1,720,968 research outputs found
Archiving social survey data in Africa : an overview of African microdata curation and the role of survey data archives in data management in Africa
No full textIncludes bibliographical references (p. 124-157).This study examines current practice in the curation of social survey data in African countries and makes suggestions for future improvements in this regard. Curation of data refers to its preservation and management for reuse. Utilising survey data for the study of social phenomena other than those for which the original survey was initiated is a relatively new research approach in Africa. Thus best practice for this type of research is still being put in place by African organisations. This involves the development of optimal means of processing and storing the data for re-use. Of concern to this study is what constitutes the most effective way of managing and sharing the information garnered from these surveys as a resource for economic and social development in Africa. Social survey data refers to both the statistical information which is the final product of censuses or sample surveys, and the documentation provided with the data to facilitate its reuse. Documentation includes technical notes and questionnaires used in the survey process, as well as meta data (detailed information about the data) and reports produced concerning the final survey findings. The research looks at the history of the management of social survey data worldwide and in African countries, and the policies and processes involved in curating survey information in these countries. The comparative component of the study examines developments in this field internationally and compares these to practices on the African continent. International best practice in the field has been used to evaluate current methods of survey data archiving in African countries. The study presents strategies to ensure the optimal preservation and effective sharing of survey data among countries of the region. Strategies for the establishment of a Pan African network of data sharing organisations are suggested to support future repurposing of African census and survey data
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
Survey on Access to African Government Microdata for Social Science Research
No full textGovernments mandate their National Statistics Offices to collect empirical data to determine appropriate policies. Re-use of this data for research can provide input regarding the effectiveness of government action. In Western Europe and North America policies and institutions support the efficient collection and sharing of official data for research purposes. In Africa the sharing of government microdata is constrained by several obstacles. African National Statistics Offices have limited resources to curate microdata and ensure its long-term availability. Consequently many African data producers do not follow international best practice with regard to survey data management or share the microdata from the surveys they conduct. This was confirmed by a survey conducted in order to investigate the availability of survey microdata from African National Statistics Offices for research. A further obstacle to access to government microdata in Africa is inadequate producer-user communication channels. Concerns around the confidentiality of respondent information also present a barrier to data usage for research, as does the bureaucratic nature of government institutions involved in data production in African countries. Access to official microdata for research requires sound data usage policies driven by African decision-makers who appreciate the role of information utilisation in national development
Figure 1 from: Woolfrey L (2017) Data Management Plan: Opening access to economic data to prevent tobacco related diseases in Africa. Research Ideas and Outcomes 3: e14837. https://doi.org/10.3897/rio.3.e14837
No full textkoamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
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