bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Plant‐attracted ants affect arthropod community structure but not necessarily herbivory
Authors: Mody Karsten , Linsenmair K. Eduard 
Published: April 2004

Abstract. 1. The effectiveness of ants as plant defenders is equivocal for plants that attract ants via extrafloral nectaries (EFNs).2. This study focused on the myrmecophilic savannah treePseudocedrela kotschyithat attracts ants to EFNs and on the arthropod fauna associated withP. kotschyi. Herbivory and arthropod community composition were compared between trees that were dominated by one of three congeneric ant species,Camponotus acvapimensis,C. rufoglaucus, andC. sericeus, and between trees where ants were experimentally excluded and untreated control trees.3. Short‐term ant‐exclusion experiments failed to demonstrate a consistent effect of ants on herbivory.4. Plants dominated by different ant species differed significantly in leaf damage caused by herbivorous insects. The relative ranking of herbivory levels of the trees dominated by different ant species was persistent in three consecutive years.5. Ants significantly reduced the abundance of different arthropod groups (Araneae, Blattodea, Coleoptera, Homoptera, non‐ant Hymenoptera). Other groups, including important herbivores, seemed not to be affected (Lepidoptera, Orthoptera, Thysanoptera, Heteroptera).6. The study suggests that the presence of ants only benefits plants when specific ant species are attracted, and protection by these ants is not counterbalanced by their negative effect on other beneficial arthropods.
Informal carers’ experience of caring for stroke survivors
Authors: Smith Lorraine N. , Lawrence Maggie , Kerr Susan M. , Langhorne Peter , Lees Kennedy R. 
Published: April 2004

Background.  Stroke is the third most common cause of death in industrialized countries and a major cause of adult disability. However, the burden of caring for stroke survivors usually rests with family members who have neither chosen nor volunteered for the role of ‘carer’.Aims.  This paper reports on a study which aimed to describe the experience of caring for a stroke survivor at one year after stroke in Scotland.Study design.  Semi‐structured, taped interviews were conducted with 90 carers of stroke survivors one year after stroke and the data analysed using NUD*IST. The interviews were part of a larger study, which included the administration of a range of valid and reliable multidimensional instruments to both carers and stroke survivors. The interview prompt schedule had been developed and tested in a previous study.Findings.  Although a medical emergency, stroke was not always diagnosed or treated as such by either the public or general practitioners. Initially most carers found that they lacked the knowledge and skills to care for the stroke survivor at home and so they had to learn how to obtain the information and assistance required. Carers had to adapt to the changes that stroke effected in the stroke survivor and seek alternative ways of securing the resources they needed for managing their lives. They thought that they had not been prepared adequately for the caring role or assessed satisfactorily in terms of whether they could manage given their skill level, age and/or health status.Conclusions.  A public health campaign to educate and inform that stroke is a medical emergency is required if stroke disability is to be minimized. The use of new technologies should be considered in facilitating carers’ learning how to care. There is a need to test alternative models of stroke follow‐up in multi‐centre studies that are holistic and place the carer‐stroke survivor at the centre of care.
The postmodern heart: war veterans’ experiences of invasive cardiac technology
Authors: Anderson Carole C. 
Published: April 2004

