Changing students' attitudes towards risky motor tasks: an application of the IZOF model

The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of an intervention programme in the physical education setting designed to change attitudes and emotions triggered by potentially risky motor tasks. The individual zones of optimal functioning (IZOF) model was used as a theoretical framework for the study. Italian male and female high school students (N = 84) took part in a 12 lesson intervention and in test-retest sessions. The assessment was conducted using the Motor Activity Anxiety Test to measure the students' approach-avoidance attitudes in the face of physical education tasks purported to engender strong emotional reactions. An idiosyncratic emotional profile was also implemented using a list of pleasant/unpleasant emotional adjectives. Two experimental groups were involved in the learning and performing of several potentially risky, highly emotion-arousing tasks, while two control groups were engaged in low-risk team sports. According to the hypothesis of the study, the programme was effective in decreasing the students' avoidance tendencies towards thrilling tasks and in increasing optimal-pleasant emotions. Our findings also demonstrated the feasibility and utility of applying the IZOF model to the context of physical education.     

Newspaper coverage of women's sports during the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games: Belgium, Denmark, France, and Italy

In general, women are well represented among sport participants and sport audiences but not in the media. Data show that women's sport is greatly underreported and trivialized in newspapers. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to measure press coverage during the 2000 Summer Olympic Games in the largest circulating Belgian, Danish, French, and Italian daily newspapers by: (a) number of articles, (b) size, (c) page placement, (d) accompanyingphotographs, and (e) photograph size. For each sport covered, the athletes' nationality and the gender were recorded. Compared to the 1996 Atlanta Games, there was an increase of 326 female athletes (+4 %), and women competed in 25 sports and 132 events (44 %) of the total 300 events. Although only 29.3 % of the articles and 38 % of photos were on women 's sports, the newspaper coverage was similar to the distribution of participating athletes and events. No significant gender differences were found with respect to article size, page placement, accompanying photographs, or photograph size. The most covered sport was track and field, independent of national achievement. Other sports received different coverage in relation to national expectations, achievement, and participation. In conclusion, there was a trend to overcome gender inequities in media coverage during the Olympic Games, which may be due to the International Olympic Committee's actions to promote increased participation of women in sport activities and to publicize their achievements. Moreover, during the Olympic Games, a nationalistic fervor might affect the equality of gender coverage.     

Television News Content of Minority Groups as an Intergroup Context Indicator of Differences Between Target-Specific Prejudices

Although research has shown that different types of prejudice are highly correlated, the existence of prejudice hierarchies indicates that individuals differentiate between target groups. Here we examine the relationship between television news coverage and differences in attitudes toward minority groups. We rely on intergroup threat theory, tone, and framing theories to formulate our hypotheses and conduct a multimethod study: All prime-time television news items in Flanders (N = 1,487) reporting on five minority groups (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender; Jews; Eastern Europeans; North Africans; Roma) were coded in terms of tone and framing and subsequently combined with individual-level survey data. Patterns in news coverage reflect differences in prejudice: Groups that are most negatively/positively evaluated by the public receive the most negative/positive coverage. Prejudice is especially high for minority groups associated with problems and criminal threat frames in the news. We conclude that news content is an important characteristic of the intergroup context reflecting differences in minority group appraisals in society.     

Hidden Treasure on the Road to Xanadu: What Connecting Library Service Usage Data to Unique Student IDs Can Reveal

Library data in the form of holdings, expenditures, and transactions continues to be collected. Recently emphasis is being placed on connecting library usage data to student success indicators for purposes of indicating impact. This article describes how one library involved in a large-scale, student success assessment project analyzed usage data linked to unique student IDs prior to connecting data to student academic information. Results revealed a trove of useful information that led to a more robust understanding of how students interacted with library services over the course of a year and are discussed in relation to process improvement.     

The Quadruple Helix Model of Libraries: The Role of Public Libraries in Newcastle upon Tyne

This article is based on semistructured interviews with library staff members in order to explore both how they perceive the role of libraries in most deprived areas in Newcastle upon Tyne and how they relate with their patrons. We show that public libraries play a primary role in activating a virtuous cycle, in which infrastructures, skills, and increased ability of users to achieve their goals simultaneously result from and feed social inclusion strategies. However, some limits might be related to the availability of public economic resources that tends to affect the smaller libraries by reducing opening times and services provided.     

To Uphold and Resist: Protecting Intellectual Freedom through Progressive Librarianship

Public librarians uphold an ethical commitment to protect the intellectual freedom of their patrons, but when information is accessed online, users become vulnerable to censorship and surveillance. The public library is a democratic institution in which patrons should be able to interact with information free of restriction or judgment, and this right is threatened by the conflict between access and privacy. Librarians should reject the notion that they are neutral and instead adopt a political stance in defense of intellectual freedom; they should actively combat surveillance and limitations on access. A framework for activism can be found within Birdsall’s theory of progressive librarianship.     

Integrating information literacy into the education of public health professionals: roles for librarians and the library

Objective: The paper reviews the core competencies for public health professionals presented in the Institute of Medicine''s (IOM''s) report, Who Will Keep the Public Healthy: Educating Public Health Professionals for the 21st Century; describes improving information literacy (IL) as a mechanism for integrating the core competencies in public health education; and showcases IL as an opportunity for solidifying partnerships between academic librarians and public health educators.Methods: The IOM competencies, along with explicit examples of library support from a literature review of current IL trends in the health sciences, are analyzed.Results: Librarians can play a fundamental role in implementing the IOM''s core competencies in shaping public health education for the twenty-first century. A partnership between public health educators and librarians through a transdisciplinary approach is recommended.Conclusions: IL skills and competencies integrated into public health curricula through a collaborative partnership between public health educators and librarians can help integrate the IOM''s core competencies and improve public health education.

Highlights

• Exploring and solidifying transdisciplinary partnerships with public health educators and librarians through curriculum-integrated information literacy (IL) is one avenue to continue successful education of public health professionals.

Implications

• Librarians can be considered public health collaborators essential to the twenty-first century education of health professionals.
• Future research is required to effectively evaluate the best practices of curriculum-integrated IL into public health education.
• Transdisciplinary research is advantageous for achieving the shared goal of educating public health professionals.

     

Conservation of a contemporary lacquered screen: A collaborative,interdisciplinary, international project involving the artist,fabricators, and conservators from three different areas

This paper discusses issues surrounding the conservation of contemporary art within the private sector using a real example, a freestanding hinged and lacquered screen. The artwork developed severe damage whilst on display in a private collection when a section of the lacquer cracked and delaminated from the bottom of one of the panels, taking paint with it. This significantly compromised its pristine appearance, and preliminary observations suggested that restoration using traditional consolidation, retouching and varnishing techniques was highly unlikely to be successful. Initial contact with the artist led to negotiation with the original fabricator's studio. This highlighted the challenges involved in reinstating the badly damaged paint and resin using an approach that would still be acceptable within the code of ethics of the conservation profession, and the potential problems of sharing information with experts who are not conservators. Part painting, part sculpture and part furniture, the screen does not fall into the standard divisions of conservation practice. Its eventual treatment demanded collaboration between specialists in paintings, sculpture, lacquer work, and conservation science. The paper addresses three areas of importance to the conservation of contemporary art: the challenges of working as an interdisciplinary team to deal with complex (and sometimes conflicting) ethical approaches and material requirements; the difficulty in balancing the desire to preserve original materials with the need to produce a pristine result, and the importance of the artist's ratification of conservation to the market value of the work.