A Cross-cultural Test of the Spiral of Silence Theory in Singapore and the United States1

This study examines the influence of individual-level characteristics on the spiral of silence effect in two countries, Singapore and the United States, making it the first cross-cultural test of the theory and thereby addressing a gap in the literature highlighted by Schefule and Moy (International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 12, 2000, 3–28). In two identical, representative telephone polls of 668 adults conducted in Singapore and 412 adults in Washington, DC, respondents were asked to indicate how likely they would be to discuss publicly two controversial issues: interracial marriage and equal rights for homosexuals. The proposed model for predicting outspokenness adds a variety of new predictors, such as culturally influenced self-concepts, fear of isolation, and communication apprehension, along with other more traditional predictors of outspokenness, such as a person's perception of the opinion climate, media exposure, issue salience, and demographics. The findings provide partial support for the spiral of silence hypothesis in Singapore, but not in the United States. Respondents’ perception of the future opinion climate in Singapore interacted with issue salience to influence their level of outspokenness; American respondents did not exhibit such an interaction effect. In both countries, however, outspokenness was associated with respondents’ perceived importance of the issue and their communication apprehension. Media exposure was not associated with outspokenness in either country.     

Online Media and Political Participation: The Case of Malaysia

This study is based on a survey of 526 adult Malaysians who were interviewed shortly before the 2008 national election about online media use, levels of political participation, and voting intentions. The goal was to document the role of online media in a society that controls political information in traditional media and, in turn, compels citizens to seek alternative news sources online. As predicted, the findings indicated that online media use was positively associated with higher levels of political participation among Malaysian voters. The use of and exposure to social networking sites, political blogs, political online videos, party websites, and political ads on cell phones showed strong associations with political activism. However, the use of political online media did not predict voters’ likelihood of voting.     

The Impact of NIH Postdoctoral Training Grants on Scientific Productivity

In this paper, we estimate the impact of receiving an NIH postdoctoral training grant on subsequent publications and citations. Our sample consists of all applications for NIH postdoctoral training grants (unsuccessful as well as successful) from 1980 to 2000. Both ordinary least squares and regression discontinuity estimates show that receipt of an NIH postdoctoral fellowship leads to about one additional publication over the next five years, which reflects a 20% increase in research productivity.     

Foreign research and development in Swedish multinationals

In 1987, Sweden's 20 largest multinationals together operated some 170 foreign R&D units, employing 8100 people, 23% of their total R&D personnel. About 60% of the units were added after 1980, the majority through acquisitions of foreign companies.Four major motives for the operation of foreign R&D units are identified: (1) support to local production (5% of foreign R&D employment); (2) ‘market proximity’, i.e. adaptation of centrally developed products (and processes) to local market conditions (32%); (3) exploitation of foreign R&D results and resources (8%); (4) ‘political factors’, i.e. environmental factors more or less directly influenced by government action (34%). The remaining 20% of employment seemed to be motivated by a combination of factors.The primary aim of the first three types of foreign R&D units is to enhance a company's competitive position in ways not possible from a domestic location. Hence, they should be little cause of concern for Swedish policy makers.     

Professional support staff at higher education institutions in Sweden: roles and success factors for the job

This paper aims to analyse and discuss the professional support staff at higher education institutions in Sweden in terms of how they view their roles and what the success factors for them are. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with support staff from the fields of business liaison, internationalisation and strategic research support. The results show that the participants have shaped their own roles and see themselves as back-office staff. This can make it challenging for them to prove their contribution to the academic activities of education and research. Because they neither identify themselves as administrators nor hold academic positions, their ability to build credibility on a personal basis is a central success factor. Aware of being actors in a culture dominated by academic values and norms, they see a more transparent discussion of their roles as a desirable development in the sector.     

