Search

This paper discusses the process of analysing online discussion and argues for the merits of mixed methods. Much research of online participation and e-learning has been either message focused or person focused analysis. The former covers methodologies such as content and discourse analysis, the latter interviewing and surveys. The paper discusses the strength and weaknesses of these approaches in the context of a study of an online social educational network for gifted students. Here interviews, questionnaire survey and content analysis were all used in order to explore the process of online discussion and the experience of taking part. The paper argues for a mixed approach in which different types of data can be compared and contrasted. Such triangulation is time-consuming but it allows for a comprehensive picture of the use of the network and the experience of online participation. [For full proceedings, see ED571430.]

This paper provides insights in the development of a skill matching test which addresses soft skills integrated videos as media to provide information about situations to be rated. The design of the skill testing and matching tool is situated in the educational ERASMUS+ project SMART which is presented as well. With a specific view on team work and the necessary skills, traits and interests this article provides insights into the representation of these aspects in the test and offers impression of the video and media design. These topics are combined with a presentation of the results of a qualitative study concerning this testing tool, which was conducted by expert interviews and analysed by using content analysis. These results highlight the advantages and challenges in the use of the testing tool. [For the complete proceedings, see ED579395.]

Sociocultural theory emphasises the mediational role of tools in learning. International students usually find themselves in a vicious cycle, experiencing difficulties when engaging with local people and culture which might provide the mediation necessary to develop their intercultural communicative competence. Yang (2016) further points out that "mobile technologies provide alternative mediational tools that might help students to break this cycle" (p. 2). This paper, developed from Yang's (2016) doctoral research, examines the roles of mobile devices in overcoming international students' intercultural difficulties during study abroad. Eight international students participated in the study and were asked to keep diaries and attend interviews for four weeks. A content analysis approach was applied to examine the students' use of mobile devices and situations. The findings revealed that for overcoming intercultural difficulties, the international students utilised mobile devices as search tools, social tools, service providers, presentation tools, and capture tools. Although the students showed some awareness of mobile devices as mediational tools, the problems that require the ability to analyse sociocultural contexts need further support from educators and technologies. [For the complete volume, see ED578177.]

High achievers with low self-efficacy in science lack interest in choosing science studies and careers. Wide-ranging knowledge of specific working life skills in science-related careers can help students identify their own strengths in science. This improves their self-efficacy beliefs in science and further promotes interest in pursuing science studies and careers. The purpose of this paper is to examine lower secondary school students' knowledge of specific working life skills. The participants in this study were 215 British, 144 Finnish and 154 German students, aged 12-14 years. Using open-ended questions and content analysis, we examined students' perceptions of working life skills needed in science-related careers. The results reveal that the students have a great deal of knowledge about working life skills, but it is often stereotypical. Students frequently mentioned sector-specific knowledge and personal attributes, but skills related to career development, organization, time and society skills were often omitted. Some variation exists between the countries. The British students linked careers in science with a great deal of thinking skills, whereas the Finnish students emphasized sector-specific knowledge. The German students described the careers more with personal attributes than in the other two countries. We conclude that the students need learning experiences including presentation of working life skills such as interacting with professionals and their real work-life problems, open-ended inquiries and balanced team working. These experiences increase students' awareness and perceived relevance of careers and working life skills, help identifying and promoting own strengths and self-efficacy and encourage choosing science-related careers. [For the complete volume, "Bridging Research and Practice in Science Education: Selected Papers from the ESERA 2017 Conference. Contributions from Science Education Research. Volume 6," see ED615249.]

The paper attempts to investigate the influence of textbooks on the results of international assessments such as TIMSS [Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study] and PIRLS [Progress in International Reading Literacy Study]. It tries to consider the role and impact of school textbooks on PIRLS and TIMSS performance across countries. As the research finds, the predominance of analytical, opinion-expressing, inferencing and evaluative categories in the school textbooks significantly favor the scores in PIRLS across the countries observed. In the case of maths, probability, data analysis and algebra problems are most predominant items schoolbooks of high performing countries in TIMSS. Advanced level analysis, integrating and comparing data, as well as reasoning and analysis could potentially be significant contributors to TIMSS science results.

The TILA project originated from the need to explore whether and how telecollaboration affects language learning processes for communication, intercultural understanding and motivation of youngsters learning foreign languages at secondary schools and to empower teachers to pioneer meaningful pedagogical innovation in the curriculum of foreign languages at secondary schools. In the 2,5 year project, 837 pupils, 300 student teachers and 48 teachers participated in telecollaboration exchanges. The results show that task-based telecollaboration can be successfully integrated in the foreign language curriculum by blending different pedagogical activities. These exchanges can contribute to enhance pupils' communicative competence, intercultural awareness and motivation. [For full proceedings, see ED564162.]

