OPACs,Users, and Readers’ Advisory: Exploring the Implications of User-Generated Content for Readers’ Advisory in Canadian Public Libraries

This article examines the contribution of social discovery platforms and user-generated content (UGC) on readers’ advisory (RA) services in Canadian public libraries. Grounded Theory was used to conduct a content analysis of library-assigned subject headings and UGC of 22 adult fiction titles in 43 Canadian public libraries that use BiblioCommons, SirsiDynix, and Encore social discovery platforms. Findings indicate that UGC complements the MARC bibliographic record as it provides insight into the subject of a work, its protagonists, and the effect the book has on readers. User-generated reviews provide a rich data set that clearly connects to known RA access points.     

Learning environment,attitudes and anxiety across the transition from primary to secondary school mathematics

Learning Environments Research - Past research has revealed that, relative to primary-school students, high-school students have less-positive attitudes to mathematics and perceive their classroom...     

Cycling shoe aerodynamics

The present paper describes the activity carried out to investigate the aerodynamic effects of cycling shoes for time trial competitions. This subject has not been widely studied but can be important for an accurate aerodynamic optimisation of a time trial cyclist. The study was carried out by means of wind tunnel testing: an appropriate test setup and an appropriate test procedure (based on “effective angle of attack approach”) were developed in order to produce realistic test conditions. The developed testing procedure was applied to two different shoe models, differently fastened. Furthermore, an important point was the investigation of the overshoe effect. The results showed that the power required to overcome the shoe’s drag is almost a tenth of the total power and that differences between the shoes can affect the cyclist’s performance.