Responses to the 2017 “1 Million Gray Question”: ASTRO Membership's Opinions on the Most Important Research Question Facing Radiation Oncology

The rights-of-nature model is gaining traction as an innovative legal approach for nature conservation. Although adopted in several countries, it remains in its infancy, including in Australia. An important research question is whether rights of nature will offer superior environmental outcomes compared to traditional nature conservation techniques including creation of protected areas. This article investigates that question through a case study of the Tarkine wilderness, in the Australia state of Tasmania. It first identifies key lessons from existing international experience with affirmation of rights of nature, such as in New Zealand and Ecuador. The article then explores how rights of nature could apply in Australia’s Tarkine region and their value compared to existing or potential protected areas and other nature conservation measures under Australian or Tasmanian law. Affirming rights of nature represents a major conceptual shift in how people via the law relate to the natural world, but whether the model offers practical benefits for nature conservation depends on a variety of conditions, in addition to the need to address broader societal drivers of environmentaldegradation.

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Social origin and the ability to self-evaluate school performance accurately

10.31235/osf.io/anvp2 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Benjamin Rosche

Keyword(s):

Theoretical Model ◽

Empirical Study ◽

School Performance ◽

Research Question ◽

Academic Ability ◽

Important Research ◽

Social Origin ◽

Highly Educated ◽

School Grades ◽

Important Research Question

As for students many consequential life decisions still lie ahead it is vitally important that their choices suit their abilities. Concerning education a misperception of academic ability can lead to educational misinvestment with potentially severe consequences. That is why this paper investigates if there are disparities in the ability to accurately self-evaluate school performance by social origin. To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the first paper considering this important research question. In doing so, the paper has two emphases: firstly, a theoretical model, arguing why disparities in the ability to accurately self-evaluate school performance by social origin are likely, is proposed and secondly an empirical study is conducted in order to examine if disparities by social origin are findable. The key results indicate that both students with less and students with highly educated parents underestimate their school performance if they have school grades higher than the average, and overestimate their school performance if they have school grades lower than the average. However, this relationship is intensified for students with less educated parents and therefore they self-evaluate their school performancecompared to students with highly educated parents less accurately.

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Wife beating amongst Africans as a challenge to pastoral care

In die Skriflig/In Luce Verbi ◽

10.4102/ids.v47i1.713 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 47 (1) ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Magezi E. Baloyi

Keyword(s):

Pastoral Care ◽

Research Question ◽

Good Practice ◽

Wife Beating ◽

Important Research ◽

Traditional System ◽

African People ◽

The Law ◽

Important Research Question

Traditional African people are known for respecting their marriage. Even though marriage is so highly regarded, it is astonishing to realise that wife beating has become an extremely common practice amongst them. It therefore becomes an important research question to ask about the extent to which deeply-seated traditional customs regarding wife beating as a form of stamping down authority and of trying to keep the household in order, will have to be confronted with what is deemed to be good practice from the perspective of the law, community and pastoral caregivers. There are women who live with scars on their faces and bodies, having been beaten by their husbands. Although there are many forms of abuse towards women in family situations, this article aims particularly to focus on wife beating that is practiced for traditional as well as other related reasons. This research will involve itself with establishing whether the reasons for wife beating are part of the traditional system for keeping the household in order and interrogate both legal and pastoral interventions that attempt to eliminate or avoid such behaviour.Tradisionele Afrikane is nog altyd daarvoor bekend dat hulle die instelling van die huwelik respekteer. Verbasend genoeg is vroueslanery egter ’n ou gevestigde gebruik wat vandag algemeen onder Afrikane voorkom. Die mate waartoe diepgewortelde gebruike soos vroueslanery as ’n manier om gesag af te dwing en orde in die huis te handhaaf, gekonfronteer sal moet word met wat as goeie praktyk beskou word vanuit die gesigspunt van die reg, die gemeenskap en pastorale versorgers, is dus ’n belangrike navorsingsvraag. Baie vroue dra fisiese en emosionele littekens wat deur hulle eggenote veroorsaak is. Alhoewel daar baie vorme van vrouemishandeling in familiesituasies voorkom, fokus hierdie artikel veral op vroueslanery wat om tradisionele en verwante redes beoefen word. Hierdie navorsing probeer vasstel of die redes vir vroueslanery deel van die tradisionele sisteem uitmaak waarvolgens orde in die huishouding gehandhaaf is. Dit ondersoek regs- sowel as pastorale ingryping wat sodanige gedrag probeer elimineer of voorkom.

