Involvement in traditional and electronic bullying among adolescents

The increasing availability of Internet and cell phones has provided new avenues through which adolescents can bully. Electronic bullying is a new form of bullying that may threaten adolescent social and emotional development. In this study the relation between involvement in electronic and traditional bullying was examined. Eighty-four adolescents completed questionnaires regarding their involvement in traditional and electronic bullying. Results show that students' roles in traditional bullying predicted the same role in electronic bullying. Also, being a victim of bullying on the Internet or via text messages was related to being a bully at school. Traditional victims were not found to be electronic bullies. Perceptions of the effects of and motivations for electronic bullying are discussed.     

Exposure to electronic media between 6 and 24 months of age: An exploratory study

This study explores the associations between electronic media exposure, age, and socioeconomic status (SES) in a longitudinal sample of 24 infants from English-speaking families. Leveraging Language ENvironment Analysis (LENA) technology, the study seeks to characterize the relation between electronic media exposure and parental and child vocal activity. We analyzed ecologically valid, daylong audio recordings collected in infants’ homes when they were 6, 10, 14, 18, and 24 months old. SES was measured with the Hollingshead Index, and exposure to electronic media and adult and infant vocal activity were measured automatically with LENA. On average, the children in the sample were exposed to 58 min of electronic media daily. We found that electronic media exposure was negatively associated with SES and decreased with child age, but only amongst high-SES families. We also found that electronic media exposure negatively impacted concurrent adult and child vocal activity, irrespective of SES and infant age. The present findings are an important step forward in examining the role of demographic factors in exposure to electronic media and enhance our understanding of the mechanisms through which exposure to electronic media may impact linguistic development in infancy and beyond.     

Electronic Creativity Techniques for Organizational Innovation

Innovation is the key to survival. Domestic and international competitions, changing government regulations, and rapidly evolving global market conditions demand constant and visionary innovation. The aim of this paper is to explore ways of using advance electronic and communication technology to improve innovation in organizations. This paper proposes that two group creativity techniques, PMI and synectics, should be implemented electronically in Group Support Systems to complement electronic brainstorming and support group idea generation. Not only are these two group creativity techniques well-developed and popular in the industry, their electronic counterparts have the added capability of transcending space and time constraints. A comparison of electronic brainstorming, PMI, synectics, and their verbal counterparts is discussed in the paper.     

Information Technology Support For Debiasing Group Judgments: An Empirical Evaluation

Human judgments, made by either individuals or groups, have been found to contain biases. One of the most prevalent biases identified is the availability bias, associated with the phenomenon that events which are more available to human memory are correspondingly judged as occurring more frequently or as being more important. This paper is concerned with how to reduce the availability bias in the group context. It reports an experiment in which two computer-based support facilities, electronic brainstorming and electronic mail, were tested for their contributions to reducing the availability bias. A 2 x 2 experimental design was used: electronic brainstorming (available or not) and communication mode (electronic or verbal). Forty teams of three members each were asked to work on a task involving the rating of the importance of a number of items associated with a secretary's task. Both electronic brainstorming and electronic communication helped reduce the availability bias. In both cases, the reduction in bias was due to increased attention paid to items that were found to have low availability in the absence of these support tools. Copyright 2000 Academic Press.     

Überwachung mittels „elektronischer Fußfessel“

For forensic expert witnesses the introduction of electronic surveillance to the German penal code system raised new questions, such as the effects on relapse prevention. This paper presents international experiences about the effects of electronic tagging, especially on relapse prevention, and lists the advantages and disadvantages of this procedure. Also the recommendations for electronic tagging concerning a sexual offender who was repeatedly convicted and released after 10 years of imprisonment are described.     

Long-term natural ageing of a dissociated dislocation in a Cu-13.43 at.% Al alloy

The nature of impurity-dislocation interactions is one of the key questions governing the strength and plasticity of solid-solution materials. To investigate the influence of impurities on the mechanical properties of intermetallic NiAl, the electronic structure and energy of NiAl with a <100>{010} edge dislocation and transition-metal impurities was calculated using the real-space tight-binding linear muffin-tin orbital method. The localized electronic states, appearing in the core of the dislocation, are found to lead to strong impurity-dislocation interactions via two mechanisms: firstly, chemical locking, due to strong hybridization between impurity electronic states and dislocation localized states; secondly, electrostatic locking, due to long-range charge oscillations caused by the electron localization in the dislocation core. The results obtained explain qualitatively why the solid-solution hardening effect in NiAl correlates with the electronic structure of impurities rather than with size misfit, as expected according to traditional views.     