Background.  The consequences of war and medical discourse have historical connections to pacemaker technology. Understanding these consequences is important because war veterans, medicine and cardiac technology have a shared history that continues into the present. The incidence of Australian war veterans needing cardiac pacemakers has increased many‐fold in recent years, due to advancing age. This need was recognized by the Australian Department of Veteran Affairs and a cardiac programme was established in the veteran hospital that was the setting for this study.Aim.  This paper reports on a study aimed at capturing the interest and sensitizing the practice of nurses involved in the care of war veterans and other health care consumers who have been diagnosed as requiring a cardiac pacemaker. The study sought to answer the question, ‘How does the war veteran experience his body in relation to invasive cardiac technology?’.Method.  The research was guided by the principles of interpretive interactionism, and used unstructured interviews with eight male war veterans. The data were collected in 2000.Findings.  Thematic and content analysis revealed five themes: emotional knowing; the medical encounter; belief in the myth of miracle; technological constraint; and the altered heart. The findings indicated that the human dimension was characterized by experiences of ambivalence, inner conflict, powerlessness and suffering.Conclusion.  Nursing is at the interface of science and patient care, and this study contributes to nursing knowledge by focusing on a previously unresearched topic, namely embodied interactions between war veterans and invasive cardiac pacemakers. Within a highly technical area such as cardiology, nurses can still work around the technology and keep patients as their primary focus, thus promoting quality care. A humanistic rather than a technological focus locates nurses between patients and cardiac technology. In this in‐between location, nurses are not an extension of cardiac technology but a valuable source of information, education, and counselling.
Translation and validation of the Nursing Outcomes Classification labels and definitions for acute care nursing in Iceland
Authors: Gudmundsdottir Elisabet , Delaney Connie , Thoroddsen Asta , Karlsson Thorlakur 
Published: April 2004

Background.  The Nursing Outcomes Classification (NOC), second edition, consists of 260 patient outcomes with definitions. This has been translated into five languages, but has not been clinically validated outside the United States of America (USA).Aim.  The aim of this paper is to describe the translation of the labels and definitions from the NOC, second edition from English to Icelandic and validation for acute‐care nursing in Iceland.Method.  A survey that has been designed to identify nurses’ perception of the percentage of patients’ for whom each NOC outcome is relevant in clinical nursing practice was used for clinical validation in this study. The translation procedure involved source to target language translation, parallel comparison, pilot test and field test. Validation included test–retest to measure the reliability for each of the 260 outcome variables. Data collected from 140 clinical nurses from 54 departments within 13 nursing specialties at Landspitali University‐Hospital in Iceland, in November 2001, were analysed to establish construct validity by confirmatory factor analysis. Internal consistency was calculated.Results.  Translation was successful. Test–retest showed that 181 of the 260 NOC outcomes were significant (P < 0·05) and moderately or highly correlated (r > 0·50) (Pearson's correlation). The confirmatory factor analysis showed that 22 of the 29 NOC classes had only one factor at the loading criteria ≥0·30. Of the 260 outcomes, 244 had loading on one factor (≥0·30) within its class. Internal consistency was >0·80 (Cronbach's alpha).Limitations.  Low response rate was a limitation. The indicators of each NOC outcome were not addressed.Conclusion.  The Icelandic version of the NOC survey is a comprehensive tool that can be applied to nursing in acute‐care for research purposes as well as to prepare for the implementation of NOC in clinical information systems.
Involving older people in intermediate care
Authors: Andrews JoyAnn , Manthorpe Jill , Watson Roger 
Published: April 2004

Background.  Intermediate care has become a crucial part of the United Kingdom government's programme for improving services for older people. Older people comprise a substantial part of the user base for these services, and it is increasingly recognized that there is a need for greater user involvement in service development for intermediate care. National initiatives undertaken in intermediate care have sought to widen and deepen the remit of such services, and in this way promote greater independence and improved quality of care for older people. In particular, the government has set out clear plans for reshaping services for older people in the National Health Service Plan and the rationale for greater involvement of older people in service development. This article considers ways in which these national and local objectives may be achieved and considers some of the implications for nursing.Aim.  This paper aims to explore the concept of intermediate care and to identify trends and existing evidence of user involvement in care. In this way it charts a possible way forward for the development of a more ‘user sensitive’ approach.Method.  The following databases were searched: Medline, Cochrane Library, the Social Science Citation Index and CINAHL. Key words were ‘intermediate care’, ‘older people’, ‘formal care’, ‘primary care’, ‘social services’ and ‘geriatrics’, used in combination.Findings.  The findings from this study indicate that there is considerable scope for increased user involvement in service development for intermediate care. Such challenges may be more effectively met through greater clarity of the concept of intermediate care, and a bridging of user involvement at the practice and policy levels. Nurses are key providers of intermediate care in the community.Conclusions.  The involvement of older people in intermediate care service development must be premised on a shared comprehension of the purpose and function of intermediate care. Nurses must be involved in shifting intermediate care from being service‐focused to patient‐centred. Effective participation eschews the application of global constructs for older people, while supporting greater participation at all levels and robust implementation processes.
Concept mapping your Web searches: a design rationale and Web‐enabled application
Authors: Lee Y.‐J. 
Published: April 2004

