Evaluation of a lower-body compression garment

The aims of this study were to determine how custom-fit compression shorts affect athletic performance and to examine the mechanical properties of the shorts. Ten male and 10 female track athletes on a university's nationally competitive track team, specializing in sprint or jump events, participated in the study. Testing utilized the compression shorts with loose-fitting gym shorts as the control garment. Several significant effects were revealed for the custom-fit compressive garment. Although 60 m sprint time was not affected, hip flexion angle was reduced. Skin temperature increased more and at a faster rate during a warm-up protocol. Muscle oscillation was decreased during vertical jump landing. Countermovement vertical jump height increased when the participants were wearing the custom-fit compression garment. In materials testing, the elasticity of the compressive garment provides increased flexion and extension torque at the end range of extension and flexion, respectively, and may assist the hamstrings in controlling the leg at the end of the swing phase in sprinting. The compressive garment significantly reduced impact force by 27% compared with American football pants alone. Through various mechanisms, these findings may translate into an effect on athletic performance and a reduction in injuries.     

The existential meaning of death and reconsidering death education through the perspectives of Kierkegaard and Heidegger

Abstract

This study explores the views of death in the ideas of Kierkegaard and Heidegger to discuss the educational meaning of death and the direction of death education. What both thinkers have in common is, first, that death is not universal, but that each individual is independently aware of his or her own death. Second, both thinkers observe that we should face death and suffer from anxiety or despair, a kind of existential limitation, which serves as an opportunity for real existence. Third, both thinkers observe that individuals can transform their lives and create an opportunity to renew their relationships with people or things around them through their existential insights into death. Death education based on the viewpoints of the two thinkers should first awaken each individual to his or her own authenticity and individuality by means of the associative perception of life and death. Second, each student should actively face the ‘crisis of death’ without circumventing it or escaping from it, thus, learn to have a sincere attitude toward one’s own life and relationships with others. To this end, it is necessary to use various educational materials related to death for regular subject curriculum and non-subject experience activities to induce students to ask existential questions and to reflect on them on their own.     

Mental Health Provision in Northern Canada: Practitioners’ Views on Negotiations and Opportunities in Remote Practice

The focus of this article is on the final expanded qualitative findings and meta-analysis of a northern Canada study involving a four-phase, 3-year research design. The qualitative findings from interviews with twenty informal and formal mental health practitioners focus on the broader themes found within the meta-analysis in an attempt to answer a recent call for more proactive literature emphasizing opportunities for counselling and mental health support. The results explored included helping professional and paraprofessional development within remote settings, visions for the provision of community supports to assist them in providing services, and components of a conceptual model of mental health practice in the Canadian North.     

Play of the unconscious in pre-service teachers’ self-reflection around race and racism

Reading psychoanalytic theory of the unconscious desire for wholeness in the light of the notion of white racial supremacy, this study explores a constituted difficulty that self-reflection around the issues of race and racism confronts by exploring three white male pre-service teachers’ emotional experiences inscribed in their responses to the process of engaging in self-reflection. The pervasiveness of strong emotional reactions to the process of engaging in self-reflection spoke volumes not only about how uncomfortable the participants felt in the face of ambivalence, incommensurability and vulnerability but also about their active resistance against their emotional states to defend their unconscious desire for wholeness that is intensified by the forces of white racial supremacy. This study also seeks to elaborate problems inherent in teachers’ self-reflection and why and how unknown and unconscious emotional world filters and at times hinders the participants’ willingness to inquire into their own relationship to race and racism. In the final section, the author discusses how the findings may be used to imagine how teachers’ unknown and unconscious emotional world can become subjective curriculum which in turn becomes a foundation for students’ learning or lack thereof and also informs the field of teacher education engaging in critical self-reflection.     

