Non-traditional Information Sources Research Articles

How external and internal factors affect translators’ source preferences – survey results

ABSTRACT Existing studies on translators’ information-seeking behavior (ISB) have either investigated translators in general or a selected group of translators (e.g. legal translators). The aim of this study was to investigate whether there were differences in the source preferences of translators according to selected factors, such as age, experience, direction of translation, use of CAT tools, post-editing practice, working language, and translation speed. The data were collected through a survey of 226 Polish professional translators. In order to examine the possible differences, we compared the answers of the selected translator subgroups (divided according to the above factors) to one question: ‘On a scale of 1–5, how often do you use the following sources when translating?’ The results were tested for statistical significance. It was found that the authorless online sources were used more often by younger and less experienced translators. MT and CAT technologies do not relieve translators of information research (no drastic differences in the frequency of source use). Translation into the mother tongue generally requires more source consultation than translation into the L2. Translators using technology rely more on non-traditional information sources.

The use of multimedia education instruments in the process of training of future specialists in labour protection

The article describes the functionality of multimedia education instruments to train future specialists in labour protection. One of the tasks of HEI is to train a future specialist for professional activity in a highly developed information and communication environment, who must be a connoisseur of modern pedagogical technologies, able to independently acquire and deep knowledge and skills. The primary task of the higher educational institution should introduce the forms and methods of students’ active learning into the educational process practice. The purpose of the article is to analyse the functionality of multimedia teaching instruments that will determine the effectiveness of their use in the process of future labour safety professionals’ training. While doing the research, theoretical methods made it possible to identify problems and tasks, to study the scientific literature and summarize the material. The latest multimedia educational instruments give students the opportunity to use non-traditional information sources, improve the efficiency of self-study work, give new opportunities for creativity, and implement new forms and methods of learning. Multimedia learning tools greatly expand the capabilities of teachers, which promotes individualization of learning, activation of students' cognitive activity and adapts the learning process to their individual characteristics. Each student can work in its own mode, choose the rate at which the material is optimally assimilated. Information technologies are used to develop educational technologies and create modern effective learning tools. They have a large range and potential to improve the learning process. The students’ individual self-work helps to consolidate, deepen and systematize the acquired knowledge. In order to ensure and improve the quality of the educational process, it is necessary to develop and implement modern information and communication technologies along with the traditional means of education. The introduction of multimedia technologies in the educational process will improve the quality of knowledge, strengthen the motivational aspect, the students’ cognitive interest to increase the level of professional training.

Big Data sources and methods for social and economic analyses

The Data Big Bang that the development of the ICTs has raised is providing us with a stream of fresh and digitized data related to how people, companies and other organizations interact. To turn these data into knowledge about the underlying behavior of the social and economic agents, organizations and researchers must deal with such amount of unstructured and heterogeneous data. Succeeding in this task requires to carefully plan and organize the whole process of data analysis taking into account the particularities of the social and economic analyses, which include the wide variety of heterogeneous sources of information and a strict governance policy. Grounded on the data lifecycle approach, this paper develops a Big Data architecture that properly integrates most of the non-traditional information sources and data analysis methods in order to provide a specifically designed system for forecasting social and economic behaviors, trends and changes.

Investor sentiment and stock returns: Evidence from provincial TV audience rating in China

Abstract In this paper, we advocate the provincial TV audience rating as the novel proxy for the provincial investor sentiment (PIS) and investigate its relation with stock returns. The empirical results firstly show that the PIS is positively related to stock returns. Secondly, we provide direct evidence on the existence of home bias in China by observing that the provincial correlation coefficient is significantly larger than the cross-provincial correlation coefficient. Finally, the PIS can explain a large proportion of provincial comovement. To sum up, all these findings support the role of the non-traditional information sources in understanding the “anomalies” in stock market.

