The promise of post‐publication peer review: how do we get there from here?

• Post‐publication peer review (PPPR) has not achieved its promise and potential.
• Few articles receive PPPR – even those in high‐profile journals.
• PPPR is difficult to find and needs to be linked to the original article.
• Academics require recognition if they are to contribute their time to PPPR.
• Improving PPPR would improve the scholarly corpus.

     

Pivoting: leveraging opportunities in a turbulent health care environment

Purpose:

The purpose of this lecture is to challenge librarians in clinical settings to leverage the opportunities presented by the current health care environment and to develop collaborative relationships with health care practitioners to provide relevant services.

Discussion:

Health care organizations are under financial and regulatory pressures, and many hospital librarians have been downsized or have had their positions eliminated. The lecture briefly reviews hospital librarians'' roles in the past but focuses primarily on our current challenges. This environment requires librarians to be opportunity focused and pivot to a new vision that directs their actions. Many librarians are already doing this, and colleagues are encouraging us to embrace these opportunities. Evidence from publications, websites, discussion lists, personal communications, and the author''s experience is explored.

Conclusion:

Developing interdisciplinary and collaborative relationships in our institutions and providing relevant services will mark our progress as vital, contributing members of our health care organizations.     

Big Math for Little Kids: The Effectiveness of a Preschool and Kindergarten Mathematics Curriculum

Research Findings: Big Math for Little Kids (BMLK) is a mathematics curriculum developed for use with 4- and 5-year-old children. To investigate the BMLK curriculum's effect on children's mathematics knowledge, this cluster-randomized controlled trial randomly assigned child care centers to provide mathematics instruction to children, using either the BMLK mathematics curriculum or the centers’ business-as-usual curriculum, over a 2-year period when children were in prekindergarten and kindergarten. Participants in the study were 762 children and their teachers at 16 publicly subsidized child care centers. The study assessed children's mathematics knowledge using the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort (ECLS-B), Direct Mathematics Assessment, a measure of young children's mathematics knowledge that is not aligned with the curriculum. The ECLS-B scores of children in the BMLK group increased significantly more than did those of children in the comparison group. The study also included exploratory analyses to examine whether children in the BMLK group demonstrated evidence of improved mathematical language. Practice or Policy: These results indicate that the BMLK curriculum, which is designed to help teachers use play-based, developmentally appropriate mathematics instruction, has a positive impact on young children's mathematics knowledge as measured by a general mathematics assessment that is not aligned with the curriculum.     

Beyond you and me: stories for collective action and learning? Perspectives from an action research project

This paper explores the combination of storytelling and reflective action research as a means to effect change and learning within and across communities and organizations. Taking the complex challenge of ‘pro-environmental behaviour change’ as an example, the paper reflects on the experiences of a pilot project run for the UK government that took place over two years with five community groups in rural England. The research question centred on how the stories of ‘older’ (aged 50+) community advocates might be amplified and inspire wider change via a systemic action research approach. This paper describes the project and shares insights into how behaviour change might occur in this action-based learning context challenging more Newtonian conceptualizations of change. Some of the methodological and practice challenges and conundrums that arose are discussed including authenticity, ownership and ethical issues of voice and ownership. Parallels and distinctions between story-based action research and action learning are identified and the role of narrative in inducing action is considered. The paper concludes by reflecting on future directions and the overall potential there is for ‘narrative action learning’ to address those wicked systemic problems that transcend organizational boundaries and that are faced by real people in our communities and society as a whole.     

Factors related to a college student's career optimism and their perception of career services

A student's expectation for a positive outcome for their future career development is referred to as career optimism. Career Services, a common university department, utilizes the social cognitive career theory (SCCT) to understand how students form career interests and make educational and vocational choices. Then Career Services can assist students in finding a career that matches their interests. We hypothesize that students' perception of the assistance provided by the Career Services department when the SCCT is applied, impacts the student's career optimism. In addition, we hypothesize, and results support, that different factors, such as a student's chosen major, impact student perception of Career Services and career optimism.     

Understanding heterogeneity in pathways between interparental conflict and children's involvement: The moderating role of affect-biased attention

The study examined the moderating role of children's affect-biased attention to angry, fearful, and sad adult faces in the link between interparental conflict and children's distinct forms of involvement. Participants included 243 preschool children (M_age = 4.60 years, 56% female) and their parents from racially (48% African American, 43% White) and socioeconomically (median annual household income = $36,000) diverse backgrounds. Data collection took place in the Northeastern United States (2010–2014). Utilizing a multi-method, multi-informant, longitudinal design, attention away from anger selectively amplified the link between interparental conflict and children's subsequent coercive involvement (β = −.15). Greater attention to fear potentiated the pathway between interparental conflict and children's later cautious (β = .14) and caregiving involvement (β = .15). Findings are interpreted in the context of environmental sensitivity models.     

Do more hours in center-based care cause more externalizing problems? A cross-national replication study

Whether high quantities of center-based care cause behavior problems is a controversial question. Studies using covariate adjustment for selection factors have detected relations between center care and behavior problems, but studies with stronger internal validity less often find such evidence. We examined whether within-child changes in hours in center-based care predicted changes in externalizing problems in toddlers and preschoolers (N = 10,105; 49% female; data collection 1993–2012) in seven studies, including from Germany, Netherlands, Norway, two from Canada and two from the U.S. Race/ethnicity data were only collected in the United States (57% and 80% White; 42% and 13% African-American; 1.2% and 5% Latinx). Meta-analyses showed no association (r = .00, p = .88) between hours in center-based care and externalizing problems.