Tweeting but not Talking: The Missing Element in Talk Radio's Institutional Use of Twitter

The interplay between Twitter and media organizations has been an increasing area of research. This article examines how talk radio stations have adopted Twitter at an institutional level, based on a comparative study of the official accounts of three prominent talk radio stations in Canada in 2010 and 2011. While talk radio is considered an interpersonal medium, our analysis shows the stations mainly use Twitter as a one-way medium to broadcast news updates, rather than to engage with audiences. Our findings suggest a divergence between institutional and individual social media practices, with official accounts as formal channels of communication.     

Does the public communication of science influence scientific vocation? Results of a national survey

The purpose of this work was to determine if public communication of science and technology (PCST) has any influence on people's decision to become dedicated to scientific research. For this reason, a national survey involving 852 researchers from all disciplines was conducted in Argentina. The results showed that the factors affecting scientific vocation are many, and that, regardless of differences in gender, age or discipline, the greatest influence on the decision to go into scientific research is exerted by teachers. The analysis also demonstrated that different manifestations of PCST (science books, press articles, audiovisual material, and activities such as visits to science museums) play a significant role in awakening the vocation for science. From these results it may be stated that PCST--in addition to its function of informing and forming citizens--exerts a significant influence in fostering scientific vocation.     

Reference density trends in the major disciplines

The aim of this study was to determine whether different areas of knowledge presented different behaviour with regard to the number of references cited per journal document or if, conversely, they shared the same reference density practices. Bibliometric and bibliographic data were collected from 27,141 journals (indexed between 2001 and 2015 in the SCImago Journal & Country Rank (SJR)) and the growth rates in reference density and number of documents and journals in each category were calculated at different levels of aggregation.Our analysis identified that (a) mean reference density values in some Social Sciences and Arts and Humanities categories were equal to or higher than those in the “hard sciences”; (b) reference density growth rates in these disciplines were not as high as those in the hard sciences and, in general, did not correspond with growth rates in the number of documents produced; (c) this can be considered an indication that citation-based evaluation practices affect publication habits; and (d) no significant differences were found in mean values or growth rates between Gold Open Access and Non Gold Open Access journals.     

Comparing Teaching Approaches About Maxwell’s Displacement Current

Due to its fundamental role for the consolidation of Maxwell’s equations, the displacement current is one of the most important topics of any introductory course on electromagnetism. Moreover, this episode is widely used by historians and philosophers of science as a case study to investigate several issues (e.g. the theory–experiment relationship). Despite the consensus among physics educators concerning the relevance of the topic, there are many possible ways to interpret and justify the need for the displacement current term. With the goal of understanding the didactical transposition of this topic more deeply, we investigate three of its domains: (1) The historical development of Maxwell’s reasoning; (2) Different approaches to justify the term insertion in physics textbooks; and (3) Four lectures devoted to introduce the topic in undergraduate level given by four different professors. By reflecting on the differences between these three domains, significant evidence for the knowledge transformation caused by the didactization of this episode is provided. The main purpose of this comparative analysis is to assist physics educators in developing an epistemological surveillance regarding the teaching and learning of the displacement current.