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Parallels with the hate speech debate: the pros and cons of criminalising harmful securitising requests

Review of International Studies ◽

10.1017/s0260210517000328 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 44 (1) ◽

pp. 43-63 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Rita Floyd

Keyword(s):

Political Theory ◽

Hate Speech ◽

Research Question ◽

Important Research ◽

Ethical Considerations ◽

Religious Minorities ◽

Pros And Cons ◽

Racial Ethnic ◽

Important Research Question

AbstractThis article argues that public expressions of Islamophobia are best understood assecuritising requests(that is, calls on powerful figures/bodies to treat an issue in security mode so that extraordinary measures can be used to combat it), especially in those cases where Muslims are feared and disliked because of the perception that Islamic people are prone to terrorism. This article argues that harmful and derogatory securitising requests targeting racial, ethnic, or religious minorities are on par with hate speech and it highlights the fact that many contemporary societies are now seeking legal protections against such security speech (expressed most notably in the desire to ban Islamophobia). It is from this perspective that this article poses an important research question: With a view to protecting those adversely affected, are legal protections against harmful and offensive securitising requests justified? The research question can be answered by drawing parallels to the existing hate speech debate in legal and political theory. The research reveals that, although the case against legal protections of harmful and defamatory security speech is ultimately more convincing, security speech alone can be so damaging that it should be informed by a number of ethical considerations. This article goes on to suggest three criteria for governing the ethics of requesting securitisation. As such this article fills a lacuna in the ‘positive/negative debate’ on the ethics of security that has engaged with securitisation, but that has failed to consider the ethics of speaking security.

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Social Science as If History Mattered

Social Science History ◽

10.1017/s0145553200014097 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 34 (1) ◽

pp. 75-81

Author(s):

Howard Kimeldorf

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Social Science ◽

Research Question ◽

State Power ◽

Practical Significance ◽

Important Research ◽

Adolf Hitler ◽

Vichy Regime ◽

Multiple Levels ◽

Important Research Question

Ruling Oneself Out is an extremely impressive scholarly achievement at multiple levels. It offers a model of how to identify and pose an important research question; that is, a question worth asking and answering not only because it is intrinsically interesting but also because it is theoretically puzzling and at the same time of great practical significance. Ruling Oneself Out is all this and more.Ivan Ermakoff (2008) begins by asking about the conditions that lead dominant actors to surrender their power in ways that are likely to undermine their own interests. It is an intriguing question and all the more puzzling because he examines this process in the context of two cases in which the decision to surrender power was reached after a long and public process of deliberation and discussion. Moreover, both cases—the German Reichstag’s passage of the enabling act in March 1933 that gave Adolf Hitler the authority to circumvent the constitution and the transfer of state power to the proponents of an authoritarian and reactionary Vichy regime in the summer of 1940—followed open and democratic decision-making procedures to realize an outcome that would ultimately undermine the commitment to democracy that made those outcomes possible.

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Coping Strategies of Schizophrenic Patients and their Relationship to Outcome

The British Journal of Psychiatry ◽

10.1192/bjp.163.2.177 ◽

1993 ◽

Vol 163 (2) ◽

pp. 177-182 ◽

Cited By ~ 30

Author(s):

Peter W. H. Lee ◽

F. Lieh-Mak ◽

K. K. Yu ◽

J. A. Spinks

Keyword(s):

Social Support ◽

Coping Strategies ◽

Research Question ◽

Psychotropic Medications ◽

Important Research ◽

Professional Help ◽

Premorbid Adjustment ◽

Self Help ◽

Schizophrenic Patients ◽

Important Research Question

The experience and perception of effective sources of help of 101 schizophrenic patients were studied. A combination of professional help, social support, and self-coping efforts was listed as helpful. The more experiences patients had with the various sources of help, the better were their outcomes. Premorbid adjustment, exposure to the magnitude and nature of helpful sources, as well as the patients' own ability and motivation to make use of available helpful sources were thought to be important mediating variables for a better outcome. Apart from psychotropic medications, over half of the patients were not using any one of the sources of help mentioned. It remains an important research question whether or not schizophrenic patients may benefit from direct coaching in self-help skills in conjunction with making optimal use of professional and environmental supports.