AbstractAlthough it has become very common to use World Wide Web‐based information in many educational settings, there has been little research on how to better search and organize Web‐based information. This paper discusses the shortcomings of Web search engines and Web browsers as learning environments and describes an alternative Web search environment that combines a concept mapping and a data mining technique to address their drawbacks.
Designing learning objects that afford learners the experience of important variations in Chinese characters
Authors: Lam H. C. , Ki W. W. , Chung A. L. S. , Ko P. Y. , Lai A. C. Y. , Lai S. M. S. , Chou P. W. Y. , Lau E. C. C. 
Published: April 2004

AbstractEffective teaching should focus the attention of learners to its essential aspects. It follows that instructional software can be designed in such a way that allows learners to experience the important variations in the critical aspects of the content to be learned. This paper reports on the experience of designing such special kinds of instructional learning objects for the learning of Chinese characters. The design of these learning objects takes into consideration not only what Chinese characters are all about but also how learners commonly make errors while they learn to write the characters. Out of the analysis of these learners' errors, variations in the structural features of Chinese characters were pulled out and embodied in the design of the learning objects. Learners tinkering with the learning objects can thus implicitly develop a sense of the structural features or regularity of Chinese characters, which most importantly should prepare the learners to learn more new characters in the future. The main proposal of this paper is the notion of this variation‐affording instructional software that allows learners to attend to the essential aspects of what is to be learned. Furthermore, the idea of the learning object also differs from other instructional software in its small, self‐contained and reusable nature, such that teachers can flexibly embed the learning objects into their own teaching materials.
Increasing interactivity in lectures using an electronic voting system
Authors: Draper S. W. , Brown M. I. 
Published: April 2004

AbstractAn overview of the experience of the opening two years of an institution‐wide project in introducing electronic voting equipment for lectures is presented. Eight different departments and a wide range of group size (up to 300) saw some use. An important aspect of this is the organizational one of addressing the whole institution, rather than a narrower disciplinary base. The mobility of the equipment, the generality of the educational analysis, and the technical support provided contributed to this. Evaluations of each use identified (formatively) the weakest spots and the most common benefits, and also (summatively) showed that learners almost always saw this as providing a net benefit to them. Various empirical indications support the theoretical view that learning benefits depend upon putting the pedagogy (not the technology) at the focus of attention in each use. Perceived benefits tended to increase as lecturers became more experienced in exploiting the approach. The most promising pedagogical approaches appear to be Interactive Engagement (launching peer discussions), and Contingent Teaching – designing sessions not as fixed scripts but to zero in on using diagnostic questions on the points that the particular audience most needs on this occasion.
Effect of season of burn on shoot recovery and post‐fire flowering performance in the resprouter Stirlingia latifolia R. Br. (Proteaceae)
Authors: Bowen Barbara J. , Pate John S. 
Published: April 2004

