CogSci Librarian

Field trip to Durham's @LifeandScience museum! #scio12

2012-01-22T16:30:00.000-05:00

I was thrilled to go on a behind the scenes tour of Durham's fabulous Museum of Life and Science at last week's ScienceOnline conference. Here is an annotated visual tour of the trip, with photos taken by several of us on the tour. I used Storify to curate the images, which were posted on Twitter, Flickr, and YouTube (the bear video is awesome; especially the last 10-20 seconds).

Thanks especially to Keeper Mikey for the tour!

A Librarian's View of ScienceOnline

2012-01-16T14:27:00.001-05:00

I've submitted a photograph to #scio12 science-art show. I wanted to convey something about science, which is tough since what I most like to photograph is flowers and cats. Ok, I could have argued that they were science photos, but I thought it was a stretch.

I thought more about it and decided to take photos of some of the books I've acquired (for myself or for my library) as a result of ScienceOnline past & current. Here, therefore, is my view of ScienceOnline:

The books are, from top to bottom:

Graedon, J., & Graedon, T. (2011). The people's pharmacy quick & handy home remedies. Washington, DC: National Geographic.
Zimmer, C. (2011). A planet of viruses. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Skloot, R. (2010). The immortal life of Henrietta Lacks. New York: Crown Publishers.
Dunn, R. R. (2011). The wild life of our bodies: Predators, parasites, and partners that shape who we are today. New York: Harper.
McKenna, M. (2010). Superbug: The fatal menace of MRSA. New York: Free Press.
Linden, T. (2011). The New York times reader: Health and medicine. Washington, D.C: CQ Press.
Tucker, H. (2011). Blood work: A tale of medicine and murder in the scientific revolution. New York: W.W. Norton.
Mooney, C., & Kirshenbaum, S. (2009). Unscientific America: How scientific illiteracy threatens our future. New York: Basic Books.
Specter, M. (2009). Denialism: How irrational thinking hinders scientific progress, harms the planet, and threatens our lives. New York: Penguin Press.
Meredith, D. (2010). Explaining research: How to reach key audiences to advance your work. New York, N.Y: Oxford University Press.

You can check out (literally and figuratively) these books on my WorldCat list of ScienceOnline Books.

Non-Librarian Conferences, #Scio12, and #AEJMC

2012-01-15T14:36:00.000-05:00

It's time for my favorite #funconference, ScienceOnline2012, which starts on Thursday in RTP. #scio12 is a conference for science communicators, including scientists, students, educators, physicians, journalists, librarians, bloggers, programmers and others, who are interested in the way the World Wide Web is changing the way science is communicated, taught and done.

Fellow librarian and conference-goer John Dupuis asked last week in his post Science Online 2012: Library and librarian sessions) about other non-librarian conferences we librarians attend. As the librarian for the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina, I like to go to the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication annual conference. This is where the and reporting, advertising, public relations faculty go to talk about the craft of teaching and share their research. I've been twice in the past 3 years, and sadly, have been the only journalism / strategic communication librarian in attendance. I hope to work with colleagues to change that in the future.

Here's why I like going:

I had theluxury at this conference to attend sessionsthat interest me intellectually. I heardpresentations on public relations efforts at the first NAACP conference in the South in 1920; possibly deceptive practices used in foodmarketing campaigns; and Advertising educators’ definitions of“diversity.” As a librarian, I rarely get to immerse myselfin the literature of journalism and mass communication, so this was a wonderfulopportunity. The conference wastherefore a win for reasons of pure self-interest.

I was able to see mystudents and faculty at work. All of the papers cited above were presentedby UNC Journalism and Mass Communication graduate students and all wereterrific. I also saw a colleague leadthe Breakfast of Editing Champions – and found that copy editors are a lot offun at 8 am!

I was able to offer some reference services at the conference as well. The public relations discussant suggested the presenters turn to polling data to help assess the results of the PR campaigns they are studying. After the session, I gave my student the name of the UNC poll data librarianwho will be able to locate and interpret relevant poll data. Later, over coffee, a friend and I discussedauthor copyright, accessibility, reputation, and other issues related tojournal editing and publishing. I offered reference to the broader communityas well, by tweeting links to articles & resources mentioned in sessions toall following the #aejmc11 hashtag.

At ScienceOnline, I get to geek out on science, which now is more of a hobby for me than a profession, and I also get to hear about science journalism, social media -- and I hang out with fun scientists, librarians, reporters, and so much more. "More" happily includes some of my peeps from UNC Chapel Hill, so I'm sure some reference and referral will happen in Raleigh too.

If you're a librarian reading this, do you go to subject-oriented conferences (as contrasted with library-focused events)? If you're a scholar, scientist, journalist reading this, do you see librarians at conferences? Do you see librarians at your primary place of work? I hope our presence at conferences helps persuade you that we can be helpful!

Stephanie's Favorite Songs, 2011

2011-12-29T11:26:00.004-05:00

As always, it was a good year for music! I've completed my favorite song list of 2011 and posted it on Spotify.

The full list, in song order, is below, with a few annotations here & there.

Foster The People – Pumped Up Kicks A great song to kick off the collection, it also kicks off a short gun-themed set. Note that the collection ends with a gun-themed song too.
Imelda May – Johnny Got A Boom Boom
Danger Mouse – Two Against One (feat. Jack White) Danger Mouse's Rome CD was amazing - I chose 2 songs for this collection, but there are many more great songs too.
Chris Difford – Like I Did Good for all the rock-loving parents out there, and quite a lovely tune too.
Diego Garcia – Under This Spell I'm guessing Amy's Leo will like this one.
Gomez – Options
Imelda May – I'm Alive Sounds quite a bit like Nick Lowe; and each of the 3 Imelda May songs here sound different from each other.
Nick Lowe – Shame on the Rain Yeah, I should have included his song "I Read A Lot" but this fit better.
The Steep Canyon Rangers – Atheists Don't Have No Songs Steve Martin is amusing here. This song kicks off a short (and hopefully not-too-offensive) religion set.
The Dirt Daubers – Wake Up, Sinners
Eliza Gilkyson – 2153
Eleanor Friedberger – Heaven
Emmylou Harris – Big Black Dog A great sing-along song, whether you have a dog or not. It's fun for cat lovers too.
Iron & Wine – Tree By The River How can you not love a song with this lyric: "I mean the world to a potty-mouth girl, with a pretty pair of blue-eyed birds." ?!
Danger Mouse – Black (feat. Norah Jones)
Sarah Jarosz – Annabelle Lee
Robbers On High Street – Second Chance Thanks to Amy for alerting me to Robbers on High Street; this isn't the song she first recommended, but it's quite a fun song anyway.
Garland Jeffreys – Rock On The first of two covers; I want to pair this one with Spiders & Snakes.
Imelda May – Tainted Love The start of this song makes me think of the Waitresses, which surely was intentional.
Noah And The Whale – Just Me Before We Met My favorite line: "don't be shy; be brave little champion."
Peter Bjorn And John – Tomorrow Has To Wait
Angus and Julia Stone – Big Jet Plane Lolhusband doesn't like that there is only one lyric here, but I love how it sounds.
Thomas Dolby – Road To Reno It's been a long time since he's had a new album, and this was worth waiting for.

If CDs were more than 80 minutes, we'd have more songs here ... but these are the cream of the 2011 crop.

Macro Monday: Beach Rose

2011-12-12T13:07:00.005-05:00

This is neither cognitive nor librarian, nor, really, science ... but it's pretty and I like it. I'm thinking about participating in Lisa's Chaos Macro Monday (today's are stunning!), as I really like taking close-up photographs of flowers and other pretty things.

(Beach Rose, taken in Bar Harbor, ME. ©swb, 2008)

College Students @ the Library

2011-11-08T10:30:00.001-05:00

A recent ethnographic study assessed how college students use the library for research projects and study needs. The results are worth your time to read if you expect students to do library research: basically, students rarely ask librarians for help.

USA Today summarized the study in August (College students rarely use librarians' expertise), and here's my summary of their summary.

The ERIAL (Ethnographic Research in Illinois Academic Libraries) project was a 2-year, 5-campus ethnographic study on how students use their campus library.

The researchers found that students "tended to overuse Google and misuse scholarly databases" -- they didn't understand sources (neither Google nor library databases), nor did they know how to find good articles.

Worse — in my view — when students went to use a library database, 50% of them used databases that a librarian "would most likely never recommend for their topic." (I've experienced this myself). Students "showed an almost complete lack of interest" in getting help from a librarian — despite all of the above.

Instead, students consult with faculty who:

Tended to overestimate students' research skills
Didn't require a visit to the library to start their research
Had low expectations of librarians
Had a sometimes limited ability to teach students effective search strategies and resources

The study also notes that it is difficult for faculty and librarians to put themselves in the place of undergraduate students who don't know how to do library research. No library theory of mind here!

My prior reading of the library literature suggests that the best way to overcome students' disinclination to use the library is for faculty to require them to use the library as part of their research. Students are more willing to follow faculty suggestions than anything else regarding library use, so if you require them to consult with a librarian, they are more likely to do so. This is particularly true, other research suggests, for students of color.

If you want your students to improve their research and use better articles in your classes, please encourage them to visit one of the libraries on campus. Better yet, ask your subject librarian to come to class and work with your students as a group to improve their library research. I consistently hear from my faculty colleagues that my sessions improve the quality of articles students find, so having a librarian speak formally to classes is A Good Thing.

For More Information

Kolowich, Steve. “Study: College Students Rarely Use Librarians’ Expertise."USA Today Online Aug. 22, 2011.
Duke, Lynda. College Libraries and Student Culture What We Now Know. Chicago: American Library Association, 2011. Information @ ALA.org or borrow through WorldCat.

Why We Get Fat, with @GaryTaubes

2011-09-26T12:00:00.004-04:00

The People's Pharmacy radio show is one of my favorites: Joe and Terry Graedon interview interesting scientists who speak intelligently about their topic (my recent listens included asthma and searching for health information online)

I was particularly impressed with their August interview with Gary Taubes, author of the 2011 book Why We Get Fat and What to Do About It. I had read his 2002 New York Times magazine article "What if It's All Been a Big Fat Lie?" and it was great to hear him discuss the fat vs. carbohydrate controversy in terms of the current obesity epidemic.

Taubes is a great science writer who can explain complex topics simply and clearly. His New York Times magazine pieces on sugar (2011) and fat (2002) are relatively easy -- if very troubling -- reads.

I first became aware of The People's Pharmacy folks, Joe and Terry Graedon, at the 2011 Science Online Conference. I enjoy their 2011 book The People's Pharmacy Quick & Handy Home Remedies. I suspected I would like their radio show ... but I didn't realize I would come to include it in my "favorite science podcasts" category. Thanks, Science Online, for continuing to give the gift of science!

Brief Bibliography of Gary Taubes' Work

Gary Taubes' Blog
Good Calories, Bad Calories : Challenging the Conventional Wisdom on Diet, Weight Control, and Disease. New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2007.
Is Sugar Toxic?, New York Times magazine article, April 13, 2011.
What if It's All Been a Big Fat Lie?, New York Times magazine article, July 7, 2002.
Why We Get Fat and What to Do About It, New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2011.

Sports & Psychology

2011-08-08T13:40:00.006-04:00

Pain, vision, and prosthetics ... the August 8 issue of Sports Illustrated covers it all, with a sports twist. Yes, I am ready for some football, which is why when I saw Nnamdi Asomugha on the cover of the library's issue of Sports Illustrated, I picked it up. I kept reading David Epstein's great "special report" on Sports Medicine.

The most interesting, cognitive science-ly speaking, is this: The Truth About Pain: It's In Your Head, by Epstein. In which he talks about how stress-induced analgesia (SIA) -- "the temporary absence of pain" due to stressful events -- manifests for athletes. Hint: it helps cyclists get to the finish line after a long race up a very steep hill.

Also of interest to cognitive science folks is Epstein's article It's All About Anticipation, in which he explains why MLB hitters can't hit softball pitches. It's not because they're too slow, but because the hitters are so unfamiliar with softball pitchers' pitching style. There's a neat sidebar about visual acuity and high performance athletes: most can see at 20-15, but some can even see at 20-9 -- vastly better than the majority of folks whose acuity has been tested.

Epstein does a nice job explaining the science correctly and understandably.

royalty-free image from stock.xchng.

Just a Ding? Good overview of concussion issues in the NFL

2011-07-06T09:59:00.000-04:00

Andrea Goetschius, one of my student colleagues at the University of North Carolina School of Journalism and Mass Communication, wrote a terrific case study called

"Just a Ding? The NFL Responds to Research on Football-Related Concussion" (summary & links; pdf)

It's a terrific overview of the concussion issues the NFL and its players have been facing for the last few years. It starts with the first cases of CTE (chronic traumatic encephalopathy) that neuropathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu, discovered during the autopsies of three former NFL players. It chronicles former WWE wrestler Chris Nowinski's interactions with the New York Times' Alan Schwarz, as well as his founding of the Sports Legacy Institute at Boston University. Throughout, Goetschius chronicles the NFL's response, ranging from the Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (MTBI) committee to the revamped Head, Neck and Spine Medical Committee.

There are also four pages of citations, which provide more information on all of these issues. I've read most of the articles Goetschius cites and she's done a great job of synthesizing all of them into a 9-page case study.

And the Arthur W. Page Society* agrees with me: they awarded Goetschius's case study the Grand Prize in its 2011 Corporate Communications Case Study Competition (all papers in this year's competition look interesting!). *The Arthur W. Page Society is "a professional association for senior public relations and corporate communications executives."

If you're interested in the topic of concussions and NFL players, this case study is worth a read.

What is the Self?

2011-05-09T11:20:00.000-04:00

Recommended: The Guardian's Science Weekly podcast on April 4. Alok Jha interviews philosopher Julian Baggini, who talks about the latest thinking in neuropsychology on what it means to be "me". Baggini interviewed Daniel Dennett and others for his new book Ego trick : in search of the self. Jha and Baggini play some of the interviews on the show. Great show!

More on Embodied Cognition

2011-05-03T10:35:00.000-04:00

Ginger Campbell interviews philosopher Lawrence Shapiro about his new book, Embodied Cognition, on the March 25, 2011 episode of the Brain Science Podcast. Shapiro writes about his new book on his website:

I lay out the various research programs within embodied cognition, critically assessing the arguments for and against their claims. I conclude with some remarks regarding the prospects of embodied cognition and its place in relation to traditional cognitive science.

Ginger does a nice job of getting Shapiro to provide a balanced introduction to embodied cognition in the podcast. You can listen to the podcast or download the transcript (pdf) at the Brain Science Podcast website.

David Eagleman on Time and Synesthesia

2011-04-27T10:49:00.001-04:00

Burkhard Bilger had a great piece in the April 25, 2011 New Yorker entitled David Eagleman and Mysteries of the Brain. In it, Bilger discusses Eagleman's fascinating work trying to figure out how we think about time. Eagleman goes to a Zero Gravity "ride" to see if he can measure how our sense of time slows down when we are afraid (he can); he also goes to London to see if drummers' brains are more precise about time than "normal" brains (they are).

Our general perception of time seems to be influenced by emotion:

When something threatens your life, [the amygdala] seems to kick into overdrive, recording every last detail of the experience. The more detailed the memory, the longer the moment seems to last. “This explains why we think that time speeds up when we grow older,” Eagleman said—why childhood summers seem to go on forever, while old age slips by while we’re dozing. The more familiar the world becomes, the less information your brain writes down, and the more quickly time seems to pass.

For more on this story, read the transcript of Bilger and Eagleman's chat session, Ask the Author Live: Burkhard Bilger on Time and the Brain. It's all fascinating!

Shortly after I read the New Yorker article, I was going through itunes, pruning some of my podcasts. I found a January 2010 episode of Australia's terrific All In The Mind in which Natasha Mitchell interviewed David Eagleman, in a show entitled: The afterlife, synesthesia and other tales of the senses. Eagleman talks very little about time, but quite a bit about synesthesia. If you want to know more about numbers having colors, or names having taste, give this show a listen.

Google Scholar & You

2011-03-21T10:17:00.010-04:00

Here are answers to some Frequently Asked Questions about Google Scholar. I often get asked what I think about Google Scholar, so I wrote a post on my library's blog in response -- and have referred several students to it. I figured it was worth sharing with the wider community, so here it is again, in slightly modified form.

