Bibliographic Management Software: A Focus Group Study of the Preferences and Practices of Undergraduate Students

With the growing population of undergraduate students on our campus and an increased focus on their success, librarians at a large midwestern university were interested in the citation management styles of this university cohort. Our university library spends considerable resources each year to maintain and promote access to the robust bibliographic management tool RefWorks. A team of librarians wondered whether RefWorks might be used by undergraduate students with the same perceived enthusiasm that we have sensed in graduate students and faculty. More generally, we explored how undergraduate students were managing their citations, if and what kinds of tools they were using to ease the process of creating bibliographies, and their general workflow in incorporating citations into their academic work.     

Efficacy of a Preventive Counseling Program for Improving Psychological Hardiness and the Positive Use of Social Network Sites among Students at Risk

The purpose of this study was to investigate the efficacy of a preventive counseling program for improving psychological hardiness (PsyH) and the positive use of social network sites (SNSs). The sample consisted of 30 students from Mu’tah University in Jordan who were randomly assigned into either an experimental group (15) or a control group (15). Two constructed scales - the PsyH scale and the Positive Use of SNSs scale - were administered to both groups pre-test and post-test, and a one-month follow-up measure was also administered to the experimental group. The findings revealed that the preventive counseling program significantly improved the level of PsyH and the positive use of SNSs and seemed to have sustained efficacy.     

Family Structure and Psychosocial Correlates among Urban African-American Adolescent Males

Substance use and delinquency, psychological well-being, and social support were compared across 5 family constellations among 254 urban African-American adolescent males. Single-mother, stepparent, both parents, mother with extended family, and extended family only households were studied. The only differences found were that youth living in single-mother households reported more parental support than other youth. Relationships with father and male role models were also studied and related to several psychosocial outcomes. The results challenge the assumptions that single African-American mothers are alone in providing support to their sons and that fathers' absence results in no significant relationship.     

Using Metadata to Design a Database-Driven Website

ABSTRACT

After a review of the Kent State Libraries and Media Services Web site, a committee of librarians and staff gathered user feedback and developed a library-specific content management system (CMS) to make the move from a static HTML environment to database-driven design. This article focuses on the significant role of metadata in the CMS from the perspective of one of the site's architects and one of its content developers. This article includes figures and a biography for further reading. The work of the redesign was earlier described in a poster presentation for the 12th Annual ACRL conference.     

The Contribution of Conceptual Change Texts Accompanied by Concept Mapping to Eleventh-Grade Students Understanding of Cellular Respiration Concepts

The present study conducted to investigate the contribution of conceptual change texts, accompanied by concept mapping instruction to eleventh-grade students’ understanding of cellular respiration concepts, and their retention of this understanding. Cellular respiration concepts test was developed as a result of examination of related literature and interviews with teachers regarding their observations of students’ difficulties. The test was administrated as pre-test, post-test, and delayed post-test to a total of 70 eleventh-grade students in two classes of the same high school in an urban area, taught by the same teacher. The experimental group was a class of 34 students who received conceptual change texts accompanied by concept mapping instruction. A class of 36 students comprised the control group who received traditional instruction. Besides treatment, previous understanding and logical thinking ability were other independent variables involved in this study. The results showed that logical thinking, treatment, previous understanding of cellular respiration concepts each made a statistically significant contribution to the variation in students’ understanding of cellular respiration concepts. The result also showed that conceptual change texts accompanied by concept mapping instruction was significantly better than traditional instruction in retention of this understanding.     

Implications of the use of artificial intelligence in public governance: A systematic literature review and a research agenda

To lay the foundation for the special issue that this research article introduces, we present 1) a systematic review of existing literature on the implications of the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in public governance and 2) develop a research agenda. First, an assessment based on 26 articles on this topic reveals much exploratory, conceptual, qualitative, and practice-driven research in studies reflecting the increasing complexities of using AI in government – and the resulting implications, opportunities, and risks thereof for public governance. Second, based on both the literature review and the analysis of articles included in this special issue, we propose a research agenda comprising eight process-related recommendations and seven content-related recommendations. Process-wise, future research on the implications of the use of AI for public governance should move towards more public sector-focused, empirical, multidisciplinary, and explanatory research while focusing more on specific forms of AI rather than AI in general. Content-wise, our research agenda calls for the development of solid, multidisciplinary, theoretical foundations for the use of AI for public governance, as well as investigations of effective implementation, engagement, and communication plans for government strategies on AI use in the public sector. Finally, the research agenda calls for research into managing the risks of AI use in the public sector, governance modes possible for AI use in the public sector, performance and impact measurement of AI use in government, and impact evaluation of scaling-up AI usage in the public sector.     

Facilitating conceptual change in ninth grade students’ understanding of human circulatory system concepts

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of the conceptual change text oriented instruction over traditionally designed instruction on ninth grade students’ understanding of the human circulatory system concepts, and their retention of this understanding. The subjects of this study consist of 73 ninth grade female students from two classes of a basic school in Jordan. One of the classes was randomly assigned as an experimental group in which conceptual change text oriented instruction was implemented, and the other class was randomly assigned as a control group in which students were instructed by traditionally designed biology instruction. Results showed that students exposed to conceptual change oriented instruction had better understanding of the human circulatory system concepts than those exposed to traditional instruction. The results also showed that the conceptual change text oriented instruction was significantly better than the traditional instruction in retention of this understanding.     

M-stock: Efficient stock monitoring for mobile users

The emergence of sophisticated and powerful mobile devices with impressive computing capabilities and storage capacity paves the way for an era of advanced mobile-based applications. Monitoring of time-critical data, process control, and security are possible candidate applications. In this work we propose a stock monitoring system that utilizes mobile phones. The system was designed to provide an alternative to costly GPRS connections for stock market traders. The system grants real-time monitoring of stock information through a user-friendly and easy to use GUI with plenty of useful features. The system was implemented by combining various Java technologies, specifically J2ME and J2EE. It was tested using the Dubai Financial Market with favorable results.     

Post-abyssal ethics in education research in settings of conflict and crisis: Stories from the field

This article draws heavily on the post-abyssal philosophy of Boaventura de Sousa Santos in order to theorise new ways of thinking about research ethics in settings affected by armed conflict and crisis, and to put them into practice. Our article explores the dilemmas and tensions faced by four graduate students and a supervisor across diverse international settings. For some of us, these are places we call home, for others these are places that provide refuge to our people: Afghanistan, Jordan, Lebanon and India. We seek to deepen standard understandings of ethics as institutionalised in university forms, arguing that tidy checklists for safety and risk mitigation do not adequately address the complex affective and socio-political struggles permeating research, and the bodies of researchers, in these settings. Our main focus here is on how we can synthesise our various experiences in order to offer something of value to others who may be about to go into the field in settings affected by armed conflict and crisis. The question that we address, then, is: how can researchers avoid the limitations, obfuscations and silences of traditional institutional ethics in order to adopt a situated, embodied, post-abyssal research ethic that might open up new spaces for emotion, encounter, and engagement with struggle, risk and voicing? We use an autoethnographic approach that enables congruence with the aims of this article, and that supports our aspirations for enhanced impact through powerful narrative. We end with discussion that contains suggestions for institutions, supervisors, researchers, and for funding and professional bodies.