Health insurance literacy: A mixed methods study of college students

Objective: This study examines the health insurance literacy, or the ability to use health insurance effectively, of college students. Participants: A total of 455 students from a large, public university completed an online questionnaire in November 2016. Methods: A questionnaire examined students’ knowledge of commonly encountered health insurance terms and ability to apply that knowledge to determine cost-sharing in a clinical setting. Results: The majority of students were able to correctly identify the most commonly encountered terms, but could not identify terms related to plan types and options. Eighty-eight percent of students could not determine their cost-sharing for two presented scenarios. Approximately half of the students indicated they had been confused about their health insurance plan, with one-quarter of students stopping or delaying medical care due to confusion. Conclusions: Outreach and education for students should target specific deficits in knowledge such as those identified in this study.     

Building a health communication brand for University of Texas System tobacco control

Objective: Despite declining cigarette smoking rates in the US, there is a continued need for tobacco prevention education campaigns to reach young adults. Recognizing the need for improved tobacco control messaging, the University of Texas (UT) System engaged The University of Texas at Austin Center for Health Communication to develop a brand and message that would strengthen tobacco control efforts at its 14 institutions. Methods: This article describes the iterative process involved in creating a brand for tobacco control, including an environmental scan, identifying potential message themes, and creating and refining logos. Results: This article highlights the process of developing a system-wide tobacco control brand. Specifically, the process included coordinating an interdisciplinary team with content and design experts, and presenting ideas to stakeholders for serial feedback and refinement, among others. Conclusions: Ultimately, this project offers a model for other systems of higher education interested in pursuing similar initiatives.     

Factors that influence elementary school teachers’ attitudes towards inclusion of visually impaired children in Turkey

There is a scarcity of research on inclusion of visually impaired children in Turkey. Specifically, a gap exists concerning the attitudes of elementary school teachers towards the inclusion of visually impaired children in mainstream schools. This article uses data from two questionnaires, leveraging the responses of 253 teachers from rural and urban areas. The results demonstrate that elementary school teachers commonly hold positive attitudes towards the inclusion of visually impaired children and that teachers’ initial and in-service training about inclusion positively influenced their attitudes. Our findings are in contrast with earlier research which argues that teachers do not hold positive attitudes to inclusion, and highlights that a key barrier to inclusion stems from elementary school teachers feeling unprepared to teach visually impaired children. We conclude that greater post-qualification training is required to enable teachers to operationalise different approaches that facilitate the inclusion of visually impaired children.     

Let the right one in: A Bourdieusian analysis of gender inequality in universities’ senior management

This article examines the lack of gender diversity in senior management positions in professional staff in universities. These results are analysed via a Bourdieusian analysis of economic, social, cultural and symbolic capital. Through a purposeful sample of senior professional staff working in universities in three countries: Australia, Canada and the UK, six career‐enhancing strategies needed for career success were determined. The article critiques the resource‐based view of career capital and argues that capitals accumulation for career success can be understood by considering the concepts of symbolic violence and habitus as a way of understanding intra‐cohort differences. It proposes that by considering both the subjective and objective cultural constructs via habitus, and by acknowledging the importance of symbolic capital and symbolic violence towards women, this may be one way of increasing female representation in senior management.     

Education and wage inequality in the informal sector: The case of Cameroon

This article analyses the effects of education on wage inequality in the informal sector in Cameroon. The author uses quantile regression on data from the Second survey on employment and the informal sector in Cameroon (EESI 2) of 2010. The results indicate that both wages and wage inequality increase with education in the informal sector, with tertiary education creating greatest inequality. These findings point to a number of policy recommendations for a transition to formality, such as the creation of more jobs for a skilled workforce, the development of sites adapted to informal sector activities and the creation of more vocational schools.     

