Disciplinary Groups Research Articles

Distributed expertise: qualitative study of a British network of multidisciplinary teams supporting parents of children with chronic kidney disease.

BackgroundLong-term childhood conditions are often managed by hospital-based multidisciplinary teams (MDTs) of professionals with discipline specific expertise of a condition, in partnership with parents. However, little evidence exists on professional–parent interactions in this context. An exploration of professionals' accounts of the way they individually and collectively teach parents to manage their child's clinical care at home is, therefore, important for meeting parents' needs, informing policy and educating novice professionals. Using chronic kidney disease as an exemplar this paper reports on one aspect of a study of interactions between professionals and parents in a network of 12 children's kidney units in Britain.MethodsWe conducted semi-structured, qualitative interviews with a convenience sample of 112 professionals (clinical-psychologists, dietitians, doctors, nurses, pharmacists, play-workers, therapists and social workers), exploring accounts of their parent-educative activity. We analysed data using framework and the concept of distributed expertise.ResultsFour themes emerged that related to the way expertise was distributed within and across teams: (i) recognizing each other's' expertise, (ii) sharing expertise within the MDT, (iii) language interpretation, and (iv) acting as brokers. Two different professional identifications were also seen to co-exist within MDTs, with participants using the term ‘we’ both as the intra-professional ‘we’ (relating to the professional identity) when describing expertise within a disciplinary group (for example: ‘As dietitians we aim to give tailored advice to optimize children's growth’), and the inter-professional ‘we’ (a ‘team-identification’), when discussing expertise within the team (for example: ‘We work as a team and make sure we're all happy with every aspect of their training before they go home’).ConclusionsThis study highlights the dual identifications implicit in ‘being professional’ in this context (to the team and to one's profession) as well as the unique role that each member of a team contributes to children's care. Our methodology and results have the potential to be transferred to teams managing other conditions.

Our 21st century health identity: Where is sleep?

That public health affects us is well documented in this issue of the Journal of Public Health. The topics in this issue cover health across the lifespan with six manuscripts discussing in detail the promotion of health of the most vulnerable people; i.e., children, women and minorities. Several dimensions of their health are adversely affected, and the interdisciplinary approach to their health discussed in this issue underscores the importance of a pertinent network of public health worldwide. This is especially the case when vulnerability ‘accumulates’, forming our 21st century health identity. More specifically, a worldwide public health network should not only govern threats to health during the daytime but equally during nighttime. For where we sleep, how we sleep, when we sleep, how much we sleep... or the “sleep-determinants of health” are amongst the many factors affecting our health in general. Thus, our current health, or the health of young adults and the elderly, as well as our future health or our children’s health, should be subject to discussion and debate from a day/night perspective. Whether guidelines are implemented in real life, health care is a highly relevant topic in terms of continued public health education and training of professionals as well as in providing optimum health care. Several reasons for not adhering to guidelines, such as reduced vigilance during our professional endeavors, can be listed. Sleep studies in medical residents suggest impairments in several domains, including attention, cognition, motor skills, and mood (Mansukhani et al. 2012; Reed et al. 2010). Unfortunately, in such a global fast-paced lifestyle, only medical errors or complications may alert us. In their observational study, Boettger et al. recommend improvements in the treatment of patients with impaired renal function. The authors discuss the practice of therapy in these patients and alert us to the negative clinical implications and the legal reasons. Being attentive regarding risk factors for adverse health outcomes can extend to the general population. In adults aged 50+, behavioral risk factors are likely multiple and varied. Linardakis et al. indicate that across European countries, the prevalence rate of multiple behavioral risk factors such as alcohol, smoking habits, physical inactivity is different. Regarding all risk factors studied, inactivity prevailed; thus, one may question the association of inactivity with sleep (Ding et al. 2013). Yet, already at a young age, behavioral risks may accrue; for instance, poor sleep (Spruyt et al.) may further promote health threats. Difficulties initiating or maintaining sleep, or circumstances impeding optimal sleep may increase vulnerability to adverse health outcomes (Spruyt and Gozal 2012; Spruyt et al. 2011). Alternatively, sleep problems such as difficulties staying asleep is commonly reported in subjects with posttraumatic stress disorder (Lamarche and De Koninck 2007; Singareddy and Balon 2002). Haase et al., for instance, report on human trafficking, a violation of human dignity affecting mostly women and children. The report is regarding the three Pparadigm—prevention, protection and prosecution—which was developed by a highly disciplinary group under the framework of the Siena Principles on Human Trafficking and Public Health. The authors emphasize the substantial health and social implications, with long-lasting grave and adverse impact on the individual, public health, human K. Spruyt (*) Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Pleinlaan 2, Brussel 1050, Belgium e-mail: spruytsleep@gmail.com

