Ben and his army scenes: a consideration of one child's out-of-school text production

In this paper, findings from a recent small‐scale case study exploring children's out‐of‐school text production are shared. It has been strongly argued that the standard literacy curriculum offered by schools is dislocated from the real interests and home literacy practices of children (Millard 2003). This argument is used as a starting point for considering the texts produced by Ben, a ten‐year‐old writer. Here, Ben's texts are considered for the range of factors that can be seen to influence his out‐of‐school text production. These factors are wide‐ranging and include social, material and agentive factors. To conclude, the factors that arise from the data are explored in relation to one another, and a framework for considering children's text production that brings into balance the social, material and agentive factors is proposed.     

Efficient literature searching in diffuse topics: lessons from a systematic review of research on communicating risk to patients in primary care

Using the example of communication about risk in a primary care setting, this paper puts forward a method of developing and evaluating a detailed search strategy for locating the literature for a systematic review of a ‘diffuse’ subject. The aim of this paper is to show how to develop a search strategy that maximizes both recall and precision while keeping search outputs manageable. Six different databases were used, namely Medline, Embase, PsychLIT, CancerLIT, Cinahl and Social Science Citation Index (SSCI). The searches were augmented by hand-searching, contacting authors, citation searching and reference lists from included papers. Other databases were searched but yielded no extra references for this subject matter. Of the 99 papers included, 80 were indexed on Medline. The Medline search strategy identified 54 of them and the remaining 26 were located on other databases. The 19 further unique references were found using the other databases and methods of retrieval. A combination of several databases must be used to maximize recall and to increase the precision of searches on individual databases, thus improving the overall efficiency of the search.     

The Effect of Digital Indexing Systems on the Accessibilityof Photographic Collections

This Digital Image Archive (DIA) project involves the production of adigital archive of a collection of Nineteenth Century photographicimages and equipment. The DIA was designed to operate as a public accesscatalogue, to aid curators with information retrieval and to reduce theneed to handle some original material. Much of the William Henry FoxTalbot collection at the Royal Photographic Society can no longer beexhibited due to damage caused by handling and light. Access to thecollection is restricted because of preservation concerns over a growingpercentage of the collection and insufficient resources forreproductions and supervision. These problems led to investigations intothe possible advantages that digital technology might offer.Cross-referencing, administrative cataloguing and recording ofpreservation techniques are ideally suited to digital technology. Theshort life span of digital storage media and concerns over systemcompatibility requires the development of a complex long-term digitalstrategy that must be standardized if the archival material is tosurvive. Construction of the DIA involved investigations into softwareand hardware configurations concentrating on the ability to customizefactors such as indexing from recognized standards and practices. Thispaper concentrates on the results of a survey into standards withindigital indexing systems, which indicates that although there is growingawareness of standardization within digital cataloguing and multimedia,many organizations continue to devise independent systems.     

Serial selection and deselection: policies and decision–making

Describes experience of serials selection and deselection in the academic library sector, the policy issues cunently being faced, and some of the steps being taking in confronting those issues.     

Effects of two football stud configurations on biomechanical characteristics of single-leg landing and cutting movements on infilled synthetic turf

Multiple playing surfaces and footwear used in American football warrant a better understanding of relationship between different combinations of turf and footwear. The purpose of this study was to examine effects of shoe and stud types on ground reaction force (GRF) and ankle and knee kinematics of a 180° cut and a single-leg 90° land-cut on synthetic turf. Fourteen recreational football players performed five trials of the 180° cut and 90° land-cut in three shoe conditions: non-studded running shoe, and football shoe with natural and synthetic turf studs. Variables were analyzed with a 3 × 2 (shoe × movement) repeated measures analysis of variance (p < 0.05). Peak vertical GRF (p < 0.001) and loading rate (p < 0.001) were greater during 90° land-cut than 180° cut. For 180° cut, natural turf studs produced smaller peak medial GRFs compared to synthetic turf studs and non-studded shoe (p = 0.012). For land-cut, peak eversion velocity was reduced in running shoes compared to natural (p = 0.016) and synthetic (p = 0.002) turf studs. The 90° land-cut movement resulted in greater peak vertical GRF and loading rate compared to the 180° cut. Overall, increased GRFs in the 90° land-cut movement may increase the chance of injury.     

Performance effects of acute β-alanine induced paresthesia in competitive cyclists

β-alanine is a common ingredient in supplements consumed by athletes. Indeed, athletes may believe that the β-alanine induced paresthesia, experienced shortly after ingestion, is associated with its ergogenic effect despite no scientific mechanism supporting this notion. The present study examined changes in cycling performance under conditions of β-alanine induced paresthesia. Eight competitive cyclists (VO_2max = 61.8 ± 4.2 mL·kg·min^?1) performed three practices, one baseline and four experimental trials. The experimental trials comprised a 1-km cycling time trial under four conditions with varying information (i.e., athlete informed β-alanine or placebo) and supplement content (athlete received β-alanine or placebo) delivered to the cyclist: informed β-alanine/received β-alanine, informed placebo/received β-alanine, informed β-alanine/received placebo and informed placebo/received placebo. Questionnaires were undertaken exploring the cyclists’ experience of the effects of the experimental conditions. A possibly likely increase in mean power was associated with conditions in which β-alanine was administered (±95% CL: 2.2% ± 4.0%), but these results were inconclusive for performance enhancement (p = 0.32, effect size = 0.18, smallest worthwhile change = 56% beneficial). A possibly harmful effect was observed when cyclists were correctly informed that they had ingested a placebo (–1.0% ± 1.9%). Questionnaire data suggested that β-alanine ingestion resulted in evident sensory side effects and six cyclists reported placebo effects. Acute ingestion of β-alanine is not associated with improved 1-km TT performance in competitive cyclists. These findings are in contrast to the athlete’s “belief” as cyclists reported improved energy and the ability to sustain a higher power output under conditions of β-alanine induced paresthesia.