Open access metadata: current practices and proposed solutions

Nearly every major publisher offers open access content of some sort, but open access metadata standards are non‐existent amongst content providers. Users, librarians, content providers, and technology vendors who offer OpenURL resolvers and discovery services all stand to benefit from standardized ways to indicate what content is open access and what is not. Additionally, all stakeholders would benefit from a standardized method by which one can ascertain what form of open access any content may be; indeed, there are many definitions of open access. There is ample evidence that every publisher handles their content metadata differently and this creates inefficiencies in the scholarly information supply chain and leads to user confusion. Many initiatives are currently working on solutions to these problems including the NISO KBART workgroup, NISO's Open Discovery Initiative, and NISO's very recently created Open Access Initiative. There are also pre‐existing concepts based on services, such as CrossRef's CrossMark service and discovery systems that hold promise with respect to open access content and metadata.     

Psychological Factors in Community College Student Retention

This study explored psychological factors in the context of a community college population purported to impact decisions to remain in college from one semester to another. Researchers examined results from 1191 responses from students attending a community college in the Mid-Atlantic United States. The study further explored the predictive power of four factors—career decision self-efficacy, career locus of control, education-employment connection, and intent to return—on both intent to return and on actual return to the college. Results indicated that intent to return was significantly predictive of actual return among this community college population. Additionally, age and gender differences, along with differences in the various psychological factors had differential impacts on each other, as well as on intent to return and subsequent return. Implications are discussed.     

‘I can do it,and how!’ Student experience in access and equity pathways to higher education

Alternative pathways and enabling courses such as foundation programmes are well-established in some tertiary institutions and are likely to be broadened and enhanced across the sector. If such a course is designed along the lines of Biggs’ constructive alignment, it would be hoped that students would be likely to adopt a ‘deep approach’ to learning through their course of study. In addition, it is often assumed (but rarely properly demonstrated) that such courses promote the confidence of students to achieve well in their academic studies. This study explored changes in approaches to learning and academic self-efficacy in the first topic of a Foundation Course, using Biggs’ R-SPQ-2F and a newly developed academic self-efficacy scale. While the findings on approaches to learning were inconclusive, analysis showed a substantial and statistically significant increase in academic self-efficacy.     

Examining Punishment and Discipline: Defending the Use of Punishment by Coaches

Confusion, uncertainty, and debate often surround the terms discipline and punishment because scholars fail to publicize that they possess distinctive meanings. This article differentiates punishment from discipline and attempts to present some rationale supporting its use, especially corporal punishment, in a sport setting from a coaching perspective. Punishment and discipline appear appropriate to study in the sporting environment because coaches must work with their players and actions affecting one player often impact the others. Thus, a wrongful behavior committed by one frequently extends consequences on teammates. Overall, this work proposes that punishment serves as an effective treatment when a coach intends to instruct, train, drill, and cultivate behavior and learning from those mentally capable of appreciating its objective. Punishment arguably appears most appropriate when a coach believes there is no other alternative for censuring and deterring behaviors and restoring the balance between victims, offenders, and the team or organization. It also appears to be an appropriate method to help perpetrators alleviate a sense of guilt or shame because punishment motivates offenders to demonstrate their repentance, a requirement for reentering society as a whole person in the eyes of others and oneself. Support for punishment also focuses on its unique ability to maintain or create order and stability, while also satiating negative feelings associated with victimization. Finally, this work argues we must recognize conventional punishment is age appropriate and proportional to the violation. Overall, punishment is acceptable because when properly measured, it supports the intrinsic worth of people as moral agents.     

Child pornography in peer-to-peer networks

ObjectiveThe presence of child pornography in peer-to-peer networks is not disputed, but there has been little effort done to quantify and analyze the distribution and nature of that content to-date. By performing an analysis of queries and query hits on the largest peer-to-peer network, we are able to both quantify and describe the nature of querying by child pornographers as well as the content they are sharing.MethodChild pornography related content was identified and analyzed in 235,513 user queries and 194,444 query hits.ResultsThe research confirmed a large amount of peer-to-peer traffic is dedicated to child pornography, but supply and demand must be separated for a better understanding. The most prevalent query and the top two most prevalent filenames returned as query hits were child pornography related. However, it would be inaccurate to state child pornography dominates peer-to-peer as 1% of all queries were related to child pornography and 1.45% of all query hits (unique filenames) were related to child pornography, consistent with a smaller study (Hughes et al., 2008).In addition to the above, research indicates that the median age searched for was 13 years old, and the majority of queries were gender-neutral, but of those with gender-related terms, 79% were female-oriented. Distribution-wise, the vast majority of content-specific searches are for movies at 99%, though images are still the most prevalent in availability.ConclusionsThere is no shortage of child pornography supply and demand on peer-to-peer networks and by analyzing how consumers seek and distributors advertise content we can better understand their motivations.Practice implicationsUnderstanding the behavior of child pornographers and how they search for content when contrasted with those sharing content provides a basis for finding and combating that behavior. For law enforcement, knowing the specific terms used allows more timely and accurate forensics and better identification of those seeking and distributing child pornography. For Internet researchers, better filtering and monitoring is possible. For mental health professionals, understanding the preferences and behaviors of those searching supports more effective treatment.     