The IADIS CELDA 2012 Conference intention was to address the main issues concerned with evolving learning processes and supporting pedagogies and applications in the digital age. There had been advances in both cognitive psychology and computing that have affected the educational arena. The convergence of these two disciplines is increasing at a fast pace and affecting academia and professional practice in many ways. Paradigms such as just-in-time learning, constructivism, student-centered learning and collaborative approaches have emerged and are being supported by technological advancements such as simulations, virtual reality and multi-agents systems. These developments have created both opportunities and areas of serious concerns. This conference aimed to cover both technological as well as pedagogical issues related to these developments. The IADIS CELDA 2012 Conference received 98 submissions from more than 24 countries. Out of the papers submitted, 29 were accepted as full papers. In addition to the presentation of full papers, short papers and reflection papers, the conference also includes a keynote presentation from internationally distinguished researchers. Individual papers contain figures, tables, and references.

To clarify dominant perspectives on women in adult education publications, ethnographic content analysis was used to examine 112 journal articles in 4 major adult education journals. Articles analyzed were from two North American journals ("Adult Education"/"Adult Education Quarterly" and "Adult Leadership"/"Lifelong Learning") and two British journals ("Adult Education" (U.K.) and "Studies in the Education of Adults"). Five major perspectives on women were identified: (1) women as adult learners; (2) women's need for personal development; (3) women's role change and adjustment; (4) marginalization of women; and (5) women as collaborative learners. A sixth potentially emergent perspective was also found: women as feminists. Strengths and limitations of each perspective were described, along with implications for future scholarship on women and gender in adult education. Implications for scholarship that could form the foundation for new educational strategies were identified: (1) adult education research must start with women's experiences and perspectives as the focal point; (2) women's learning within formal education might be explored more extensively from the perspective of the learner; (3) adult education scholarship might strive for a more pluralistic understanding of women and men as learners; and (4) researchers might move toward a broader understanding of gender as a socially and culturally defined system that shapes and is shaped by adult education. (123 references) (YLB)

A study was conducted to describe the extent and dimensions of televised messages about nation, culture, and the Olympics, comparing them across three broadcast systems in Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The study was based on complete opening ceremony telecasts by NBC in America, Australia's Network TEN, and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). Data were gathered on important audio and visual dimensions of the broadcasts. The three major components of the ceremony as planned by the event organizers were: (1) the obligatory Olympic rituals and gestures as defined by the Olympic Charter; (2) the entry/exit of the athletes; and (3) cultural performances including music, dance and demonstrations. Findings indicated that all of the opening ceremony telecasts conveyed an emphasis on both nation and Olympic-style internationalism. A second general finding was that the three broadcast systems offered viewers different constructions of the Seoul opening ceremony. Results also indicated that, despite varied constructions and interpretations of the ceremony, South Korea's overall image portrayal across three opening ceremony telecasts was positive. The empirical evidence presented provides strong confirmation that television constructs the Olympic spectacle into multiple realities and that it does so with profound implications for images of nation, culture and the Olympic movement. (Four figures and four tables of data are included. One appendix, showing the "story units" of the opening telecast, and 39 references are attached.) (MG)

