Chips,tags and scanners: Ethical challenges for radio frequency identification

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems identify and track objects, animals and, in principle, people. The ability to gather information obtained by tracking consumer goods, government documents, monetary transactions and human beings raises a number of interesting and important privacy issues. Moreover, RFID systems pose an ensemble of other ethical challenges related to appropriate uses and users of such systems. This paper reviews a number of RFID applications with the intention of identifying the technology’s benefits and possible misuses. We offer an overview and discussion of the most important ethical issues concerning RFID, and describes and examine some methods of protecting privacy. Norman G. Einspruch serves as a consultant to several high-technology companies, one of which is in the RFID components and systems business.     

Context matters in child and family policy

The traditional model of translation from basic laboratory science to efficacy trials to effectiveness trials to community dissemination has flaws that arise from false assumptions that context changes little or matters little. One of the most important findings in developmental science is that context matters, but this fact is not sufficiently taken into account in many translation efforts. Studies reported in this special issue highlight both the potential of systematic interventions in parenting, peer relations, and social-cognitive skills training, and the problems that will be encountered in trying to bring these interventions to a community context. It is advocated that developmental scientists start from within the community context itself so that translation to policy is only a small step. It is also advocated that this research be conducted through rigorous community randomized controlled trials.     

Changes in the prevalence of child sexual abuse, its risk factors, and their associations as a function of age cohort in a Finnish population sample

Objective

We examined (1) the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) experiences as a function of cohort and gender, (2) the prevalence of factors associated with CSA as a function of cohort and whether the association of these factors with CSA remained the same irrespective of cohort, and (3) whether any cohort differences could be explainable by cohort differences in reporting bias.

Method

We used the responses of 4,561 men (M = 29, SD = 7 years) and 8,361 female (M = 29, SD = 7 years) Finnish participants who responded to the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire-Short Form as well as questions regarding family structure.

Results

The prevalence of CSA experiences varied between 0.7-4.6% for men and 1.8-7.5% for women depending on the item. Younger cohorts reported less CSA as well as less of the risk factors (physical neglect and abuse, emotional neglect and abuse, parental substances abuse, not growing up with both biological parents) that were positively associated with the likelihood of CSA. The effects of these risk factors did not vary as a function of the cohort. Also, the declining trend was not explainable by social desirability being higher in the younger cohorts.

Conclusions

The results suggest that there is a real decline in the prevalence of CSA and it is associated with a simultaneous decline in factors associated with CSA.     

Exploring the forward citation patterns of patents based on the evolution of technology fields

Forward citations of patents have been used extensively to capture the impact of technological knowledge. However, our understanding of the factors shaping patent citation patterns remains limited. One of the main limitations is the lack of scholarly attention paid to the dynamic influences arising from the evolution of technology fields. From an evolutionary perspective, technological impact is not simply determined by the static attributes of a technology itself; it is also dynamically affected by changes in the external conditions. Drawing on this viewpoint, this study suggests a model for understanding patent citation patterns by reflecting the evolution of the technology fields to which each patent belongs. Four such factors are explored: technology cycle time, potential of technological convergence, popularity of the technology field, and technological novelty. Based on the proposed model, we show how expected citation patterns can change as a result of different scenarios for technology field evolution. We conduct a case study of patents in the information technology and healthcare industries to show citation patterns of patents across heterogeneous industries as well as those within an industry. Contributions to the innovation literature and research investment decisions are discussed.     

Surgeons as medical school educators: an untapped resource

Despite extensive experience teaching residents, surgeons are an untapped resource for educating medical students. We hypothesized that by involving surgeons as teachers earlier in the medical school curriculum, medical students' interest in surgery will increase and their opinions of surgeons will improve. Five programs designed to involve surgeons as educators in the medical school curriculum were implemented. The first program, started in 2008, introduced surgical faculty into the first-year medical student anatomy dissection laboratories. Other programs initiated in 2008 included: Surgical Clinical Correlates in Anatomy, which involved faculty teaching through cadaver surgery; Clinical Pathologic Conferences in Anatomy, a surgeon-led conference based on clinical cases; and a women's faculty-student mentorship program. Table Rounds, a surgeon-led anatomy review that used clinical scenarios to quiz students was begun in 2009. All five programs were successfully integrated into the medical school curriculum. While student opinion of surgeons as educators improved, there were no significant changes in student interest in surgery as a career nor change in performance on written examinations over the Anatomy content covered by the surgeons. Surgical faculty and trainees can be integrated into the medical school curriculum. Involving surgeons as educators earlier in the medical school curriculum may have longer term effects than could be observed in this study. At a minimum, the experience improved student opinion of surgeons as educators.     

Participation-related relative age effects in Masters swimming: a 6-year retrospective longitudinal analysis

Medic and colleagues (Medic, Starkes, & Young, 2007) found that relatively younger cohorts of Masters athletes had higher participation rates and achieved higher performances compared with a relatively older cohort. Considering that Medic and colleagues' (2007) study was cross-sectional in nature, the purpose of this investigation was to employ a retrospective longitudinal study design to examine the participation rates of Masters swimmers as a function of an individual's constituent year within any 5-year age category over a period of 6 years. Using archived data from the 2003 to 2009 US Masters Short Course National Championships, swimmers' attendance was followed for a period of six consecutive years. Results indicated that a participation-related relative age effect was observed among swimmers who, over a period of 6 years, competed in either at least one championship (N = 2596; Cochran's Q? = 64.16, r(s) = -0.92, both P < 0.0001) or at least three championships (N = 441; Cochran's Q? = 47.51, r(s) = -0.91, both P < 0.0001). Overall, effect size analyses indicated that the odds of a Masters swimmer participating in the championship during the first constituent year of any 5-year age category was more than two times greater than the odds of that athlete participating during the fifth constituent year.     

Epidemiology in Middle School Science Curricula: a COVID-19 Pre–post Intervention

Journal of Science Education and Technology - It is of great importance that science educators teach COVID-19 and related pandemics to boost students’ scientific literacy. A mixed methods...     

Identification and evaluation of technology trends in K-12 education from 2011 to 2021

Education and Information Technologies - Educational technologies have captured the attention of researchers, policy makers, and parents. Each year, considerable effort and money are invested into...