Professional Doctorates and Careers: the Spanish case1

This article analyses the determining factors weighted by doctoral graduates when choosing their professional careers. In Spain, the analysis of such a group has been traditionally excluded from the empiric studies. On the one hand, the lack of databases made it difficult to see their professional situation, and on the other, a university career was understood as this group's innate purpose. The growing demand for qualified professionals in general and for those with a scientific training in particular has prompted the developed countries to carry out research on how to match the third-level training cycle and labour market needs. The analysis of this group's labour conditions allows one to assess whether the current doctoral education programmes satisfy labour market needs. The estimation of a multinomial logit model reveals the different factors when choosing a professional career depending on the area of knowledge. Personal characteristics, such as age, training, area of knowledge or job, as well as the expected wages become fundamental when determining doctors' professional future. Moreover, the results prove that a job outside the university is becoming a preferred option for doctors in certain fields.     

Competitive pressure and arousing television news: a cross-cultural study

In many scholarly writings about journalism, the idea can be found that competitive pressure urges journalists to make news more arousing. This hypothesis was tested in two cultural settings: the Western European culture and the Chinese-dominated culture. A total of 3028 TV news stories from seven different markets, or 12 different news programs, were analyzed on the presence of arousing news characteristics. High competitive pressure at the market level appeared to contribute to the prevalence of arousing news, but this effect was more pronounced in the Chinese-dominated culture than in the Western European culture. Effects of high competitive pressure at the station level were only observed in the Western European culture.     

What Influences Advertising Price in Television Channels?: An Empirical Analysis on the Spanish Market

Advertising has an important role in the media industry. In a context where advertising generates a negative externality for viewers, this article analyzes the factors explaining ad prices in free TV empirically. This article also considers the participation of government-owned broadcasters in the Spanish market. This study finds that private ownership is associated with higher advertising prices. The results show a positive relation between audience size and ad price and a negative relation between ad price and advertising time. In addition, this study finds that higher prices are associated with the percentage of the population between 14 and 29 years old and the regional gross domestic product per capita in the broadcast area.     

The e-balanced scorecard (e-BSC) for measuring academic staff performance excellence

This research paper is a pilot study that investigated the suitability of adopting an automated balanced scorecard for managing and measuring the performance excellence of academic staffs in the higher education setting. A comprehensive study of related literature with requirements elicited from the target population in a selected premier university in Malaysia through document analysis, interviews and survey questionnaires provided the foundation for the system development. By adopting the balanced scorecard, the proposed system provided a means for top down alignment of organisational objectives while creating a medium of communication between the lecturers and management. Though the method suggested in this study primarily focuses on the academic staff, it addresses the lack of a representative form of performance measurement for lecturers that accommodates the complexities of the profession while providing the potential adoption of an unconventional method to encourage excellence and development amongst all levels of employees in the industry.     

Relationship between skeletal muscle contractile properties and power production capacity in female Olympic rugby players

This study aimed to determine which contractile properties measured by tensiomyography (TMG) could better differentiate athletes with high- and low-power values, as well as to analyse the relationship between contractile properties and power production capacity. The contractile properties of the vastus medialis (VM), rectus femoris (RF) and vastus lateralis (VL) of an Olympic women’s Rugby Sevens team (n?=?14) were analysed before a Wingate test in which their peak power output (PPO) was determined. Athletes were then divided into a high-power (HP) and a low-power (LP) group. HP presented an almost certainly higher PPO (9.8?±?0.3 vs. 8.9?±?0.4 W kg^?1, ES?=?3.00) than LP, as well as a very likely lower radial displacement (3.39?±?1.16 vs. 5.65?±?1.50?mm, ES?=?1.68) and velocity of deformation (0.08?±?0.02 vs. 0.13?±?0.03 mm ms^?1, ES?=?1.87) of the VL. A likely lower time of delay was observed in HP for all analysed muscles (ES?>?0.60). PPO was very largely related to the radial displacement (r?=??0.75, 90% CI?=??0.90 to ?0.44) and velocity of deformation (r?=??0.70, 90% CI?=??0.87 to ?0.34) of the VL. A large correlation was found between PPO and the time of delay of the VL (r?=??0.61, 90% CI?=??0.84 to ?0.22). No correlations were found for the contractile properties of RF or VM. These results highlight the importance of VL contractile properties (but not so much those of RF and VM) for maximal power production and suggest TMG as a practical technique for its evaluation.     

Development and optimization of an injury prevention intervention for physical education teachers

Background: Injury prevention is highly needed in physically active populations, such as pre-service and in-service physical education teachers (PETs). As a lack of adherence to preventive strategies is problematic in injury, it seems crucial to develop and optimize interventions that correspond to the specific needs and wishes of PETs.

Aim: The purpose of the present study was fourfold. Specifically, we aimed at (1) systematically optimizing an injury prevention intervention for PETs, based on teachers’ qualitative evaluation of the intervention, (2) quantitatively investigating whether the appreciation of the injury prevention intervention was higher after optimization, (3) examining whether participation in the intervention resulted in positive changes in teachers’ perceived utility of, and confidence to apply the proposed preventive strategies, as well as their knowledge about these strategies, and (4) describing teachers’ adherence to the proposed preventive strategies while they were engaging in the intervention.

Participants: Twenty PETs (13 men, Mage = 42.1 ± 12.17 years) from nine different secondary schools in Flanders (Belgium) voluntarily participated in this study. The intervention, based on findings from the continuing professional development (CPD) literature, and the principles of the self-determination theory, took place on two different training days (Training A and Training B) and consisted of seven intrinsic injury prevention strategies.

Data collection and analysis: Qualitative data on teachers’ appreciation of the intervention were collected by means of focus group interviews, which were used to optimize the intervention (Aim 1). Quantitative data on teachers’ appreciation were collected directly after they had engaged in the intervention and were used to compare the appreciation from the initial to more optimized versions of the trainings (Aim 2). Further, by means of repeated measures ANOVAs positive evolutions in teachers’ belief in the utility of, confidence to apply and knowledge about the provided strategies across time were examined (Aim 3). Finally, teachers’ adherence was evaluated by relying on weekly online registrations of minutes and types of preventive strategies teachers had practised during the past week (Aim 4).

Findings: Despite the relatively high initial appreciation scores (4.2 out of 5), the optimized versions of the trainings scored better on interaction, intelligibility, innovation, practical usefulness, and recommendation (Aims 1 and 2). Significant differences were found over time in terms of within-teacher changes in perceived utility of (4.05–4.73–4.48; p?p?p?Conclusions: The present study developed an intervention that optimally fulfils the wishes and needs of the target population, namely PETs, and can readily be implemented in PET education programmes or CPD programmes for in-service PETs. Results of this pilot study are promising because teachers displayed increases in several relevant outcomes. Various suggestions are formulated on how to increase PETs’ appreciation of CPD programmes.     

Search for the roots of ratio: Some thoughts on the long term learning process (towards ... a theory)

According to the view of several experts which have been reported in part I, (Streefland, 1984) ratio requires a long term learning process. In the present part features and tools to outline and shape the longer term learning process for ratio are exhibited and elucidated by examples. Particularly instigating ratio-anticipating activities and creating visual models and schemes. The search for sources of the concept of ratio results in what might be called germs for a theory of teaching and learning ratio.