A Network Perspective on European Union News: Explaining Relationships of Horizontal Reporting Across EU Member States

Due to the increased importance of transnational governance, individual states become increasingly interdependent. This is also reflected in the news media coverage and media attention to foreign affairs. The European Union (EU) represents a case of advanced globalization. This study investigates news media attention to fellow EU member states. The main objective of this study is to explain what factors determine whether EU member states report about each other. The analysis is based on large-scale content analysis data of TV news and newspaper articles of 27 EU member states gathered during the 2009 European Parliament election campaign (N = 19,106) and employs network analysis to explain differences in media attention. The findings show that there are indicators at the national level that are independent of EU governance, as well as factors related to the European integration that determine whether two states report about each other. As such, countries that are neighbors, and where the same language is spoken, are more likely to report about each other. Furthermore, smaller, older, and EU member states that are more supportive of the European integration report more on fellow states.     

Transactional Links Between Social Anxiety Symptoms and Parenting Across Adolescence: Between- and Within-Person Associations

This 4-year longitudinal multi-informant study examined between- and within-person associations between adolescent social anxiety symptoms and parenting (parental psychological control and autonomy support). A community sample of 819 adolescents (46.1% girls; M_ageT₁ = 13.4 years) reported annually on social anxiety symptoms and both adolescents and mothers reported on parenting. Between-person associations suggested that adolescent social anxiety symptoms were associated with higher adolescent- and mother-reported psychological control and lower mother-reported autonomy support. At the within-person level, however, mothers reported lower psychological control and higher autonomy support after periods with higher adolescent social anxiety symptoms. Our findings illustrate the importance of distinguishing among between-person and within-person associations and including perceptions of both dyad members in longitudinal research concerning parenting and adolescent mental health.     

Clinical Anatomy and Unexpected Careers: Is There Curriculum for That?

Reduction in faculty positions in higher education and increased graduate matriculation rates represent a higher education conundrum. Planned happenstance theory (PHT) is a career development model focusing on positive outcomes resulting from unpredictable precareer events. This mixed methods study explores how PHT applies to the career paths of a clinical anatomy (CA) postgraduate cohort. It provides insight into educational practices designed to equip students for labor markets inside and outside academia. Alumni of CA (n = 12; 2014-2018) were interviewed about career-related events transpiring from graduate studies to present, allowing exploration on how PHT contextualizes their shared experiences. Planned happenstance career inventory (PHCI) enumerated planned happenstance skill (PHS) scores. Total PHS was referenced 527 times across 12 interviews. Of the PHS references, curiosity established highest incidence (154 references, 29%), optimism (132 references, 25%), flexibility (101 references, 19%), risk-taking (85 references, 16%), and persistence (55 references, 10%) and 43 distinct happenstance events were documented. In addition, social networking (52 references) arose as an emergent code and was divided into internal networking (28 references, 54%) and external networking (24 references, 46%). Application of the five-point PHCI scale revealed: curiosity (4.4 ± 0.3; mean ± SD), flexibility (3.6 ± 0.7), persistence (4.4 ± 0.3), optimism (4.3 ± 0.4), and risk-taking (4.1 ± 0.5). Curiosity had the strongest association with happenstance event incidence. Social networking was a key substituent of PHT not yet described in the literature. Educational practices incorporating PHT concepts, with emphasis on curiosity, may provide graduates novel metacognitive skills needed to develop novel career paths.     

The Naked Truth about the Naked This: Investigating Grammatical Prescriptivism in Technical Communication

The decision to follow the demonstrative this with a noun phrase is important to students’ writing development. Previous research has emphasized when students should not attend this rather than studying why students make the choice. Using a corpus-linguistic approach, we investigated 1,999 instances of (un)attended this in student technical and academic writing. High shares of unattended this were found in both text types as well as in original and revised drafts.     

Rationalising predictors of child sexual exploitation and sex-trading

Although there is evidence for specific risk factors leading to child sexual exploitation and prostitution, these influences overlap and have rarely been examined concurrently. The present study examined case files for 175 young persons who attended a voluntary organization in Leicester, United Kingdom, which supports people who are sexually exploited or at risk of sexual exploitation. Based on the case files, the presence or absence of known risk factors for becoming a sex worker was coded. Data were analyzed using t-test, logistic regression, and smallest space analysis. Users of the voluntary organization's services who had been sexually exploited exhibited a significantly greater number of risk factors than service users who had not been victims of sexual exploitation. The logistic regression produced a significant model fit. However, of the 14 potential predictors – many of which were associated with each other – only four variables significantly predicted actual sexual exploitation: running away, poverty, drug and/or alcohol use, and having friends or family members in prostitution. Surprisingly, running away was found to significantly decrease the odds of becoming involved in sexual exploitation. Smallest space analysis of the data revealed 5 clusters of risk factors. Two of the clusters, which reflected a desperation and need construct and immature or out-of-control lifestyles, were significantly associated with sexual exploitation. Our research suggests that some risk factors (e.g. physical and emotional abuse, early delinquency, and homelessness) for becoming involved in sexual exploitation are common but are part of the problematic milieu of the individuals affected and not directly associated with sex trading itself. Our results also indicate that it is important to engage with the families and associates of young persons at risk of becoming (or remaining) a sex worker if one wants to reduce the numbers of persons who engage in this activity.     

Databases on Human Rights Education

International Review of Education -     

“We thought it might encourage participation.” Using lottery incentives to improve LibQUAL+™ response rates among students

Libraries deploying the LibQUAL+? survey can offer a lottery incentive and many do so in the hope of increasing response rates. Other libraries may be prohibited from offering one because of Institutional Review Board restrictions, as is the case at Oregon State University. We wanted to discover why libraries offer lottery incentives, what kinds of incentives, and if they believe these incentives have a positive impact on their response rates. The responding libraries hold a general belief that lottery incentives are effective, but base this on feeling rather than research. We examine what the literature says about lottery incentives and student populations.