Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Lesley University Library Newsletter, Vol. 2(2), Hedi Benaicha, Jonah Lee Santiago, Micki Harrington, Zack Wray, Rachel Fernandez, Philip M. Siblo-Landsman, Abby Mancini, Marie Wasnock, Samantha Quiñon Snair, Jamie Glass, Alexis Dhembe, Robyn Ferrero, Tyahra Angus

Philip M. Siblo-Landsman

The Spring 2018 Lesley University Library Newsletter is an overview of developments that have taken place in the library since the Fall 2017 semester. It reports on success stories, gives insight into personal accounts of library resources, and new developments to enhance the quality of services.

The newsletter begins with an overview by Dean Hedi BenAicha and is followed with contributions from many of the staff members of the library. This includes Sam Quiñon's article, "Attention Faculty: what Lesley Librarians Actually Do," which indicates how the library field has changed and how important it is for librarians to engage in …

Lesley University Library Newsletter, Vol. 2(1), Hedi Benaicha, Rachel Fernandez, Micki Harrington, Philip M. Siblo-Landsman, Abby Mancini, Mikayla Collins, Sam Quiñon

Philip M. Siblo-Landsman

The second volume of the Lesley University Library Newsletter debuts a new layout. Topics covered include an overview of the 2016-2017 academic year, new library resources, an article on the librarian as a generalist, new faculty workshops, the development of information literacy tools for online learning, and an overview of scholarly publishing tools.

Massachusetts Medicaid Members That Smoked In 2008: Characteristics Associated With Smoking Status In 2014, Alexis D. Henry, John Gettens, Judith A. Savageau, Doris Cullen, Anna Landau

Judith A. Savageau

The smoking rate among non-elderly Medicaid enrollees is more than double the rate for those privately insured; smoking-related conditions account for 15% of Medicaid expenditures. Under state health reform, Massachusetts Medicaid (MassHealth) made tobacco cessation treatment available beginning in 2006. We used surveys conducted in 2008 and 2014 to examine changes in smoking abstinence rates among MassHealth members identified as smokers and to identify factors associated with being a former smoker. Members previously identified as smokers were surveyed by mail or phone; 2008 and 2014 samples included 3,116 and 2,971 members, respectively. Surveys collected demographic and health information, asked members …

An Old Tool With Enduring Value: Using Excel To Prepare Data For Analysis, Gregory A. Smith

Gregory A. Smith

Microsoft Excel was first released on the Windows platform 30 years ago and has since become widely used. Although new tools for manipulating, analyzing, and visualizing data are constantly emerging, Excel remains a potent tool—and not just because of newer features. Simple functions such as TRIM, MID, SUBSTITUTE, FIND, ROUNDDOWN, and VLOOKUP can be used to manipulate data sets in powerful ways. This workshop applies selected functions to realistic library data sets. Demonstrations include: deriving time-series categories from date and time stamps pre-coding survey comments based on keywords dealing with messy data points such as call numbers and publisher names …

History Of The 3rs In Toxicity Testing: From Russell And Burch To 21st Century Toxicology, Martin L. Stephens, Nina S. Mak

Martin Stephens, PhD

Toxicity testing is a key part of the process of assessing the hazards, safety, or risk that chemicals and other substances pose to humans, animals, or the environment. Standardized methods for such testing, typically involving animals, began to emerge during the first half of the 20th century. In 1959, British scientists William Russell and Rex Burch proposed a framework for reducing, refining, or replacing animal use in toxicology and other forms of biomedical experimentation. This “3Rs” or “alternatives” approach emerged at a time of growing sensitivity to the use of animals in experimentation, and progress in its implementation has been …

Are Politicians Office Or Policy Motivated? The Case Of U.S. Governors' Environmental Policies, Per G. Fredriksson, Le Wang, Khawaja Mamun

Per Fredriksson

Are elected politicians primarily motivated by holding office, thus choosing environmental policies accordingly? Or are they motivated by the chance to implement their preferred environmental policies? Do governors have character, in the sense that they promise and implement environmental policies consistent with their own preferences? To answer these questions, we study the differences in environmental spending across both re-electable and lame duck governors from the two main political parties. In our empirical analysis, we make use of parametric and non-parametric regression-discontinuity approaches. While re-electable governors do not set significantly different policies, lame duck governors do. We argue that in the …

