Citation analysis in the literature of tropical medicine

A brief historical account of tropical medicine as a science is given, followed by a short survey of the development of the literature in the field. The citations indexed in Tropical Diseases Bulletin for a forty-eight-month period (1972-1975) were analyzed according to the journal in which they were published and the language in which they appeared. The results of the study conformed to Bradford's law of bibliographic distribution. The reference scattering coefficient was determined to be 0.504, which indicated a high concentration of articles in relatively few journal titles. A rank order list of sixty-one journal titles is given in an appendix. The study showed English to be the most important language in the literature in terms of productivity. The results of the study may be used as an acquisition tool for developing a journal collection in tropical medicine.     

Differential effects of endurance and resistance training on central fatigue

The effect of long-term endurance and resistance training on central fatigue has been studied using transcranial magnetic stimulation by exercising the biceps brachii to exhaustion and recording motor-evoked potentials from the non-exercised homologous biceps. Three groups of eight healthy individuals took part: two groups of individuals who had more than 8 years of athletic training in either an endurance or resistance sport, and a group of controls. The size of a motor-evoked potential (area of averaged rectified response) was significantly depressed in all three groups in the non-exercised arm after exhaustive exercise of the opposite arm. Recovery of motor-evoked potentials occurred earlier in endurance athletes (20 min) than in control participants (30 min) and resistance athletes (>30 min). Dexterity and maximum voluntary contraction of the biceps for the non-exercised arm were not depressed in any group. In a separate session, the limit of endurance time for the biceps was reduced significantly following exhaustive exercise of the biceps of the other arm for resistance athletes and control participants, whereas there was no change in the endurance athletes. Our findings suggest that athletic training has an effect on the mechanism of central fatigue that may be specific to the nature of training.     

The physiological cost of velocity coupling during tennis groundstrokes

Velocity coupling denotes a perceptual motor behaviour known to occur during coincidence timing tasks. Individuals have been shown to increase their effector limb speed with increases in stimulus speed during interceptive tasks. However, little is known about the physiological effects of velocity coupling. The aim of this study was to determine the physiological cost of velocity coupling during tennis groundstrokes. Eight male and eight female competitive tennis players volunteered to perform three 4-min bouts of continuous groundstrokes against balls projected from a tennis ball machine at speeds of 18, 22, and 27 m x s(-1) (65, 79, and 97 km x h(-1)) and a frequency of 14 balls per minute, the order of which was counterbalanced. Breath-by-breath pulmonary gas exchange, heart rate, locomotion time, and limb acceleration were measured throughout each of the 4-min bouts. Capillary blood samples (for blood lactate analysis), rating of perceived exertion, and difficulty rating were taken at the end of each bout. Increasing ball speed did not influence the locomotion time between groundstrokes but did result in a bilateral increase in both the mean upper- and lower-limb acceleration (all P < 0.05). Velocity coupling behaviour increased oxygen uptake, blood lactate concentration, heart rate, rating of perceived exertion, and perceived task difficulty (all P < 0.05). It would appear, therefore, that velocity coupling influenced tennis groundstroke behaviour and indirectly modified the concurrent cardiopulmonary and metabolic responses.     

大熊猫——中国的国宝

本文由一位外籍老师撰写,喜爱大熊猫的他通过对我国大熊猫现状的调查,呼吁大家一起珍爱我们的国宝。     

Uncovering Hidden Collections of Alternative Serials on Microfilm

Many libraries have significant backlogs of uncataloged microforms. As attention has shifted toward digitized serials in recent years, unique holdings with high research value may be languishing untapped in the older, often overlooked formats of microfilm and microfiche. Libraries that devote resources to surveying and cataloging hidden collections of microforms greatly facilitate discovery of valuable resources for research. The current effort to survey, organize, process, and catalog more than 10,000 reels of microfilm in the Tamiment Library at New York University has vastly improved access to a multitude of uncommon serials that have been used by researchers, both onsite and via interlibrary loan.     

Factors Affecting the Difficulty of Reading Comprehension Items for Successful and Unsuccessful Readers

This study assessed the contributions of various test features (passage variables, question types, and format variables) to reading comprehension performance for successful and unsuccessful readers. Items from a typical standardized reading comprehension test were analyzed according to 20 predictor test features. A three-stage conditional regression approach assessed the predictability of these features on item-difficulty scores for the two reader groups. Two features, location of response information and stem length, accounted for a significant amount of explained variance for both groups. Possible explanatory hypotheses are considered and implications are drawn for improved test design as well as for further research concerning interactions between assessment task features and reader performance.     

A journey towards sustainable feedback

Meeting students’ expectations associated with the provision of feedback is a perennial challenge for tertiary education. Efforts to provide comprehensive, timely feedback within our own first year undergraduate public health courses have not always met students’ expectations. In response, we sought to develop peer feedback activities to support the development of ‘self-evaluative strategies’ that would acknowledge the centrality of students in the feedback process. We describe these activities, their staged development and the qualitative and quantitative data gathered from students and the teaching teams to evaluate this. Our first steps towards embedding peer feedback with first year students indicated they are willing to engage in the process and appreciated the opportunity to provide and receive feedback, but the quality and extent of the peer feedback was largely superficial. Students’ reflections on the feedback received were also shallow. Supporting students to develop self-evaluative skills cannot be achieved in the short term, but must be embedded in courses and consistently reinforced, with greater emphasis placed on the development of a dialogue around feedback that connects students with peers and educators.