International and domestic co-publishing and their citation impact in different disciplines

This paper studies disciplinary differences in citation impacts of different types of co-publishing. The citation impacts of international, domestic inter-organizational and domestic intra-organizational co-publications, and single-authored publications, are compared. In particular, we examine the extent to which the number of authors explains the potential differences in citation impacts when compared to the influence of different types of international and domestic collaborations. The analysis is based on Finland's publications in Thomson Reuters Web of Science database in 1990---2008. Finland is a small country, thus, it has fewer opportunities to find collaborators inside own country when compared to larger countries. Finland's science policy has underlined internationalization and research collaboration as key means to increase the quality and impact of Finnish research. This study indicates that both international and domestic co-publishing have steadily increased during the past two decades in all disciplinary groups. International co-publications gain on average more citations than domestic co-publications. In natural sciences and engineering, co-authorship explains only a small proportion of variability in publications' citation rates. When the effect of the number of authors is taken into account there are no big differences in citation impacts between international and domestic co-publications. However, international co-publications by ten authors or more gather significantly more citations than other publications. In humanities, the difference in citation impacts between co-authored publications in relation to single-authored publications is significant. However, international co-publications are not on average more highly cited in relation to domestic co-publications in humanities.

Sustainability research: Organizational challenge for intermediary research institutes

The agricultural sustainability challenge is often formulated in terms of meeting the increasing demand for food of a growing and wealthier world population while simultaneously reducing environmental impacts. Strategies to meet this challenge include increasing agricultural yields, saving land and diverting agricultural produce from use for feed and fuel. The paper compares such strategies based on natural sciences with alternatives captured under the umbrella of sustainability sciences, based on systems and mixed sciences approaches. Theoretical and methodological foundations of various branches of sustainability have been developed over the last decades at academia, but although experimentation -putting theory into action- has been carried out a in The Netherlands to a considerable degree, this has hardly led to institutional change of research constellation itself. It is argued that intermediary research institutes by their position in between academia, practice and between government and society are in principle well positioned to incorporate sustainability science. This requires boundary management beyond the traditional boundaries of biological and technical disciplines and their fields of application and retention of methodology and knowledge within with units of scientists with complementary knowledge and skills. To become effective doing sustainability science can probably only be achieved after a prolonged period of experimentation and evaluation, while the shared base of theories, methods and networks form the core of such a knowledge system, as contrasted to disciplinary groups.

Developing an Approach for Data Management Education: A Report from the Data Information Literacy Project

This paper describes the initial results from the Data Information Literacy (DIL) project designed to identify the educational needs of graduate students across a variety of science disciplines and respond with effective educational interventions to meet those needs. The DIL project consists of five teams in disparate disciplines from four academic institutions in the United States. The project teams include a data librarian, a subject-specialist or information literacy librarian, and a faculty member representing a disciplinary group of students. Interviews with the students and faculty members present a detailed snapshot of graduate student needs in data management education. Following our study, educational programs addressing identified needs will be delivered in the fall of 2012 and spring of 2013. Our findings from the project interviews are analyzed here, with a preview of the training approaches that will be taken by the five teams.

Exploring the role of instructional technology in course planning and classroom teaching: implications for pedagogical reform

Instructional technology plays a key role in many teaching reform efforts at the postsecondary level, yet evidence suggests that faculty adopt these technology-based innovations in a slow and inconsistent fashion. A key to improving these efforts is to understand local practice and use these insights to design more locally attuned interventions. This exploratory study draws on systems-of-practice theory from distributed cognition research to provide a framework for producing comprehensive accounts of technology use. This account includes three components: (a) awareness of the local resource base for instructional technology, (b) decision-making processes regarding tool use, and (c) actual classroom use of technology. Interviews and classroom observations of 40 faculty in math, physics, and biology departments at three research universities in the U.S. were analyzed using thematic and causal network analysis. Results indicate that faculty have both a shared and discipline-specific resource base for instructional technology. The adoption, adaptation, or rejection of technology-based innovations is influenced by the alignment among pre-existing beliefs and goals, prior experiences, perceived affordances of particular tools, and cultural conventions of the disciplines. Classroom use of technology varied across disciplinary groups, with mathematicians and biologists exhibiting relatively limited repertoires of tool use while physicists used a larger variety of tools. Additionally, different tools were associated with different teaching methods and types of student cognitive engagement. Policymakers and instructional designers can use these insights to inform the design and implementation of technology-based initiatives, especially in ensuring that innovations resonate with existing belief systems and practices.

