Plagiarism and copyright: Best practices for classroom education

Plagiarism and copyright infringement are terms that most students are familiar with, and when asked, most students will readily express the sentiment that plagiarizing the work of others or committing copyright infringement is wrong. Despite students' basic understanding of these concepts, many struggle to put them into practice. Often this is a result of students not having enough knowledge about how to cite sources or how copyrighted works can legally be reused for scholarly purposes. This article identifies a way in which copyright and plagiarism can be taught as well as a process students can work through when addressing these issues.     

Seven steps to help you become more knowledgeable about U.S. copyright law

As copyright law is so closely ingrained with library services, it is important for librarians to learn about it and how to balance the law with the needs of users. Unfortunately, many Library and Information Science degree programs do not address copyright issues as part of course curriculum. As such, librarians may have to educate themselves about the law. This article will identify seven steps librarians can take to facilitate this process.     

Hidden in the Middle: Culture,Value and Reward in Bioinformatics

Bioinformatics – the so-called shotgun marriage between biology and computer science – is an interdiscipline. Despite interdisciplinarity being seen as a virtue, for having the capacity to solve complex problems and foster innovation, it has the potential to place projects and people in anomalous categories. For example, valorised ‘outputs’ in academia are often defined and rewarded by discipline. Bioinformatics, as an interdisciplinary bricolage, incorporates experts from various disciplinary cultures with their own distinct ways of working. Perceived problems of interdisciplinarity include difficulties of making explicit knowledge that is practical, theoretical, or cognitive. But successful interdisciplinary research also depends on an understanding of disciplinary cultures and value systems, often only tacitly understood by members of the communities in question. In bioinformatics, the ‘parent’ disciplines have different value systems; for example, what is considered worthwhile research by computer scientists can be thought of as trivial by biologists, and vice versa. This paper concentrates on the problems of reward and recognition described by scientists working in academic bioinformatics in the United Kingdom. We highlight problems that are a consequence of its cross-cultural make-up, recognising that the mismatches in knowledge in this borderland take place not just at the level of the practical, theoretical, or epistemological, but also at the cultural level too. The trend in big, interdisciplinary science is towards multiple authors on a single paper; in bioinformatics this has created hybrid or fractional scientists who find they are being positioned not just in-between established disciplines but also in-between as middle authors or, worse still, left off papers altogether.     

The effects of short-term jump training on bone metabolism in females using oral contraceptives

The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of oral contraceptive use on bone serum markers following a 3-week jumping protocol. Twenty-three females (18–25 years) were grouped as oral contraceptive users (OC+) or non-users (OC?). Following a 3-week observation period, participants completed a 3-week (15-day) jump protocol. Jump sessions consisting of ten 42 cm drop jumps with a 30 s rest interval between jumps were completed each day, 5 days per week. Peak vertical ground reaction force and loading rate were measured and the osteogenic index was calculated. Serum markers for bone formation, bone alkaline phosphatase (BAP) and bone resorption, C-terminal telopeptides of type I collagen (CTX) were measured at three time points (pre-, mid-, post-jump). BAP and CTX increased significantly (P = 0.0017, 0.0488) in both groups post-jump; however, bone metabolic markers were not different between the OC+ and OC? groups. Osteogenic index, ground reaction force and vertical jump height were similar between groups. Correlations between markers of bone metabolism and participants’ age at menarche, weight, loading rate and years on OC were not significant. A 3-week jumping protocol was found to be effective in stimulating bone metabolism in both OC+ and OC? groups.     

Emergence and maintenance of leadership among gifted students in group problem solving

This paper reports results of a study of the emergence and maintenance of leadership in groups of gifed students engaged in unstructured, creative production. The study used Fiedler's dimensional analysis of task structures. Information is presented concerning the relationship between group perceptions of leadership effectiveness, group product creativity, and the style of leadership adopted. Instructional implications for teachers of the gifted are presented.