The effect of a supported exercise programme in patients with newly diagnosed Type 2 diabetes: a pilot study

The aim of this study was to examine the effectiveness of either a standard care programme (n = 9) or a 12-week supported exercise programme (n = 10) on glycaemic control, β-cell responsiveness, insulin resistance, and lipid profiles in newly diagnosed Type 2 diabetes patients. The standard care programme consisted of advice to exercise at moderate to high intensity for 30 min five times a week; the supported exercise programme consisted of three 60-min supported plus two unsupported exercise sessions per week. Between-group analyses demonstrated a difference for changes in low-density lipoprotein cholesterol only (standard care programme 0.01 mmol · L(-1), supported exercise programme -0.6 mmol · L(-1); P = 0.04). Following the standard care programme, within-group analyses demonstrated a significant reduction in waist circumference, whereas following the supported exercise programme there were reductions in glycosylated haemoglobin (6.4 vs. 6.0%; P = 0.007), waist circumference (101.4 vs. 97.2 cm; P = 0.021), body mass (91.7 vs. 87.9 kg; P = 0.007), body mass index (30.0 vs. 28.7 kg · m(-2); P = 0.006), total cholesterol (5.3 vs. 4.6 mmol · L(-1); P = 0.046), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (3.2 vs. 2.6 mmol · L(-1); P = 0.028), fasting β-cell responsiveness (11.5 × 10(-9) vs. 7.0 × 10(-9) pmol · kg(-1) · min(-1); P = 0.009), and insulin resistance (3.0 vs. 2.1; P = 0.049). The supported exercise programme improved glycaemic control through enhanced β-cell function associated with decreased insulin resistance and improved lipid profile. This research highlights the need for research into unsupported and supported exercise programmes to establish more comprehensive lifestyle advice for Type 2 diabetes patients.     

Optimizing kick rate and amplitude for Paralympic swimmers via net force measures

Kicking is a key component of freestyle swimming yet the optimum combination of kick rate and kick amplitude remains unknown. For Paralympic swimmers, with upper and lower limb disabilities, the influence of the kick plays an important role in net force production. To determine optimum kick characteristics, 12 Paralympic swimmers aged 19.8 ± 2.9 years (mean ± s) were towed at their individual peak freestyle speed. The experimental conditions were (i) a prone streamline glide for passive trials and (ii) maximal freestyle kicking in a prone streamline for active trials at different speeds and kick amplitudes. Kick rate was quantified using inertial sensor technology. Towing speed was assessed using a novel and validated dynamometer, and net force was assessed using a Kistler force-platform system. When peak speed was increased by 5%, the active force increased 24.2 ± 5.3% (90% confidence limits), while kick rate remained at approximately 150 kicks per minute. Larger amplitude kicking increased the net active force by 25.1 ± 10.6%, although kick rate decreased substantially by 13.6 ± 5.1%. Based on the current kick rate and amplitude profile adopted by Paralympic swimmers, these characteristics are appropriate for optimizing net force.     

Effects of self-talk: a systematic review

This article presents a systematic review of the literature examining the relationship between self-talk and performance. "Second-generation questions" regarding potential mediators and moderators of the self-talk-performance relationship were also examined. A total of 47 studies were analyzed. Results indicated beneficial effects of positive, instructional, and motivational self-talk for performance. Somewhat surprisingly, two evidence-based challenges to popular current viewpoints on self-talk emerged. First, negative self-talk did not impede performance. Second, there was inconsistent evidence for the differential effects of instructional and motivational self-talk based on task characteristics. Results from the mediation-based analysis indicate that cognitive and behavioral factors had the most consistent relationships with self-talk. The findings are discussed in the context of recent theoretical advances, and the article includes recommendations for future research (e.g., the use of designs allowing the testing of meditational hypotheses) and for current applied practice (e.g., avoiding the use of thought-stopping techniques).     

The relationship between work conditions and perceptions of organizational justice among library employees

Library employees hold perceptions about the fairness of the outcomes, processes, and interpersonal treatment in their workplaces. When employees feel the workplace is fair they are more likely to feel commitment to the organization, perform in-role and extra-role tasks, and experience job satisfaction. When employees perceive injustice in the workplace, research points to negative outcomes such as withholding work or even sabotage. To understand the antecedents of organizational justice, researchers carried out a national survey of librarians to compare the predictive power of perceived organizational support, job autonomy, job feedback, and job stress. Results indicate that increasing librarians' perceptions of organizational support and their autonomy, and providing meaningful and timely job feedback can increase overall perceptions of justice. Managers can enhance a climate of justice in their workplaces by developing strategies that target organization support, autonomy, and feedback to reduce a sense of injustice between and among employees.     

Citizen reactions to municipalities’ Instagram communication

In this paper, we explore how local governments are using Instagram as a communication tool to engage with their citizens, using data from the municipalities of Andalusia (Spain). We seek to identify the determinants of local government use of Instagram, the determinants of activity in this channel and the determinants of citizen reactions in order to understand the influence of media types (picture, video or album) used in municipality posts, and to understand content type (what the post is about). Instaloader, an open source intelligence (OSINT) tool for Instagram, was applied. It made it possible to automatically extract all posts of the analysed municipalities (14,742 posts). These were later automatically analysed using R, an open source software. It was determined that of the 29 Andalusian local governments with the highest populations, only those that maintain an account on Instagram, totalling 17 municipalities (58.62%), would be part of the final analysis. Our findings demonstrate that when local governments have a high level of debt, they do not maintain and actively use Instagram accounts. We also found that quality of posts’ content is more important than quantity of followers, since there is no significant relationship between citizen reactions and the number of inhabitants of a municipality or the number of followers (audience), while there is a significant negative relationship between the number of posts (activity) and reactions. Our results also highlight that the level of reactions can be stimulated by certain media and content types.     

School learning support for teacher technology integration from a self-determination theory perspective

Teacher technology integration research on persistence is needed. Teachers’ persistence is strongly associated with their autonomous motivation, as defined by self-determination theory (SDT); however, most SDT-based studies have focused on teachers’ support and students’ motivation and well-being. SDT founders also recently suggested that future studies should include teacher motivation towards the use of technology. Accordingly, this experimental and longitudinal study aimed to investigate how the proposed support encouraged and sustained the low- and high- quality teachers’ integration practices. It proposed a school learning support intervention with three dimensions—leader, expert, and peer support—to meet teachers’ basic needs and thereby increase their motivation for and persistence in classroom technology integration. It had a sequential explanatory mixed-methods design, involved 122 school teachers and lasted for 22 months. Pre-, post- and delay- questionnaires and two arounds of interviews were used to collect the teachers perceptions on needs satisfaction and technology integration practices. The results suggest that the support increased the extent to which the teachers’ needs were met, resulting in more high-quality (student-centered) but not low-quality (lecturing) integration practices. However, the intervention sustained both types of integration practices. The findings offer three major empirical implications, makes two theoretical contributions, and offers four practical suggestions for researchers and practitioners.

     

On Rest-from-Deliberate-Learning as a Mechanism for the Spacing Effect: Commentary on Chen et al. (2021)

Educational Psychology Review - In their recent paper, Chen et al. (Educational Psychology Review, 2021) propose that rest periods between deliberate learning characterize the spacing effect and...     

Revisioning Fairness as Social Justice in Early Childhood Education

Early Childhood Education Journal - Young children’s ideas of fairness have been studied in a range of laboratory settings with findings that children see fairness as equal distribution of...