Log in if you survived: Collective coping on social media in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines

This study explores the use of Facebook for collective coping in the immediate aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest storms ever recorded on Earth, which hit the Philippines in November 2013. When traditional communication channels became non-operational, non-traditional information sources and communication platforms, such as Facebook, became salient. Drawing from interviews with 29 individuals from various groups—government officials, local journalists, and residents—this study found three collective coping strategies facilitated by Facebook. First, social media became a platform for survivors to tell their friends and family they survived. Second, social media provided a means for residents to participate in the social construction of their experience. Finally, social media also became a venue for survivors to manage their feelings and memories by documenting—and memorializing—what they experienced and how they are moving on.

Evaluation and Verification of the Global Rapid Identification of Threats System for Infectious Diseases in Textual Data Sources.

The Global Rapid Identification of Threats System (GRITS) is a biosurveillance application that enables infectious disease analysts to monitor nontraditional information sources (e.g., social media, online news outlets, ProMED-mail reports, and blogs) for infectious disease threats. GRITS analyzes these textual data sources by identifying, extracting, and succinctly visualizing epidemiologic information and suggests potentially associated infectious diseases. This manuscript evaluates and verifies the diagnoses that GRITS performs and discusses novel aspects of the software package. Via GRITS' web interface, infectious disease analysts can examine dynamic visualizations of GRITS' analyses and explore historical infectious disease emergence events. The GRITS API can be used to continuously analyze information feeds, and the API enables GRITS technology to be easily incorporated into other biosurveillance systems. GRITS is a flexible tool that can be modified to conduct sophisticated medical report triaging, expanded to include customized alert systems, and tailored to address other biosurveillance needs.

Conveying the sense-making corporate persona: The Mobil Oil “Observations” columns, 1975–1980

Since at least the early 20th century, the corporation has arisen in the US as an entity that attempts to help individuals make sense of the world through the use of public relations. Public relations scholarship, however, tends to focus on how corporations primarily articulated their worth through touting how the products and services they offered were constructive to society. This study, however, through a review of Mobil's “Observations” advertorials that ran from 1975 through 1980, reveals how a corporation attempted to build an influential persona by offering a corporate personality, that is an empathetic fellow traveler who is also believable and aspirational. This examination of the presence of the corporate persona points to lingering concerns, especially regarding how well the corporation can realize and communicate its corporate character in a world that is increasingly complicated by the rise of non-traditional information sources (e.g., social media), and interlocking, systemic concerns (e.g., climate change, economic/ecological sustainability). Public relations can assist in better understanding such factors so that the corporate persona can act in ways that benefit stakeholders and society.

A forgotten tweet: Somalia and social media

Several studies highlight the power of social media outlets to raise awareness, funds, and further recovery efforts in disaster-prone areas, but few have investigated where social media have been ineffectual. Although the long-running humanitarian crisis in Somalia receives only sporadic news coverage, the country is not without a social media presence. This study uses Coombs’ SCCT Model to evaluate the crisis response message strategies put forth via Twitter from leading Somali-based government agency sources. The limitations of social media as a force to exact change and manage crises in Africa is examined, and insight is offered into how social media channel information to traditional and non-traditional information sources.

Value relevance of blog visibility

This study empirically examines the effect of a non-traditional information source, namely a firm's blog visibility on the capital market valuation of firms. After controlling for earnings, book value of equity and other value relevant variables, such as traditional media exposure, R&D spending, and advertising expense, we find a positive association between a firm's blog visibility and its capital market valuation. In addition, we find blog visibility Grange causes trading, not vice versa. Our findings indicate that non-traditional information sources such as blogs help disseminate information and influence consumers' investment decisions by capturing their attention.

The Changing Landscape of Information Access:

This article explores the impact which this technological evolution is having upon the strategies employed by research libraries in their quest to provide access to the information and services. It also offers some thoughts on what library administrators, collection development professionals, acquisition managers, and others in the field can do in order to anticipate these developments, promote those changes which would be beneficial to the use community, and stay ahead of the demand for increased access to non-traditional information sources.