Listening to student voices: student researchers exploring undergraduate experiences of university transition

This exploratory study presents a different approach to studying transition by involving students as researchers. The aim was to investigate how students talked about their experiences of transition in university. Nineteen first and second year undergraduate psychology students participated in focus groups and semi-structured interviews, conducted by student researchers, to provide in-depth accounts of their transition experiences. Findings showed that students held internal images about university, shaped through cultural experience, which were used to form expectations and interpret experiences. Social relationships were crucial, with the formation of groups facilitating adjustment in an unfamiliar environment. Students also described how negotiating transition contributed to personal changes. The research emphasises the salience of sociocultural factors in transition, and the relationship between transition and identity. Additionally, the value of including students as researchers to provide authentic access to student voices is highlighted.     

DEVELOPING AND EVALUATING AN INTERDISCIPLINARY CLINICAL TEAM TRAINING PROGRAM: LESSONS TAUGHT AND LESSONS LEARNED

The training of clinicians in working together as an interdisciplinary team has received growing support in geriatrics. Most teamwork training programs have focused on group process and development as the core competencies of team practice necessary to improve levels of team functioning. The experience of the Rhode Island Geriatric Education Center (RIGEC) in developing and implementing an ongoing teamwork training program, including the training of several geriatric teams from a variety of health care settings, suggests that additional objectives should include the empowerment of teams for advocacy in rapidly changing health care settings increasingly shaped by economic forces. The lessons learned by RIGEC for the development and implementation of teamwork training include the importance of defining team membership, dealing with the shifting shoals of the health care system, understanding individuals and systems under stress, and redefining the objectives of teamwork training.     

Genetic and Rare Disease Diagnoses: A Review of Resources for Patients and Health Care Professionals

Abstract

This article reviews genetic and rare disease resources from the National Library of Medicine and National Institutes of Health that assist patients and their families to decipher the complexity of rare and genetically related diseases. Librarians can use these resources to guide those seeking genetic information that encompasses the medical, social, psychological, and financial aspects of living with a rare disease. Physicians and healthcare professionals will find these resources helpful when assisting patients and engaging in genetic research.     

When do Online Audiences Amplify Benefits of Self-Disclosure? The Role of Shared Experience and Anticipated Interactivity

ABSTRACT

As individuals increasingly write about their distressing experiences online, it is important to understand how perceived online audiences influence the effects of self-disclosure. In an experiment, participants wrote about recent breakups for online audiences purportedly varying in 1) whether they shared recent breakup experiences and 2) their ability to leave comments. Participants perceiving audiences with shared experience showed more cognitive processing in their writing and reported increased post-traumatic growth at follow-up than participants perceiving general audiences. Those anticipating comments wrote less about emotions than those who did not. Mechanisms accounting for the benefits of shared experience warrant further investigation.     

Foreign correspondence: journalism in the Germaine Greer Archive

Germaine Greer’s print journalism forms a significant portion of her archive. It needs to be reassessed and recognised as having equal value to her other types of writing. Greer’s journalism powers much of this major archive and it is important to acknowledge that this archive is as much a journalist’s one as it is the archive of a feminist, a performer or a literary scholar. Greer’s own methodical creation and re-creation of her print journalism legacy into a series of records in the Greer Archive is also an implicit argument for the value of her ‘smalls’. As a recordkeeper, she has gathered up ‘the madwoman’s underclothes’, the hundreds of articles published around the world.     

Taking the plunge into the gene pool: Teaching and learning in genetics

Genetics is an area of science that causes problems for children. This paper reviews initial findings from research into children's views of how inheritance works and the role this plays in their overall view of genetics. The implications these results have for the traditional approach to genetics education are outlined. An alternative approach is proposed. Specializations: teacher development, science and technology curriculum development.     

Living with a rare health condition: the influence of a support community and public stigma on communication,stress, and available support

People affected by rare diseases often have limited coping resources and sometimes face stigma. They build communities with others who share their conditions, but not all members may benefit from these communities. This study investigated how adults with a rare genetic health condition (Alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency; AATD) think about both the Alpha-1 community and public stigma about AATD, and how these cognitions predict their communication responses and well-being. The results showed that people with AATD-encountered stigmatization from various sources. Stronger public stigma predicted more secrecy, more stress, and less available support. Stronger group identification with the Alpha-1 community predicted less secrecy; stronger group activism predicted more available support and more communication to challenge stigmatizers. Post hoc analyses showed significant interactions between public stigma and group cognitions on communication to challenge stigmatizers. Practical implications for bolstering communities to improve the well-being of people with rare diseases were discussed.     

Working around the ERM: Automating Accurate Electronic Serials Holdings Data in Bibliographic Records

Accurate holdings information for electronic serials is essential to librarians and users. Collection management staff spent copious amounts of time creating and updating links and public notes in electronic serials bibliographic records. This effort not only duplicated the work of our e-resource access and management software, but the updated information also quickly became outdated and inaccurate. This article describes our project to replace platform-specific Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) with an International Standard Serial Number–specific, static URL that points to the e-resource access and management software resource page and details the. process, from generating the URL and batch-editing machine-readable cataloging records, to garnering support from stakeholders and teaching users to navigate new steps.