Q. What is Google Scholar?
A. Google search for scholarly articles, books, theses on a variety of topics, heavy on science & social science. Good for international materials.

Q. What do you think about Google Scholar?
PROS:

easy to search
quick
good for citation searching (who's cited this article)
good coverage for international / non-English topics

CONS:

can be hard to track down full-text of articles (see below).
no clear description of scope or scale of their holdings (are they a science search engine? social science? what neuroscience journals are included? how far back is the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience indexed?)
full-text may be from author's website -- which might or might not be the same as the published version
some metadata is wacky, leading to incorrect citations (see Peter Jacso's 2009 article on "ghost authors")

Q. How do I get full-text of articles I find through Google Scholar?
A. This is a huge question -- and it's easier to answer for the UNC community than for scholars at large. For UNC, use this link for Google Scholar and look for the "find article @ UNC" link to the right of the search results. UNC Library staff have activated "Find @ UNC" within Google Scholar to facilitate easy access to content available at UNC.

If you're not at UNC, but you are affiliated with a university, check Google Scholar Library Links page -- it's possible that your library has set up a linking system similar to what the good folks at UNC have done.

If you're not affiliated with a university, you may be asked to pay for an article you discover with Google Scholar. Check with your public library to see if they will request articles for you via Interlibrary Loan.

Q. What is "Find @ UNC"?
A. Links article metadata to article full-text if available through any UNC-licensed databases (using the OpenURL standard). If the article is in a 2008 issue of Journal of Communication, "Find @ UNC" knows that we have that issue available online through the publisher.

Q. Hey, that doesn't work for me!
A. It won't if you're off-campus and don't have the magic URL. If you have a UNC ONYEN, are off-campus, and want to use Google Scholar, use this link: http://libproxy.lib.unc.edu/login?url=http://scholar.google.com/.

Q. Hmmm. I don't want to rely on Google Scholar so much. What else can I do?
A. The UNC community has many reliable, scholarly search engines for just about every topic. Those are listed on the Park Library home page. Your state library probably has some excellent academic search engines -- see what NC Live offers to North Carolina residents with a library card; Connecticut residents should check out iconn.org.

For More Information

Hoseth, Amy, Google Scholar. The Charleston Advisor, January 2011.
Jacso, Peter, Newswire Analysis: Google Scholar's Ghost Authors, Lost Authors, and Other Problems. Library Journal, Sept. 24, 2009.
UNC Library staff, About Google Scholar. March 27, 2009.

Share Your Data!

2011-03-09T10:40:00.004-05:00

NiemanLab is trying an experiment: in a blog post called Share your data! Tell us how your readers arrive at your site: search, social media, the front door?, they are asking readers to do just that. Joshua Benton states what libraries know, that there is a lot to be learned from sharing information (his actual quote: "there’s lots to be learned from seeing how one site’s audience compares to another’s.") and asked readers who run a news website to post answers to 4 questions:

What percentage of your traffic comes from search engines?
What percentage of your traffic comes from facebook.com?
What percentage of your traffic comes from twitter.com?
What percentage of your site’s visits begin on your front page?

The comments are chock full of interesting data.

I'd love to see similar data for libraries! I recently attended Paul Signorelli and Char Booth's ALA TechSource webcast on the Role of Web Analytics in the Library (post-class post and discussion) and am looking more carefully at my data.

I was initially very surprised to see that about 29% of my website's traffic comes from Google. But after knowing that and watching students navigate to my website during reference encounters, I see that instead of bookmarking the page, they just Google "park library jomc" or a variation. Mystery solved.

My challenge to you: read Benson's post, and then come back & post your library's analytic data. Respond to these questions, for the last 30 days:

How do people get to your website & in what %? (This is called "Traffic Sources Overview" in Google Analytics.)
Top 2-3 search terms to used in search to get to you.
What are your top 2-3 pages?

(thanks to the Daily Tar Heel's Sara Gregory for tweeting her response to the this post)

Embodied Cognition

2011-03-02T10:50:00.003-05:00

I mentioned Embodied Cognition briefly in my talk at SILS yesterday so thought I would post a bit more about it here. The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy has a nice definition, which begins: "Embodied Cognition is a growing research program in cognitive science that emphasizes the formative role the environment plays in the development of cognitive processes."

What sparked my interest was this article in the January/February issue of Scientific American Mind: Body of Thought by Siri Carpenter which includes these tantalizing tidbits: "...a rapidly growing body of research indicates that metaphors joining body and mind reflect a central fact about the way we think: the mind uses the body to make sense of abstract concepts." Carpenter cites some interesting examples, two of which stand out to me:

Just in the past few years studies have shown that holding a hot cup of coffee or being in a comfortably heated room warms a person's feelings toward strangers ...
[T]hat sitting on a hard chair turns mild-mannered undergraduates into hard-headed negotiators.

Fascinating stuff!

library note: this article is not freely available on the Internet, but it is available to UNC and other institutional subscribers to Scientific American.

"User Services" ... or helping people in an academic library

2011-03-01T09:05:00.000-05:00

My thoughts on User Services, or providing services to patrons in an academic library are many ... and I've just discussed them with students in Barbara Moran's Academic Libraries class at UNC's School of Information and Library Science. Notably, I am an embedded librarian, which is to say that I work where my patrons work. The Park Library is on the second floor of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, making contact with students and faculty very easy.

Beyond the location, I think about this work in terms of who I am helping, and so have organized the talk around these constiuent groups:

Undergraduate patrons. They are first because they are so numerous! The School of Journalism and Mass Communication has roughly 800 undergraduates, and I work with them in many ways:

Instruction. In the academic year 2010-2011, I have taught or will teach a total of 33 classes, reaching about 600 students. Courses include Case Studies in Public Relations, African American Newspapers, History of Broadcasting, Law of Cyberspace, Magazine Writing & Editing, and Undergraduate Honors. I've taught two entry-level classes for MA and PhD students. You can see the full range at my course guides page.
Face-to-face / synchronous reference. I get most of my reference business from faculty referrals or from having taught students in class. The majority of the questions are in person, but several come via our LibraryH3lp chat sessions. In the calendar year 2010, my staff and I answered almost 800 in-person or chat questions from users, mostly reference, but many directional and technical questions as well. I detailed my theories of reference back in 2008, and they're still holding up.

The Library's website is an important component of my outreach, especially to undergraduates. I redesigned the website in summer 2010. It was intended to promote material I think undergraduates should use most (like Academic Search Premier and Communication & Mass Media Complete) -- I used a green star on the main page to highlight the really important databases.

I promote the library via Twitter and least 85 undergraduates following me back. Check out my Twitter favorites for a sense of the library promotion I do via Twitter.

I do my best to make the library a comfortable place to study, allowing food and beverages and offering PCs, Macs, wireless along with tables for solitary or group study.

Faculty colleagues. I collaborate with my faculty colleagues quite a bit on teaching the courses I mentioned above.

I make it a point to attend faculty meetings and other gatherings of faculty. I want to be available in case they have questions for me. Often I see someone in the hall who says "oh, I've been meaning to ask you about Blah Blah Blah," and I know it's my presence that reminds them of their information need-- and the question gets answered. Additionally, it's important to be aware of what they are thinking about. It's good to know about new hires, because I can do collection development in a new area (always fun), and it's useful to know about curriculum changes or other elements of their daily work life. My role is to think about how I can help them do their work better or more efficiently.

I've been intrigued by conversations with John Dupuis, who blogs at Confessions of a Science Librarian. We've been cyber buddies for a few years and have met at two ScienceOnline conferences in RTP. Dupuis recently blogged about stealth librarianship, whereby we infiltrate (my word) ourselves into the work lives of our faculty colleages. Dupuis strongly believes we should step away from being so library-focused and "collaborate with faculty in presentations" and "...we must make our case to our patrons on their turf, not make our case to ourselves on our own turf." There are some interesting additional opinions at the In the Library with the Lead Pipe blog: Lead Pipe Debates the Stealth Librarianship Manifesto.

John's challenge to SILS students is: comment on his blog (at a mininum) or write your own manifesto.

I would like to collaborate with my faculty and publish in the JOMC literature about how librarian / faculty collaborations can be effective. This is one of my 2011 goals!

Fellow librarians. That said, it's important to collaborate and cross-pollinate with our librarian colleagues as well. I was happy to have the time and energy this year to participate in Library Day in the Life #6 (see my #libday6 tweets here). I reported my daily tasks for my fellow librarians and was pleased to read about their daily tasks as well. I also participated as a way of demonstrating that librarians don't just sit quietly in the library and read and shelve. Some of the tasks I did that week:

Staff meeting
Future tweeting via Hootsuite
Met with a professor about teaching her PR Campaigns students to improve their research skills
Resolved a question regarding delivery of SRDS Circulation, an annual publication about newspaper circulation
Showed a student how to use RefWorks
Showed a student worker how to prepare serials for binding
Tried to figure out PubMed for the PR Campaigns class.
Got help with PubMed from a fellow UNC librarian also participating in libday6.
Met a fellow Mount Holyoke librarian at UNC who was also participating in libday6.
Weeded some of our book collection
Looked at long-term web analytics for library website.

The Boss. I give my boss (Jean Folkerts, dean of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication) all of the above information and more. I want her to know what I'm doing and what my staff are doing. I prepare gobs of data for her, which is how I knew how many reference interactions we had in 2010 and how many classes I've taught so far this academic year. Want more data? In 2010, we circulated over 1,400 items, and our patrons requested over 700 titles from libraries elsewhere on campus. My assistant (JOMC graduate Megan Garrett) has added over 1,800 titles to the catalog in the last year. There's more data still, but I'll stop now.

The overarching theme of my services to patrons is: be where users are and stand ready to help them. I offer help in person or in class, as well as through the library website. Further, I promote the library, and back it up with solid work. I talk-talk-talk about the terrific services we offer and I back it up by offering terrific services. It's an awesome job!

ScienceOnline11: Scientific American Mind

2011-02-14T11:06:00.001-05:00

Fun stuff in the #scio11 swag bag, deconstructed:

My favorite item in the ScienceOnline swag bag was the free issue of Scientific American Mind. I'd read several issues, but not in a few years, and it's a great accompaniment to breakfast.
Thanks to the free issue, and the reminder of how much I enjoy it, I have started a personal subscription -- so thanks, @sciammind.
Happily, the UNC Library subscribes to the online edition of Scientific American Mind, but -- call me old-fashioned -- I still like to read some things in print.

Here are some news briefs / articles that might tempt you to check out Scientific American Mind:

Why Testing Boosts Learning, by Andrea Anderson.
The Pain of Exclusion ostracism and or sense of self, by Kipling D. Williams.
Mind Over Magic?, the Nov/Dec. 2010 cover story by Stephen L. Macknik, Susana Martinez-Conde and Sandra Blakeslee.

If you want to see other items in the #scio11 swag bag, check out Joe Kraus' great annotated video. Thanks so much to the Conference's generous sponsors who made the conference possible. The wifi was amazing and was a model of how wifi should be made available at conferences everywhere!

Go Team! Ill-Will to the Other Team!

2011-02-04T09:27:00.001-05:00

Here's some interesting neuroscience research to ponder as you watch the Superbowl this weekend.

In the January 2011 issue of Psychological Science, Mina Cikara and colleagues studied baseball fans' reactions to play of their & their rival's teams and have shown that "the failures of an in-group member are painful, whereas those of a rival out-group member may give pleasure—a feeling that may motivate harming rivals." As a long-time NY Football Giants fan, this is not a surprise to me.

Frankly, I was most entertained by the methods they used to elicit fans' pleasant and painful feelings. They tested "die-hard" Red Sox (n=11) or Yankees (n=7) fans. To determine die-hard fan status, the authors asked participants to

correctly identify photos of three Red Sox players and three Yankees players that we selected, as well as the position of a fourth player we selected from each team. Participants also had to give extreme responses to questions regarding how they felt about their favored team and how they felt about their rival team (scale from 1, love them, to 10, hate them).

The stimuli, illustrated at right, involved several plays, yielding four possible conditions: favorite team's (let's call them the Red Sox) success against the rival team (ok, it's the Yankees); Yankees' failure against the rival team (both of these, are, of course, subjectively positive); favored team's failure against the rival team (subjectively negative) and the rival team's failure against a neutral team (the Orioles. How did they get to be neutral, I wonder?). This last is the "pure schadenfreude" condition -- which is both amusing and so true.

The study's participants "rated the subjectively negative plays as significantly more angering and painful than the plays in the subjectively positive and control conditions." (emphasis mine). When the authors followed up with the participants two weeks later, the fans indicated that they were 'significantly more likely" to heckle, insult, threaten, and even hit a rival fan than an Orioles fan. Yikes! (tho', if I'm honest, this is not news to me).

To me, the methods were as entertaining as the conclusion, so I'll leave the conclusion to the folks at Psychological Science's Daily Observations, to ensure accuracy:

When the rival team hit a home run against the favored team, the brain’s pain network was engaged. Most strikingly, participants who showed the greatest pleasure when watching their rival fail were also the most prone to say they might act aggressively, even violently, toward a rival fan. These results establish an initial neural link between social-mediated emotion and socially-directed action.

Please note that I do not advocate sports violence in any way. Also note that I chose my team in the above example purely at random and in no way wish harm to the New York Yankees or their fans. As for the Superbowl: go Steelers! go Packers!

For More Information

Cikara, Mina, Matthew M. and Susan T. Fiske. Us Versus Them: Social Identity Shapes Neural Responses to Intergroup Competition and Harm. Psychological Science January 2011. doi:10.1177/0956797610397667 (abstract free; full-text available @ your library).
the Association for Psychological Science's Daily Observations are fascinating and worth following on the web or via Twitter (@PsychScience).
Thanks to UConn's Dr. Ross Buck for alerting me to this paper.
No discussion of the condition of schadenfreude is complete without a link to the Avenue Q song of the same name: Schadenfreude.

ScienceOnline11: ScienceWeekly Podcast

2011-01-31T09:05:00.004-05:00

I really enjoyed #scio11, also known as ScienceOnline 2011. Here is another of the neat things I learned:

My bee buddy Kerstin Hoppenhaus introduced me to Alok Jha's Science weekly podcast. I listened to and loved an episode on my drive to the conference -- and then met Alok himself. I highly recommend his podcast.
The Jan. 24 episode is about ScienceOnline, so you can hear more about the conference.
The September 20, 2010 episode is entitled What the Brain Can and Can't Do and is a good listen for cognitive science aficionados.
Alok and ScienceWeekly are both on Twitter.

Science weekly comes out Mondays, so listen to it today!

Takeaways from ScienceOnline 2011

2011-01-27T09:33:00.000-05:00

I really enjoyed #scio11, also known as ScienceOnline 2011, held in North Carolina's RTP for its fifth year. ScienceOnline is an informal conference of scientists, students, educators, physicians, journalists, librarians, bloggers, programmers and others interested in the way the World Wide Web is changing the way science is communicated, taught and done.

I'm going blog some of the things I enjoyed about the conference over the next few weeks.

I went on a pre-conference tour of UNC-TV also in RTP. It was fascinating to see all the wires and boxes. The highlight was a full-size stuffed Cookie Monster, but also interesting were seeing Roy Underhill's set for the Woodwright's Shop and a 1954 TV camera.
Thanks to our tour guide Charlie Allen, also known as UNC-TV's chief engineer.

Overall, the conference reminded me how much I enjoy science. I never worked as a scientist, and now that I'm no longer a science librarian, I have strayed a bit -- but I do love science. My New Year's resolutions this year includes: incorporate more science into my life.

Favorite Songs of 2010

2010-12-30T08:09:00.007-05:00

Here's a list of my favorite songs for this year. I added all but the Belle & Sebastian to a myspace playlist. Enjoy & support the artist whose songs you like!