A Study on the Significance of Spiritual Learning and Teaching Through Augustine's Confessions

This study will examine the significance of spirituality and how to cultivate it in this modern era, in which introspection on the meaning of life is lacking due to issues including consumerism, violence, terror, hedonism, and the influences of an instrumental education environment, through Augustine's Confessions. This study suggests the significance of spiritual education as the sharing of stories of spiritual life to sublimate the joy of spiritual learning achieved after overcoming vulnerability and limitations as a human to the joy of sharing and teaching through Confessions, by Augustine.     

A vigilante serial killer as ethics educator? An exploration of Dexter as a tool for moral education in the professional domain

This study aims to inform the discussion over the proposed merit of morally ambiguous dramas as a tool in moral education in the professional domain, by providing insight into student groups’ moral evaluations of Dexter. In-depth interviews (N = 61) were conducted among a diverse sample of law and (developmental) psychology students. The results demonstrate differences in moral evaluations, according to the degree of ‘professional’ experience. Remarkably, law students follow the unlawful reasoning of vigilante killer Dexter instead of their own moral make-up; yet slowly develop a professional, strict procedural, point-of-view during their education. Conversely (developmental) psychology students ground moral evaluations instantly in professionalism, but proceed from an idealistic to a more realistic and nuanced point-of-view. To fully reach its potential as a launch pad for discussing professional predicaments, we recommend that Dexter is incorporated later in the curriculum after both student groups have had more experience in the field.     

Within and beyond the classroom door: assessing quality in child care centers

This study reports data from a multisite study of typical center-based child care and children’s development regarding (a) associations among quality of care defined by structural features, process indicators, and compliance with state regulations, (b) variation in quality based on the stringency of state child care regulations and center compliance, and (c) specific quality indicators that show especially strong links to children’s experiences in child care. Findings confirmed prior evidence regarding the importance of ratios, teacher training, and group size for high quality classroom processes, but demonstrated the more significant contribution of teacher wages and parent fees. Both structural and process measures of quality varied with the location of the center in a state with more or less stringent child care regulations. The results indicate the importance of incorporating economic and regulatory considerations into future studies of childcare quality.     

Directional aiming bias in golf putting

Johnston, Benton, and Nishida (2003, Last but not least - Golfers may have to overcome a persistent visuospatial illusion. Perception, 32(9), 1151–1154) reported that when standing sideways to hit a golf ball, it becomes very difficult to see the veridical line of putt to the target and it creates a bias to misread the direction to the right of target. The purpose of the study was to determine if this perceptual aiming bias also impacts putting. A group of expert (N = 24) and novice (N = 24) players performed a perception task of aligning a line on the golf ball towards the target hole and an action task of putting a ball to the target hole located 1 m and 4 m away. Novice players showed large perceptual aiming bias and small action aiming bias of putting. Yet, expert players showed neither bias in perceptual aiming nor in putting. This replicates earlier work (van Lier, van der Kamp, & Savelsbergh, 2011 Perception action in golf putting: Skill differences reflect calibration. Journal of Sport & Exercise Psychology, 33(3), 349–369) and was explained by the two-visual-pathway hypothesis. Despite the results showing some favorable support for the two-visual-pathway hypothesis, possible limitations are discussed.     

Weblog Technology for Instruction,Learning, and Information Delivery*

Ever since Weblog emerged as an infusive online communication tool over the last decade, its impacts have been witnessed by the Internet society at large. Meanwhile, more and more universities and colleges are offering online classes enhanced by Web technology. In this article, we investigate the role of Weblog combined with face‐to‐face lectures through a three‐phase study that examines college students' perception of Weblog used in class. Ordinary least squares (OLS) regression and Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) techniques are employed to recognize meaningful patterns from collected data. The findings lie in the aspects of: relationship between level of study and the perceived value of Weblog, the relationship between level of Weblog experience and the perceived value of Weblog, and factors contributing to students' perception of Weblog usage. As the first work of its kind examining Weblog adoption from student perspective, this article provides educators, researchers, and practitioners with conceptual and practical references.