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Predicting the success of induction of labour using cervical volume

BMC Research Notes ◽

10.1186/s13104-021-05865-5 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 14 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Malitha Patabendige ◽

Sanka Rajesh Athulathmudali

Keyword(s):

Sri Lanka ◽

Observational Study ◽

Prospective Observational Study ◽

Research Question ◽

Cervical Length ◽

Induction Of Labour ◽

Important Research ◽

Data Description ◽

Important Research Question ◽

Singleton Pregnancies

Abstract Objectives Assessing the likelihood of success of induction of labour using cervical volume is an important research question. Data description We provide data generated in a prospective observational study which was carried out at North Colombo Teaching Hospital, Ragama, Sri Lanka. Study conducted to compare pre-induction digital cervical assessment, sonographic cervical length, and sonographic cervical volume with vaginal delivery rate within 24 h. Inductions with 100 singleton pregnancies at term were included.

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Contribution of Neurotrophins to the Immune System Regulation and Possible Connection to Alcohol Addiction

Biology ◽

10.3390/biology9040063 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 9 (4) ◽

pp. 63 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Evgenii M. Kozlov ◽

Andrey V. Grechko ◽

Yegor S. Chegodaev ◽

Wei-Kai Wu ◽

Alexander N. Orekhov

Keyword(s):

Immune System ◽

Neurotrophic Factors ◽

Research Question ◽

Signaling Cascades ◽

Potential Contribution ◽

Neurotrophin Receptors ◽

Important Research ◽

Immune System Regulation ◽

Neurotrophin Signaling ◽

Important Research Question

The first references to neurotrophic factors date back to the middle of the 20th century when the nerve growth factor (NGF) was first discovered. Later studies delivered a large amount of data on neurotrophic factors. However, many questions regarding neurotrophin signaling still remain unanswered. One of the principal topics in neurotrophin research is their role in the immune system regulation. Another important research question is the possible involvement of neurotrophin signaling in the pathological processes associated with alcoholism. Among known neurotrophins, NT-4 remains the least studied and appears to be involved in alcoholism and chronic stress pathogenesis. In this review we discuss known neurotrophin signaling cascades mediated by different neurotrophin receptors, as well as provide a generalization of the data regarding the influence of neurotrophins NGF, BDNF, and NT-4 on the immune system and their potential contribution to the pathogenesis of alcoholism.

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An Investigation of the Relationship between In-Class and Out-of-Class Efforts on Student Learning: Empirical Evidence and Strategy Suggestion

Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning ◽

10.14434/josotl.v16i4.20028 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 16 (4) ◽

pp. 14-32 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Tin-Chun Lin

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Empirical Model ◽

Research Question ◽

Motivation To Learn ◽

Important Research ◽

Student Group ◽

Learning Resource ◽

Trade Off ◽

The Relationship ◽

Important Research Question

In this paper we explore and discuss an important research question in higher education – is there a trade-off relationship between in-class and out-of-class efforts for students? We used an empirical model to test the trade-off hypothesis between these two efforts. We identified a trade-off between in-class and out-of-class efforts, especially for those students who do not perform well on examinations. We clarified possible reasons for this relationship in a lower-performing student group and noted potentially harmful implications for higher education. We recommended that instructors work individually with students in setting appropriate goals for each exam and frequently offering feedback. Doing so can strengthen rapport between students and faculty, thereby enhancing students’ motivation to learn and confidence in utilizing faculty as a learning resource. We also recommended a classroom-based game play strategy to promote students’ motivation to learn and encourage their participation.

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