Reading revolutions: Online digital text and implications for reading in academe

Author(s):  
Barry W. Cull

While the Internet is a text-saturated world, reading online screens tends to be significantly different from reading printed text. This review essay examines literature from a variety of disciplines on the technological, social, behavioural, and neuroscientific impacts that the Internet is having on the practice of reading. A particular focus is given to the reading behaviour of emerging university students, especially within Canada and the United States. A brief overview is provided of the recent transformation of academic libraries into providers of online digital text in addition to printed books and other materials, before looking at research on college students’ preferences for print and digital text, and the cognitive neuroscience of reading on screen.

1995 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 577-593 ◽  
Author(s):  
David S. Crystal ◽  
Kazuo Kato ◽  
Sheryl Olson ◽  
Hirozumi Watanabe

This study examined attitudes related to the possibility of changing cognitions and behaviours among samples of college students in the United States and Japan. Students were asked to identify three things about themselves that they wanted to change, the method they would use to effect these changes, how difficult they thought making such changes would be, and how much they desired to make the changes. Japanese and US students differed significantly in the frequency with which they mentioned all seven aspects of the self that were targeted for change. Students in the United States expressed a desire to improve their sociability, academic achievement and cognitive abilities, physical appearance, and sense of individuality. Students in Japan were most concerned about enhancing their relationships with others, self-control and motivation, and ability to manage practical affairs. In addition, US respondents were more likely than their Japanese counterparts to use behaviour-oriented strategies, to believe it was easy to make self-changes, and to indicate a strong desire to improve the self. The findings are discussed in the context of theories describing different cultural construals of self, and of empirical research on differences between collectivistic and individualistic cultures.


PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (6) ◽  
pp. e0252185
Author(s):  
Spencer G. Shumway ◽  
Jonas D. Hopper ◽  
Ethan R. Tolman ◽  
Daniel G. Ferguson ◽  
Gabriella Hubble ◽  
...  

The world is currently dealing with a devastating pandemic. Although growing COVID-19 case numbers, deaths, and hospitalizations are concerning, this spread is particularly alarming in the United States where polarizing opinions, changing policies, and misinformation abound. In particular, American college campuses have been a venue of rampant transmission, with concerning spillover into surrounding, more vulnerable, communities. We surveyed over 600 college students from across the United States and modeled predictors of compliance with non-pharmaceutical interventions. We identified concern with severity, constitutionalism, news exposure, and religiosity as significant positive correlates with compliance, and general trust in science as a significant negative correlate. To determine how applicable nationwide modeling might be to individual local campuses we also administered this same survey to nearly 600 students at two large universities in Utah County. In this population, concern with severity was the only significant positive correlate with compliance; Additionally, feelings of inconvenience were negatively correlated. The effects of feelings of inconvenience, and news exposure were significantly different between populations. These results suggest that we should focus our efforts on increasing knowledge about the pandemic’s effects on our society and informing about constitutionality amongst college students. However, we also show that nationwide surveys and modeling are informative, but if campuses are to efficiently curb the spread of COVID-19 this coming semester, they would be best served to utilize data collected from their student populations as these might significantly differ from general consensus data.


2011 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 186-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malini Ratnasingam ◽  
Lee Ellis

Background. Nearly all of the research on sex differences in mass media utilization has been based on samples from the United States and a few other Western countries. Aim. The present study examines sex differences in mass media utilization in four Asian countries (Japan, Malaysia, South Korea, and Singapore). Methods. College students self-reported the frequency with which they accessed the following five mass media outlets: television dramas, televised news and documentaries, music, newspapers and magazines, and the Internet. Results. Two significant sex differences were found when participants from the four countries were considered as a whole: Women watched television dramas more than did men; and in Japan, female students listened to music more than did their male counterparts. Limitations. A wider array of mass media outlets could have been explored. Conclusions. Findings were largely consistent with results from studies conducted elsewhere in the world, particularly regarding sex differences in television drama viewing. A neurohormonal evolutionary explanation is offered for the basic findings.