Abstract  Stirlingia latifolia R. Br. is a proteaceous undershrub that is widespread in open woodlands and heathlands of the south‐west botanical province of Western Australia where it is subject to frequent fires, both natural and the result of fuel‐reduction burns. Shoots are completely destroyed by fire but regenerate rapidly by resprouting numerous new shoots from the root crown. Flowering is strongly triggered by fire with only sparse flowering in fire‐free periods. A study was undertaken to compare regrowth and flowering in populations of S. latifolia burnt in summer or autumn with populations burnt in spring as well as in unburnt population. Post‐fire flowering was recorded in 92% of plants burnt in summer/autumn compared with 73% of plants burnt in spring and less than 3% in populations that had not been burnt for more than 2 years. Plants burnt in summer/autumn resprouted an average of 8.5 shoots from their root crown, of which 93% developed an inflorescence. In contrast, spring‐burnt plants averaged only 5.9 shoots per plant with only 64% of these bearing an inflorescence. Ability to produce flowers was found to be related to plant age, with young individuals producing fewer or no inflorescences following spring burns in comparison with the more prolific flowering of similarly aged individuals following summer/autumn burns. Summer/autumn‐burnt plants also produced significantly longer inflorescence‐bearing shoots bearing a greater numbers of flower heads than those burnt in spring. Possible explanations for these results are given in the present report.
Seasonal drought and dry‐season irrigation influence leaf‐litter nutrients and soil enzymes in a moist, lowland forest in Panama
Authors: Yavitt Joseph B. , Wright S. Joseph , Wieder R. Kelman 
Published: April 2004

Abstract  Climatic conditions should not hinder nutrient release from decomposing leaf‐litter (mineralization) in the humid tropics, even though many tropical forests experience drought lasting from several weeks to months. We used a dry‐season irrigation experiment to examine the effect of seasonal drought on nutrient concentrations in leaf‐fall and in decomposing leaf‐litter. In the experiment, soil in two 2.25‐ha plots of old‐growth lowland moist forest on Barro Colorado Island, Republic of Panama, was watered to maintain soil water potential at or above field capacity throughout the 4‐month dry season. Wet‐season leaf‐fall had greater concentrations of nitrogen (N, 13.5 mg g−1) and calcium (Ca, 15.6 mg g−1) and lower concentrations of sulfur (S, 2.51 mg g−1) and potassium (K, 3.03 mg g−1) than dry‐season leaf‐fall (N = 11.6 mg g−1, Ca = 13.6 mg g−1, S = 2.98 mg g−1, K = 5.70 mg g−1). Irrigation did not affect nutrient concentrations or nutrient return from forest trees to the forest floor annually (N = 18 g m−2, phosphorus (P) = 1.06 g m−2, S = 3.5 g m−2, Ca = 18.9 g m−2, magnesium = 6.5 g m−2, K = 5.7 g m−2). Nutrient mineralization rates were much greater during the wet season than the dry season, except for K, which did not vary seasonally. Nutrient residence times in forest‐floor material were longer in control plots than in irrigated plots, with values approximately equal to that for organic matter (210 in control plots vs 160 in irrigated plots). Calcium had the longest residence time. Forest‐floor material collected at the transition between seasons and incubated with or without leaching in the laboratory did not display large pulses in nutrient availability. Rather, microorganisms immobilized nutrients primarily during the wet season, unlike observations in tropical forests with longer dry seasons. Large amounts of P moved among different pools in forest‐floor material, apparently mediated by microorganisms. Arylsulfatase and phosphatase enzymes, which mineralize organically bound nutrients, had high activity throughout the dry season. Low soil moisture levels do not hinder nutrient cycling in this moist lowland forest.
The pressure–temperature–time path of migmatites from the Sikkim Himalaya
Authors: Harris N. B. W. , Caddick M. , Kosler J. , Goswami S. , Vance D. , Tindle A. G. 
Published: April 2004

