1,720,957 research outputs found
Learning from the past: the experiences of students involved in Distance Learning in the pandemic and post-pandemic period
No full textThe COVID-19 emergency in 2020 forced universities to rapidly implement Distance Learning (DL), affecting the lives of both faculty and students in different ways (Polianovskyi et al., 2021; Minor et al., 2021). These experiences have been investigated to better understand the role of digitalization in teaching and learning processes (Salleh, Hanafi & Azman, 2021) with studies that explored the benefits and challenges of DL (Polianovskyi et al., 2021). Specifically, many studies focused on several aspects, including technological, cognitive and social issues (Mok et al., 2021; Asgari et al., 2021), besides their psychological and educational impact (Alomyan, 2021; Charman et al., 2023). Furthermore, they underscored the potential of technology to enhance the learning process when effectively implemented (El Refae et al., 2020; Boyko et al., 2021). Reflection on its practices promotes the growth of Higher Education (HE) within a framework of Faculty Development aimed at enhancing the efficacy of its educational setting (Mastan et al., 2022; Steinert, 2014). Analyzing the experiences of DL participants provides insights for the future design of educational programs that reflect evolving learning and teaching needs (Polianovskyi et al., 2021).
To investigate its own experience, the University of Verona conducted a study grounded in a phenomenological approach, considering the phenomenon inside its context (Mortari, 2007) and encouraging a process of Developmental Evaluation aimed at its improvement (Patton, 2006). The study involved both faculty and students who engaged in DL at the University of Verona during the pandemic and post-pandemic periods and it was divided into three phases. Initially, participants answered two surveys with multiple-choice and open-ended questions, specific to the two groups. Subsequently, we analyzed documents prepared by the Joint Committee, which is responsible for monitoring academic activities. Finally, semi-structured interviews were conducted with students to further explore the themes that emerged in the earlier phases.
The data collected were analyzed using qualitative and inductive content analysis, which allowed to identify significant elements for the research question, maintaining a bottom-up perspective (Elo & Kyngäs, 2008), and to compare the data through a process of triangulation.
This paper presents the results of the semi-structured interviews conducted with 45 students. The interview questions were designed to investigate in depth previously identified themes, such as effective and ineffective practices implemented by the University of Verona, parallel to the definition of effectiveness, the impact of DL on students’ learning and organization, and technological challenges alongside the support they received to face them. Finally, students reflected on the effectiveness of integrating technology into university teaching, with particular attention on the Blended Learning approach.
The first outcomes of the interview analysis revealed both the strengths and limitations of DL during the pandemic. Moreover, they underlined the students’ desire for innovative solutions that integrate DL into the current teaching approach, adapting it to the delivered lessons effectively. Thanks to the students’ collaboration, University of Verona can learn from the past to enhance its teaching and learning programs
MAPPING GLOBAL GENERATIVE ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE GUIDELINES IN HIGHER EDUCATION: THE AMBIGUOUS BALANCE BETWEEN INNOVATION AND REGULATION
No full textArtificial Intelligence (AI), especially Generative AI (GenAI), is impacting academic life for all stakeholders. While offering opportunities like enhanced learning and assessment, its uncritical and unethical use raises critical academic integrity, social, and environmental sustainability issues. This highlights a strong need for GenAI literacy and comprehensive institutional policies. As innovation centres, universities have a unique responsibility to guide GenAI's ethical and effective use. Many are developing guidelines, but the landscape is fragmented, creating an urgent need for clarity and systematic analysis. This research investigates how 16 leading universities (identified across major rankings) are formulating and communicating their GenAI guidelines to address these complexities. Using inductive content analysis of publicly available website materials, preliminary findings show that guidelines target all academic community members, stressing the key role of faculty and staff in disseminating directives or integrating them into curricula. Guidelines cover GenAI adoption actions: pre-usage elements that explain universities' attitudes towards AI and try to foster awareness; implementation actions that detail practical procedures; post-usage, which emphasises responsibility, ownership, and maintenance actions to promote a sustainable looking-forward approach. However, many guidelines remain general, allowing broad interpretation and not always offering optimal solutions. While valuable, guidelines are only one approach to managing GenAI. By providing a clearer picture of current developments, the research contributes to theoretical and practical advancements, offering a foundation for future inquiries into the role of GenAI in Higher Education. Future work should focus on reducing ambiguity and enhancing the applicability of these guidelines. By doing so, institutions could explore alternative approaches to foster a critical and effective integration of GenAI into teaching and learning
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
koamabayili/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
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
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