Developing Media Literacy in Public Libraries: Learning from Community Media Centers

The rise of digital media labs and spaces for content creation in public libraries has been documented in the scholarly literature. However, fewer studies have investigated the outcomes of media literacy initiatives in community media centers (CMCs) and how they might inform similar programs and services in public libraries. This article reports findings from a study that used qualitative research to investigate the current goals and activities of CMCs across the United States. The findings show that the educational, social, and community benefits of these programs could be useful for public libraries to consider in developing or augmenting their own media literacy initiatives.     

THE RELIGIOUS TRAINING OF CHILDREN

Silence needs to be shown to be taught. This is because the nonverbal, which is a different way of referencing the world than symbols, cannot be translated into words. Teaching silence is of special importance today because of the connection between silence and the creation of existential meaning, as well as the functioning of the creative process itself. The loss of silence in our culture will result in the loss of religious meaning and the impairment of creativity. Without deep meaning and the creative process the human species is at risk.     

Associations Between First‐Time Expectant Women's Representations of Attachment and Their Physiological Reactivity to Infant Cry

Associations among 53 primiparous women's Adult Attachment Interview classifications (secure–autonomous vs. insecure–dismissing) and physiological and self‐reported responses to infant crying were explored. Heart rate, skin conductance levels, and respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) were recorded continuously. In response to the cry, secure–autonomous women demonstrated RSA declines, consistent with approach‐oriented responses. Insecure–dismissing women displayed RSA and electrodermal increases, consistent with behavioral inhibition. Furthermore, insecure–dismissing women rated the cries as more aversive than secure–autonomous women. Nine months postpartum, secure–autonomous women, who prenatally manifested an approach‐oriented response to the unfamiliar cry stimulus, were observed as more sensitive when responding to their own distressed infant, whereas women classified prenatally as insecure–dismissing were observed as less sensitive with their own infants.     

Spatial Ability: A Neglected Talent in Educational and Occupational Settings

For over 60 years, longitudinal research on tens of thousands of high ability and intellectually precocious youth has consistently revealed the importance of spatial ability for hands-on creative accomplishments and the development of expertise in science, technology, engineering, and mathematical (STEM) disciplines. Yet, individual differences in spatial ability are seldom assessed for educational counseling and selection. Students especially talented in spatial visualization relative to their status on mathematical and verbal reasoning are particularly likely to be underserved by our educational institutions. Evidence for the importance of assessing spatial ability is reviewed and ways to utilize information about individual differences in this attribute in learning and work settings are offered. The literature reviewed stresses the importance of spatial ability in real-world settings and constitutes a rare instance in the social sciences where more research is not needed. What is needed is the incorporation of spatial ability into talent identification procedures and research on curriculum development and training, along with other cognitive abilities harboring differential—and incremental—validity for socially valued outcomes beyond IQ (or, g, general intelligence).     

Perceptions of studying during adolescence: student typologies and the relationship with attainment

This research explores perceptions of studying among students taking public examinations at age 16. Cluster analysis was used to classify 826 Year 11 students, in their final year of compulsory schooling, according to their study typology. Pupils were drawn from eight outer London schools and completed a self-report questionnaire to assess perceptions of studying. The analysis revealed six distinctive groups with differences in the use of metacognitive, effort-management, time-management and study strategies. The groups differed in relation to attainment and the amount of homework that students reported completing. Clusters were identified with poor students, who had become disengaged with their studies, and hard working students, who valued the task and adopted a variety of strategies. Other clusters displayed poor time management strategies, use of planning and organisational strategies. For the future, it appears important to understand characteristics that are exhibited by individual students, if all are to be assisted in achieving their potential.     

Beyond traditional collaborative search: Understanding the effect of awareness on multi-level collaborative information retrieval

Although there has been a great deal of research into Collaborative Information Retrieval (CIR) and Collaborative Information Seeking (CIS), the majority has assumed that team members have the same level of unrestricted access to underlying information. However, observations from different domains (e.g. healthcare, business, etc.) have suggested that collaboration sometimes involves people with differing levels of access to underlying information. This type of scenario has been referred to as Multi-Level Collaborative Information Retrieval (MLCIR). To the best of our knowledge, no studies have been conducted to investigate the effect of awareness, an existing CIR/CIS concept, on MLCIR. To address this gap in current knowledge, we conducted two separate user studies using a total of 5 different collaborative search interfaces and 3 information access scenarios. A number of Information Retrieval (IR), CIS and CIR evaluation metrics, as well as questionnaires were used to compare the interfaces. Design interviews were also conducted after evaluations to obtain qualitative feedback from participants. Results suggested that query properties such as time spent on query, query popularity and query effectiveness could allow users to obtain information about team's search performance and implicitly suggest better queries without disclosing sensitive data. Besides, having access to a history of intersecting viewed, relevant and bookmarked documents could provide similar positive effect as query properties. Also, it was found that being able to easily identify different team members and their actions is important for users in MLCIR. Based on our findings, we provide important design recommendations to help develop new CIR and MLCIR interfaces.