AbstractA combined metamorphic and isotopic study of lit‐par‐lit migmatites exposed in the hanging wall of the Main Central Thrust (MCT) from Sikkim has provided a unique insight into the pressure–temperature–time path of the High Himalayan Crystalline Series of the eastern Himalaya. The petrology and geochemistry of one such migmatite indicates that the leucosome comprises a crystallized peraluminous granite coexisting with sillimanite and alkali feldspar. Large garnet crystals (2–3 mm across) are strongly zoned and grew initially within the kyanite stability field. The melanosome is a biotite–garnet pelitic gneiss, with fibrolitic sillimanite resulting from polymorphic inversion of kyanite. By combining garnet zoning profiles with the NaCaMnKFMASHTO pseudosection appropriate to the bulk composition of a migmatite retrieved from c. 1 km above the thrust zone, it has been established that early garnet formed at pressures of 10–12 kbar, and that subsequent decompression caused the rock to enter the melt field at c. 8 kbar and c. 750 °C, generating peritectic sillimanite and alkali feldspar by the incongruent melting of muscovite. Continuing exhumation resulted in resorption of garnet. Sm–Nd growth ages of garnet cores and rim, indicate pre‐decompression garnet growth at 23 ± 3 Ma and near‐peak temperatures during melting at 16 ± 2 Ma. This provides a decompression rate of 2 ± 1 mm yr−1 that is consistent with exhumation rates inferred from mineral cooling ages from the eastern Himalaya. Simple 1D thermal modelling confirms that exhumation at this rate would result in a near‐isothermal decompression path, a result that is supported by the phase relations in both the melanosome and leucosome components of the migmatite. Results from this study suggest that anatexis of Miocene granite protoliths from the Himalaya was a consequence of rapid decompression, probably in response to movement on the MCT and on the South Tibetan detachment to the north.
Stress Provoking Factors in Dental Education
Authors: Divaris K. , Polychronopoulou A. 
Published: April 2004

Aim  To identify stress provoking factors in dental education and to explore the role of study level and gender on perceived sources of stress.Methods  Five hundred seventy‐one undergraduates, officially registered at the University of Athens Dental School, participated in the survey by filling a 30‐item modified version of the Dental Environment Stress questionnaire.Results  Assigned workload, performance pressure and self‐efficacy beliefs constituted the most stress provoking factors. Females reported significantly higher distress, whereas stress intensity greatly differentiated by class year. Multivariate analysis revealed that, irrespective of gender, fourth level and graduating students were less concerned about class work overload, clinical training difficulties and course failing, but were significantly more insecure about their professional future. Entry‐level students appeared to be the most concerned about the lack of time for relaxation. However, they were the least stressed about completing graduation requirements compared with the rest of their peers.Conclusion  The reconsideration of the existing educational system towards a more balanced, flexible and student‐centred orientation, as well as the implementation of continuous self‐assessment and study counselling, might be effective in reducing inherent stress sources in dental education.
Student State of Readiness for E‐Learning: University of Sheffield's Faculty of Medicine
Authors: Stokes C. W. , Basford L. , Cannavina G. 
Published: April 2004

A study to assess the state of readiness of students for the implementation of new e‐technologies into the learning environment formed the first phase of the FDTL4‐funded WILeN Project. The project will collaborate with institutions across the UK to develop a Web‐Based Interprofessional Learning Network.Current learning theories place the emphasis on student–teacher and student–student interaction. However, previous research and development on e‐learning has focused on the interaction of the students with the learning material.The aim of the study was to evaluate the state of students’ readiness for e‐learning and their ability to participate in online discussions, contribute to message forums and interact via video‐conferencing.The study was undertaken in two phases. A survey, conducted electronically, was designed to find a ’base level’ of student IT skills that could be used to design the next‐generation of interactive and inter‐professional e‐learning materials, and students produced denture designs via video‐conferencing seminars.In result, 191 valid responses were received reporting that most students (95.8%) check their e‐mail every few days or more, with slightly less (82.8%) using the web frequently. There was a low incidence of students having used technologies recognized as providing the basis for future online learning environments: Internet Relay Chat (37.7%), Message Forums (49.7%) and Video‐conferencing (5.8%). The data revealed that the students generally lacked experience of the new interactive technologies. However, the successful video‐conferencing seminars demonstrated that the students had a willingness and capability to learn new skills. In conclusion, there is a lack of educational readiness for new interactive learning media, but the students have the transferable skills and enthusiasm to enable their use in future learning scenarios.