Song	Band	Album
Be My Thrill	The Weepies	Be My Thrill
Telegrams to Mars	Little & Ashley	Stole My Heart EP
Somethin’ Stupid	The Secret Sisters	The Secret Sisters
The Curse	Josh Ritter	So Runs The World Away
Hormones	Tracey Thorn	Love and Its Opposite
Beauty in the World	Macy Gray	The Sellout
Better Off In Texas	Raul Malo	Sinners & Saints
Tennessee Me	The Secret Sisters	The Secret Sisters
Cornbread and Butterbeans	Carolina Chocolate Drops	Genuine Negro Jig
Nothing but the Whole Wide World	Jakob Dylan	Women And Country
Ridin’ In My Car	She & Him	Volume Two
Still Missing You	Little & Ashley	Stole My Heart EP
Long Hard Road	Sade	Soldier Of Love
Pickle	Chumbawamba	Abcdefg
I Didn’t See It Coming *	Belle and Sebastian	Write About Love
Bad Romance	Lady Gaga	The Fame Monster
Why Does The Wind?	Tracey Thorn	Love and Its Opposite
Anytime You Need Me	Michael Franti	The Sound Of Sunshine
I Want The World To Stop *	Belle and Sebastian	Write About Love
San Antonio Baby	Raul Malo	Sinners & Saints
Hey Hey Hey	Michael Franti	The Sound Of Sunshine

(* not on myspace)

And in the shameless family promotion department, please check out my niece Rachel Austin on myspace; she has quite a lovely voice!

Finding Old Tweets

2010-11-27T09:52:00.001-05:00

Tweet much? Want to study tweets, or review tweets from a recent (or not-so-recent) conference? I've been asked for recommendations on software that will archive tweets, so I thought I'd post my replies here for posterity. Also for my future self.

All The Old Tweets Are Found: Google Launches Twitter Archive Search reports Greg Sterling on Search Engine Land. A Google search will yield archived tweets; click on "More" to the left of the results and scroll down to "Updates."

Here are the results from last year's Science Online conference, hashtagged #scio10. You'll see a few recent tweets, but then you'll see a flurry of tweets from Feb. 2010 to the present (apparently the service started in Feb.) You can click on a calendar image to see tweets from a particular month or date.

(click to see Feb 2010 tweets about #scio10.)

I also tried another conference I attended, #asist21010, & was pleased to see pre-, mid-, and post-conference tweets. For something a bit more topical, check out #ItGetsBetter. Greg's Search Engine Land post goes into more detail, so I'll link to it again.

The Archivist Desktop By Mix Online (and Microsoft). Only available for Windows. They say: "The Archivist is a Windows application that helps you archive tweets for later data-mining and analysis. Start a search with The Archivist and get as many results as it can. The, leave The Archivist running and it will poll Twitter for that search."

Chris Pirillo tweeted about this in September: Archive the Tweets That are Important to You. There is a web version as well for non PC users.

Back in August, 2009, Read Write Web listed 10 Ways to Archive Your Tweets.

Of these, Twinbox looks really handy, as it downloads certain Twitter feeds directly to your Outlook mail client. Again, however, this is only for PeeCee folks.

If you are interested in assessing social media campaigns, you might also want to check out my list of resource to help you Assess Social Media Campaigns.

Tweet on!

Concussions

2010-10-31T09:52:00.006-04:00

Not surprisingly, the spate of concussions on Sunday, Oct. 17 yielded a lot of discussion among newspapers, magazines, and the blogosphere on the safety of the game of football as it's currently played in the National Football League. Here are some of the items that caught my eye and are worth another look:

The November 1, 2010 issue of Sports Illustrated has CONCUSSIONS on the cover, complete with a stunning cover photo of Steelers linebacker James Harrison's hit on Browns wide receiver Mohamed Massaquoi. Inside are several articles, including a conversation with Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis on concussions and modified play and a discussion of how players might better protect themselves from concussions (via tensing their necks).

I most enjoyed David Epstein's article Unexpected Findings: The Damage Done, which chronicles research at Purdue detailing the cumulative effect of minor hits to the head throughout a game and season.
Peter King's cover article includes a great description of Boston University's Ann McKee (associate professor of neurology & pathology; diagnoser of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, in football players, in former NFL players) getting ready for a football-ful Sunday.
The articles are good, but the entire package is so well-done (and the photographs so striking) that I recommend buying the print issue, or reading it at your library.

The New York Times has been giving this a tremendous amount of coverage, of course. I particularly enjoyed William C. Rhoden's October 19 column Thirty-Yard Penalties Would Help Lower N.F.L. Violence and Michael Sokolove's Oct. 23 "Week in Review" essay Should You Watch Football? (yes).
Finally, Tweeter and blogger @concussionblog counts the hits at The Concussion Blog. It's a grim, but useful accounting of who got hit when, and not just in the NFL. Dustin Fink includes rugby, soccer, MLB, and more in his counting. He also does a nice job linking to current coverage of concussions around the country.

For More Information

The Purdue Study:
Talavage TM, Nauman E, Breedlove EL, et al. Functionally-Detected Cognitive Impairment in High School Football Players Without Clinically-Diagnosed Concussion. Journal of Neurotrauma. October 2010. [Epub ahead of print]

My Summer Vacation

2010-07-21T19:26:00.003-04:00

It's definitely summer here in North Carolina: we've had 36 days with temperatures at or above 90º in June or July (in 1952, we had 45 such days in June or July, says the News & Observer), and things are hot & sticky down south!

It's not quite vacation-time in an academic library, and my big project is to redesign the Park Library's web site. More on that later; check out the current site if you like.

The only blog writing I've done is to participate in Bora Zivkovic’s ScienceOnline interviews at his personal blog A Blog Around The Clock. This was part of Bora's occasional interviews with some of the participants of the ScienceOnline2010 conference that was held in the Research Triangle Park, NC back in January; they are all interesting! Mine was recently posted, so feel free to pop on over to Bora's blog if you want to know more about my relationship with science and libraries.

Back to the website drawing board ... I will post about the new site when it goes live in early August.

Twitter & the Library of Congress

2010-05-03T10:19:00.006-04:00

You may have seen that the Library of Congress will be archiving Tweets for the future. Here are my tweets on the topic, which should provide a brief summary of some useful articles:

How Tweet It Is!: Library of Congress Acquires, Saves Entire Twitter Archive, blog post @ blogs.LoC.gov, April 14, 2010.

Retweet of UNC SILS PhD student @fstutzman: "Good American Prospect interview w/ Library of Congress (LoC) re: Twitter: Deal is signed, done, LoC doesn't know about opt out. Ugh." The Library of Congress Is Now Following You on Twitter. Phoebe Connelly, April 16, 2010.

Retweet of UNC SILS / JoMC professor @smalljones: "Archivist of the United States makes case for (LoC) saving tweets." AOTUS: Collector in Chief » Tweets: What We Might Learn From Mundane Details. David Ferraro, April 16, 2010.

The Library and Twitter: An FAQ « Library of Congress Blog, Matt Raymond, April 28, 2010.

Retweet of Duke's "Digital strategist and plate-spinner" @paoloman: Digital Domain - A Sea of History - Twitter at the Library of Congress, New York Times, April 30, 2010.

Facebook & Theory of Mind, or Why I'm No Longer Updating Facebook

2010-03-06T11:58:00.002-05:00

Facebook is a place where you can communicate with your friends, family members, co-workers, ex-flames, maybe even your boss if you choose to friend her. Theory of mind is our "...intuitive understanding of [our] own and other people's minds or mental states, including beliefs and thoughts." (from A Dictionary of Psychology, edited by Andrew M. Colman. Oxford University Press 2009); it explains how we know what other people know.

What does this have to do with Facebook? In the old days, before Facebook's recent privacy changes, if Conchita posted something on Darius' wall, here's who could read it:

Darius could read it, because Conchita posted it on Darius' wall
Conchita could read it, because Conchita posted it on Darius' wall
Their mutual friends Albert and Brigadoon could read it, because

they were alerted when one friend wrote on another friend's wall
Albert and Brigadoon have access to Darius' wall because they are friends with him.

The above is still true. Here's what used to be true that is no longer true:

Conchita's friend Ephesus, who doesn't know Darius from Adama, previously could not see that she posted on Darius' wall. Additionally, Conchita's, family, co-workers, and other Facebook-defined friends who were not friends with Darius did not know about and therefore could not read that post. We all had a pretty clear notion of who would have access to that, and some measure of privacy WITHIN OUR FACEBOOK CONTACTS.
Now, Ephesus and all of Conchita's other Facebook "friends" know when she writes on ALL OF HER FRIEND'S walls, regardless of whether they know Conchita's friends or not. They also know when she comments on a photograph or a note or anything shared by ANY OF HER FRIENDS. If Conchita's not careful, they can even READ all of Conchita's comments to all of her friends.

As far as I can tell, there is no changing this setting. It is possible to hide some, most, or all of yourself from the World Wide Web, and from people who don't know you from Adama, but it is not possible to hide who you interact with on Facebook to the rest of your, and their, Facebook contacts.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation concurs: "These new 'privacy' changes are clearly intended to push Facebook users to publicly share even more information than before. Even worse, the changes will actually reduce the amount of control that users have over some of their personal data." Further, a story in this week's Inside Higher Ed reports that "A small change to the settings for Gadsden’s [an East Stroudsburg University sociology professor] online profile allowed the 'friends' of Gadsden’s own 'friends' to read her updates, and in so doing created a controversy that the professor now feels could damage her career and her chances at tenure."

This major change to Facebook's privacy policy has rattled me; and although I'd long ago stopped posting anything personal, it has silenced my Facebook updates.

For More Info

Facebook's New Privacy Changes: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, Electronic Frontier Foundation, December 9th, 2009.

Perez, Sarah. The 3 Facebook Settings Every User Should Check Now, New York Times, January 20, 2010.
News: Not So Private Professors, Inside Higher Ed, March 2, 2010.

What Can You Ask a Librarian?

2010-02-15T10:48:00.009-05:00

A recent Library Hacks blog post at Duke's Perkins Library, Ever wonder what you can ask a reference librarian? prompted me to publicize some of the questions we've been asked at the Park Library. (I first posted this on the JoMC Park Library blog but thought it would be fun over here too)

Recent questions include (along with answers, where feasible):

Basic Questions, students asked for ...

Communication Yearbook by call number. (check the catalog)
Dissertations by former JoMC students (online! from 1997-present in ProQuest Dissertations & Theses full-text *)
Related: looking for a MA thesis by a former JoMC student (list is online)
How to request books from another library (Carolina BLU rocks!).
Printing, printing, printing! Lots of questions about printing. We currently don't have the "free" ITS printers anywhere in Carroll Hall, and we answer lots of questions about that.

More Complex Questions, where folks asked for ...

Alcohol advertisements from the late 1960s to present (Duke's Ad*Access is a great start, as are some of the other resources on this page)
Editorial cartoons (this research page can help)
An article from the Los Angeles Times from 1984 (we have the LA Times from 1881-1986 *& the most recent 6 months in LexisNexis *)
Tough one: readership of southern, American newspapers in the mid-1800s. We found some material in books and other old-fashioned sources.
Industry surveys of the motorcycle industry (I love these market research resources!)
Articles from North Carolina newspapers about an event that took place in southeastern NC in the mid-80s to mid-90s. The papers the patron needed weren't on microfilm ... helped her find the appropriate microfilm source and identify specific dates via the Charlotte Observer (available from 1985-present in America's Newspapers *)

Many of these links will work regardless of your institutional affiliation. The links followed by an * are available to the UNC community only.

The library staff and I are happy to answer questions about doing research in journalism & mass communication. You can reach me by email (swbrown @ unc . edu), by phone at 919.843.8300, IM to JoMCParkLib, and now you can even text Qs to us at 919-200-0713.

Ask us anything!

Caprica, Media, and Crisis Communication

2010-02-11T09:04:00.005-05:00

I am a huge Battlestar Galactica fan, and I've been intrigued by the spinoff/prequel Caprica. This week's Caprica touched many of my interests beyond the sci fi philosophy that I like (one character asked another this week "Can you be free if you’re not real?") and the soap opera that I find addictive.

The first episode of Caprica included a massive terrorist bombing, and one of the terrorists may or may not be one of the main characters (who died in the bombing, but whose avatar lives on). The character's father, Daniel Graystone, is a corporate mogul (think Bill Gates or Steve Jobs). The episode features a lot of media reaction to the bombing and the daughter's possible involvement: many stories have appeared in the daily newspaper, the Caprican (which has its own page on the syfy web site), and a Jay Leno-like commentator spoke derisively about the characters' involvement in the bombing.

The media outcry turned so hostile that the company's stock began to tumble, and Graystone's assistant suggested some public relations assistance in the form of a crisis communicator. The side elements of media and communications added to my enjoyment of the show.

If you've watched Caprica, or you're interested in the media aspects, check out the Capricology entries on the ReligionDispatches blog. Some great academic minds are writing weekly posts about various media and religion aspects of Caprica. They include

Diane Winston, the Knight Chair in Media and Religion at the University of Southern California.
Salman Hameed, astronomer and Assistant Professor of Integrated Science & Humanities at Hampshire College.
Anthea Butler, Associate Professor of religion at the University of Pennsylvania.
Henry Jenkins, Provost's Professor of Communication, Journalism, and Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California.

Their thoughtful Capricology discussions enhance my enjoyment of Caprica, and this week's entry, Capricology: Week 3: Apotheosis, Anyone? cover many of the media aspects I've highlighted here.

Librarians & Scholars

2010-01-28T15:40:00.002-05:00

One of my ScienceOnline goals seems to be happening: scientists and librarians are improving their (intraspecies?) communication. Several folks have blogged or FriendFeeded about the interaction between librarians and scientists. What really got me going today was Greg Laden's Do you think libraries and librarians are important?, which, happily, has been retweeted many times - mostly by scientists & other science folks.

Naturally, I think libraries & librarians are important to a variety of scholars, including scientists. I believe librarians have a perception problem -- many non-librarians think we sit around and read all day, go around shushing people, and date-stamp books. We do some of that occasionally, but we also do much more. I wrote this in response to Greg's question:

What we librarians are NOT doing well is communicating what we have to scientists & other scholars. We are also NOT making our material easy to use, the way Google is. Some of it is admittedly more complex than what Google is doing, but some of it is legacy systems (and mindset) left over from the days when the librarian was not the last person in the world you'd ask for help with research.

So, what's the solution? We must be where our scholars are. This can be done a few ways: "embedded" librarians who spend a good deal of their work time with their scholars, in their departments, at their meetings, working with their scholar peers. If this is not possible, and even when it is, we should also make it a point to engage with our scholars online and at conferences.

I am extremely fortunate to be truly live among my researchers at UNC's School of Journalism and Mass Communication, as my office / library is right in the middle of the School's building, and I attend faculty meetings, see folks in the hallways, and otherwise spend most of my day with folks I am trying to support. I casually mention my research interests (usability, interaction of undergraduates with library materials, cognitive science) in conversation, and I listen to them discuss theirs. This interaction establishes that I am (moderately) scholarly myself, and it helps me integrate my scholars' & students' interests into the library.

It is not possible, or even desirable, for every librarian to be embedded with their departments in this way. There are other activities that can achieve the same goals, such as holding office hours in a department, attending receptions for faculty and students, and spending time physically in the presence of the scholars whom we are supporting.

Additionally, we should make an effort to engage with our scholars online and at conferences. There were several librarians at ScienceOnline, as John Dupuis notes, and I believe that we generated a lot of good conversations with scientists, journalists, and others about how librarians can help further their work. I know of at least one instance where this prompted a scientist to seek out a librarian at his home institution, and I'd guess that it's made many non-librarians realize some of what we can offer.

Finally, we librarians should be reading blogs and tweets of the scientists and/or scholars whom we support. This costs no money, and takes as much or as little time as you have to devote to it. By being in the conversation, we are starting to change the way scholars think of librarians -- one scholar, and one librarian, at a time.

ScienceOnline Posts about Librarians & Scientists

Christina Pikas' Librarians & Scientists: YMMV on Christina's LIS Rant
Dorothea Salo's Science Online 2010: Scientists and librarians on The Book of Trogool
Greg Laden's Do you think libraries and librarians are important?
Martin Fenner's Scientists and librarians: friend or foe? from Gobbledygook on Nature Network
"librarian" on the #scio10 thread in FriendFeed.
"librarian" on the #scio10 thread in Twitter

9 Take-aways from ScienceOnline10

2010-01-18T11:40:00.003-05:00

Jonathan Eisen, aka @phylogenomics had a great post today entitled Top 11 things I learned at Science Online 2010 (#scio10). I wanted to blog about the conference myself but was stuck as to how to get started, and I thought I'd follow @phylogenomics' lead. I'll expand on some of these topics in future posts.