Comparison of auditory and visual conditioning stimuli in delay eyeblink conditioning in healthy young adults

Classical eyeblink conditioning (EBC) has been widely used to probe cerebellar function in humans and nonhuman mammals. Although the neural pathways governing behavior in this task are well understood and fairly discrete, it remains unclear in the human literature how conditioned stimuli (CSs) of different modalities (e.g., visual and auditory) influence the exhibition of conditioned responses (CRs). In the present study, therefore, CRs to a visual CS and an auditory CS were examined with the single-cue delay EBC procedure. An initial experiment (N=61) was conducted to identify visual and auditory stimuli that had equal perceived intensities. Using these perceptually equivalent stimuli, a second group of 25 subjects completed auditory and visual EBC procedures in two testing sessions 5–8 days apart. Whereas the acquisition of CRs was similar between the CS modality conditions, the timing of the CRs differed such that earlier CR onset and peak latencies were associated with the visual CS. In addition, CR timing improved across testing sessions, as indicated by the later CR peak latencies exhibited during the second testing session, as compared with the first.     

Teacher Evaluation, Teacher Effectiveness and School Effectiveness: Perspectives from the USA

This article provides historical overviews of the conceptual and research and development focus of teacher evaluation, teacher effectiveness and school effectiveness research in the USA. Pertinent literature is cited and arguments are made that these lines of inquiry have coexisted for nearly four without adequate integration. With the fourth stage of school effectiveness research in process, there is a recognition that within school context variables, particularly teacher effectiveness, have important effects on school improvement and school outcomes. Similarly, there is the recognition that findings from school effectiveness research have relevance for studies of teacher effectiveness and ongoing developments in teacher evaluation. Examples of: (a) new generation, learner-centered teacher evaluation systems in the USA that are informed by teacher and school effectiveness research; and (b) the fourth stage of school effectiveness research are described. It is proposed that these lines of research should be merged as completely as possible.     

Dimensions of child sexual abuse before age 15 in three Central American countries: Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala

OBJECTIVE: The prevalence of sexual abuse during childhood or adolescence varies depending on the definitions and age categories used. This study examines the first national, population-based data available on child sexual abuse that occurs before age 15 in three countries: El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. This study uses comparable indicators and measures of sexual abuse for the three countries to document the prevalence of abuse, types of perpetrators, and the association of child sexual abuse with recent intimate partner violence. METHODS: Child sexual abuse was defined as sexual abuse that first occurs before age 15. Nationally representative data from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras were used. In El Salvador, separate questions on forced intercourse and non-penetrative sexual abuse were asked. Bivariate and multivariate analyses were performed using STATA Version 8SE. RESULTS: The prevalence of child sexual abuse varied from 7.8% in Honduras to 6.4% in El Salvador and 4.7% in Guatemala. In all three countries, the overwhelming majority of women who reported child sexual abuse first experienced the abuse before age 11. Perpetrators tended to be a family member, a neighbor, or an acquaintance. Bivariate and multivariate analyses indicated that women who experienced child sexual abuse in Guatemala and Honduras were about two times more likely to be in violent relationships as women who did not experience abuse. This relationship was not significant in multivariate analyses for El Salvador where the prevalence of intimate partner violence was the lowest. CONCLUSIONS: Child sexual abuse in Central America is clearly a problem with the prevalence between 5% and 8%. Child sexual abuse can have long-term negative health impacts including exposure to intimate partner violence in adulthood. Programs to prevent abuse and treat victims of child sexual abuse are needed in Central America.     

Looking for leadership: the potential of dialogic reflexivity with rural early-career teachers

Many early-career teachers (ECTs) begin their teaching careers in rural and remote schools in Australia, and do not stay long, with consequences for their own lives, and for their students, schools and communities. By understanding how first-year ECTs navigate personal (subjective) and contextual (objective) conditions, opportunities to disrupt patterns of ECT attrition may be found. This paper explores the online longitudinal reflections from two rural ECTs. Margaret Archer’s three dimensions of reflexivity were used to analyse what personal, structural and cultural resources were activated by ECTs as they discerned and deliberated the costs of being a rural ECT. The potential for school leaders and mentors to support rural ECTs through dialogic reflexivity, that is the opportunity to discern and deliberate priorities with others, is identified as a role that is significant for ECT support but not straightforward. Prompts for dialogic reflexivity are proposed.