Data falsification and question on academic integrity

In this commentary, we argue that plagiarism is not a new problem in academic publishing and data falsification in recent times has received a great attention globally. Due to lack of literature, the objective of this study is to evaluate data falsification and academic integrity. Accordingly, the study presents the academic misconduct (Falsification/Fabrication of data and Concerns/Issues About Data) case of Professor James E. Hunton, a former top ranked accounting professor from Bentley University. The study shows how research fraud/data falsification activity in the academic world lacks honesty and morality. The study offers some recommendations for the detection of plagiarism and academic misconduct. In the age of the Internet and digital era, Crossref, iThenticate, the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) would help to detect plagiarism. However, the question remains on detecting data falsification in the academic world.     

《易经》文学化品质的三维结构

《易经》是一部文学化的哲学著作。结构维域下其具有言、象、意等三个层面的成分构成,具有语音的韵律性音乐性、字词含义的精练性多义性、阐义释理的形象性生动性、载道寓理的蕴藉性丰富性等文学品质。对《易经》进行文学化结构成分分析,可以使人感受《易经》与后世文学的契合和交流关系,彰显其文学品质价值。可以拉近《易经》与读者之间的心理距离,使《易经》获得更多的文化观照。但目前相关方面的研究并不系统充分,对此有探讨研究的空间和必要。     

三级装备制造业供应链质量管理行为研究

作为我国工业化建设和国民经济发展的根本保证,供应链环境下装备制造企业的产品质量问题受到了广泛关注。本文重点考虑产品质量对供应链收益的影响,运用微分对策理论研究由单一制造商、单一部件供应商和单一零件供应商构成的三级装备制造业供应链质量管理行为的协调问题。通过对比Nash非合作博弈和Stackelberg主从博弈两种分散式决策模式及集中式决策模式下协同合作博弈的均衡结果,得到相关结论,并利用算例进行验证。研究表明,①分散式决策下,制造商的质量管理行为相同,但相比于Nash非合作博弈,Stackelberg主从博弈能够改善部件供应商和零件供应商的质量管理行为,提升供应链成员的收益水平;②集中式决策下,供应链成员的质量管理行为达到最优,系统整体收益实现最大。研究结论为装备制造业供应链成员间质量管理战略联盟的构建提供了理论依据。     

面向服务的复杂成形装备产品架构设计与优化

复杂成形装备作为高端制造产业的基础装备,是各产业转型升级和技术进步的重要保障。同时快速发展的互联网与大数据等新兴信息技术已经成为装备制造业创新不可或缺的组成部分,极其深刻地影响着复杂成形装备产业的制造模式、发展战略以及产品的开发方式。本文研究了面向服务的复杂成形装备产品架构设计与优化方法。采用公理化设计的域结构思想,建立需求域、功能域和架构域之间的映射关系;提出了基于QFD的功能生成方法以及功能模型约简方法;利用DMM建立产品架构和服务架构之间的关联关系;利用模块化理论方法,并考虑成本因素对产品架构进行优化。     

The dynamics of citizen sociolinguistics

The objective of this paper is to explore the dynamics of citizen science (CS) in sociolinguistics or citizen sociolinguistics, i.e. the engagement of non‐professionals in doing sociolinguistic research. Based on a CS‐study undertaken in Norway where we engaged young people as citizen scientists to explore linguistic diversity, this paper aims to clarify the definition of citizen sociolinguistics; it seeks to advance the discussion of the advantages of CS and of how CS can contribute to sociolinguistics; it also addresses the opposite: how sociolinguistics can contribute to the general field of citizen science; and it discusses the challenges of a CS‐methodology for sociolinguistic research, epistemologically and ethically, as well as in terms of recruitment, quality control and possible types of sociolinguistic tasks and topics. To meet the needs of society and societal challenges of today there is a need to develop methods and establish scientific acceptance for the relevance of public engagement in research. This paper argues that citizen sociolinguistics has the potential to advance the societal impact of sociolinguistics by constructing a dialogue between ‘the academy’ and ‘the citizens’; citizen sociolinguistics relies on and encourages participatory citizen agency, provides research experience, stimulates curiosity, further research, public understanding of science and (socio)linguistic awareness, and encourages linguistic stewardship.