Getting the Science Right, subtitled "The importance of fact checking mainstream science publications — an underappreciated and essential art — and the role scientists can and should (but often don’t) play in it" offered great insight into several different ways fact-checking is done (or not done) and how long it can take. It was great to hear experiences of the three speakers, Rebecca Skloot, Sheril Kirshenbaum, and David Dobbs.
My presentation with Dorothea Salo on helping scientists find information was not incredibly well-attended, but between us, Dorothea and I made a big difference for a few people.
The energy of bloggers, twitters, and science geeks was impressive and inspiring. It was a small conference (~250 attendees) and folks seemed eager to connect with all sorts of other attendees. This led me to be ...
Motivated to start blogging again. It's been a hectic several months, including a 700-mile move, starting an awesome new job, and a 700-mile road trip to see the friends from whom I'd recently moved away. I foresee having a bit more time in the coming weeks, so I pledge to blog more - maybe once a week or so.
The difference in writing styles in blogging, tweeting, and other kinds of writing. Blogging is harder than tweeting, srsly. Reading blogs is different from reading tweets, and also different from reading dead-print media such as magazine articles. Reading journal articles and books is different still. While this is obvious, it was good to talk about it.
The value & simplicity of video. Lots of attendees were documenting the conference with Flip cameras. After seeing the ease of using the video cameras, and the immediacy of the message they conveyed, and a great session by Mary Spiro on video storyboarding, I was intrigued.
Google Sidewiki sponsored a contest for a Flip camera for the most sidewiki annotations during the conference. Since I had achieved a modicum of interest in video (#6 above), I decided to explore Sidewiki. I'm glad I did, as it seems to have a lot of potential for libraries (about which more later, as in #4 above).
Meeting tweeps, previously known and unknown, in person. Also, finally meeting a mutual friend after several years of mutual friendness. In both cases, meeting in person was greatly facilitated by prior connections, and good conversations started almost immediately. Next year, will meet even more previously-known tweeps.
Speaking of next year, plan to stay in conference hotel. I live 30 minutes away from the festivities, and that was about 25 minutes too far. I was reminded of how difficult it is to attend a conference while living at home, as there is a disconnect between home life and conference life. Both would have benefited from my staying at the conference hotel for at least one night.

Take-away for all of you: if you're interested in the intersection of science and online activities, consider attending ScienceOnline2011.

ScienceOnline in Real Life

2010-01-11T20:23:00.001-05:00

Finally I'm going to ScienceOnline! I wanted to go 2 years ago, but didn't have the nerve to sign up. I wanted to go a year ago, and although I found the nerve to sign up, I didn't go because I would be moving shortly and couldn't add One More Thing into my busy spring schedule. Now that I'm living in the Triangle, I'm going to ScienceOnline -- without even the hassle of a plane trip. Yippee!

As I read more about the workshops, program sessions, BlogMedia coverage and browse the list of participants, I get more and more excited. If you haven't heard of ScienceOnline, here's what excites me about it:

1. It's about science and collaboration, very broadly defined. I first heard about some of the folks involve at scio10 (as it's called) at the 2007 American Society for Information Science & Technology conference (which I blogged), and I realized that not only were some librarians doing cool stuff with technology, but some scientists were too. Jean-Claude Bradley impressed me as he talked about using wikis with his chemistry students; Bora Zivkovic neatly delineated different reasons for science blogging; and Janet Stemwedel talked about the value of blogging in the scientific process. Not only are scientists learning cool things about how the brain and mind work, but they are talking about it - so I was hooked both intellectually and technologically. I expect to witness and even participate in the science & technology at scio10.

2. Some cool librarians are attending. My e-buddy John Dupuis has collected a list of library people at Science Online 2010 at his great blog Confessions of a Science Librarian. I look forward to meeting him and some other science librarians I've met online over the years. Dorothea, who blogs as The Book of Trogool and I are doing a session creatively titled Scientists What can your librarian do for you?, with an accompanying wiki. I hope we get some good discussion and even learning as we try to give science folks the scoop on Libraries. If you can't attend, and you're a librarian or a scientist, check out Dorothea's slides as they are clever and informative.

3. A nice mashup of my interest in science, as evidenced by the "Science" in Cognitive Science and journalism, as evidenced by my new gig as librarian for the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina.

Here are just a few of the sessions I want to attend ... tho' I'll probably only make it to half of these:

PRI’s The World Science – Elsa Youngsteadt and Rhitu Chatterjee
Rebooting Science Journalism in the Age of the Web – Ed Yong, Carl Zimmer, John Timmer, and David Dobbs
Online Civility and Its (Muppethugging) Discontents – Janet Stemwedel, Sheril Kirshenbaum and Dr.Isis
Casting a wider net: Promoting gender and ethnic diversity in STEM – Anne Jefferson
Science and the mobile device – Christopher Perrien
Tour of the NC Museum of Life + Science
Blogging 102 – Dave Munger
Repositories for Fun and Profit – Dorothea Salo
Storyboarding your science video and posting it online – Mary Spiro

But really, it's 4: Awesome sessions for the science nerd at a level that a science aficionado can understand; advanced degree helpful but not required.

Cycling and the Brain

2009-11-09T09:26:00.000-05:00

More broadly: exercise in the brain, with an emphasis on cycling. There's a neat article in the Nov. 2009 issue of Bicycling about the effects of cycling on ADHD. The focus is on a first-year college student named Adam Leibovitz, in the lead article Riding is My Ritalin, in which Leibovitz is able to control his attention difficulties with long bicycle rides.

There are a few interesting sidebars in the article.

Christine Mattheis summarizes some scholarly articles on the cognitive benefits of riding (as well as other regular exercise) in Your Brain on Cycling
Bruce Barcott describes exercise as a tool to combat ADHD in The Exercise Option: Who Knew?
Mattheis also reviews Michael Wendt's research suggesting the possibility of controlling ADHD with exercise in The Drug-Free Drug

I was intrigued by (summaries of) so much research demonstrating not only that exercise is good for mood but also good for concentration. Barcott quotes Harvard's John Ratey: " 'Regular exercise can raise the baseline levels of both norepinephrine and dopamine,' he says, 'which are the same neurotransmitters that Ritalin and Adderall go after.' "

For More Information

Barcott, Bruce. Riding is My Ritalin. Bicycling, November 2009, pp.52-59, 93.
Conant-Norville, D.O., Tofler, I.R. Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder and Psychopharmacologic Treatments in the Athlete. (2005) Clinics in Sports Medicine, 24 (4 SPEC. ISS.), pp. 829-843.
Ratey, John and Eric Hagerman. Spark : The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain. New York : Little, Brown, 2008.
Wendt, Michael Stephen. "The Effect of an Activity Program Designed with Intense Physical Exercise on the Behavior of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) Children." Dissertation, State University of New York at Buffalo, 2000.

Fun!

2009-11-02T10:30:00.000-05:00

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

The NFL & the Brain

2009-11-01T10:15:00.005-05:00

I'm going to (try to) keep track of much of the reputable coverage of the NFL, concussions, and long-lasting effects of concussions on brain health. Recent coverage includes:

WVU's Dr. Julian Bailes and Bennet Omalu, M.D., a neuropathologist now practicing in California, appeared on ABC's Nightline program (with guest host Martin Bashir) on October 16, 2009 to discuss the long-term impact of concussions to NFL football players.

Concussions and Congress and the Future Game NYTimes.com Fifth Down Blog, Nov. 1, 2009. Includes YouTube video of Representative Linda Sánchez (D., CA) questioning NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.
Hard Knocks: Does Playing in NFL Cause Brain Trauma? Online NewsHour (PBS), Oct. 29, 2009.
Malloy, Daniel. Hearing spotlights NFL concussions Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Oct. 29, 2009.
Schwarz, Alan. Commissioner Criticized Over N.F.L.’s Handling of Players’ Brain Injuries. New York Times, October 28, 2009.
Schwarz, Alan. In Gay Culverhouse, N.F.L. Players With Head Injuries Find a Voice New York Times, October 27, 2009.

Catch up on current stories about nfl concussions via Google News.

Cognitive Science Fiction: Alzheimer's Edition

2009-10-19T09:05:00.000-04:00

I recently read a very moving novel about a woman suffering from Alzheimer's, called Still Alice. In it, neuroscientist Lisa Genova writes about neuroscientist Alice Howland who develops early-onset Alzheimer's at age 50. I especially enjoyed the first-person account of the progression of the disease, and I'd recommend it to anyone with a loved-one or friend suffering from Alzheimer’s. I'd also recommend it to anyone treating Alzheimer's patients, as it presents Alzheimer's from an unusual perspective.

For More Information

Genova, Lisa. Still Alice. New York : Pocket Books, 2009.

This is Your Brain in the NFL

2009-10-12T09:04:00.003-04:00

As I watched the Giants play football yesterday, I rooted for my favorite players, the offensive line, to have a great game. I also worried about their future, as those players are often susceptible to debilitating brain injuries after retirement.

That's according to some recent and troubling stories about brain injuries among former NFL players. The most detailed is the most disturbing: GQ's October 2009 article entitled Game Brain (available only through GQ's web site in a Very Clunky Format; soon to be available in LexisNexis & InfoTrac). Author Jeanne Marie Laskas interviews neuropathologist and self-proclaimed "brain chaser" Bennet Omalu in his quest to identify this new strain of "punch-drunk syndrome," formerly associated only with boxers. He calls it "gridiron dementia" in his readable and sobering book Play Hard, Die Young: Football Dementia, Depression, and Death.

Omalu named this disease strain chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) and published his findings in the journal Neurosurgery; Laskas notes that the article contained "scientific evidence that the kind of repeated blows to the head sustained in football could cause severe, debilitating brain damage." What Omalu found literally were "[b]rown and red splotches. All over the place. Large accumulations of tau proteins. Tau was kind of like sludge, clogging up the works, killing cells in regions responsible for mood, emotions, and executive functioning."

Laskas also spoke with Julian Bailes, a neurosurgeon of considerable renown who had for a decade worked as a Pittsburgh Steelers team doctor. Bailes, chairman of neurosurgery at West Virginia University Hospitals, who was the first to tell Omalu that he believed in his research. The GQ article details both the medical quest to identify and the political issues as Omalu, et al. try to convince the NFL of their findings.

Since it's football season, there are some other articles about this as well, including one from last month's New York Times and today's New Yorker.

image from GQ

For More Information

Carpenter, Les. 'Brain Chaser' Tackles Effects of NFL Hits Washington Post, April 25, 2007.
Gladwell, Malcolm. Football, Dog Fighting, and Brain Damage The New Yorker, Oct. 19, 2009.
Laskas, Jeanne Marie. Game Brain. GQ. October, 2009.
Omalu Bennet, et al. Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy in a National Football League Player. Neurosurgery. 57(1):128-134, July 2005.
----. Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy in a National Football League Player: part II. Neurosurgery. 59(5):1086-1093, November 2006.
Omalu, Bennett. Play Hard, Die Young: Football Dementia, Depression, and Death. Lodi, Calif. : Neo-Forenxis Books, 2008.
Schwarz, Alan. Dementia Risk Seen in Players in N.F.L. Study. New York Times, September 29, 2009.

Additional Info:

Study Links Concussions To Brain Disease 60 Minutes - CBS News, Oct. 11, 2009.
Fatsis, Stefan. Health Care Reform ... for the N.F.L. New York Times Op-Ed, Oct. 11, 2009.
New York Times Fifth Down Blog, Malcolm Gladwell on Concussions, and the Gagliardi Solution Oct. 18, 2009

A Good Laugh

2009-08-31T09:18:00.000-04:00

I often quote from Ranganathan's Five Laws of Library Science. Here they are, in case you haven't committed them to memory:

Books are for use.
Every reader his [or her] book.
Every book its reader.
Save the time of the User.
The library is a growing organism.

What's great is that S.R. Ranganathan was an Indian librarian (often called the father of library science in India) who published these laws in 1931 -- and they are still relevant today, half a world away. The Laws are particularly valid if you substitute another library-themed word for "books," such as databases or information. While teaching reference, I often exhorted my students to "Save the time of the User" by knowing their collection and knowing how to interview patrons to find out what they really wanted. In my new position at UNC's Park Library of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, I find myself saying "Books are for use" as we begin to circulate our books.

How is this funny? So far, it isn't. But fellow librarian Steve Lawson (check out his great blog, See Also) has created a Classics of Librarianship Mad Lib. In it you can add your own nouns and a verb or two to generate Your Own Five Laws of Whatever, consistent in form with Ranganathan's Five Laws of Library Science.

Browse some of the Laws, or generate your own with his Mad Lib machine. I am chuckling enormously, feeling about as silly as I did when I first created Mad Libs back in 6th grade. It's nice to combine librarianship with 6th-grade silly.

The Placebo Effect is Stronger than Ever

2009-08-26T17:09:00.000-04:00

The September 2009 issue of Wired has a terrific article about the placebo effect / response. Steve Silberman writes in "Placebos Are Getting More Effective. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why" that the placebo effect in drug clinical trials has been increasing in recent years, causing many trials to "cross the futility boundary" where drugs are no more effective than a placebo.

Silberman writes: "It's not that the old meds are getting weaker, drug developers say. It's as if the placebo effect is somehow getting stronger."

This is not good for drug manufacturers, of course, but it is fascinating for cognitive science aficionados. Some of the points Silberman raises in the article:

Previously effective Prozac has recently tested as less effective against placebos;
Antidepressant effectiveness compared with placebos differs by geographic region;
Perhaps the increase in drug advertising has affected people's expectation of what drugs will do, thus leading to an increase in the placebo effect.

Italian researcher Fabrizio Benedetti, at the University of Turin, has done research showing that "Alzheimer's patients with impaired cognitive function get less pain relief from analgesic drugs than normal volunteers do." Benedetti speculates that Alzheimer's patients can't anticipate the treatment and so only feel the actual effect of the drug, rather than anticipating its effects.

There is a data-mining effort underway, supported by the NIH, called the Placebo Response Drug Trials Survey, in which psychiatrist William Potter and colleagues from many drug firms are trying to "determine which variables are responsible for the apparent rise in the placebo effect." (Silberman notes that the "existence of the project ... is being kept under wraps" -- which is consistent with my experience, as a Google / literature search for "Placebo Response Drug Trials Survey" resulted in no hits.)

Silberman provides a great definition of the phenomenon: "one way that placebo aids recovery is by hacking the mind's ability to predict the future." I enjoyed the article and can't wait to hear more.

For More Information

Silberman, Steve. Placebos Are Getting More Effective. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why. Wired. September 2009.

Nom nom nom: brain food!

2009-08-13T10:20:00.002-04:00

Brain Food at Street Anatomy

Vanessa Ruiz, creator of the Street Anatomy blog, "obsessively covers the use of human anatomy in medicine, art, and design." Yesterday, she found this: "Red velvet raspberry cake with French vanilla cream cheese frosting and a chocolate brain by Pamela. She made these using miniature brain molds."

Found via @vaughanbell's tweet, who found it on Boing Boing.

Concussion Awareness Research

2009-08-12T18:19:00.006-04:00

Today's News & Observer had an article about the UNC football team, a body temperature pill, heat-related injuries, and concussions. Combine football with science, and throw in a brain injury ... and I'm hooked.

This CorTemp capsule allows coaches to monitor players' body temperature, which is helpful in assessing whether or not they should continue practice in hot weather. The N&O article has a neat photo of a player's temperature being taken through his back.

The pill is also part of a study that is assessing situations that could promote concussions. Kevin Guskiewicz, head of UNC's department of exercise and sport science, referred to a "theory that dehydration could make concussions more likely;" he added that because symptoms are so similar, it can be difficult to tell if a player is dehydrated or if he has suffered from a concussion.

Guskiewicz has been working on another study, in which sensors are inserted in players' helmets to correlate the amount of force it takes in different locations for a player to sustain a concussion. Used together, the temperature pill and the helmet sensor can help determine if the player has sustained a concussion. Further, because Guskiewicz has been testing the pill on other teams, he says that the the aggregate data can help " 'compare the G-forces to the temperature, and try to correlate whether the [G-forces] get higher when the body temperature is hotter.' "

I'm glad to read that researchers are trying to develop methods to prevent situations that can cause dehydration and concussion, because ... I'm ready for some football!