Taxing Under The Influence? : Corruption And U.S. State Beer Taxes, Per G. Fredriksson, Stephan Gohmann, Khawaja Mamun

Per Fredriksson

This article examines the effect of state level corruption on state beer taxes in the United States. Our lobby group model predicts that corruption reduces the beer tax, but this effect is conditional on the level of alcohol-related vehicle deaths. Using a panel of state level data from 1982 to 2001, we find that increased corruption is associated with lower state beer tax rates. The magnitude of the effect, however, declines with increases in alcohol-related traffic deaths. Our findings suggest that future empirical work estimating the effect of alcohol taxes on alcohol-related traffic fatalities should treat alcohol taxes as endogenous.

National Assessment Program: Sample Assessment: Civics And Citizenship Report: Years 6 And 10: 2016, Julian Fraillon, Eveline Gebhardt, Judy Nixon, Louise Oakwell, Tim Friedman, Michelle Robins, Mark Mcandrew

Julian Fraillon

Under the National Assessment Program, the Civics and Citizenship sample assessment is administered to a representative sample of Year 6 and Year 10 students every three years. It is conducted under the auspices of the Education Council. The National Assessment Program – Civics and Citizenship assesses students’ skills, knowledge and understandings of Australia’s system of government, civic institutions and the values which underpin Australia’s democracy. It also provides an indication of student attitudes and their engagement in civic-related activities at school and in the community. This report presents the findings of the fifth National Assessment Program – Civics and Citizenship …

62. The Effects Of Implicit Encouragement And The Putative Confession On Children’S Memory Reports., Kyndra C. Cleveland, Jodi A. Quas, Thomas D. Lyon

Thomas D. Lyon

Critical Animal And Media Studies: Expanding The Understanding Of Oppression In Communication Research, Nuria Almiron, Matthew Cole, Carrie P. Freeman

Carrie P. Freeman

The Practitioner, The Priest, And The Professor: Perspectives On Self-Initiation In The American Neopagan Community, Marty Laubach, Louis Martinie’, Roselinda Clemons

Marty Laubach

Initiation is a religious practice that is generally understood as involving socialization and acceptance into a religious community, but American Neopaganism, with its emphasis on individualism and autonomy, has evolved a meaning that challenges that simple understanding. American Neopagan communities are marketplaces of ideas that are comprised of groups and solo practitioners, all in interaction in which they might conduct main holidays together, but not necessarily work together in what they would consider more “serious” practices in which they receive the spirit communications with which they develop the ideas. Among groups, these practices include initiations through which candidates are trained …

Weaving Connections: Utilizing A Library – Social Work Partnership To Build Information Literacy Skills, David Vess, Laura Trull

David Vess

Time For Change: Aid, Ngos, And Transitional Justice In Bosnia-Herzegovina, Arnaud Kurze

Arnaud Kurze

This article examines Scandinavian donor practices in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH) with regards to post-conflict justice activities. BiH has been a laboratory of reconstruction, peace-building and transitional justice processes since the end of the war in 1995. While issues related to rebuilding and developing war-torn societies and their economies have attracted extensive scholarly attention, the question of international aid practices in transitional justice contexts remains widely understudied. Although the influence of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in reconciliatory transitional justice work has been growing, the relationship between international donors and local NGOs involved in these projects remains very limited. The objective of this study …

Innovative School Counseling Approaches To Improving College And Career Readiness, Nick R. Abel, Brandie Oliver

Nick R. Abel

School counselors are at the forefront of efforts to improve the college readiness of K-12 students. It is clear that many roadblocks exist with regard to college readiness and adequate access to college counseling. Many public schools serving minority, first-generation, low-income students have school counselors with large caseloads and numerous non-counseling duties leaving them with little time to spend on college counseling (Clinedinst, Koranteng, & Nicola, 2015). This exploratory study aimed to review promising practices that target college and career readiness for students. A deeper investigation was conducted at an urban school serving underrepresented students which revealed an innovative five-year, …

Beyond Powerpoint: Innovative Ways To Engage Counselors-In-Training, Nick R. Abel, Rick Auger

Nick R. Abel

No abstract provided.

