Celette Sugg Skinner, Adam Buchanan, Matthew W. Kreuter, Cheryl Holt, Dawn Bucholtz and Tara Smith Strigo
This paper demonstrates that a message library – the computer‐tailored intervention component that contains all potential versions of tailored content – can be adapted for use in…
Abstract
This paper demonstrates that a message library – the computer‐tailored intervention component that contains all potential versions of tailored content – can be adapted for use in a new setting at reasonable cost and effort. A message library developed for one population was adapted to enable its use with a second population in a different geographic region. Concludes that adapting message libraries for new populations need not be a barrier to disseminating tailored interventions and designing message libraries with dissemination in mind creates tailored interventions that can be adapted for use with different populations.
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Increasing the ethicality of a project and the usefulness of the data enhances the probability that social good will result from the research; a combination of ethical and…
Abstract
Increasing the ethicality of a project and the usefulness of the data enhances the probability that social good will result from the research; a combination of ethical and methodological soundness is therefore crucial. From 1999‐2002 I conducted a qualitative study of women’s, men’s, and mixed Internet chat room conversations. In this article, I discuss the particular ethical issues that arose, outlining my ethical decision‐making process within the context of current debates. I also describe the methodological concerns, demonstrating why a synthesized method responsive to the advantages and disadvantages of cyberspace was necessary, and how the data were enhanced by this choice of method and by certain characteristics of cyberspace. In discussing the details of my study, my overall goal is to provide an assessment of the social good of the project with a view to increasing the probability of more ethical and useful Internet‐based research outcomes more generally.
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Paula Mählck and Beverly Thaver
The purpose of this paper is to provide insights into certain themes and discourses that have emerged from two research projects on gender and racial equality in higher education…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide insights into certain themes and discourses that have emerged from two research projects on gender and racial equality in higher education in Sweden and South Africa.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on discourse analysis using a Foucauldian lens, and Universalism concepts premised on Robert Merton's scientific narratives, social texts are analysed to bring out diversity themes that shape individual research identities as positioned in South Africa and Sweden.
Findings
The findings indicate that two common themes have emerged during the research process: marginalized discourses of ethnicity and “race” as these emerge in the appointment process; and institutional culture and language. Despite the obvious differences between the countries there appear to be similar discourses at work in the education policy documents such as “gender equality” and “diversity”. The themes listed above appeared to be central for understanding how “gender equality” and “diversity” strategies operate through ethicised/racialized discourses in researchers' everyday academic lives in similar but not identical contexts.
Research limitations/implications
To be able to determine if these findings can be abstracted to a more general level, further investigations on how gender and race/ethnicity operate in the everyday lives of researchers in different socio‐cultural contexts will need to be conducted.
Originality/value
The paper offers new insights into how global discourses on “gender equality” and “diversity” operate in similar but not identical academic contexts and how academics respond to them on the level of social interaction as well as on the level of institutional culture.
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Sharon L. Harlan, Anthony J. Brazel, G. Darrel Jenerette, Nancy S. Jones, Larissa Larsen, Lela Prashad and William L. Stefanov
The urban heat island is an unintended consequence of humans building upon rural and native landscapes. We hypothesized that variations in vegetation and land use patterns across…
Abstract
The urban heat island is an unintended consequence of humans building upon rural and native landscapes. We hypothesized that variations in vegetation and land use patterns across an urbanizing regional landscape would produce a temperature distribution that was spatially heterogeneous and correlated with the social characteristics of urban neighborhoods. Using biophysical and social data scaled to conform to US census geography, we found that affluent whites were more likely to live in vegetated and less climatically stressed neighborhoods than low-income Latinos in Phoenix, Arizona. Affluent neighborhoods had cooler summer temperatures that reduced exposure to outdoor heat-related health risks, especially during a heat wave period. In addition to being warmer, poorer neighborhoods lacked critical resources in their physical and social environments to help them cope with extreme heat. Increased average temperatures due to climate change are expected to exacerbate the impacts of urban heat islands.