The empowerment of women dairy farmers in India

This study explores the role of communication in the empowerment process of female dairy farmers in India, through a program that particularly draws on the theoretical perspectives of Paulo Freire and Saul Alinsky regarding empowerment. Female dairy fanners who participated in this communication program were more empowered than female dairy farmers who did not participate.     

Informatization,globalization, and privatization in the new Millenium

Informatization is the process through which the new communication technologies are used as a means for furthering socioeconomic development as a nation becomes more and more an information society. The informatization strategy in very recent years has provided an alternative to previous strategies of development communication. India is an example of such a shift, as the New Economic Policy of 1991 opened the nation's borders to global competition and encouraged a change from state‐owned institutions to private businesses. Several high‐technology cities like Bangalore and Hyderabad helped India become a major player in the computer software industry. The privatization of Indian television promoted consumerism, capitalism, and other Western values. One result of informatization is a growing digital divide between the majority of India's population versus the 100 million urban, elite information workers. Comparisons are made with Singapore's road to informatization.     

Applying an Integrative Technology Adoption Paradigm to Health App Adoption and Use

The present study employs an audience-centered approach to examine motivations for mobile fitness app use. We explicate and test an Integrated Technology Adoption model, which incorporates perspectives on competition, self-esteem, self-efficacy, and audience uses and gratifications. An online survey of 469 respondents reveals that app adoption intentions were predicted by internal competition orientations and gratifications, exercise self-efficacy, social utility motives, and attitudes toward the app. External competition decreased behavioral intentions related to app use. Study results thus provide support for an integrative model linking social cognitive factors with a new set of mobile app uses and gratifications.     

Effects of small-sided game and change-of-direction training on reactive agility and change-of-direction speed

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of training change-of-direction speed and small-sided games on performance in the Planned-AFL agility test and reactive agility. Twenty-five elite-standard U-18 Australian Rules football players were randomly allocated either to a change-of-direction group or a small-sided games group. Players participated in one or two 15-min sessions per week with 11 sessions conducted over a 7-week period during the season. Tests conducted immediately before and after the training period included the Planned-AFL agility test and a video-based reactive agility test specific to Australian Rules football. The reactive agility test variables were total time, decision time and movement response time. The small-sided games group improved total time (P = 0.008, effect size = 0.93), which was entirely attributable to a very large reduction in decision time (P < 0.001, effect size = 2.32). Small-sided games produced a trivial change in movement response time as well as in the Planned-AFL agility test (P > 0.05). The change-of-direction training produced small to trivial changes in all of the test variables (P > 0.05, effect size = 0–0.2). The results suggest that small-sided games improve agility performance by enhancing the speed of decision-making rather than movement speed. The change-of-direction training was not effective for developing either change-of-direction speed as measured by the Planned-AFL test or reactive agility.     

Shedding Light on Preservice Teachers' Domain-Specific Self-Efficacy

The purpose of this study was to investigate preservice teachers' efficacy beliefs across domains in a reading-specific methods course. Participants were preservice teachers in a state required reading methods course. During this course, preservice teachers were required to work with an elementary student in reading and write a case study linking theory to practice. At the beginning and end of the course, participants completed a battery of adapted, domain-specific versions of the Teacher Sense of Efficacy Scale. Results showed that preservice teachers reported a significant increase in their sense of efficacy within each domain. However, efficacy beliefs differed with regard to domain.     

Validity of the Simultaneous Approach to the Development of Equivalent Achievement Tests in English and French

The evidence gathered in the present study supports the use of the simultaneous development of test items for different languages. The simultaneous approach used in the present study involved writing an item in one language (e.g., French) and, before moving to the development of a second item, translating the item into the second language (e.g., English) and checking to see that both language versions of the item mean the same. The evidence collected through the item development stage suggested that the simultaneous test development method allowed the influence and integration of information from item writers representing different language and cultural groups to affect test development directly. Certified English/French translators and interpreters and the French Immersion students confirmed that the test items in French and English had comparable meanings. The pairs of test forms had equal standard errors of measurement. The source of differential item functioning was not attributable to the adaptation process used to produce the two language forms, but to the lack of French language proficiency as well as other unknown sources. Lastly, the simultaneous approach used in the present study was somewhat more efficient than the forward translation procedure currently in use.