For More Information

Pickeral, Robbi. UNC Gauges a Gut Reaction. News & Observer, August 12, 2009. page A1.
HQ Inc. Press Stories and Downloads (about using the CorTemp pill to detect stress). Sources include NBC Nightly News, a PowerPoint showing CorTemp's use on the Minnesota Vikings in 2006 training camp, and a 2006 IEEE Spectrum article on CorTemp.

Smart Birds!

2009-08-10T10:16:00.010-04:00

Fascinating research shows that rooks, members of the corvid family like crows, can use tools to enhance their access to food. In this case, they used stones to raise water level in a tube high enough so they could get a worm out of the tube. The video demonstrates Connelly the rook's ingenuity; later experiments (also available on YouTube) show Cook the rook putting stones in tube of water rather than sand to get his worm.

Cell Press describes their featured video: "Corvid birds are known for their intelligent use of tools. In this video, three different rooks (Connelly, Cook, and Monroe) use stones to raise the water level in a vial in order to reach a floating worm, as described in detail in the paper by Bird and Emery published online on August 6. In the first two trials, Connelly is required to raise the water level by a varying amount by using seven stones and one stone, respectively. In the third trial, Monroe uses preferentially larger stones to get to the goal, and in the last trial Cook drops the stones into a vial with water as opposed to one containing sawdust."

A related note: I love that Cell Press is marketing its authors' research / publication with a YouTube video channel. It's a great way to promote science!

For More Information

Bird, Christopher David, and Nathan John Emery Rooks Use Stones to Raise the Water Level to Reach a Floating Worm. Current Biology, August 6 2009.

The New Yorker & The News Biz

2009-07-20T15:59:00.005-04:00

After many years, I am finally subscribing to the New Yorker again. Not in print, but via their Digital Reader. I'm blogging about it because I like their model: the Digital Reader adds something I wouldn't get from the library version, and I feel like this new model bears watching as we migrate from print to online.

The Digital Reader offers a digital flip-through version of the print magazine - I wish I could show you this via a screen shot, but you have to try it to believe it. Click on the white circle within the grey triangle to move from page to page. You see the cover in all its colorful glory, the cartoons, advertisements, and, of course, entire stories. As a long-time New Yorker reader (over 40 years!), I love that I can again see the articles in context - with adjacent cartoons, snarky comments after the articles end, and that unique New Yorker font. I am excited again about reading the New Yorker -- I eagerly check my email on Monday mornings to browse the table of contents online.

But as a librarian in the world of journalism, I am excited about the model, too, because it seems like it just might be sustainable, or at least a step in the right direction. The New Yorker charged me $40 for this access, and I'm so happy about it, I'm blogging it. Points to them for peer promotion. Plus, they get to tell advertisers that folks are seeing their ads, even in the online version. I'd guess that advertisers get little or no benefit from readers accessing magazine archives through a library database. And presumably, readers themselves are happy about it, because they can read just the articles they want, in the familiar New Yorker format.

Blogger Jason Kottke gave a thoughtful list of pros & cons to the new interface in November 2008, in which I learned that the archives go back to 1925, and the site works on an iPhone. I agree that some improvements could be made to the interface, and I encountered some technical problems early on. It works well enough now on Mac FireFox, but printing isn't great on Safari.

I know that online access isn't the best option for all readers, but clearly the trend is for more online access to media-formerly-available-only-in-print. This is the first online foray by a print outlet that has captured my imagination AND persuaded me to open my wallet. I hope that other print publications will watch this and attempt their own versions.

For More Information

New Yorker Digital Reader, 4-week trial offer.
Kottke, Jason. The New Yorker's online Digital Reader, an evaluation. blog post, November 11, 2008.

Susan Stamberg & Early NPR Days

2009-07-12T10:13:00.010-04:00

Two interesting interviews with Susan Stamberg about the early days of NPR:

Bob Edwards interviewed her in November 2008 for his eponymous XM Radio show, and it was both entertaining and informative. They discussed some of her interviews, including Henri Cartier Bresson and Jorge Mester; they also talked about the monkey version of her cranberry relish recipe. Stamberg talked to Edwards about the very early days of being on the air at NPR, including a vignette about his early work as a newscaster. I laughed out loud while listening on the bus.

The interview is available on Audible, where it is described:

In the early 1970's, Susan Stamberg was one of the first producers hired by the fledgling National Public Radio and later she became the first woman to anchor its nightly news program, All Things Considered. Bob talks with Stamberg about her experience as a radio pioneer, what she feels makes a great interview and the true story behind her mother-in-law's Thanksgiving cranberry relish.

More recently, NPR librarian Jo Ella Straley interviewed "The Mother of Public Radio" and posted the 17 minute piece on the NPR library blog, A Matter of Fact.

For More Information

Edwards, Bob. Interview with Susan Stamberg. The Bob Edwards Show, XM Radio. November 27, 2008. Available on Audible for $2.95 and through iTunes as Bob Edwards Weekend.
Clements, Maureen & Jo Ella Straley. First File: Susan Stamberg. Blog: A Matter of Fact. July 9, 2009.
bonus: finding aids for the Susan Stamberg Collection at the University of Maryland Libraries.

A Twitter Tizzy!

2009-06-30T09:24:00.000-04:00

After tweeting privately for over 18 months, I have recently created two public Twitter accounts. One is for folks at my new position as director of the Park Library at UNC's School of Journalism and Mass Communication (JoMC), where I am @JoMCParkLib and the other is ... finally! ... as @CogSciLibrarian.

All this Twitter activity has gotten me thinking about how I use Twitter and why I feel the need for three separate accounts. I've also been thinking about it because of an upcoming study at UNC by Fred Stutzman and Woody Hartzog on privacy behaviors in online social networks. They are looking for people who "have started using social networking sites within the last two years, and maintain multiple profiles (e.g. a 'work profile' and a 'personal profile')." I'll use my blog for personal reflection and share my thoughts, in partial answer to "omg! three Twitter accounts" reaction and also in response to Stutzman and Hartzog's interesting call for participants.

My personal Twitter account is for me to stay in touch with my friends. I "know" most of the people I tweet with privately, either in the Real World or from connections made online. I talk about what I'm cooking for dinner, what license plate I'm going to get (NC State Parks), and other miscellaneous chatter that is reserved for friends.

My work Twitter account, @JoMCParkLib, is where I post library items of interest to students, faculty, alumni, and staff who use or might use the Park Library. I want to promote the exciting resources that the library makes available to members of the JoMC and UNC communities. Journalists and other mass communicators such as advertisers and marketers are making good use of Twitter, so I am consciously trying to communicate in a medium that is familiar to my library's audience. If Twitter isn't familiar to folks at JoMC, maybe my Twitter account will encourage them to learn more about it. The tweets are going directly to those who follow me on @JoMCParkLib, but I also have them feed into the library's home page, and I send out a weekly email to faculty & staff highlighting the week's top tweets.

The work Twitter account is also where I'll write the majority of my professional library science tweets; I did some live-tweeting from the recent Special Libraries Association (SLA) conference and will probably do the same for the upcoming Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) conference. At SLA, I was eager to show my followers how libraries are useful to journalists (there were great shout-outs to librarians by Colin Powell, Judy Woodruff, and Robyn Meredith). At AEJMC, I will also be happy to promote the role of the librarian in educating journalists & mass communicators.

I use Tweetie on my Mac to manage the two Twitter accounts, and that is going so well that I created a third Twitter account for @CogSciLibrarian.

I haven't been blogging much, in part because I was teaching and working full-time last semester, and then moved over 700 miles ... but I was still thinking about all things CogSci. There's been some talk that Twitter is supplanting blogging (it is called microblogging, after all), where shared items (or ReTweets, as they are called; RT for short) on a topic are tweeted instead of written about on a blog. Longer, more thoughtful items are written as blog posts. My new idea is to embed my @CogSciLibrarian Twitter feed into this blog and continue blogging longer items of cognitive science interest. I don't expect to post to @CogSciLibrarian as much as I do to my other two feeds, and I will not post personal material to that feed at all.

While I am dividing my Twitter accounts, I will most likely keep one blog, under the CogSciLibrarian name. I will continue to post about cognitive science and library science, with a splash of music; and I will integrate some journalism / mass communication into the mix.

For More Information

Common Craft. Twitter in Plain English. March 5, 2008. A short video introduction to the micro-blogging service Twitter.
Stutzman, Fred and Woody Hertzog. Recruiting Participants for a Research Study. Unit Structures, blog. June 26, 2009. Consider participating!

A Rock Star of Neuroscience

2009-06-29T09:09:00.002-04:00

I've been meaning to read the May 11 New Yorker article on V. S. Ramachandran and this weekend I finally had time to do so. It is a great read for those interested in "Rama" or in many of the hot topics in neuroscience for the last 15 or so years.

Rama really is a rock star of neuroscience, as Colapinto's article ably demonstrates. Ramachandran has developed a mechanism for people to overcome -- and even eradicate -- phantom limb pain; he has studied synesthesia, mirror neurons, and brain plasticity. The article provides examples of all of these areas of Rama's expertise, as well as several of his other endeavors (hiding habits of flounder, for instance).

Colapinto includes a charming interlude with Rama's wife of over 20 years (Diane Rogers-Ramachandran is a UNC grad!) which provides amusing insight into Rama's inability to find his car in a parking lot.

I've blogged about Ramachandran several times, including a vibrant TEDTalk, and if you are interested in his work, I recommend this article.

For More Information

Colapinto, John. Brain Games, the New Yorker. May 11, 2009.(registration required for the full article, or read the article in EBSCO's Academic Search Premier database for free if your institution is a subscriber)
Colapinto, John. Ramachandran’s Mirror Trick, blog post at the New Yorker. May 6, 2009. Includes a written description of Ramachandran's ingenious solution to phantom limb pain, the mirror trick, along with a photo of how the mirror should be positioned for the trick to work.

A Musical Interlude

2009-06-27T07:37:00.005-04:00

NPR.org/music has some terrific musical material! They have interviews with musical acts of all stripes: rock/pop/folk; classical; jazz & blues; world; and urban. I've mostly explored the first category, which has featured:

Moby -- All Things Considered interview *and* they stream his new album Wait for Me, in its entirety
Regina Spektor -- Bob Boilen's review of her new album Far, along with a link to stream of the entire album.
the 100 best folk songs, as selected by Folk Alley listeners -- all 100! streamed in random order
An amazing concert archive, from various public radio shows across the country, including WXPN's Friday Concert series and Mountain Stage.

You can add these and other musical material to a playlist, and hear albums and songs of all sorts play continuously. This is a highly-recommended summer diversion!

Memory, Math, and Cognitive Science Fiction

2009-06-24T19:30:00.001-04:00

I just finished a delightful novel called The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yōko Ogawa and translated by Stephen Snyder. What was interesting from a cognitive science perspective was that the (unnamed) Professor had a traumatic brain injury which left him with only 80 minutes of short-term memory. He remembers everything prior to the accident which occurred in the late 1970s, but he can only remember the past 80 minutes and anything prior to that is forgotten.

The Professor was a mathematician and copes with his lack of memory by doing mathematical puzzles. He is very interested in prime numbers, and fractals, and the book is full of math (and Japanese baseball).

It was well-written and both the story and characters are memorable. I was particularly struck by the difficulties a person encounters when he has only 80 minutes of current memory, and the Professor's coping mechanisms are fascinating. If you like a good story, math, baseball, or are working with people who have short-term memory loss, you might enjoy this novel.

For More Information

Ogawa, Yōko. The Housekeeper and the Professor. Translated from the Japanese by Stephen Snyder. New York : Picador, 2009.

More about Synesthesia

2009-06-22T08:14:00.000-04:00

I was so excited about my possible synesthetic experience last week (aural synesthesia?) that I didn't explain what synesthesia actually is. It just so happened that on last week's episode of Australia's terrific radio program All in the Mind, host Natasha Mitchell interviewed neuroscientist David Eagleman. The two talked about his new novel Sum: 40 tales from the Afterlives, and Mitchell notes that Eagleman is "also a leading researcher in synesthesia, studying people who taste sounds, hear colours, and live in a remarkable world of sensory cross-talk."

The interview is quite interesting -- for this topic, that's especially true of the second half, where Mitchell and Eagleman talk about his research into synesthesia and what we still don't know about the brain. Mitchell's blog post summarizes more of the interview and has been left open for comments from synesthetes and others.

For More Information

Cytowic, Richard E. and David Eagleman. Wednesday is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain on Synesthesia. MIT Press, 2009
David Eagleman's lab
Mitchell, Natasha, interview: David Eagleman: The afterlife, synesthesia and other tales of the senses. All in the Mind, June 20, 2009. mp3 ... print transcript available shortly.

Aural Synesthesia?

2009-06-18T14:47:00.002-04:00

I was recently in DC for conference of special librarians and I was lucky enough to have a tour of the NPR building. My guide, library director Laura Soto-Barra, asked about my favorite shows on NPR.

News junkie that I am, I said that the top- and bottom-of-the-hour newscasts are tops on my list of NPR shows. Laura thoughtfully took me over to the area where the newscasters work and I was thrilled to meet Ann Taylor and Jack Speer, who speak just the way they sound on the air. I also met the other folks who make the newscast happen, producer Rob Schaefer; editor Jeanine Herbst; and associate producer Whitney Jones. I admit to gawking like a kid. (I was also excited to meet The Two-Way blogger Frank James, who sits in their corner).

The tour continued, and as we walked around the building, I heard the reporters' voices in my head as I saw name plates on cubicles and doors. Claudio Sanchez, Bob Boilen, Felix Contreras, Michel Martin. I didn't meet any of them, mind you, just saw them or even their name plates -- and yet I imagined their voices so clearly it was as if I were actually hearing them. Is this aural synesthesia? Or does everyone hear voices in their heads when they see names?

Regardless, I appreciated the tour and meeting some of the newscasters.

For more about the NPR library, check out the NPR librarians' blog As a Matter of Fact and read their response to Frequently Asked Questions about the library

The Reference Interview, Stereotypically

2009-06-10T20:28:00.002-04:00

The librarians at UT Arlington are at it again -- if I were still teaching reference, I'd show this video to start a discussion of the reference interview.

Promoting Science

2009-06-10T09:23:00.000-04:00

I've just run across three cool ideas for promoting science:

BoraZ reteweets an interesting story from science writer Mary Spiro: Rock Stars of Science: Will it hype scientific celebrity and increase research funding? In this Baltimore Science News Examiner story, Spiro writes about a nifty campaign called Rock Stars of Science, pairing actual rock stars like Aerosmith's Joe Perry, Sheryl Crow, Black Eyed Pea will.i.am, and Seal with actual scientists like neuroscientists Ron Petersen, Steven T. Dekosky, and Sam Gandy. Men's magazine GQ and the Geoffrey Beene Gives Back Alzheimer’s Initiative are working together to create this "promotional" campaign -- which you can download as a pdf. Spiro does a nice job linking the advertising, musicians, and rock star scientists; she also wonders aloud if this kind of project will work.

For younger folks, Linda Braun tweets about a "science-focused kids virtual world" to go along with some science television efforts, "in the name of making science fun." In reviewing the online world, Venture Beat says

Zula Patrol, on PBS and NBC revolves around aliens who travel from world to world and solve various problems using science. In the virtual world, kids can create an online character, or avatar, and become an alien. They can fly their own spaceships and customize the garages where they park them. They can play mini games within the world that help teach scientific principles, said Deb Manchester, creator of the Zula Patrol.

Check out the game at ZulaWorld.

And on my own (new) campus at the University of North Carolina, some science majors have started a campus magazine called Carolina Scientific, an undergraduate science magazine. Their mission is to "produce a scientific publication each semester that focuses on the exciting innovations in science and current UNC research." Recent articles have covered Sea Turtle Navigation, baby birds in Reproductive Biology & Behavioral Neuroecology: The Sockman Lab, and the International Year of Astronomy. Check out their first issue in pdf (Better yet, pick up a copy of it in th School of Journalism and Mass Communication's Park Library)

Promoting science a little bit at a time!

Thinking Critically About Science

2009-05-31T17:23:00.008-04:00

How can we think more critically about science? I've recently heard/ read two bits of information (1) about some bad science being promulgated.