New Modes of Internal Governance of Higher Education Institutions: The case of Göteborg University

Swedish higher education institutions havebeen given increased autonomy to organise theirinternal affairs, raising numerous demands onleadership and governance. Changes are so profoundthat institutions wanting to create an`entrepreneurial response' through a newdecision-making structure must undergo a culturerevolution, threatening existing power structures. Three organising principles are used to describe andanalyse Göteborg University. One conclusion isthat collegial decision-making bodies shouldsimultaneously be redefined, reestablished andabolished, depending on the issues dealt with.Commissions as deans and department heads must beclear and accountable to superiors or tonon-sub-optimising boards in a balanced powerstructure.     

Effects of sodium phosphate and caffeine loading on repeated-sprint ability

The effects of sodium phosphate and caffeine supplementation were assessed on repeated-sprint ability. Using a randomised, double-blind, Latin-square design, 12 female, team-sport players participated in four trials: (1) sodium phosphate and caffeine, (2) sodium phosphate and placebo (for caffeine), (3) caffeine and placebo (for sodium phosphate) and (4) placebo (for sodium phosphate and caffeine), with ~21 days separating each trial. After each trial, participants performed a simulated team-game circuit (4 × 15 min quarters) with 6 × 20-m repeated-sprints performed once before (Set 1), at half-time (Set 2), and after end (Set 3). Total sprint times were faster after sodium phosphate and caffeine supplementation compared with placebo (Set 1: P = 0.003; Set 2: d = ?0.51; Set 3: P < 0.001; overall: P = 0.020), caffeine (Set 3: P = 0.004; overall: P = 0.033) and sodium phosphate (Set 3: d = ?0.67). Furthermore, total sprint times were faster after sodium phosphate supplementation compared with placebo (Set 1: d = ?0.52; Set 3: d = ?0.58). Best sprint results were faster after sodium phosphate and caffeine supplementation compared with placebo (Set 3: P = 0.007, d = ?0.90) and caffeine (Set 3: P = 0.024, d = ?0.73). Best sprint times were also faster after sodium phosphate supplementation compared with placebo (d = ?0.54 to ?0.61 for all sets). Sodium phosphate and combined sodium phosphate and caffeine loading improved repeated-sprint ability.     

GearSketch: an adaptive drawing-based learning environment for the gears domain

GearSketch is a learning environment for the gears domain, aimed at students in the final years of primary school. It is designed for use with a touchscreen device and is based on ideas from drawing-based learning and research on cognitive tutors. At the heart of GearSketch is a domain model that is used to transform learners’ strokes into gears and chains, animate the turning of the gears and check whether learners’ solutions to practice problems satisfy the given constraints. Additionally, this domain model is the basis for GearSketch’s learner model and item generation an selection mechanisms. The learner model is used to track learners’ knowledge and adaptively select items as they progress through the practice problems. Two experimental evaluation studies show that GearSketch’s interface and animations lead to improved learning outcomes, but that its adaptive features do not significantly affect posttest results.     

Muscular superheroes and girly ducks: Gender talk using comics in the classroom

This paper explores how participants in a Swedish secondary school do gender talk with comics. Swedish schools are tasked with working with gender, but this can be a challenge for many teachers, and finding materials to work with gender aspects can be difficult. Meanwhile, literary research on comics has shown them to be a potential tool for problematising gender, but little educational research has investigated the gender discussions that comics can promote. Therefore, using conversation-analytical methodology, we have documented situated classroom talk through video observations, focusing on the social construction of gender. Five excerpts are shown, where different aspects of gender talk are displayed and discussed. Results indicate that although students deconstruct and criticise gendered binaries in characteristics and behaviour from comics' imagery, this critique remains superficial, revolving around the hypersexualised body imagery of the muscular superhero the Phantom or the outdated femininity of the girly Daisy Duck. Although comics present an opportunity for discussions of norm critique in the classroom, we suggest that more social-realistic comics, wherein gender roles are more subtle and nuanced, be used for furthering the research on this topic and allowing students more width when it comes to deconstructing gender binaries.