This preliminary study adopts an exploratory position and investigates the sustainability curriculum at British universities delivering hospitality management programmes. Sustainability is a prime business focus in the 21st century, and this paradigmatic shift has impacted on higher education too (Boley 2011; Millar and Park 2013). Sustainability education is now an integral component of management courses. Though such concerns have been widely reported and even problematised, the sustainability curriculum has rarely been investigated within the context of hospitality education and hence is the key agenda pursued in this paper. A total of 33 British public universities delivering postgraduate courses in hospitality / tourism / events management were included in the final sample frame. Content analysis of the course overview and module specifications was conducted, based on the information published on the official websites of selected universities. Content analysis has thus far been an underexplored research strategy, particularly in relation to the vast amounts of textual data freely available through organisational websites (Duriau et al. 1997), and this was exploited in this paper. Published, as well as latent content was included for the purpose of this study, as recommended by Bryman and Bell (2011). In essence, the paper adopts an interpretivist epistemological position. By extension, qualitative analysis was conducted, with the intention of constructing the meaning in text. This aspect of content analysis is vastly underutilised (Altheide 1996). Key themes were identified and patterns were established. The study demonstrates that sustainability is finding a prominent place within mainstream hospitality management curricula, although there is scope for better integration within courses. However, the sustainability-related curriculum remains very fragmented, and there is a need to consolidate prime agendas, informed through pedagogical discussions among key stakeholders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to previous research, online news as opposed to traditional news is characterized by interactivity, immediacy and liquidity. However, most research in this area has focused on the news site-level of analysis, and there are still only few studies on how interactivity, immediacy and liquidity affect online news on the news story-level. In addition, there are virtually no content analyses that include online news while taking its special characteristics into consideration. Thus, the overall purpose of this paper is to explore approaches for the study of interactivity, immediacy and liquidity on the news story-level of analysis. The paper develops a three-pronged strategy for freezing the flow of online news to enable systematic content analyses of how online news stories are affected by interactivity, immediacy and liquidity. The paper also tests this strategy in a comparative analysis of the news sites Guardian.co.uk in Britain and Aftonbladet.se in Sweden. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper looks at the coverage of whistleblowers in the UK national press as a way of examining practices of journalistic accountability. Based on a content analysis of newspaper coverage in the period from 1997 to 2009, the paper demonstrates, first of all, that whistleblowing is viewed as newsworthy and is taken seriously by the media, who mostly cover whistleblowers in neutral or positive ways. Nevertheless, the acts of whistleblowing which receive most media attention fit with the existing news agenda and prevailing social and economic trends. We further suggest that journalistic story-telling constructs narratives of whistleblowers as heroic, selfless individuals to establish the legitimacy of their claims of systemic wrongdoing in the public interest. Thus, our study ultimately demonstrates that the forms of accountability and systemic critique enabled by whistleblowing stories operate in complex and historically contingent ways. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Great Britain and Germany are close trade partners, both members of the European Union and belong to the NATO. However, the relationship between these two nations is still difficult and the British media sometimes portray Germany as the old enemy of the Second World War. In 2005 Dresden commemorated the 60th anniversary of the bombing of the city on February 13, 1945. Now the questions arise: How do the British media report about this special date? And in comparison to that, how do the German media deal with this topic? Is the question: "Who is to blame for the destruction of Dresden?" after 60 years still discussed? A content analysis of the leading German and British newspapers will answer these questions. The authors of this paper identified certain news values that are especially relevant for the international news coverage. They tested them by analyzing the coverage about February 13, 1945 and 60 years later. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research replicated and extended earlier findings of Gardikiotis, Martin, and Hewstone (2004), who examined UK media representations of numeric majority and minority groups. Study 1 used content analysis to examine the propensity, content, and article length of newspaper headlines and articles in California pertaining to majority and minority groups. Consistent with UK findings, majority headlines were associated with politics and identity adjectives. Minority headlines were linked with social issues and ethnicity-based adjectives. Contrary to UK findings, minority headlines were more frequent and majority articles were lengthier than minority articles. Study 2 considered headlines and articles in North and South Dakota. By and large, these results replicated UK findings. Alternate explanations derived from power and number definitions as well as social categories associated with majority and minority groups are advanced. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyzes the party leader presentation in party election broadcast in Great Britain from 1979 to 2001. Prime ministerial democracies like the Great Britain, have recently paid increased attention to the importance of party leaders' personality in a general election contest. Although televised political advertising is banned in the country, political parties are afforded opportunities to broadcast promotional messages in the form of party election broadcasts.