Reap What You Sow: Planting The Seeds Of Supervision In Your Master's Students, Nick R. Abel, Tom Keller, Brandie Oliver

Nick R. Abel

Nick Abel's handout from the NCACES 2016 conference.

Student Success Skills: An Evidenced-Based Program To Impact Student Outcomes, Nick R. Abel

Nick R. Abel

No abstract provided.

Spotlighting Stigma And Barriers: Examining Secondary Students' Attitudes Toward School Counseling, Nick R. Abel, Rick Auger, Brandie Oliver

Nick R. Abel

No abstract provided.

Degrees Of Poverty: The Relationship Between Family Income Background And The Returns To Education, Timothy J. Bartik, Brad J. Hershbein

Timothy J. Bartik

Drawing on the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we document a startling empirical pattern: the career earnings premium from a four-year college degree (relative to a high school diploma) for persons from low-income backgrounds is considerably less than it is for those from higher-income backgrounds. For individuals whose family income in high school was above 1.85 times the poverty level, we estimate that career earnings for bachelor’s graduates are 136 percent higher than earnings for those whose education stopped at high school. However, for individuals whose family income during high school was below 1.85 times the poverty level, the career …

Degrees Of Poverty: The Relationship Between Family Income Background And The Returns To Education, Timothy J. Bartik, Brad J. Hershbein

Brad J. Hershbein

Drawing on the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we document a startling empirical pattern: the career earnings premium from a four-year college degree (relative to a high school diploma) for persons from low-income backgrounds is considerably less than it is for those from higher-income backgrounds. For individuals whose family income in high school was above 1.85 times the poverty level, we estimate that career earnings for bachelor’s graduates are 136 percent higher than earnings for those whose education stopped at high school. However, for individuals whose family income during high school was below 1.85 times the poverty level, the career …

Liability For Mass Sexual Abuse, Tsachi Keren-Paz, Richard W. Wright

Richard W. Wright

Dj Returns With Frequent Guest, Prof. Todd Swanstrom, Todd Swanstrom

Todd Swanstrom

No abstract provided.

Climate Change, Cattle, And The Challenge Of Sustainability In A Telecoupled System In Africa, Tara S. Easter, Alexander K. Killion, Neil H. Carter

Neil H. Carter

Information, energy, and materials are flowing over greater distances than in the past, changing the structure and feedbacks within and across coupled human and natural systems worldwide. The telecoupling framework was recently developed to understand the feedbacks and multidirectional flows characterizing social and environmental interactions between distant systems. We extend the application of the telecoupling framework to illustrate how flows in beef affect and are affected by social-ecological processes occurring between distant systems in Africa, and how those dynamics will likely change over the next few decades because of climate-induced shifts in a major bovine disease, trypanosomosis. The disease is …

Hand Annotation And Reliability: Corpus Linguistic Approaches To Teaching And Studying Writing, Brian Larson

Brian Larson

200 Years Of Us Immigration In One Gorgeous Visual, Tsion Chudnovsky

Tsion Chudnovsky, JD

Inequality, Boom, And Bust: From Billionaire Capitalism To Equality And Full Employment, Howard J. Sherman, Paul Sherman

HOWARD J SHERMAN

Inequality, Boom, And Bust: From Billionaire Capitalism To Equality And Full Employment, Howard J. Sherman, Paul Sherman

HOWARD J SHERMAN

Graduate Outreach Services Perspectives From Two University Library Programs.Pptx, Nashieli Marcano, Corinne Bishop

Nashieli Marcano

No abstract provided.

Paranormal Activity In West Virginia, Marty Laubach

Marty Laubach

Follow the Mountain State Spirit Seekers Society as they hunt ghosts at Moundsville State Prison; bigfoot hunters in Dolly Sods with Virginia Sasquatch Watch; and Point Pleasant's mysterious Mothman.

Structural Identity Theory And The Dynamics Of Cross-Cultural Work Groups, P. Christopher Earley, Marty Laubach

Marty Laubach

The creation of a global village, transnational corporations, internet and similar influences remind us constantly that a science of organizations and management is incomplete without the integration of concepts of culture and self-awareness. It is no longer appropriate to discuss organizational activities and employee actions without incorporating a more complete view of where such activities take place. Not only must we include an immediate social context, but we must deal with the international and cultural aspects of the social world as well. More than ever, understanding of employee action requires knowledge of how action is related to the environment in …