First up, favorite radio show host Paul Harris interviewed bad astronomy blogger Dr. Phil Plait about the anti-autism vaccination movement, spearheaded by Jenny McCarthy and espoused on Oprah. Paul Harris writes on his blog that he "invited Phil to explain the battle between people of reason and people of nonsense, the role Oprah Winfrey is playing in the story, and whether he blames anti-vaxxers for the recent death of a four-week-old child in Australia who died of whooping cough." They also talked about science in Star Trek (not so great either, but at least that's fiction), the Hubble Space Telescope repair, and the upcoming Amazing Meeting (blogged here before). The 30-minute interview is a great listen if you're interested in any of those topics.

And then Bora Z tweets "Newsweek critical of the Oprah Effect re quackery" linking to this Newsweek article: Live Your Best Life Ever!, subtitled "Wish Away Cancer! Get A Lunchtime Face-Lift! Eradicate Autism! Turn Back The Clock! Thin Your Thighs! Cure Menopause! Harness Positive Energy! Erase Wrinkles! Banish Obesity! Live Your Best Life Ever!" In which Weston Kosova and Pat Wingert discuss the Oprah phenomenon as it relates to her passing on information that is scientifically sound (mostly related to diet and overall health) as well as information that is questionable at best (the Secret, taking extra hormones, and vaccines-cause-autism).

"If she says something is good, it must be. This is where things get tricky. Because the truth is, some of what Oprah promotes isn't good, and a lot of the advice her guests dispense on the show is just bad." The Newsweek article also describes what happened to Jenny McCarthy to make her such an advocate for the no-autism vaccination movement: her son was vaccinated and shortly thereafter was diagnosed with autism. Correlation, sure, but not necessarily causation.

Librarians often teach people to question what they find, but not necessarily in the scientific arena. We talk about verifying facts, determining who's behind a certain web site, and when we can do that, it's a good thing (we should do quite a bit more of it, but that's another story). Who is teaching critical thinking about scientific assertions? Or at least, the difference between correlation and causation. Clearly Oprah is having some influence in this arena. It would be nice if there were more public discussion about how to evaluate scientific information; the Newsweek article is a good start.

(1) what do we call groups of articles, podcasts, lectures, etc.?

For More Information

Harris, Paul. Interview with Phil Plait: Phil Plait vs. Jenny McCarthy. KIRO, May 28, 2009. mp3 or download from iTunes.
Kosova, Weston and Pat Wingert. Live Your Best Life Ever! Wish Away Cancer! Get A Lunchtime Face-Lift! Eradicate Autism! Turn Back The Clock! Thin Your Thighs! Cure Menopause! Harness Positive Energy! Erase Wrinkles! Banish Obesity! Live Your Best Life Ever! Newsweek. From the magazine issue dated Jun 8, 2009, and online.

Oooh! I'm a Shover! and a Maker!

2009-05-06T16:38:00.008-04:00

I just got word that I was awarded the prestigious Shover & Maker award, sponsored by the good library people at the Library Society of the World. I'm in great company, as over 140 librarians have won the award in 2009.

People I know in person:

People I'd like to know ... there are too many to mention! Browse the list of winners, and then ... nominate yourself! The May 15 deadline is fast approaching, so hop on over to the S&M web site to appoint yourself a Shover and Maker.

Deaf Sentence

2009-04-20T11:04:00.001-04:00

I just finished reading David Lodge's most recent novel Deaf Sentence. My enjoyment was enhanced by its relationship to cognitive science, as it touches upon linguistics and language comprehension by the deaf.

Desmond, the main character, suffers from high frequency deafness, and he writes about his increasing difficulty hearing with both accuracy (as he describes loss of hair cells inside the ear and various technology he uses to compensate) and frustration. It was fascinating and somewhat chilling to read about this character's struggle to understand conversation, starting with the loss of consonants. It's often humorous as well, as Desmond describes some language misinterpretations, as well as the continual "what did you say, darling" conversations between him and his wife.

I suspect that the personal description of high frequency deafness would be helpful to new or experienced audiologists, as the character is articulate about the limitations of his hearing in a personal, rather than clinical way. I highly recommend this novel.

Also of interest to some cognitive geeks is the linguistic aspect of the novel. Desmond is a retired linguist, and most of his encounters throughout the novel are tinged with his linguistic touch. He reviews concordances for words like deaf and love; thinks about homophenes (words that look the same when lipreading, such as park, mark, and bark); and, academically, the stylistic analysis of suicide notes.

For More Information

Lodge, David. Deaf Sentence. New York, N.Y. : Viking, 2008.

Promoting & Poking Fun @ Your Libary

2009-04-15T16:51:00.004-04:00

... if you're at the University of Texas at Arlington, that is.

My e-buddy Eric Frierson tweeted yesterday "librarian v. stereotype videos getting great feedback - next one will involve a gorilla suit." The current YouTube videos are a great combination of library promotion and poking fun at the profession; here's the video introducing Librarian and Stereotype:

and here are Librarian and Stereotype talking about scholarly communication:

Can't wait to see the gorilla suit!

Government Web Site Widgets

2009-04-12T09:11:00.003-04:00

I just had two great librarians talk to my reference class, and I learned as much as the students did about government documents work and GIS / geography sources. Thanks to UConn's undergraduate and GIS librarian Michael Howser and Connecticut's federal documents librarian Nancy Peluso!

Nancy showed a fabulous feature of usa.gov, the US government's search engine. A search for the word widgets yields some amazing widgets, free for use on any web site.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has many widgets, including an FDA peanut recall widget, a National Flu Activity map, and a Daily Health tip (today's is a warning not to give birds as gifts):

This is also available in Spanish:

Other cool widgets that come up include:

San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District "BART" News Widget
AmeriCorps widgets
Business.gov Gadgets; their widget includes a search box and links to information helpful to small businesses.
FDA Drug Information links, including widgets for drug safety information, Medwatch, FDA podcasts, and Drugs @ FDA

... search for, oh, say, Wellbutrin & see what kind of information you get.

Take a peek at the search, too -- the results page offers a nifty preview option, displaying the widget right in the results page, and a "Remix" option on the left which lets you narrow results by topic, agency, or source.

There are some great free web resources here for libraries, health marketers, and others.

the Brain, lately

2009-04-06T16:33:00.003-04:00

I've seen some neat stuff about the brain lately, and since I'm swamped with mid-semester craziness, plus mid-move tasks, I thought I'd just link to the stuff I've seen:

Today's New York Times reports on research showing ways memory may be erased. Yipes! The article raises lots of interesting physical and philosophical issues. See Brain Researchers Open Door to Editing Memory, by Benedict Cary. New York Times, April 6, 2009.

Last week, uber-librarian Stephen Abram blogged about 2 Wired stories reporting on efforts to map the human brain. (Note that the images are not for the squeamish, but if you want to see what the grey matter looks like, check out these images). Mapping the Human Brain, Stephen's Lighthouse, March 31, 2009.

edited to add: I just went the print issue of Wired and thoroughly enjoyed the article that goes along with the photos: Jonah Lerer's Scientists Map the Brain, Gene by Gene from the April 2009 issue of Wired. Highly recommended!

What is an Electronic Resource Librarian?

2009-03-30T08:32:00.002-04:00

I've had a few friends ask what I do as an Electronic Resource Librarian, and I thought I'd share the answer more widely, in case others are curious.

If you are looking for a job as an Electronic Resource Librarian, I expect that most libraries (usually academic) would want:

Experience with licensing for all kinds of electronic resources (individual journals, journal packages, databases, e-books, etc.)
Experience using & troubleshooting access to same
Experience obtaining, compiling, and analyzing usage data

One big issue that many electronic resource librarians are wrestling with is how to manage the resources -- often, but not always using something called an ERM (electronic resource management system). Elements that need to be managed can include (but are not limited to!):

When the license was signed, by whom, and if by the university alone or in a consortium. When the license renews / expires;
What the license permits (for Interlibrary Loan -- sending by print, email, or secure transmission; for electronic reserves -- in print? an electronic course pack?);
The URL for patron access as well as the administrative interface;
If & how the resource provides access to usage statistics. If so, notes about how & where to access them.

ERM systems are usually based on the Electronic Resource Management Initiative (ERMI), which covers most possible permutations of data elements that electronic resource librarians need to track.

I have blogged about troubleshooting UConn's e-resources at http://elibraryuconn.blogspot.com/ which provides a real-life sense of the issues we deal with.

Definitions from the Online Dictionary for Library and Information Science

Electronic resource management
COUNTER (Counting Online Usage of Networked Electronic Resources); see also Project COUNTER.
Usage of electronic resources

For More Information (all of these are available in Gale's OneFile database)

Young, Jeanne. "Electronic records management on a shoestring: Three case studies." Information Management Journal 39.1 (Jan-Feb 2005): p58(3)
Tull, Laura. "Electronic resources and Web sites: replacing a back-end database with innovative's Electronic Resource Management." Information Technology and Libraries 24.4 (Dec 2005): p163(7).
Grogg, Jill. "Investing in digital: as electronic spending rises, ERAMS, ERM, and URM systems step in to help with acquisitions and reporting." Library Journal 132.9 (May 15, 2007): p30(4).
"The ERMI and its offspring." Library Technology Reports 42.2 (March-April 2006): p14(8).

Working with Faculty on Instruction Assignments

2009-03-27T16:23:00.002-04:00

Two of my former students have pointed me to an interesting blog piece called "Stepping on Toes: The Delicate Art of Talking to Faculty about Questionable Assignments" by Ellie Collier.

Collier talks about faculty aversion to "online" resources -- and instead of just complaining about difficult-to-teach library assignments, she provides examples of how to other librarians have worked with faculty to improve those assignments.

I recommend it especially to students interested in working in an academic library, but it's got some actual instruction interactions which would be interesting to librarians of most stripes.

For More Information

Collier, Ellie. Stepping on Toes: The Delicate Art of Talking to Faculty about Questionable Assignments. In the Library with the Leadpipe, March 18, 2009.

Interesting CogSci Folks

2009-03-17T13:43:00.002-04:00

Two quick notes:

Ginger Campbell, of the Brain Science Podcast recently interviewed Patricia Churchland on Neurophilosophy and other topics. Read Ginger's show summary & download the show if you want to hear the whole thing:

Churchland is the author of Brain-wise : studies in neurophilosophy [WorldCat.org] (c2002) and Neurophilosophy : toward a unified science of the mind-brain [WorldCat.org] (c1986). She is currently on the faculty of the University of California at San Diego and she was a featured speaker at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in 2008.

In this interview we talked about neurophilosophy, which is an approach to philosophy of mind that gives high priority to incorporating the empiric findings of neuroscience. We also talk about the evolving relationship between philosophy and neuroscience. Churchland shares her enthusiasm for how the discoveries of neuroscience are changing the way we see ourselves as human beings. We also talked a little about the issues of reductionism

Longtime readers of this blog may remember I wrote about Pat & Paul Churchland 2 years ago, summarizing an extensive New Yorker article about both of them.

If you'll be anywhere near Storrs, CT on Thursday, March 19, you might want to stop by the Dodd Center's Konover Auditorium to hear Marc Hauser (Professor of Psychology, Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, and Anthropology, Harvard University) speak at 4:00 p.m. His talk is entitled:

The Evolution of a Moral Grammar. Marc Hauser is an expert on the evolution of animal communication, behavioral ecology, and the evolution of mind. His work integrates animal behavior, cognitive neurosciences, anthropology, and philosophy. He is the author of a number of influential books, including The Evolution of Communication [WorldCat.org] (c1996) and Moral Minds: How Nature Designed our Universal Sense of Right and Wrong [WorldCat.org] (c2006).

Hauser was interviewed on Australia's radio programme All in the Mind in late 2006, which I summarized on this blog.

Meet Paul Jones!

2009-02-25T08:31:00.000-05:00

I heard a fascinating interview with Paul Jones, a clinical associate professor at UNC-Chapel Hill's School of Journalism and Mass Communications and a clinical associate professor in the School of Information and Library Science. Frank Stasio, interviewer for WUNC, also calls Jones a "public intellectual."
The interview is a like a whirlwind tour of the interwebs, as Jones talked about having worked with Tim Berners-Lee (the birth of the Internet), Larry Lessig (the birth of the Creative Commons), and Brewster Kahle (the birth of the online archive), as well as a bit about setting up ibiblio.org. Jones talked about Roger McGuinn and Youssou N'Dour (find out what they have in common!). He also read a lovely poem he wrote called Dividing Waters and talked about what poetry and coding have in common.

If you have 49 minutes and are interested in the interwebs, I highly recommend this interview.

For More Information

Meet Paul Jones, The State of Things, North Carolina Public Radio WUNC, Feb. 16, 2008. Also on iTunes.
IntraHealth OPEN and Youssou N’Dour promote Open Source for Health in Africa with music downloads. The Real Paul Jones, Jan. 24, 2009.

Future of Journalism? Newspapers?

2009-02-12T11:05:00.003-05:00

I heard a neat interview on Radio Times today about the future of journalism & news. It was surprisingly, and happily, upbeat (or maybe it was just my mood). Listening to the conversation, I felt optimistic that while news gathering as we know it may change, but that reporting and writing will not change so much as to be unrecognizable. I even felt optimistic that some kind of revenue stream could perhaps be worked out so that in-depth reporting (ie, what we think of now as print journalism) could continue. Probably it won't look the same, but maybe it will continue to exist.

One surprising bit of information that one of the guests mentioned (and I forget which; I was driving and didn't take notes) is that actual readership of content-formerly-known-as-print- journalism is UP, after a slide that started in the 1940s.

Here's what Radio Times says about the show: "We talk about the challenges facing the profession of journalism and consumers of the news. How will we fund news-gathering operations, what will they look like how will we access the news and how we will ensure quality journalism? Our guests are ROBERT NILES of Online Journalism Review and TOM ROSENSTIEL of The Pew Research Centers Project for Excellence in Journalism."

For More Information

Radio Times, Challenges Facing the Profession of Journalism. February 12, 2009. Audio will be available shortly online and through iTunes.

CogSci Humor: Consciousness

2009-02-04T14:09:00.001-05:00

more animals

ScienceOnline09

2009-02-03T10:33:00.005-05:00

... is a conference I wish I could have attended. The third annual science blogging conference took place Jan. 16-18, 2009 in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. The wiki states that the "goal [was] to bring together scientists, bloggers, educators, students, journalists and others [i.e. librarians!] to discuss, demonstrate and debate online strategies and tools for promoting the public understanding of science."

There were four tracks: science blogging; science communication and education; doing and publishing science; and show-and-tell quick sessions. If I had gone, I would have attended these sessions:

"You are a science blogger but you want to publish a pop-sci book?" moderated by Tom Levenson and Dave Munger (discussion page)
"Science online – middle/high school perspective (or: 'how the Facebook generation does it'?)" moderated by Stacey Baker and her students (discussion page)
"Teaching College Science: Blogs and Beyond" moderated by Andrea Novicki and Brian Switek (discussion page)
"Race in science – online and offline" moderated by Danielle Lee (discussion page)
and, of course, "How to search scientific literature" moderated by science librarians Christina Pikas and John Dupuis (discussion page)

There were many more sessions I'd like to have attended.

If you're interested in this conference, I highly recommend this interview with Bora Zivkovic, one of the conference organizers, on Minnesota Atheist Radio. Interviewer / conference attendee Stephanie Zvan talks to Bora about the conference, its origins, and his goals for the 2009 conference.

What appeals to me about the conference is the inclusive nature of the attendees and topics. There were high school science students & bloggers in attendance (and presenting!), as well as people of all genders and races and scientific interests. I am a big fan of science, but I'm no scientist (maybe I would have been, had conferences & teachers like this been around when I was in high school) ... and I feel like I would have been welcomed. And welcomed not only to attend, but to participate, to ask questions, to provide my perspective on science. As a science librarian and a future journalism librarian, I definitely have some thoughts about science and its promotion -- and I'd love to be part of this conversation.

Next year, I will be.

For More Information

ScienceOline09 Conference Program
ScienceOnline09 wiki.
ScienceOnline09 list of Blog & Media coverage
Zivkovic, Bora. "ScienceOnline'09 on Minnesota Atheist Radio" on his blog, A Blog Around the Clock.

Delightful Cognitive Science Fiction

2009-01-28T10:55:00.006-05:00

I just finished the best novel of 2009 ... and while it's early in the year, I am confident this will still be towards the top of the list at the end of the year.

