Causal attributions of students and student-proctors for performance on a university examination

Undergraduate psychology students rated the importance of several causes of examination outcomes both prior to and after taking a course exam. Similar attributions were made by advanced psychology students who served as course proctors. Students rated proctor characteristics as more important and their own characteristics as less important determinants of exam outcomes, particularly successful outcomes. Results suggested that positivity biases rather than egotism biases are operative in actual classroom settings. Further, contrary to expectancyconfirmation theory, student and proctor preexamination confidence was not strongly related to postexamination attributions.     

Issues in the definition of child sexual abuse in prevalence research

Despite efforts to promote uniform criteria for defining child sexual abuse, there are still variations in the definitions adopted by individual researchers. This paper focuses on four representative studies, describes differences in the definitions used and examines how such differences may contribute to discrepancies in the estimated prevalence of abuse. Similarities and dissimilarities are identified in several areas: the upper age limit for child sexual abuse, the criteria used to define a given sexual experience as abusive, the inclusion or exclusion of experiences involving age peers, and the use of different criteria for incidents occurring during adolescence. Prevalence rates from one study, which used a slightly less restrictive definition of abuse, were recalculated based on the definitions of other researchers. This resulted in a 14% decrease in the number of individuals identified as abused. While this is a substantial change, it accounts for only a portion of the discrepancy in prevalence rates, suggesting that other factors, such as methodological differences, need to be examined with regard to their impact on prevalence rates. Historical and legal issues pertaining to the definition of child sexual abuse are also discussed.     

The sexual abuse of Afro-American and White-American women in childhood

This study examined the prevalence of child sexual abuse in a multi-stage stratified probability sample of Afro-American and white-American women, 18 to 36 years of age, in Los Angeles County. The sample ranged in demographic characteristics by age, marital status, education and the presence of children. Of the total sample of 248 women, 154 (62%) reported at least one incident of sexual abuse prior to age 18, with 57% of Afro-American women and 67% of white-American women having been abused. Sexual abuse before the age of 18 appears to be of equal concern for both ethnic groups, although similarities and differences in the circumstances under which abuse incidents occurred were subtle and deserve attention. The need for identifying contemporary factors that contribute to the prevalence of abuse over the past 40 years is stressed.     

Modelling the determination of research output in British universities

The paper begins by noting some of the recent proposals for restructuring research activity in British universities, mainly through a process of concentration of research resources. We then review the available evidence, which shows that there is little support for such concentration except in the most resource-intensive disciplines. Since there is little firm information about the shape of “research production functions’, either for institutions or for the system as a whole, the core of the paper studies the factors likely to be important in such functions and investigates the consequences of particular functional forms. Finally, it is concluded that more research is needed to gain a better understanding of the research process in universities, and that in the meantime it would be unwise to embark on a wholesale restructuring of the system.     

A Faculty Development Program for Nurse Educators Learning to Teach Online

As the College of Nursing at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville prepared to move their graduate programs online, a nursing faculty grass-roots movement led to the implementation of a faculty development program. This instructional design portfolio describes the design, development, implementation, and evaluation of this program, with the goal of identifying best practices in the design of programs for learning to teach online.     

Business Faculty's Attitudes: Open Access,Disciplinary Repositories,and Institutional Repositories

Business faculty were surveyed to determine their attitudes toward institutional repositories, disciplinary repositories, and open access journals. The majority of faculty was unaware of institutional repositories at their local institutions. However, approximately one third are using disciplinary repositories and are receiving encouragement from their departments to do so. Likewise, many faculty are unaware of open access journals. Open access journals are seen as lacking prestige and being lower quality publications in the business field due to the lack of prestigious publishers and editors. Many faculty believe their prestige would fall if they published in an open access journal.