person acts on the basis of an internal moral system of principles, emotions and motives and provide an account of the way that it develops during a person’s interaction with the environment.     

University-industry knowledge and technology transfer in Switzerland: What university scientists think about co-operation with private enterprises

This study explores empirically the factors determining the propensity of Swiss science institutions at the level of a single institute or department to get involved in a wide spectrum of knowledge and technology transfer (KTT) activities with private corporations. A main finding is that scientific institutes with a stronger orientation to applied research and/or lower teaching obligations are also stronger inclined to get involved in overall KTT activities. The same is valid for institutes which have already had experience with industry co-operations as reflected by a high share of external funds in an institute's budget. Further, there is no systematic size effect with respect to KTT activities. Institutes of engineering, natural sciences and economics/management are strongly represented among KTT-active institutes. Universities of applied sciences have an above-average propensity to KTT activities.     

Anatomy Learning from Prosected Cadaveric Specimens Versus Plastic Models: A Comparative Study of Upper Limb Anatomy

Human cadaveric prosections are a traditional, effective, and highly appreciated modality of anatomy learning. Plastic models are an alternative teaching modality, though few studies examine their effectiveness in learning of upper limb musculoskeletal anatomy. The purpose of this study is to investigate which modality is associated with a better outcome, as assessed by students' performance on examinations. Overall, 60 undergraduate medical students without previous knowledge of anatomy participated in the study. Students were assigned into two groups. Group 1 attended lectures and studied from cadaveric prosections (n = 30) and Group 2 attended lectures and used plastic models in the laboratory (n = 30). A knowledge assessment, including examination with tag questions (spot test) and written multiple-choice questions, was held after the end of the study. Students' perceptions were also investigated via an anonymous questionnaire. No significant difference in students' performance was observed between the group using prosections and the group using plastic models (32.2 ± 14.7 vs 35.0 ± 14.8, respectively; P = 0.477). Similarly, no statistically significant difference was found regarding students' satisfaction from using each learning modality (P = 0.441). Plastic models may be a valuable supplementary modality in learning upper limb musculoskeletal anatomy, despite their limitations. Easy to use and with no need for maintaining facilities, they are highly appreciated by students and can be useful when preparing for the use of cadaveric specimens.     

The Long-Term Effects of Small Classes in Early Grades: Lasting Benefits in Mathematics Achievement at Grade 9

Reducing class size to increase academic achievement is a policy option currently of great interest. Although the results of small-scale randomized experiments and some interpretations of large-scale econometric studies point to positive short-term effects of small classes, some scholars view the evidence as ambiguous. Project STAR in Tennessee-a 4-year, large-scale randomized experiment on the effects of class size—provided persuasive evidence that small classes have immediate positive effects on academic achievement. Unlike most other early education interventions, these effects persisted for several years after the children returned to regular-sized classes. The authors of the present article report analyses of a 6-year follow-up of the students in that experiment. Class-size effects persisted for at least 6 years and remained large enough to be important for educational policy. The results suggest that small classes in early grades have lasting benefits and that those benefits are greater for minority students than for White students.     

Teaching and discussing about risk: seven elements of potential significance for science education

The present paper takes its point of departure in risk being a relevant content for science education, and that there are many different approaches to how to incorporate it. By reviewing the academic literature on the use and definitions of risk from fields such as engineering, linguistics and philosophy, we identified key elements of the risk concept relevant for science education. Risk is a phenomenon of the future that may be conveyed by our activity, it is something that may or may not take place. Hence, at the core of risk we find uncertainty and consequence. Furthermore, the elements of probability and severity are relevant modifiers of the consequence, as well as both subject to uncertainty. Additionally, in framing, understanding and decision-making on risk, as individuals or society, we need to acknowledge that risk has both objective and subjective components, lying in the interface between knowledge and values. In this paper, we describe how these key elements were derived from the literature and derive a schematic model of the risk concept for the purpose of science education. We further discuss how this model may assist in planning, execution and evaluation of teaching activities explicitly or implicitly involving risk issues.     

State feedback uniform decoupling problem of linear time-varying analytic systems

A new approach to the input-output uniform decoupling problem of linear time-varying analytic systems via proportional state feedback is presented. A major feature of the proposed approach is that it reduces the solution of the uniform decoupling problem to that of solving a linear algebraic system of equations. This system of equations greatly facilitates the solution of the three major aspects of the decoupling problem: the necessary and sufficient conditions, the general analytical expressions for the controller matrices, and the structure of the uniformly decoupled closed-loop system.