This study aims to address two interrelated issues. (1) What is the role of no-executive directors (NEDs) of public companies listed in the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) in the UK? (2) Whether AIM listed companies accept the principles and provisions of the Combined Code of Corporate Governance (CCCG)?1 and, if so, to what extent? Small and medium companies can use AIM to float their shares with more flexible regulatory system than is applicable to main market. There is dearth of studies on roles of NEDs of AIM listed companies in the UK, which is a growing segment of the UKs economy (AIM, 2007). This study intends to fill the knowledge gap that exists in the areas of understanding the role of NEDs in AIM listed companies and about the degree of acceptance of principles and provisions of CCCG by these companies. The study is also important in a sense that the role of NEDs is not getting serious attention among researchers on continuity basis as it has been given primacy when there are corporate collapses only. The role of NEDs is associated with corporate governance. AIM insists the usefulness of the CCCG for its listed companies despite the fact that AIM companies are not required to follow the CCCG. Practically, this study is important to enhance the understanding of tasks to be performed by NEDs in different organisational context and effective discharging their duties and responsibilities towards stakeholders. Another contribution of this study is the application of content analysis methodology in identifying the role of NEDs in AIM companies, which might be useful for future researchers as well. Numerous studies and regulatory bodies have also indicated the need to create accountability within the boards by NEDs in making effective dialogue at board meetings and in addressing CG issues (e.g. Halablian and Rajagopalan, 2006; Roberts et al., 2003; FRC, 2006). Method This study adopts content analysis method to collect and analyse data. It is a technique used for "objective, systematic and quantitative description of the manifest content of communication" (Kassarjian, 1977, P. 8). We selected this method because of its ability to address three important properties: stability, reliability, and validity. Stability is ensured by continuous and consistent use of same coding given to document. The properties of mutual exclusiveness and mutual exhaustiveness are addressed to ensure reliability. General theoretical frames works are used in the literature, application of methodology, and in the discussion of findings to ensure internal validity. 75 annual reports were used for identifying and coding of NEDs roles and corporate governance mechanisms. Contingency tables and frequency analysis are used for interpreting data. Chi Square statistical test was used to see whether the coded data is randomly distributed ensuring mutual exclusiveness and exhaustiveness of the categories (Cooper and Schindler, 2003). In the analysis and discussion, tasks of NEDs were identified as dimensions of roles. Results The findings indicate that the nature of task of NEDs of AMI listed firms is characterised by multiplicity of tasks and task variation by the type of chair. For example, the content analysis indicated 24 tasks of NEDs. Some of these tasks such as strategy, advice, monitoring are well established findings in the literature. This study found number of cognitive tasks such as beliefs, considerations, and expectations. With regard to variation of task by the type of chair, it was found that some task categories are more relevant to particular type of chair, which was classified as Chair, executive chair, non executive chair. With regard to specific characteristics of tasks of NEDs of AIM companies, the study found three major roles and relationships. They are (1) identification of the needs of several share holders, (2) concerns about more corporate governance than strategic direction, and (3) Cognitive tasks and their relationships to key board tasks. The degree of voluntary acceptance of principles and provisions of CCCG of AIM listed companies was reflected by the types of chairs, number of NEDs, and acceptance of sub committees of the board. Implications This study contributes to fill the knowledge gap in the literature with regard to the role of NEDs of SMEs in general and AIM listed companies in the UK in particular. The identification of common and specific roles played by NEDs of AIM companies would be useful for enhancing tasks, responsibilities and performance of NEDs. This contribution might be useful for effective fulfilment of interest of stakeholders of SMEs and AIM companies in the UK. To best of our knowledge, this study is the first if its kind to explore the role of NEDs in AIM companies by using content analysis. As such this study has the strength of providing methodological and research design insights for future researchers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we examine the content of children's television programs from the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) that have become popular in recent years, including Thomas & Friends, Bob the Builder and Barney & Friends. Using both content analysis and comparative historical methodology, we seek to use Althusser's (1971) concept of ideology and ideological state apparatus (ISA) to demonstrate the relationship of these programs to the emergence of neo-liberalism and the transformation of political-economic social formations in the U.K. and the U.S. since Thatcher and Reagan. We consider these shows to be an integral part of the ISA and we compare the content of these shows to Sesame Street to reveal the change in discourse as an example of the resurgence of ideological interventions in the reproduction of social relations of production as outlined in the Althusserian framework. This article also incorporates the work of British Cultural Studies, Fiske (1987 and 1989) and critics of Fiske to intervene in the discussion and debate about the situation of television and popular culture more generally, especially the debate about the extent to which television is able to exert hegemonic control and ideological closure. While there has been much research on these questions concerning television more generally, very little research on children's programming has been conducted using this framework. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on content analysis of newspapers and in-depth interviews of journalists, this article analyzes the role of the media in defining the European Union and, therefore, in contributing to the production and reproduction of social representations of the EU in the public. The research concentrated on three EU member countries: France, Spain, and the United Kingdom (UK). The study is theoretically informed by the agenda-setting role of the media. Results demonstrate that there are major differences among the newspapers analyzed here in terms of how they represented the EU in the news, according to their nationality and political orientation. Furthermore, many of the principles that dominate the production of news undermine information on the EU. The material on the EU presented to a misinformed public tends to reinforce traditional views on economics, politics, and society, including the widespread belief that a national government is better than the EU for solving society's problems. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]