Evaluation of a university course to promote physical activity: project GRAD

Project GRAD (Graduate Ready for Activity Daily) evaluates a university course to promote physical activity. In a randomized study, 338 university seniors participated in either an intervention or control course for academic credit, and posttest data were collected on 321. The control course was knowledge-oriented. The intervention course taught behavior change skills in weekly lectures and peer-led labs. Physical activity was assessed with 7-Day Physical Activity Recall interviews. The intervention had no significant effects on men. Among women, the intervention increased total physical activity during leisure, strengthening exercises, and flexibility exercise. This university course had the intended effects of promoting healthful patterns of physical activity among women, but no effects were observed on men, who were more active than women at baseline.     

Quality of grey literature in the open access era: Privilege and responsibility

Conclusions We are living a deep change in the information transfer process involving the different actors of the editorial scene (from authors to editors, web-editors, e-publishers and readers), who occasionally play different roles at the same time (e.g., authors sometimes bypass the editor thus assuming direct responsibilities in the diffusion of documents in the Internet). Furthermore, information producers, managers or seekers often show twofold personalities like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. They would like to find all documents free on the Internet and be able to read original, reliable, and high quality information, but they are sometimes reluctant to spread their papers through online nonofficial channels as they care for the impact factor, prestige, and career advancement. It is a revolutionary period in which new and alternative forms of scholarly communication live together with more traditional ones and the future is difficult to define. Recent initiatives of open access—such as Pubmed Central, Public Library of Science, Budapest Open Access Initiative—are contributing to define new trends in the editorial market, challenging the traditional distribution channels, mainly managed by commercial editors, and placing the authors’ role and publication copyrights under severe discussion. In this landscape, GL now has new dignity and becomes closer and closer to innovative scientific publications supported by researchers in view of a generalised movement towards open access. The nuances of grey are becoming lighter and lighter. The questions are many, the answers few, but, in any case, the ethical responsibility of producing and issuing quality documents can never be disregarded.     

Awareness, use and opinions of methodological search filters used for the retrieval of evidence-based medical literature-a questionnaire survey

The aim of this study was to determine the level of awareness of methodological search filters among health and academic librarians in the UK and Ireland, their use of filters and views on the perceived benefits, limitations and ways to increase usage of search filters. A random proportional sample of health and academic librarians were surveyed by telephone and fax. Overall, 88% (196/224) completed the telephone survey to establish awareness and use of filters. Eighty-four per cent (51/61) completed a fax survey focusing in more depth on usability issues surrounding filters. Results indicate a high level of awareness of methodological filters, but low level of usage. Furthermore, a high level of awareness did not necessarily correlate with a high level of knowledge or understanding. Examination of responses revealed limitations and recommendations beyond those reported in the literature and highlights the relationship between understanding and effective use of filters. Improved dissemination and publication of filters is required to better inform librarians on the concept of filters and how to use them effectively.     

The Region 4 collaborative virtual reference project

In May 2002, the Denison Memorial Library at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center and the J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library at the University of Missouri-Columbia, with funding from the National Network of Libraries of Medicine-Midcontinental Region, embarked on a collaborative, real-time reference project using the 24/7 Reference, Inc., software package. This paper describes how the project was conceived, and includes details on the service hours, staffing, training, marketing, lessons learned, and future plans for the service.     

Functional brain development in infants: elements of an interactive specialization framework

One future direction for cognitive development research involves a closer integration with our knowledge about the developing brain. I present a framework for analyzing and interpreting postnatal functional brain development in human infants. Three specific hypotheses contribute to this framework, within which a variety of phenomena associated with the neural basis of perception and cognition in normal and abnormal development can be characterized.     

U.S. and international electronic data interchange

A variety of standards organizations are moving toward a single set of standards to be used worldwide for electronic communication of business transactions in the publishing industry. Sandra K. Paul is president of SKP Associates, past chairperson of the National Information Standards Organization, past chairperson, secretary, and subcommittee chair of BISAC, and treasurer of SISAC. She is also chairman of the ANSI Information Systems Standards Board.