Associations between sexually experienced adolescents' sources of information about sex and sexual risk outcomes

The objective of this study was to describe prevalent informal sources of information about sex and examine associations between informal sources of information about sex and sexual risk outcomes among sexually experienced adolescents. Work involved the secondary analysis of data from the Minnesota Student Survey, a statewide survey to monitor priority risk and protective health behaviors. The study sample included 22,828 sexually experienced adolescents aged 13–20 years. Multivariate logistic regression analyses examined associations between adolescents' informal sources of information about sex and three sexual risk outcomes. Peers and siblings were the most commonly reported source of information about sex. Ninth-graders who reported parents or parents plus peers/siblings as a source of information about sex had significantly lower odds of having multiple sex partners in the past year. Ninth-graders who reported any informal source of information about sex had significantly lower odds of unprotected intercourse at last sex. Ninth-graders and 12th-graders who reported any informal source of information about sex had significantly lower odds of lifetime pregnancy involvement. Findings suggest information about sex from people in adolescents' everyday lives has the potential to diminish the likelihood of involvement in sexual risk behaviors. To maximize effectiveness, formal sex education programs should engage informal sources of information about sex in adolescents' everyday lives.     

如何看待考研

考研无疑是大学生们毕业时选择人数最多的道路之一,从这个实际情况来看,他最适合绝大多数同学.这是什么原因呢?我们在这里尝试综合一下,也许是画蛇添足,但也许能给低年级的同学们一点启发.     

Next Generation Cataloging

During the past several years the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) noted increasing concern from the library community regarding the future of cataloging. In response to this concern and to the rapidly changing metadata environment, OCLC is taking steps to further a paradigm shift toward early acquisition of metadata in WorldCat directly from the entities responsible for content purchased by libraries—chiefly the publisher supply chain. This shift in thinking requires the acknowledgement that metadata is dynamic and will change over time and relies upon the automated capture of metadata early in the publishing cycle as well as automated processes to help make the early metadata “good enough.”     

An examination of the effectiveness of a sexual ethics curriculum

This article presents early evaluation data on the effectiveness of an ethics-based sex education program, the Sexual Ethics for a Caring Society Curriculum (SECS-C), which strives to develop adolescents’ thinking about sex so that they might act ethically in relation to other people and reflect ethically upon sexual messages and events in the world around them. Unlike typical evidence-based curricula that measure prevention goals from a health perspective, effectiveness was measured in terms of attitude change. Seventy-nine 9th graders from 7 diverse classrooms at a charter school received 8 lessons from the curriculum. Pre and post measures assessed belief in rape myths (the Illinois Rape Myth Acceptance Scale) and bystanderism (the Bystander Attitude Scale, Revised (BAS-R)). The students showed improvements with regard to rape myth attitudes but not with regard to their beliefs in the likelihood of intervening in troublesome sexual situations.     

Learning to engage: how positive attitudes about the news,media literacy,and video production contribute to adolescent civic engagement

Many students enroll in video production courses in high school as part of a vocational, career, or technical program. While there has been an explosion of scholarly work in digital literacy in informal settings, less is known about how digital and media literacy competencies are developed through school-based video production courses. This study explores the relationship between civic engagement and the various multimedia instructional practices used in a high school video production course with a single-school convenience sample and an ethnically diverse population of students. Findings reveal that the best predictors of the intent to participate in civic engagement are having positive attitudes about news, current events, reporting, and journalism. Media literacy attitudes and a range of in-classroom learning experiences with video production are also associated with civic engagement.     

考研:名校比一般学校好考

在选择考研的学校时,考哪个学校是和考哪个专业一样重要的问题,考名校还是考一般的学校,考本校还是外校,这是个问题.我的观点是,还是考名校比较好.     

Observed peer victimization during early elementary school: continuity, growth, and relation to risk for child antisocial and depressive behavior

The rate at which 266 boys and girls ages 5 to 7 years old were victimized by peers was observed on multiple occasions in kindergarten and first grade. Individual differences in victimization were observed at kindergarten entry and in growth over the subsequent 2 years. Victimization increased for some children but decreased for others. Growth in victimization was reciprocally related to growth in teacher-reported antisocial and depressive behavior for boys. For girls, kindergarten victimization was related to growth in parent-reported antisocial behavior, teacher-reported depressive behavior to growth in victimization, and growth in victimization to parent-reported depression. At a short-term group level, antisocial behavior had a lagged suppressive effect on victimization for boys but a facilitating effect for girls.     

Gender in plants

Complex evolutionary forces determine whether plants are male, female or hermaphrodite throughout their lives or whether they switch from one sex to another. This article explores these often conflicting forces and seeks answers for sex change in plants.     

The validity of reading comprehension rate: Reading speed,comprehension, and comprehension rates

This article describes a secondary analysis of a brief reading comprehension rate measure, percent comprehension questions correct per minute spent reading (%C/M). This measure includes reading speed (seconds to read) in the denominator and percentage of comprehension questions answered correctly in the numerator. Participants were 22 4th‐, 29 5th‐, and 37 10th‐grade students. Results showed that reading speed accounted for much of the variance in Broad Reading Cluster scores and subtest scores of the Woodcock–Johnson III Tests of Achievement across all grade levels. Converting reading speed to the rate measure %C/M increased Broad Reading Cluster variance accounted for in the 4th‐ and 5th‐grade sample, but decreased the Broad Reading Cluster variance accounted for in the 10th‐grade sample. Discussion focuses on the importance of reading speed and the failure to enhance validity of a brief rate measure in more skilled readers by incorporating a direct measure of comprehension. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.