Emotion Reporting Using Electronic Diaries Reduces Anxiety Symptoms in Girls With Emotion Dysregulation

Theory and empirical research suggest that electronic diaries, which require children to report on their emotional experiences, might encourage emotional processing and facilitate a reduction in symptoms of anxiety, particularly for children exhibiting emotion-related deficits. Electronic diaries were given to 52 children (aged 7–12) to track their emotions and associated intensity for 7?days; anxiety was assessed prior to and after the use of the electronic diary by both parent- and child-report. It was hypothesized that the use of an electronic diary to track emotional experiences would lead to a reduction in anxiety symptoms for those children high in poor awareness, high in expressive reluctance, and low in emotion coping. The use of electronic diaries was effective at reducing child self-reported anxiety symptoms in girls who reported low emotion coping and reducing parent-reported anxiety for girls who reported a high reluctance to express emotions. Current findings suggest that having children identify their emotions using electronic diaries may be particularly beneficial for girls who are reluctant to express emotions and who report poor coping abilities.     

Monitoring and Performance: A Comparison of Computer and Supervisor Monitoring1

This research addresses how computer monitoring affects the way individual workers perform on their jobs. The study tests the effects of a supervisor's physical versus electronic presence on individual worker performance. Forty-two women were hired to perform a simple data entry task. The women worked in one of three conditions: (a) alone, (b) in the physical presence of the supervisor who monitored their work, or (c) computer-monitored (electronic presence) by the data entry system without the physical presence of the supervisor. It was hypothesized that social facilitation effects would result from either the physical or electronic presence conditions. Electronic presence does seem to result in social facilitation, though the mean differences are not statistically significant. The results for physical presence are mixed. Profile analysis indicates that there are significant differences in the patterns of performance. When subjects work alone or with electronic presence, performance follows a steady pattern. When subjects work with physical presence, performance is somewhat lower than in the alone condition, except when the supervisor is actively monitoring, then individual performance is significantly increased. There are no satisfaction differences between the three conditions. The results of this research suggest that “Big Brother” is not lurking inside every computer-monitoring system.     

Using electronic discussion boards to teach responsible conduct of research

This study presents the results of a survey of student satisfaction with electronic discussion boards in a course on the responsible conduct of research (RCR). On a 1–5 scale, the respondents stated that the use of the electronic discussion board was an effective teaching tool (4.71), that it enabled them to get feedback from their peers (4.43), that it helped promote discussion and debate (4.36), that it helped them learn how to analyze ethical dilemmas in research (4.36), and that they would consider using an electronic discussion board, if they ever taught a course themselves (4.76). In their written comments, the respondents indicated that electronic discussion boards are a convenient way of promoting debate and in-depth discussion. These results suggest, but do not prove, that discussion boards can promote debate and discussion in courses on research ethics. Instructors who teach RCR should consider using electronic discussion boards in regular or online courses, and they should consider studying the effectiveness of electronic discussion boards in research ethics education. Although electronic discussion boards cannot replace the face-to-face interaction that occurs in a classroom setting, they may provide a useful medium for the exchange of ideas and opinions online.     

家庭社会经济地位对幼儿词汇理解的影响：多重中介效应分析

摘 要 目的：探讨家庭阅读环境（HLE）和电子媒介暴露在家庭社会经济地位（SES）和幼儿词汇理解间的中介作用。 方法：使用家庭基本信息调查表、家庭阅读环境问卷、皮博迪图片词汇测验对278名幼儿及其父母进行调查。 结果：（1）SES、HLE各维度（除hle5）与词汇理解呈显著正相关;电子屏幕使用时间与SES、HLE各维度和词汇理解呈显著负相关;（2）HLE和电子屏幕使用时间分别在SES和母亲受教育水平与幼儿词汇理解间起链式中介作用。 结论：HLE和电子屏幕使用时间在SES和幼儿词汇理解间起中介作用。     

Playing with technology: Mother–toddler interaction scores lower during play with electronic toys

To investigate play with electronic toys (battery-operated or digital), 25 mother–toddler (16–24 months old) dyads were videotaped in their homes playing with sets of age-appropriate electronic and non-electronic toys for approximately 10 min each. Parent–child interactions were coded from recorded segments of both of the play conditions using the PICCOLO checklist. Mean scores for each play session were compared and the result showed significantly lower scores in the electronic toy condition for three of the four domains of the PICCOLO. Family demographic and play pattern data were also collected, via self-report questionnaire. These data indicated that the play experiences of toddlers were compromised by the lower quality of parent–child interaction during joint play with electronic toys. The potential impact on early child development and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

Making the Right Connections: Perceptions of Human Resource/Personnel Directors Concerning Electronic Job-Search Methods

To be competitive in today's job market, many entry-level management candidates are looking to electronic technology to help them find employment. Although technology is an essential part of today's business environment, the findings of this study indicate that very few of the human resource/personnel directors (HR/PD) in the top 100 privately owned companies in Georgia are using electronic technology to fill entry-level managerial positions. These HR/PD, however, view positively those applicants who use electronic methods for job searching and predict that these methods will become a common practice within 2 years.     

