scholarly journals Serving Higher Education’s Highest Goals: Assessment of the Academic Library as Place

2011 ◽  
Vol 72 (5) ◽  
pp. 428-442 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather Lea Jackson ◽  
Trudi Bellardo Hahn
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Study ◽  
Positive Emotions ◽  
Academic Library ◽  
Psychology Of Religion ◽  
Assessment Techniques ◽  
Library As Place

An empirical study was conducted using methods borrowed from the psychology of religion (instead of corporate assessment techniques) to assess whether the academic library as place supports students’ desire to feel connected to higher education’s mission. The findings from an in-person survey of fifty-four students at three universities showed a preference for exterior and interior images of traditional libraries over those classed as modern, and those images evoked feelings of scholarship, engagement, spirituality, and other positive emotions, as well as subjects’ desire to use those spaces more than they currently use their existing library.

scholarly journals A case study of a conservation flagship species: the monarch butterfly

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephanie D. Preston ◽  
Julia D. Liao ◽  
Theodore P. Toombs ◽  
Rainer Romero-Canyas ◽  
Julia Speiser ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mixed Methods ◽  
Empirical Study ◽  
Positive Emotions ◽  
Monarch Butterfly ◽  
Mixed Methods Study ◽  
Flagship Species ◽  
Mass Migration ◽  
Tests Of Association ◽  
And Migration

AbstractWhat makes a flagship species effective in engaging conservation donors? Large, charismatic mammals are typically selected as ambassadors, but a few studies suggest butterflies—and monarchs in particular—may be even more appealing. To gather more information about people’s responses to monarchs, we conducted an empirical study of member submissions to a successful conservation campaign, the Monarch Story Campaign, conducted by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). The set of 691 stories along with their associated demographic and donation data was analyzed in a mixed-methods study using qualitative analysis and tests of association. The results showed that people often described encounters with monarchs in childhood and as adults. They expressed strong, positive emotions, and lauded the monarch’s beauty and other “awe-inspiring” qualities and expressed wonder at their lifecycle (i.e., metamorphosis and migration). They also raised conservation themes of distress at monarch loss, calls for action, and caretaking, such as being “fragile” and “in need.” Sharing personal encounters was associated with current efforts to save the species and more past financial donations, while a second pattern tied more donations to awe at the monarch’s mass migration. These results imply that conservation campaigns built around species people encounter may build lifelong awareness, concern, and actions towards conservation.

scholarly journals Book Review: Classroom Assessment Techniques for Librarians

2015 ◽  
Vol 55 (2) ◽  
pp. 169
Author(s):  
Calantha Tillotson
Keyword(s):  
Classroom Assessment ◽  
Academic Library ◽  
Educational Assessment ◽  
Library Instruction ◽  
Assessment Program ◽  
Assessment Techniques

Melissa Bowles-Terry and Cassandra Kvenild present Classroom Assessment Techniques for Librarians as a toolbox for instruction librarians seeking to create an assessment program in their academic library. Beginning by providing a basic introduction to educational assessment theory, Bowles-Terry and Kvenild build a foundation of understanding with their fellow instruction librarians regarding what assessment means and why it should be used in any library instruction program.

scholarly journals A Case Study of a Conservation Flagship Species: The Monarch Butterfly

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephanie D. Preston ◽  
Julia D. Liao ◽  
Theodore P. Toombs ◽  
Rainer Romero-Canyas ◽  
Julia Speiser ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Study ◽  
Positive Emotions ◽  
Monarch Butterfly ◽  
Mixed Methods Study ◽  
Flagship Species ◽  
The Past ◽  
Mass Migration ◽  
Tests Of Association ◽  
And Migration

Abstract What makes a flagship species effective in engaging conservation donors? Large, charismatic mammals are typically selected as ambassadors, but a few studies suggest butterflies – and monarchs in particular – may be even more appealing. To gather more information about people’s responses to monarchs, we conducted an empirical study of member submissions to a successful conservation campaign, the Monarch Story Campaign, conducted by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). The set of 691 stories along with their associated demographic and donation data was analyzed in a mixed-methods study using qualitative analysis and tests of association. The results showed that people often described encounters with monarchs in childhood and as adults. They expressed strong, positive emotions, and lauded the monarch’s beauty and other “awe-inspiring” qualities and expressed wonder at their lifecycle (i.e., metamorphosis and migration). They also raised conservation themes of distress at monarch loss, calls for action, and caretaking, such as being “fragile” and “in need.” Sharing personal encounters was associated with current efforts to save the species and more financial donations in the past, while a second pattern tied more donations to awe at the monarch’s mass migration. These results imply that conservation campaigns built around species people encounter may build lifelong awareness, concern, and actions towards conservation.

scholarly journals Game Playing: Proposing and Developing Queen Challenge Puzzle Game from 1 to 25 Levels