Penalties and premiums: The impact of gender, marriage, and parenthood on faculty salaries in science, engineering and mathematics (SEM) and non-SEM fields

The prevalence of gender wage gaps in academic work is well documented, but patterns of advantage or disadvantage linked to marital, motherhood, and fatherhood statuses have been less explored among college and university faculty. Drawing from a nationally representative sample of faculty in the US, we explore how the combined effects of marriage, children, and gender affect faculty salaries in science, engineering and mathematics (SEM) and non-SEM fields. We examine whether faculty members’ productivity moderates these relationships and whether these effects vary between SEM and non-SEM faculty. Among SEM faculty, we also consider whether placement in specific disciplinary groups affects relationships between gender, marital and parental status, and salary. Our results show stronger support for fatherhood premiums than for consistent motherhood penalties. Although earnings are reduced for women in all fields relative to married fathers, disadvantages for married mothers in SEM disappear when controls for productivity are introduced. In contrast to patterns of motherhood penalties in the labor market overall, single childless women suffer the greatest penalties in pay in both SEM and non-SEM fields. Our results point to complex effects of family statuses on the maintenance of gender wage disparities in SEM and non-SEM disciplines, but married mothers do not emerge as the most disadvantaged group.

On “Quality Patient Care in Labor and Delivery: A Call to Action”

While each disciplinary group has a specific scope of practice, the statement underscores the importance of the central focus on our patients, both mother and child. By working together, we can ensure quality patient care and outcomes. The recommendations for action, focusing on communication, shared decision making, teamwork and quality measurement, are steps that all organizations and institutions should keep in mind as we collaborate to provide the best possible care for our patients and their families.

Ethical principles for project collaboration between academic professionals or institutions and the biomedical industry

Ethics in biomedical research cannot be defined by etymology, and need a semantic definition based on national and contemporary values. In a Nordic cultural and historic context, key values are solidarity with one’s fellow man, equality, truth, justice, responsibility, freedom, and professionalism. In contemporary medical research, such ethics are further subgrouped into research ethics, researcher ethics, societal ethics, and distributive ethics. Lately, public and academic debates have addressed the necessary strengthening of the ethical concerns and interests of patients and society. Despite considerable progress, common ethical definitions and control systems still lack uniformity or indeed do not exist. Among the cooperative partners involved, the pharmaceutical industry have preserved an important role. The same is true for the overall judgments reflected by the European Forum for Good Clinical Practice, leading peer-reviewed journals, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics for developing nations, and the latest global initiative, the Singapore Statement on Research Integrity. To help both institutions and countries, it will be valuable to include the following information in academia–industry protocols before starting a project: international authorship names; fixed agendas and time schedules for project meetings; chairperson shifts, meeting reports, and project plan changes; future author memberships; equal blinding and data distribution from disciplinary groups; an equal plan for exchange of project manuscripts at the proofing stage; contractual descriptions of all procedures, disagreements, publishing rights, prevention, and controls for suspected dishonesty; and a detailed description of who is doing what in the working process.

Australian Clinician’s Views on Interprofessional Education for Students in the Rural Clinical Setting

AbstractBackground: Collaboration between education providers and clinical agencies to develop models that facilitate cross-disciplinary clinical education for students is essential to produce work-ready graduates.Methods and Findings: This exploratory study investigated the perceptions of and opportunities for interprofessional education (IPE) from the perspectives of 57 clinical staff from three regional/rural health services across Victoria, Australia. Data were collected through a semi-structured questionnaire, interviews, and focus group discussions with staff from 15 disciplinary groups who were responsible for clinical education. Although different views emerged on what IPE entailed, it was perceived by most clinicians to be valuable for students in enhancing teamwork, improving the understanding of roles and functions of team members, and facilitating common goals for patient care. While benefits of IPE could be articulated by clinicians, student engagement with IPE in clinical areas appeared to be limited, largely ad hoc, and opportunistic. Barriers to IPE included: timing of students’ placements, planning and coordination of activities, resource availability, and current regulatory and education provider requirements.Conclusions: Without the necessary resources and careful planning and coordination, the integration of IPE as a part of students’ clinical placement experience will remain a largely untapped resource.