Author(s):  
Edward Herbst

Bali 1928 is a restoration and repatriation project involving the first published recordings of music in Bali and related film footage and photographs from the 1930s, and a collaboration with Indonesians in all facets of vision, planning, and implementation. Dialogic research among centenarian and younger performers, composers and indigenous scholars has repatriated their knowledge and memories, rekindled by long-lost aural and visual resources. The project has published a series of five CD and DVD volumes in Indonesia by STIKOM Bali and CDs in the United States by Arbiter Records, with dissemination through emerging media and the Internet, and grass-roots repatriation to the genealogical and cultural descendants of the 1928 and 1930s artists and organizations. Extensive research has overcome anonymity, so common with archival materials, which deprives descendants of their unique identities, local epistemologies, and techniques, marginalizing and homogenizing a diverse heritage so that entrenched hegemonies prevail and dominate discourse, authority, and power.


2021 ◽  
pp. 088626052199793
Author(s):  
Tiffany L. Marcantonio ◽  
Danny Valdez ◽  
Kristen N. Jozkowski

The purpose of this study was to assess the cues college students use to determine a sexual partner is refusing vaginal-penile sex (i.e., refusal interpretations). As a secondary aim, we explored the influence of item wording ( not willing/non-consent vs refusal) on college students’ self-reported refusal interpretations. A sample of 175 college students from Canada and the United States completed an open-ended online survey where they were randomly assigned to one of two wording conditions ( not willing/non-consent vs refusal); students were then prompted to write about the cues they used to interpret their partner was refusing. An inductive coding procedure was used to analyze open-ended data. Themes included explicit and implicit verbal and nonverbal cues. The refusal condition elicited more explicit and implicit nonverbal cues than the not willing/non-consent condition. Frequency results suggested men reported interpreting more explicit and implicit verbal cues. Women reported interpreting more implicit nonverbal cues from their partner. Our findings reflect prior research and appear in line with traditional gender and sexual scripts. We recommend researchers consider using the word refusal when assessing the cues students interpret from their sexual partners as this wording choice may reflect college students’ sexual experiences more accurately.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-41
Author(s):  
Ana Cristina Lindsay ◽  
Qun Le ◽  
Denise Lima Nogueira ◽  
Márcia M. T. Machado ◽  
Mary L. Greaney

Abstract Objectives: The objective of this study was to assess sources of information about gestational weight gain (GWG), diet, and exercise among first-time pregnant Brazilian women in the United States (US). Design: Cross-sectional survey. Setting: Massachusetts, United States. Participants: First-time pregnant Brazilian women. Results: Eighty-six women, the majority of whom were immigrants (96.5%) classified as having low-acculturation levels (68%), participated in the study. Approximately two-thirds of respondents had sought information about GWG (72.1%), diet (79.1%), and exercise (74.4%) via the internet. Women classified as having low acculturation levels were more likely to seek information about GWG via the internet (OR = 7.55; 95% CI: 1.41, 40.26) than those with high acculturation levels after adjusting for age and receiving information about GWG from healthcare provider (doctor or midwife). Moreover, many respondents reported seeking information about GWG (67%), diet (71%), and exercise (52%) from family and friends. Women who self-identified as being overweight pre-pregnancy were less likely to seek information about diet (OR = 0.32; 95% CI: 0.11, 0.93) and exercise (OR = 0.33; 95% CI: 0.11, 0.96) from family and friends than those who self-identified being normal weight pre-pregnancy. Conclusions: This is the first study to assess sources of information about GWG, diet, and exercise among pregnant Brazilian immigrants in the US. Findings have implications for the design of interventions and suggest the potential of mHealth intervention as low-cost, easy access option for delivering culturally and linguistically tailored evidence-based information about GWG incorporating behavioral change practices to this growing immigrant group.


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