1,721,294 research outputs found
Trying to catch the fog: can ‘active research’ contribute to enhancing a sports development partnership?
No full textPartnerships are ubiquitous in the practice of contemporary sports development and, as a result, have increasingly become a focus for research in a variety of countries (e.g. Alexander, Thilbault, & Frisby, 2008; Babiak & Thilbault, 2008; Lindsey, 2009). To date, this research has tended to focus on explaining the prominence and formation of partnerships as well as describing the form and nature of partnerships that exist. Recognising these themes in the existing research on the wider practice of network governance, Søresnsen & Torfing (2008, p10) recognise the need for a ‘renewal and enlargement’ of the research agenda. Similarly, there is a need to move beyond the initial descriptive focus of research on sports development partnerships to begin to consider issues, such as the reasons for the success of failure of partnerships, which may be more enlightening for academics and practitioners alike. Moreover, research on sports development partnerships would also benefit from encompassing more diverse methodological approaches that would augment the qualitative, retrospective interviews that have been used in the majority of studies thus far. To these ends, this study examines a formally constituted sports development partnership operating across a local authority area in Southern England. Three research questions underpin the study:• What internal structures and processes enhance or constrain the sports development partnership?• What external factors enhance or constrain the sports development?• What contribution can research examining these questions make to the effectiveness of the sports development partnership? Adopting a ‘decentered’ approach advocated by Bevir & Richards (2009), the study utilises ethnographic methods to focus on the beliefs, interpretations and actions of partnership members. Interviews with partnership members, observations of partnership meetings and facilitated group discussions are being undertaken over an extended period of time. In line with the third research question, and recommendations by Huxham & Vangen (2005) and McKay & Romm (2008), an ‘active research’ approach underpins the design of all of the research methods. In this way, it is hoped that conducting and disseminating the research contributes to the improvement of the sports development partnership though encouraging both individual and collective reflection. As the study nears its conclusion, contributions by both the chairperson of the sports development partnership and the researcher will consider the extent to which the research has met its objectives. The chairperson will examine the contribution of the research process to encouraging reflection within the sports development partnership on group dynamics, representation, individual contributions and other influences on the overall character and strategic direction of the partnership. From the researchers’ perspective, comments will be made as to whether the research approach has been effective in developing new understandings of sports development partnerships. Moreover, other issues pertinent to conducting ethnographic, active research on sports development partnerships will be identified
Australia's glorious day, April 25th 1915, General Sir Ian Hamilton's despatch : the official story of the landing and attack by our combined forces at the Dardanelles.
No full textAlso Australia's roll of honor : the first 18 casualty lists -- T.p.; Also available online http://nla.gov.au/nla.aus-vn2012396; FERG copy from Ferguson First World War, 1914-1919 pamphlet collection
Comparison of polyvinyl chloride membrane electrodes sensitive to alkylphosphonium ions for the determination of the electrical difference (ΔΨ) of Streptococcus mutans and Lactobacillus casei
No full textPolyvinyl chloride membrane electrodes sensitive to tetraphenyl phosphonium (TPP+), butyltriphenyl phosphonium (bTPP+), and methyltriphenyl phosphonium (mTPP+) ions have been compared for the determination of the electrical potential difference (ΔΨ) of the oral bacteria, Streptococcus mutans DR0001 6 and Lactobacillus casei RB1014. All three types of electrode proved suitable for determining Δ,gY, although the TPP+-sensitive electrode was particularly susceptible to interference by protonmotive force (Δp) dissipators known to inhibit sugar uptake by the bacteria. The mTPP+-sensitive electrode was the least affected. Similarly, both strains had high nonspecific binding capacity for TPP+ and bTPP+ ions, and this increased for all three ions when the bacteria were heated to 80°C for 1 h to abolish glucose uptake and metabolism. This heat-treatment procedure is therefore not a suitable control for determination of nonspecific binding to cells. However, 1% ( v v) toluene, 20 μm gramicidin, or 10 μm valinomycin effectively depolarized the bacteria without interfering with nonspecific binding. The ionophores were therefore used subsequently for the determination of nonspecific binding of the lipid-soluble cations. The mTPP+ ion and corresponding electrode proved the most effective system, and ΔΨ values of -89 and -107 mV were obtained for S. mutans and L. casei, respectively, harvested from glucose-limited continuous cultures and incubated in 100 mm Hepes-KOH buffer (pH 7.0), containing 1 mm dithiothreitol and 10 mm glucose. Although the ΔΨ of S. mutans decreased significantly in the presence of Mes-KOH and potassium phosphate buffers at pH 7.0, it increased to -119 mV in Tris-HCl buffer (pH 7.0). Addition of 100 mm KCl to the Tris buffer showed that the inhibiting effects of the former buffers resulted from their high K+ content. Glucose uptake and acid production by both strains was also markedly inhibited by high concentrations of Na+. The measuring system revealed that the ΔΨ of both strains decreased by up to 50% in the presence of 100 mm Na+, supporting the proposed role for Na+ in the deenergization of Δp in oral bacteria.</p
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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