Administrators' decisions about resource allocation

Do academic administrators make decisions about resource allocation differently depending on the discipline receiving the funding? Does an administrator's academic identity influence these decisions? This study explored those questions with a sample of 1,690 academic administrators at doctoral-research universities. Participants used fictional summaries of academic program reviews. The summaries had scenarios of increased-resources and shrinking-resources involving hard versus soft and pure versus applied disciplines. Administrators were forced to choose among them for funding decisions. Results showed that a hard-applied discipline, mechanical engineering, was evaluated as significantly more likely to receive additional resources and to be exempted from cuts than examples from other disciplinary groups: physics, English, and elementary education. Decisions varied significantly with participants' home disciplines, but not their longevity in academe or in administration.

Revisiting the Landscape of Literatures: Replication and Change in the Use of Subject Collections

Circulation data from the Virginia Tech Libraries were analyzed to determine the extent of continuity or change between the author’s study of the use of subject collections in 1982 and the present. Book circulation has declined, largely due to much less use by undergraduates. The overall profile of subject use has changed in ways traceable to changes in the population of active library users. Disciplinary groups who still rely on library monographs do so in ways strikingly similar to their behavior in 1982, and the findings strongly replicate the earlier findings that were most suggestive for library practice and the sociology of knowledge.

Different research markets: a disciplinary perspective

Drawing upon the notions of academic capitalism and the transformation of academic research from traditional academic orientation into market orientation, the paper sets out to empirically scrutinize the changing nature of academic research, focusing especially on disciplinary differences. The paper is based on a survey of heads of departments and research units at Finnish universities representing all disciplinary groups (n = 255) and on in-depth interviews with Finnish academics (n = 31) in the fields of humanities, social sciences, technology and natural sciences. Based on the survey data, the funding, selection of research topics, collaboration partners, audiences and publication forums in research are analysed. Following this, five research markets are discerned: academic, corporate, policy, professional and public market, each characterized by its own values and rationality as to what is considered the reference group, basic objective and outcome of research. The paper concludes that the transformation thesis needs to be revisited and specified since on the one hand, academic orientation still remains crucially important in all disciplinary groups, and on the other hand, market orientation entails several kinds of markets, pointing to the versatility of the university–society relationship.

Perceptions of Feedback among Undergraduate and Postgraduate Students of Four Health Science Disciplines

Feedback is an important support for student learning. Yet data suggests that some students are often under-whelmed with the feedback they receive. Two factors potentially influencing this perception are entry level and type of health science program. To investigate this further, 492 undergraduate and postgraduate students from four health science disciplines (occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech pathology and audiology) at a large Australian university were asked to complete a survey on the feedback that they had received during their studies. Students reported that they valued feedback with 93% seriously engaging with their feedback and 88% considering that feedback assisted their learning. However, different perceptions on some areas of feedback were reported by different groups. Postgraduate students had significantly (p< 0.01 to 0.0005) higher satisfaction with several aspects of feedback than undergraduate students, while audiology students reported significantly (p< 0.05 to 0.0001) higher satisfaction levels than the other disciplinary groups. Fifty-eight percent of the students felt that feedback would be improved if it was more timely and if there was more of it, particularly in practical classes (55%). Methods of improving the feedback provided to these students are discussed.

Disciplinary Differences in Student Ratings of Teaching Quality

Comparisons of large samples of course and teaching evaluation questionnaire data show consistent disciplinary differences. The current study examined the disciplinary differences in a theoretical model positing the impact of the perceived nature of teaching and learning environment on the development of generic capabilities by testing of (1) whether a common model of good teaching operated across disciplines and (2) the extent of deployment of teaching variables and their impact on learning outcomes. The sample consisted of 3,305 first and third year Chinese undergraduates of a university in Hong Kong, divided into four broad disciplinary groupings. Multiple-group structural equation modelling analysis showed configural invariance of the hypothesised model, suggesting a common model of good teaching across disciplines; and significant differences in the magnitude of structural paths and latent mean values across the four disciplinary groups were obtained reflecting differences between disciplines in the extent to which elements within the teaching and learning environment were brought into play. Possible reasons in terms of the epistemological nature of the disciplines were given to explain for the disciplinary variations.

Planning training seminars in palliative care: a cross-sectional survey on the preferences of general practitioners and nurses in Austria.