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 87
Author(s):  
Hussain Mohammad Abu-Dalbouh ◽  
Fahad Almansour ◽  
Nehal Aldowighri
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Empirical Study ◽  
Positive Emotions ◽  
Descriptive Statistics ◽  
Game Playing ◽  
Game Development ◽  
Game Board ◽  
The Cost

In recent decades, massive improvements in graphic sophistication have begun to produce declining returns. The creative focus in game development has shifted to artificial intelligence. The queens’ task game is part of a sequence of popular games. It is the challenge of putting n chess queens on a game board such that no two queens are threatening each other. The plan does not involve two queens sharing the same row, column or diagonal. Each column contains exactly one queen, each row contains exactly one queen, and each diagonal contains exactly one queen. For every level in the game, there are many ways to solve it. For example, there are 92 solutions to the 8×8 problem. There are many levels in the literature, but each level should be downloaded separately. Thus, it causes a lot of difficulties for players, and they should download each level to complete the challenge. This will lead to more time and effort being spent by the players, and the cost of each level will cost the players more and more. As a result, the number of players who want to play this game will decrease. The aim of this paper is to incorporate a number of levels in order to save time, money and effort by downloading each level separately. This paper also aims to develop the proposed prototype and display all the solutions while playing a puzzle game at any level. The proposed game was tested by a questionnaire-based empirical study. Descriptive statistics on the questions revealed that the players had achieved the objectives of the game by applying their skills and knowledge and that the players had positive emotions about the effectiveness of the proposed game.

scholarly journals Seven Years of Noise Reduction Strategies in an Academic Library Improve Students’ Perceptions of Quiet Space, Especially Among Graduate Students

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 179-181
Author(s):  
Elaine Sullo
Keyword(s):  
Graduate Students ◽  
Management Strategies ◽  
Academic Library ◽  
Management Program ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Free Text ◽  
Information Control ◽  
University Library ◽  
Library As Place ◽  
Noise Management

A Review of: McCaffrey, C. & Breen, M. (2016). Quiet in the library: An evidence-based approach to improving the student experience. portal: Libraries and the Academy, 16(4), 775-791.  http://doi.org/10.1353/pla.2016.0052     Abstract Objective – To examine the interventions implemented by an academic library for noise management, and their impact on library users, over a seven-year period.  Design – Retrospective data analysis. Setting – University library in Ireland. Subjects – LibQUAL data from 2007, 2009, 2012, and 2014. Methods – The researchers analyzed data from the 22 core LibQUAL questions and the three dimensions of library as place, information control, and effect of service. The study focused specifically on LibQUAL question LP2 in the library as place dimension: quiet space for individual work. Qualitative free text comments in the surveys related to noise or quiet issues were also analyzed. The adequacy mean was used to determine improvement in scores; this metric is calculated by subtracting the minimum mean score from the perceived mean score. Main Results – LibQUAL scores related to the quiet space question steadily improved over the seven-year period studied. The adequacy mean went from -1.2 to -0.13, representing a 1.07 degree of improvement. For all 22 questions, the adequacy mean increased from 0.02 to 0.38, showing overall improvement of 0.36. Researchers reviewed the data for all individual questions to measure the degree of change over the seven years; the quiet space question had the highest level of improvement of all of the questions. Considering user groups’ perceptions, there was a 2.03 degree of improvement for graduate students, while there was a 0.82 degree of improvement for undergraduates. The researchers wanted to know if the noise interventions had a specific impact on the quiet space question compared to a more general impact on the “library as place” dimension. None of the other “library as place” questions improved to the degree of the quiet space question. Of the “library as place” questions, question LP5, the group space question, was the only one where the adequacy mean dropped, with an adequacy mean difference of -0.23. External benchmarking conducted by the researchers put these results in an international context, using consortium data from ARL in North America and the Society of College, National and University Libraries (SCONUL) in the United Kingdom (U.K.). Conclusion – Based on the study findings, the long-term noise management program implemented from 2007 to 2014 at the University library had a measurable impact, and users’ perceptions of the quiet space in the library improved.  Because perceptions improved most among graduate students, researchers concluded that future efforts for noise management strategies should consider focusing on this group.

Religious Experience and the Theory of Signs

2021 ◽  
pp. 31-57
Author(s):  
Hans Joas
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Study ◽  
Religious Experience ◽  
William James ◽  
Psychology Of Religion ◽  
Friedrich Schleiermacher

The foundation of the psychology of religion in the work of William James and others is a major methodological breakthrough in the empirical study of religion. This psychology of religion focuses on experience, offering an alternative to the emphasis on religious doctrines or institutions. This chapter first presents a reconstruction of William James’s relevant writings. It then compares them to the theological writings of Friedrich Schleiermacher, who is sometimes seen as a source of inspiration for James. Finally it demonstrates the epochal achievement of Josiah Royce’s combination of pragmatist semiotics and the psychology of religion.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document