Update on inflation of journal prices: medical journals, U.S. journals, and Brandon/Hill list journals

This paper examines the increases in prices for the last twenty years for the journals listed in the 1987 Brandon/Hill list and for the last twelve years for those on a list of medical and general periodicals published annually in Library Journal. This information is compared to the general U.S. inflation rate as measured by the Consumer Price Index. Despite the decline in the general rate of inflation, the buying power of libraries has continued to dwindle. Librarians need to use this information when justifying increased budget requests. They also need to interact more effectively with publishers to resolve this problem. The buying power of the dollar (as compared to the 1975 dollar) spent on the Brandon/Hill list journals is now 59% of that of a dollar spent in the general economy. This compares to 64% in 1983, when this research was last updated.     

Stress and cognitive functioning in sport

This paper considers the relationship between stress and cognitive functioning and discusses some of the concepts and methods that may be adopted to examine the relationship between stress and sports performance. It considers only that literature that may be relevant to, or furthers, the understanding of sports performance under competitive stress. One of the most popular approaches has been to explain the relationship in terms of the unidimensional inverted-U hypothesis. The validity of this approach to explaining sports performances in specific situations is discussed and it is generally concluded that the inverted-U hypothesis is too vague and simplistic. The discussion considers multidimensional approaches and discusses the suitability and implications of some more recent and more complex models of stress and performance which are now available in the psychological literature. It is concluded that the relationship between stress and sports performance is an extremely complex one and involves the interaction between the nature of the stressor, the cognitive demands of the task being performed and the psychological characteristics of the individuals performing it.