BackgroundTraining in palliative care is frequently requested by health care professionals. However, little is known in detail about the subject matters and the educational preferences of physicians and staff or assistant nurses in this field.MethodsAll 897 registered GPs and all 933 registered home care nurses in the district of Steiermark/Austria were sent postal questionnaires.ResultsResults from 546 (30%) respondents revealed that GPs prefer evening courses and weekend seminars, whereas staff and assistant nurses prefer one-day courses. Multidisciplinary sessions are preferred by almost 80% of all professional groups. GPs preferred multi disciplinary groups most frequently when addressing psychosocial needs (88.8%) and ethical questions (85.8%). Staff and assistant nurses preferred multidisciplinary groups most frequently in the area of pain management (88%) and opted for multi disciplinary learning to a significantly higher extent than GPs (69%; p < 0.01). Those topics were ranked first which are not only deepening, but supplementing the professional training. On average, GPs were willing to spend a maximum amount of € 400 per year for training seminars in palliative care, whereas nurses would spend approximately € 190 for such classes.The results provide a detailed analysis of the preferences of GPs and nurses and offer guidance for the organisation of training seminars in palliative care.ConclusionsMedical and nursing education programs often pursue separate paths. Yet our findings indicate that in palliative care multidisciplinary training seminars are favoured by both, doctors and nurses. Also, both groups prefer topics that are not only deepening, but supplementing their professional knowledge.

Enhancing academic climate: doctoral students as their own developers

This study describes a collaborative initiative with doctoral students to create an academic climate more conducive to fostering interaction across disciplinary groups in a faculty of education in North America. The project attempted to ensure that these students had a voice in creating practices, structures, and policies in the faculty that would enhance their doctoral experience. The evidence suggests that students emerged as their own and others' developers, with a commitment and preparedness to provide leadership within the faculty. While situated in a particular faculty, we believe that the findings have important development implications in other settings since they offer an alternate perspective on development – a shift from expanding training to meet perceived needs to creating opportunities for individuals to construct their own learning opportunities. Cette étude décrit une initiative collaborative, impliquant des doctorants, visant à créer un climat académique permettant davantage d'interactions entre groupes disciplinaires au sein d'une Faculté d'Education en Amérique du Nord. Le projet visait à assurer que ces étudiants puissent s'exprimer relativement à la création de pratiques, structures et politiques qui amélioreraient leur expérience doctorale au sein de la faculté. Les résultats indiquent que les étudiants sont devenus contributeurs de leur propre développement et de celui de leurs collègues, par leur implication et leur volonté à exercer un leadership au sein de la faculté. Bien que les résultats soient ancrés dans une faculté spécifique, il nous semble que ceux‐ci ont des implications importantes en matière de développement pour d'autres environnements puisqu'ils offrent une perspective alternative à l'égard du développement – un déplacement depuis l'idée d'offrir des activités de formation répondant à des besoins perçus vers la création d'occasions pour des individus de construire leurs propres scénarios d'apprentissage.

Citation analysis and peer ranking of Australian social science journals

Citation analyses were performed for Australian social science journals to determine the differences between data drawn from Web of Science and Scopus. These data were compared with the tier rankings assigned by disciplinary groups to the journals for the purposes of a new research assessment model, Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA), due to be implemented in 2010. In addition, citation-based indicators including an extended journal impact factor, the h-index, and a modified journal diffusion factor, were calculated to assess whether subsequent analyses influence the ranking of journals. The findings suggest that the Scopus database provides higher number of citations for more of the journals. However, there appears to be very little association between the assigned tier ranking of journals and their rank derived from citations data. The implications for Australian social science researchers are discussed in relation to the use of citation analysis in the ERA.

POLITICAL ACTS? TOWARD THE RECUPERATION OF OPINION

Encouraging debate on inclusion and equity can meet with awkward silences, particularly across disciplinary boundaries. In disability studies, for example, it can be difficult to build dialogue with other disciplines; as a consequence, the different disciplinary groups within the field of education often end up working in their own “equity” silos. In this essay Valerie Harwood addresses this concern by drawing on Hannah Arendt's emphasis on the importance of opinion together with Michel Foucault's work on truth‐telling and critique. Following Arendt's emphasis on opinion and the political, Harwood makes the case that political acts in education require that we recuperate the importance of opinion and to take account of how truth functions in our contemporary context.

A comparison of UK academics' conceptions of information literacy in two disciplines: English and Marketing

The authors aim to present and compare findings from a phenomenographic investigation into conceptions of information literacy in two populations: academics in English and Marketing disciplines teaching at British universities. These were chosen as examples of, respectively, soft-pure and soft-applied disciplines.We begin by defining information literacy and briefly setting our research in context. We explain the nature of research using the phenomenographic approach, and describe our sample and methods. We present firstly, the four qualitatively different conceptions of information literacy held by the English academics, and then the seven conceptions held by the Marketing academics. Key differences between the conceptions held in the two disciplines are discussed, in particular relating differences to characteristics of soft-pure and soft-applied disciplines. The authors conclude that study of the differences between the conceptions held by the two disciplinary groups can illuminate and guide information literacy initiatives.