Stephanie Kallos' Sing Them Home is delightful, and also relevant to cognitive science, language, and library science. Here's how:

Cognitive Science. One of the characters, Larken, is an art history professor who sees people in color. She does this throughout the novel, and I was reminded of synesthetes each time. Here's an example:

"Sometimes Daddy was yellow - not Mommy Yellow (the color of egg yolks in the mixing bowl, prescrambled and paled by lacings of milk, the color of Hope [the mother] when they were reading together at bedtime), but his own special Daddy Yellow: intense, glossy: the pudding-y filling inside lemon bars served at church de bachs; dandelion flowers after a downpour." (p. 93-94)

Language. The novel takes place in the fictional town of Emlyn Springs, in southeast Nebraska near Lincoln with strong ties to Wales. Many of the characters speak or sing Welsh, and there are many Welsh rituals. Kallos' loving portrayal of the language and rituals, is touching and might be appreciated by those who enjoy language.

Library Science. One small but terrific scene takes place at a library in nearby Beatrice, NE; it nicely illustrates principles of good reference librarianship that I try to instill in my students. Viney, the not-quite stepmother, goes to the library to send an email to a Welsh acquaintance, and she asks for help. Emphasis is mine, with [comments] explaining just why this is such great reference service.

" 'I'd be happy to help you,' the librarian says, coming out from behind the information desk. 'Follow me.' This librarian is no pinched, spinsterish matron wearing a cardigan and spectacles. She's a big girl, twentysomething, and she walks like a man. ...

" 'I'm here to write an email letter. Can I do that?'
" 'You bet.' The girl lays her hand on a silver, dinner-roll-sized object on the desk and expertly starts sliding it around. ...
" 'This is called a "mouse,"' Addison remarks. 'Sadly it's the only named part of a computer that has any poetry.' "

Addison the librarian goes on to show Viney how to select a username in gmail and says "'While you work on that, I'll go help those folks at the counter. As soon as you've got something we’ll get you started, okay?' " [librarian gives patron information, lets her work, and goes to help other patrons, promising to return]

Viney thinks and tries several names until she finds one that works. "Addison is back. 'How you comin' along?' she asks." [returning as promised, still helpful.] They figure out a good username for Viney (Addison's is "Sad bison at gee mail dot com;" Viney ultimately selects nutriyogavine) and Addison explains how to write the "email letter:"

" 'Now,' Addison continues, 'We’ll get the cursor moved down to where you need to start writing ... Now you just start typing the way you would on a regular typewriter.' Addison's fingers move with incredible speed." She shows Viney how to send the message when she's ready, and then says " 'You'll do great. I'll be right over there if you have any questions." [Addison is so patient with Viney, and she ends the encounter with good closure, inviting Viney to ask for more help if she needs it.] (pages 290-292)

If I were writing this up for a reference observation paper (which is an assignment I ask my students to complete), I would demonstrate the many ways that Addison meets the ALA /RUSA Guidelines for Behavioral Performance of Reference and Information Service Providers. And does a great job of helping a patron we care about in the novel ... as I know many public librarians do in the Real World.

Kudos to Stephanie Kallos for portraying good library assistance. The novel is good in a lot of other ways as well, but for the purposes of this blog, I recommend it for the cognitive and information science tidbits strewn here and there.

For More Information

Kallos, Stephanie. Sing Them Home. Atlantic Monthly Press, 2009.
Valby, Karen. Sing Them Home (review). Entertainment Weekly, Jan. 16, 2009.

Mind Not on the Road?

2009-01-27T08:27:00.010-05:00

If you're driving and talking on a cell phone, your mind isn't on the road. Period. And the problem isn't the the physical act of dialing, holding the phone, or listening to the person on the other end. The impairment comes from speaking; and in terms of accident risk, the impairment is comparable to driving drunk.

So says David Strayer, psychology professor at the University of Utah. Radio Times' Marty Moss-Coane interviewed Stayer on Monday's show, and it was a fascinating listen. Some tidbits from the conversation, mostly derived from Strayer's studies in his lab's driving simulator:

Cell phone conversations are much more distracting than in-car conversations. While conversation-making is a big drain on attention, if you are talking with someone in the car with you, the other person is paying attention to the road as well.
The levels of impairment are essentially the same for hand-held and hands-free devices.
Text-messaging while driving is, not surprisingly, even more dangerous.
Listening while driving -- to the radio, to a book on CD, pre-recorded conversations to this interview on Radio Times -- is not nearly as problematic. It's the generation of communication, according to Strayer, that causes the interference. (phew!)
Strayer said: "driving also interferes with your ability to make good decisions while you're on the phone." Because attention is limited, and because it takes attention to both drive safely and make good decisions, when your attention is divided, both driving and decision-making can suffer.
Finally, if you do business on your phone while driving, Strayer suggests that you might be putting your company at risk for liability if there is an accident.

The interview is a great listen; callers asked great questions to which Stayer provided fascinating responses. A logical conclusion would be that talking on cell phones & driving don't mix.

For More Information

Radio Times interview with David Strayer, January 27, 2009. (mp3) or find WHYY's Radio Times in iTunes.
Drivers Distracted More by Cell Phones Than by Passengers. University of Utah News Release, November 30th, 2008.
Drews, Frank A., Monisha Pasupathi, and David Strayer. Passenger and cell phone conversations in simulated driving. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied. 14(4), Dec 2008: 392-400. (Subscription required or @ your library).
Drivers on Cell Phones Are as Bad as Drunks. University of Utah News Release, June 29th, 2006.
Strayer, D.L., Drews, F.A., Crouch, D.J. A Comparison of the Cell Phone Driver and the Drunk Driver Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society. 48(2), Jan. 2006: 381-391. (Subscription required or @ your library)
Cell Phone Use as Dangerous as Drunken Driving. Alcohol: Problems & Solutions entry provides a nice summary of Stayer's 2006 article.
Drivers on Cell Phones Clog Traffic. University of Utah News Release, January 1st, 2008.

Interruptions & Watching Television

2009-01-25T08:06:00.003-05:00

Apparently, television commercials serve a useful purpose in the enjoyment of television shows. Future Tense's Jon Gordon interviewed Jeff Galak, a doctoral candidate at NYU's Stern School of Business last week regarding Galak's research suggesting that "commercial interruptions make TV shows more enjoyable."

Apparently it's not the commercials themselves that make us enjoy the shows we are watching. Instead, it's the forced break; we get habituated to what we are doing and thus enjoy it less over time. Since the commercials stop the show, when we return to the show, we enjoy it more because we've had a break. From the abstract:

"...[S]tudies demonstrate that, although people preferred to avoid commercial interruptions, these interruptions actually made programs more enjoyable (study 1), regardless of the quality of the commercial (study 2), even when controlling for the mere presence of the ads (study 3), and regardless of the nature of the interruption (study 4)."

The article will be published August.

For More Information

Gordon, Jon. Study: Interruptions make TV shows more enjoyable. Future Tense, Jan. 20, 2009.
Nelson, Leif D., Tom Meyvis, and Jeff Galak (2009), “Enhancing the Television Viewing Experience through Commercial Interruptions,” in Press at the Journal of Consumer Research, 36 (August). [Paper; subscription required or check @ your library]

Leaving New England ... Moving to North Carolina!

2009-01-19T09:43:00.009-05:00

The CogSci Librarian is on the move! I am leaving my position as Electronic Resource Librarian at the University of Connecticut on April 30. I'll be moving to North Carolina to serve as the director of the Park Library at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of North Carolina starting June 1. I'm really excited about the new position, as newspaper libraries are my first love, and I'm thrilled to be going back to the field of journalism.

This is a great time of year to be thinking about moving out of New England -- we've got several inches of snow on the ground, and it's a wee bit warmer in Chapel Hill.

Once again, I'll be rethinking this blog, which is good for me and for the blog. There are interesting connections between journalism, communication, and library science,and I will be exploring those in some form, in some place. JOMC hosts some fascinating blogs, and I may move over there at some point.

For this semester, things will remain the same: I'll continue to serve the University of Connecticut ELibrary & troubleshooting; the departments of communication and psychology; and I'm teaching reference for Simmons GSLIS. Crazy, but I plan to blog things library science and cognitive science for a while yet.

Web 2.0 for my friends or, a Facebook Frenzy!

2009-01-15T10:45:00.002-05:00

In thinking back over 2008, one of the best things about the year was the proliferation of friends, buddies, and acquaintances I met. For the most part, this meeting took place online, through various social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and FriendFeed. Many of my library colleagues have written about how they use these tools for professional tasks, such as staying connected with distant colleagues, getting ideas, answering professional questions, and even keeping up with their patrons (for a great treatise on using Twitter in a library setting, see Brian Mathews' article "Social Eyes"). I've found these social networking sites to be a great addition to my professional life.

But I realize that my face-to-face (f2f), non-librarian friends are not quite as tech-savvy as my f2f library friends are. I find that I keep up with my real life friends less now that I spend so much time online - my spouse and I even stay connected on Facebook! He and I have talked about this, and we decided to hold a Facebook Frenzy.

This weekend, we've invited some of our f2f friends who are not as tech-savvy (or "tech-addicted") as we are over to our house for an afternoon of Facebook, Skype, and hulu. We have wireless, and we've encouraged our buddies to bring laptops if they have them, and we also have some laptops of our own people can use if they don't have a traveling computer. It's going to be informal, with us showing the three sites, answering tech questions (two friends have just gotten MacBooks, so I anticipate some questions there), and talking about privacy settings in Facebook.

From my own experience, I know I learn best when a friend shows me something - it happened with Facebook and with Twitter; if I hadn't had friends there, I probably wouldn't have explored them. I want to take my teaching expertise out of the academy and into my personal life -- and I have an ulterior motive: I want to hang out with my f2f friends online in addition to, well, face to face.

About Vision Therapy, II

2009-01-06T16:58:00.001-05:00

I get so many hits on my blog for vision therapy, mostly looking for material about Stereo Sue, so I take it for granted that all of my visitors know what vision therapy is. Bad librarian!

It's hard to find a good definition online of vision therapy from a reputable source, in part because it's somewhat controversial. My impression of it, and this is from my own experience, is that it's a way of retraining the eyes and brain to work together to improve vision. It's both a personal interest and a professional one, as effective vision therapy relies heavily on the brain's ability to change at any age (also known as brain plasticity).

Vision therapy has been used with people with learning disabilities, with traumatic brain injury, and vision problems like strabismus. Athletes have used it to improve their hand-eye coordination (useful for baseball players, for instance). In my case, it was used to correct a convergence insufficiency. It is generally practiced by behavioral optometrists, whose goal is "to develop or improve fundamental visual skills and abilities" and/or "change how a patient processes or interprets visual information" (College of Optometrists in Vision Development [COVD]).

If you're looking for vision therapy treatment, my eye doctor recommends finding a COVD optometrist. Read what the COVD says about vision therapy; you might also be interested in their information about vision therapy for adults.

For More Information, check out these blog posts about vision therapy

Stereo Sue and Me, July 1, 2006
About Vision Therapy, July 13, 2006
Scholarly Research on Vision Therapy, July 13, 2006
Links for Vision Therapy, July 28, 2006
Vision Therapy, a personal perspective, January 5, 2009

Vision Therapy, a personal perspective

2009-01-05T19:41:00.003-05:00

My vision buddy Heather has just started blogging about her experiences with vision therapy. She calls it "One Eyed Girl - My Life with Strabismus: [a] Journal of living with monocular vision and learning through Vision Therapy to use both eyes."

I went through a visual revolution several years ago through my own vision therapy, and I appreciate reading someone else's thoughts mid-therapy. I'd read that athletes and children were doing VT to improve their vision, but I didn't know anyone else doing vision therapy at the time -- except for the kids I'd see in my eye doctor's office before or after my appointment. My therapy resulted in a visual revolution -- colors pop, trees have depth, snowflakes are truly three-dimensional -- but I had no one but my eye doctor and vision therapist to tell about these developments. They were happy for me, but it wasn't the same as sharing the milestones with someone who was going through -- or had gone through -- a similar transformation

Heather's visual system is vastly different than mine, and so her rehabilitation is different, but still I like reading her accounts of how her vision is improving. Her descriptions of new visual experiences, large and small, are inspiring, particularly if you have gone through vision therapy. And if you're a vision therapist or behavioral optometrist, it's a nice insight into a patient's experience.

Online Reading List Creation Tool? Not!

2008-12-31T10:25:00.000-05:00

I'm teaching reference at Simmons again in the spring, and I am pulling together my reading list. (see the Fall 2007 reading list). That list looked nice and meets most of the criteria I have for a reading list:

Citations are formatted properly in MLA, and include the name of the database where I got the full-text as well as the date accessed. I am a stickler for good citation style in my classes, and I feel I should model that in the citations I give them.

The list is sorted on several levels: first by week, then by topic, and then alphabetically by author (or title if there is no author). This is important because I want students to easily know which readings are due when (tho' some find it confusing that you need to read week 2's articles BEFORE week 2's class), and under what topic.

The downside of this kind of list is that it's complex to maintain. It starts with the citation, which I email to myself, paste into a FileMaker database and fix the metadata, and then export with correctly formatted html, and then paste into the html file, which is finally uploaded to the Simmons server. phew! I'm tired just writing all that out!

It's been 18 months since I taught reference, and I thought there must be a better way. Ideally, I wanted a two-step process to export from the article to the bibliography: 1) find the article and 2) export to bibliography -- while maintaining good MLA citation style and complex sort order. My options seemed infinite, with so many bookmarking and social networking citation sites available. Sadly, none met all my criteria, so I'm back to manually coding my html file.

Here's what I tried. The links go to a few sample articles I wanted to share with my class, along with notes about why each product didn't meet my needs:

RefWorks

On the plus side:

It's RefWorks, which I encourage my students to use during their career at Simmons.
It's incredibly simple to get citations from EBSCO, CSA, etc. into RefWorks.
It's possible to create shared folders that anyone can view.
It's very customizable, with 15 user-defined fields and an infinite number of ways to format citations.
Simmons' RefWorks is OpenURL-enabled, so it's easy for students to get to the full-text of the article, PLUS they get early familiarity with Simmons' ArticleNow!

On the minus side:

The default view for RefWorks' shared folders is not customizable. The metadata doesn't display consistently across document types (article, book, web page), and the Standard View doesn't display in any recognized format (APA, Turabian, MLA). I wrote the company and was told that it is not possible to modify the Standard View.
The inability to easily display instructions for textbook readings in the Standard View (i.e., chapter number, title, and pages for the chapter, along with the book title) was the straw that broke this camel's back.

CiteULike

On the plus side:
- Easy (theoretically) to add citations with a bookmarklet.

Citations are online.
Easy to add tags.

On the minus side:

None of the citations I tried to add through their bookmarklet actually loaded. I tried from Scopus, which is on the CiteULike list of "web sites". EBSCO isn't on their list, so I wasn't surprised that EBSCO citations didn't import automatically. That's a deal-breaker, as a large percentage of my citations are in EBSCO's Library, Information Science, and Technology Abstracts (LISTA) database.
The ads on the interface are distracting and leave little room for viewing citations.

Connotea

On the plus side:
- Includes date and time the citation was added to the database. The downside is that it's not in my time zone.
- The default is to share citations.
On the minus side:

Not possible to automatically add from EBSCO or other Simmons databases; only via their bookmarklet.
The article's metadata is not added automatically via their bookmarklet. The default is to only display the title with a hyperlink to the article. It's possible to add complete citations, but that requires extra steps -- and the point of this exercise is to save time.
Lots of red on the page is tiring. Page is kind of cluttered.
Extra features like "related"articles and links to others who've linked to the same citation are not relevant to a class reading list.

2collab.com

On the plus side:
- Clean, simple layout with professional colors.
- Scopus citations imported easily.
- Nice tagging.
On the minus side:

It works best with Elsevier databases. This is a problem for two reasons:
- I have access to Scopus through my main job at UConn, but not through Simmons. So any citations I find in Scopus that I want to use for class have the UConn / Scopus URL rather than a Simmons-friendly (i.e., proxied) URL for easy access to the full-text. I'd have to copy & paste the URLs from LISTA for citations that are in Scopus.
- Scopus doesn't index some of the non scholarly journals, so I had to manually add Stephen Abram's terrific Searcher article Evolution to Revolution to Chaos? Reference in Transition.
Making articles shared was a two-step process: clicking the "group" box AND agreeing to the pop-up that yes, I do want to share this article.
Finally, it didn't do well with textbook chapters -- too much manual metadata entry.