The Rice Virtual Lab in Statistics

The Rice Virtual Laboratory in Statistics is an integrated combination of an electronic textbook, simulations/demonstrations, and case studies. The electronic textbook covers basic concepts in statistics and data analysis and contains links to data analysis tools, instructional demonstrations/simulations, and other on-line texts. The simulations and demonstrations help make abstract concepts concrete and allow students to investigate various aspects of statistical tests and distributions. Case studies demonstrate the real-world applicability of statistical methods. Materials are available on the World-Wide Web.     

Adapting Work Analysis to a Fast-Paced and Electronic Business World

The reliance of traditional job analysis on job incumbents as the primary source of work-analytic data is critically examined. It is argued that the sole use of incumbents is practically and theoretically unjustified. The incorporation of non-incumbents to the work analysis process is advocated, especially when abstract human attributes and strategic requirements are evaluated. The time and resource savings afforded by the use of mechanical estimation of work dimensions are also discussed. A revision of traditional formats of data collection in job analysis such as paper-and-pencil surveys and face-to-face interviews is proposed. Instead, the potential work-analytic uses of electronic records of work information nowadays available in electronic performance monitoring systems are outlined.     

The on-line voyeur: Promises and pitfalls of observing electronic interaction

Studies that compare objective data on communication activity to data provided in verbal reports have indicated that verbal report data are not as accurate as one might hope. Researchers of communication have used verbal reports as their primary source of data because it presents a cheap and easy way to collect the data. This paper presents an easy alternative involving the study ofelectronic communication: a method that allows the collection of objective information on electronic communication, thus avoiding the problems associated with self-reports. The paper reviews the available literature on the accuracy of self-reports of communication, presents the instrument used to collect the objective electronic communication data, and discusses some of the difficulties and limitations encountered in implementing a study using the instrument.     

Group Creativity and Technology

Despite the popularity of brainstorming, research has shown that verbal brainstorming is not always effective in increasing group creativity. On the other hand, its electronic counterpart, electronic brainstorming, appears to produce much better results. Is technology the panacea for group idea generation? This paper first reviews the theory of group creativity and then examines the characteristics of electronic brainstorming that makes it more effective than verbal brainstorming. From the success of electronic brainstorming, it then argues that the use of technology might be the key to overcome the space and time constraints that are commonly faced by creativity groups.     

The electronic teaching theater: Interactive hypermedia and mental models of the classroom

The introduction of hypermedia into the classroom presents both an opportunity to expand the power of teaching through electronic facilitation of the media and a challenge to redesign the classroom and instructional environment to exploit the enhanced features of hypermedia. This paper briefly surveys the current state of computers in the classroom and then argues that a more integrated approach is required. To this end, the concept of an electronic teaching theater is proposed which takes advantage of hypermedia and collaborative work environments. The aim of the electronic teaching theater is not to totally redesign the classroom and instructional interaction, but rather to facilitate it using well understood metaphors to lay out the dynamics of classroom interaction on the electronic media and to use the results from research in human/computer interaction to design the interface. To facilitate the application of hypermedia, a model of instructional interaction among the students, the instructors, the course material, and the products of instruction is presented. A number of component models pertaining to course preparation, lectures, note taking, and other instructional activities are then discussed that should prove useful in designing the electronic classroom. The origin of these models is the mental representation of the interaction as perceived by the teacher and the student. The idea is to start with such models as a base metaphor, to instantiate the metaphors in the electronic classroom, and then to explore innovations in the technology that go beyond the strict application of the metaphor. This work was supported in part by a grant from AT&T to the University of Maryland during the author’s visit to the Medical Research Council—Applied Psychological Unit, Cambridge, England. Appreciation is expressed to Patricia Wright and Richard M. Young for their helpful comments on this paper.     

The electronic mood device: Design, construction, and application

The electronic mood device (EMD) is designed to help answer questions about the variability and dynamics of emotions. It is a small, portable instrument used for repeated recording of moods and feelings. Both construction and operation of the EMD are described. The EMD can best be conceived of as an electronic mood adjective checklist. Persons using the EMD are signaled at designated (e.g., hourly) or random intervals to register their mood or feelings. Paper and pencil are not required. An application is given. It shows how feelings vary within and between persons and during the day. It is concluded that the EMD offers several advantages over paper-and-pencil instruments. Retrospective use is impossible. Timing and registration are accurate. Data handling is fast. Potential future applications are suggested.