I also looked briefly at EBSCO's shared folders and Zotero, but neither seemed easily shareable, so I didn't actually test them. Briefly:

I love EBSCO's folders, but if you want to share them, you have to email everyone with whom you want to share the folder, and with 21 students in the class, that's too much extra work for moi.
Zotero's got great potential, but as it is now resident only one one browser, it's not ready for a shared class reading list.

I have used a wiki in the past for my source list (which looks a lot like a reading list, since many of the sources are books, and all need to be properly cited). I asked students to annotate each source on the wiki, and that was terrific. However, I still had to format the citations, both in html and wiki style. For next semester, I have put my sources in delicious, and I will use that both as the source list AND the annotation vehicle.

Back to the software under discussion: Please note that I have assessed these tools to be used as a reading list, which is not exactly what they were designed for. I have taught many UConn students and faculty to use RefWorks, and I will continue to do so. It's great for keeping track of citations. Similarly, the other products I've described have great features for researchers and scholars.

Sadly, though, none is robust enough to serve as the reading list for my upcoming class. I am keeping the list in the "cloud" though, using dropbox for its easy, everywhere access. Take a look at the Spring 2009 reading list -- it's in flux, but you might find something fun to read!

Favorite Songs 2008

2008-12-21T09:51:00.004-05:00

One of my usual end-of-year projects is to create a CD of my favorite songs which came out in the past year. This year, thanks to cool technology, I was able to upload mp3s of the songs to 8tracks.com and I can share them with you all!

Here's the full song list, in order on the CD:

Post It 4:02 The Aluminum Group Little Happyness
Horizon 4:23 Ashby The Best of Marina Records
Birthday 3:30 The Bird And The Bee One Too Many Hearts
The Motorbike Song 4:23 Justin Jude
Beautiful Eyes 3:54 The Aluminum Group Little Happyness
El Fusilado 2:32 Chumbawamba The Boy Bands Have Won
Far Away 3:50 The Hampdens The Last Party
Librarian 4:16 My Morning Jacket Evil Urges
Je Suis Un Parisien 3:41 Jean-paul Elysee Pourtant
Oxford Comma 3:16 Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend
Quotidien 2:57 Sandrine Kiberlain Putumayo Presents Acoustic France
Walcott 3:42 Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend
Unstoppable 3:33 Santogold Santogold
This Is The Life 3:05 Amy Macdonald This Is The Life
How Am I To Be 3:05 The Watson Twins Fire Songs
All This Beauty 3:20 The Weepies Hideaway
You Don’t Love Me Yet 3:52 Winterpills Central Chambers
Add Me 3:28 Chumbawamba The Boy Bands Have Won
Secret Blue Thread 4:23 Winterpills Central Chambers
One Fine Day 4:55 David Byrne & Brian Eno Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
Lovely Day 3:26 The Aluminum Group Little Happyness

Notes

Due to licensing restrictions, I could only include 2 songs by each artist. I'd only chosen 2 Winterpills songs, so they were safe, but I had to deselect something from the Aluminum Group; you can see their Beautiful Eyes video below.
I can only listen to 30-second clips from each song in my mix -- hope they sound ok to you!
If you like any of these songs or artists, please consider buying their CD!

The Aluminum Group - Beautiful Eyes from epb21 on Vimeo.

Short Takes

2008-11-26T09:56:00.004-05:00

Here are a few of my recent favorite things, for your Thanksgiving (U.S.) browsing pleasure:

Bora posts a great article on New and Exciting in PLoS ONE: an article entitled Whole Body Mechanics of Stealthy Walking in Cats and he asks for LOLCat submissions to illustrate the articles. I'd like to see that too!

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

I just bought the library a terrific book called Head First Statistics (O'Reilly, 2008), which I like for several reasons:

It explains a bunch of statistics in a lot of different ways; and, quoting O'Reilly: "brings this typically dry subject to life, teaching statistics through engaging, interactive, and thought-provoking material, full of puzzles, stories, quizzes, visual aids, and real-world examples."
It's a great example of how books can be designed to effectively -- and professionally -- teach complex concepts. (O'Reilly says the book "satisfies the requirements for passing the College Board's Advanced Placement (AP) Statistics Exam" so it's clearly no slouch!). I'd might even call it a 2.0 book?!
I got some good ideas of how to present study tips to my LIS students from page xxxiii entitled "Here's what YOU can do to bend your brain into submission," using tips like "Slow down" ... "Talk about it. Out loud" ... "Do the exercises. Write your own notes." Interactivity improves learning.

Check out the book ... either to learn statistics, or to get ideas on how to make reading tough concepts manageable.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

Heard some interesting (but not uplifting) brain science stories on the News Hour:

Misdiagnosing Dementia (Nov. 12 2008): "About 5 million Americans suffer from dementia -- about half of those from suspected Alzheimer's disease -- according to official estimates. Now, researchers are looking for new treatments in a field that hasn't seen a major advance since the 1960s."
Military, VA Confront Rising Suicide Rates Among Troops (Nov. 10 2008) "The Army says that suicides among active duty personnel have doubled in recent years, and multiple deployments might contribute to that increase."

Read the transcript, download the audio, or watch the video on the News Hour site. (Note to the News Hour: nice way to keep your content vibrant in this multimedia age!)

Pre-1923 Psychology Books Online

2008-11-17T11:57:00.005-05:00

You may remember that I recently wrote about UConn's project to digitize books published prior to 1923 ... focusing on 200 or so psychology published before 1923. I've heard from lots of UConn faculty voting for various titles (thanks!) and I'm keeping an annotated list of print candidates for digitization in Google Docs; browsing the list, you can see which titles are popular.

I was also excited to find that many of these titles have already been digitized! Since they already exist online, we will add them to Homer, our online catalog so that they'll be available to all. In the meantime, if you want to take a peek inside some psychology classics, take a look below:

Most of these are available through the Internet archive, but others are available through Google Books or other electronic book sites. All are free for anyone to use!

Please let me know if you don't like the quality of the digitized book already available online; I've been told that we will digitize titles that are already online if folks would prefer a better quality scan. And let me know if you have any questions!

Note: no books will be harmed during digitization.

Deconstructing Scientific Articles

2008-11-16T18:30:00.003-05:00

I spent some time this evening reading thoughtful, well-reasoned critiques of a few recent medical studies. On his blog, Genomics, Evolution, and Pseudoscience, Steven Salzberg describes 5 problems about the recent report that Cresor can result in "a 'dramatic risk reduction' in heart attack risk for men."

In Serious doubts about new study of statins and heart disease, Salzberg summarizes the studies: "[they] claimed that people with normal cholesterol levels could get significant health benefits [by taking Crestor]. If true, [these two studies] impl[y] that millions more people should start taking statins to protect themselves against heart attacks." He adds "[t]his new finding is rife with problems, despite the breathless news reporting about it" and goes on to describe 5 of them:

"Both studies were funded by AstraZeneca, the drug company that sells Crestor," although Salzberg is quick to add that this is clearly disclosed in both articles.
The lead author of both studies is Paul Ridker, who owns the patent on the primary test for C-reactive protein (CRP) levels, and he stands to benefit financially if more people are tested for CRP. Again, Salzberg calls this only eyebrow-worthy, as this is clearly stated in both articles.
Although it suggests that a seven-variable method is more predictive than the traditional five-variable model, "the Circulation study didn’t report separately on the effect of CRP and family history of heart disease."
"[T]he NEJM [New England Journal of Medicine] study actually reports a very small benefit: ... you’d have to treat 95 people for 2 years with statins to prevent 1 heart attack."
"The patients in the NEJM study were randomly divided into two groups, treatment (Crestor) and placebo [and] there are 3 critical variables where the two groups are not identical."

It's a fascinating read, because Salzberg knowledgably disputes the articles' claims (and includes a few snarky notes about how the media covered the story).

If you like that post, you might like these:

New members for Vioxx Hall of Shame In which Salzberg updates his list of medical researchers who had been paid by Merck to conduct studies of Vioxx (October 2008).
NIH halts chelation study after patients die Reporting on a Medscape Journal of Medicine article that reports on the halting of the NIH's Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy (TACT). (Sept. 2008)
And what else is acupuncture good for? Reporting on a Yahoo! News headline " 'Unclear whether acupuncture helps fertility' " (July 2008)

I like these posts because they debunk bad science ... and I also humbly suggest that they may be helpful in teaching science students how to evaluate scientific articles.

For the socially networked: I found this blog through my FriendFeed buddy Jean-Claude Bradley, who follows Lars Juhl Jensen, who linked to Salzberg's blog.

"Ripple Effect:" Weight Loss Among Couples

2008-11-12T08:52:00.005-05:00

Maybe you heard about a weight loss "ripple effect" among couples over the past few months; the story had crossed my radar, but I didn't realize the study's author was a psychology professor at UConn.

There's an article in the Nov. 10 issue of the UConn Advance, highlighting Amy Gorin's published study in the International Journal of Obesity which demonstrates that if one member of a couple goes on an "intensive weight loss program," their spouse will probably lose weight too.

Gorin's study looked at 357 pairs of participants in Look AHEAD, "evaluating the impact of intentional weight loss on cardiovascular outcomes in overweight individuals with type 2 diabetes" (quote from article abstract) to see the effect of this weight loss program on the non-participating spouse. In fact, the Advance notes that "[s]pouses of individuals enrolled in the more intense program lost an average of five pounds, even though they did not participate in the weight loss program themselves."

Why does this happen? The Advance quotes Gorin:

“When we change our eating and exercise habits, it can spill over in a positive way to other people. This is evidence that if you change your own behavior, you may motivate others around you and get them motivated as well.”

The article's abstract concludes:

The reach of behavioral weight loss treatment can extend to a spouse, suggesting that social networks can be utilized to promote the spread of weight loss, thus creating a ripple effect.

Yay for social networks!

For More Information

Gorin, A.A., Wing, R.R., Fava, J.L., et al. Weight Loss Treatment Influences Untreated Spouses and the Home Environment: Evidence of a Ripple Effect. International Journal of Obesity, Sept. 2008 [Epub ahead of print; link to PubMed citation].
Look AHEAD, a "multicenter randomized clinical trial to examine the effects of a lifestyle intervention designed to achieve and maintain weight loss over the long term through decreased caloric intake and exercise"
Poitras, Colin, Study Shows 'Ripple Effect' of Weight Loss Programs among Couples. UConn Advance, Nov. 10, 2008.

Digitizing Books @ UConn

2008-11-06T14:16:00.003-05:00

UConn is participating in an exciting project whereby we are digitizing pre-1923 / out-of-copyright books as part of the Boston Library Consortium / Open Content Alliance project, with a goal of scanning approximately 1500 UConn books a year. The digitized books will be listed & linked in Homer, the Libraries' catalog, and will be online through archive.org. Note that many pre-1923 psychology titles are already there, including these works by or about William James and psychology.

This relates to psychology because I get to select 50 titles to be digitized from over 200 identified psychology titles -- and I'd love input from the UConn psychology department. You can see the list of digitization candidates in Google Docs. If there's a title or two (or more!) that you'd like to see digitized, please let me know. Note: some of the titles we'd like to digitize are already available online -- if that is the case, they will be directly added to Homer. My deadline is Dec. 1, so I'd like to receive comments by Nov. 20.

For More Information

About the Internet Archive
Zack, Suzanne. University Libraries to play major role in consortium’s mass digitization project. UConn Advance, Oct. 1, 2007.

Today's Front Pages

2008-11-05T09:07:00.004-05:00

On special news days, I like to head over to the Newseum to browse the front pages of newspapers across the United States and around the world.

You can browse all 674 (as of today) or you can just look at the front pages by region, like the US, the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East, and more. If you click on the thumbnail image, you'll see a blown up image of the front page.

You can also look at archived pages for special events, like when the Phillies won the World Series, the first day of the Olympics, or Sept. 12, 2001.

new Psychology & Communication Sciences Books

2008-11-03T10:55:00.004-05:00

Thanks to WorldCat and Google Reader, I've created some nifty lists that highlight new books I've purchased in communication sciences (either communication or communication disorders) and psychology. As new books come into the library, I add them to a list at WorldCat, which then goes through Google Reader, and ultimately onto my subject pages for my three disciplines.

Note that those pages are also home to lists of recent publications by UConn faculty in those departments; both pages change frequently, so check them out often!

You can see some of the recent book purchases here:

Please let me know if you'd like me to consider purchasing a book for your subject!

For Prospective LIS Students

2008-10-30T11:41:00.003-04:00

I've talked to a couple of prospective LIS students this week and wanted to give them all sorts of information about what it's like to be a librarian. Librarians show their affection and support with information, right?!

So I made a short web site with material I'd share with these two students ... and any others that may come along.

Take a look, and pass it on!

4-page Tip Sheet for PsycINFO

2008-10-29T11:54:00.008-04:00

The American Psychological Association and EBSCO created a handy 4-page tip sheet on searching PsycINFO through the new EBSCO interface.

Using the magic of Adobe Acrobat, I was able to modify the document slightly, so that it contains UConn-specific information, including my name & contact info. and the direct link to get to PsycINFO (for both on- and off-campus access).
If you're a UConn student & want to easily access PsycINFO off-campus, try this link. Did you know you can search PsycINFO & Medline at the same time? Also from off-campus! As usual, if you have any questions about this, please ask!

For More Information

The APA's original PsycINFO Tip Sheet (pdf)
PsycLIT® Search Help/Training Center, which includes this and other tip sheets
UConn's modified PsycINFO Tip Sheet (pdf)

Audiology Lectures @ California's Commonwealth Club

2008-10-28T08:49:00.000-04:00

I've been listening to some terrific audiology lectures thanks to the Commonwealth Club of California, "the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum." In May 2008, they offered a "Hearing Miniseries," in which three hearing specialists spoke for about an hour each on various aspects of hearing and hearing-related issues.

1. "How Hearing and the Brain Changes with Age," by Robert W. Sweetow, PhD, Director of Audiology at the UCSF Medical Center on May 15, 2008. Sweetow explains how hearing works, and notes that some age-related hearing problems are due to deterioration of the hearing systems in the ear. Other issues, he says, are more brain-related, because the brain is slower to process information as we age, and this includes processing sound and turning it into something meaningful. You can listen to the audio on the Commonwealth Club web site in real audio, purchase a CD of the lecture ($15), or look for it in iTunes (mp3). His part starts about 5 minutes into the ~66 minute lecture.

#2: "Cochlear Implants: Where Are we in 2008," by Lawrence Lustig, M.D., Division Chief of Otology, Nuerotology and Skull Base Surgery, UCSF, on May 22, 2008. Lustig explains what cochlear implants are and how they work, providing some history and some ideas of the future of cochlear implants. He brought two patients with him who talk briefly about what it was like to get cochlear implants and what effect the implants had on their hearing. You can listen to the audio on the Commonwealth Club web site in real audio, purchase a CD of the lecture ($15), or look for it in iTunes (mp3). His part starts about 6 minutes into the ~65 minute lecture.

#3: "The Future of Hearing: A Sound Investment," by Rodney Perkins M.D., Founder and Chairman of Sound ID, on May 28, 2008. Perkins talked about "hearing devices" (he abhors the term "hearing aids") in general, and then about two devices that his companies are working on. I liked his speaking style -- and I really liked his discussion of why dogs (and, I would argue, cats) perk their ears in different directions (to pinpoint the location of sound). You can listen to the audio on the Commonwealth Club via iTunes or via mp3. His part starts 4 minutes into the ~59 minute lecture.

I'd recommend these lectures to people who are personally interested in hearing -- either because they or someone they know is suffering from hearing loss, or because they are studying hearing / audiology and want some basic information presented in an engaging way. Of course, they're also very helpful for librarians supporting hearing professionals of all stripes.

Psychology Podcasts @ UConn

2008-10-24T09:04:00.001-04:00

UConn psychology professor Dr. David B. Miller is recording small group discussions which enhance his two large psychology classes. One podcast is called iCube ("Issues In Intro"), about which Miller says:

[These] are informal discussions with students on course material following each week's General Psychology lectures. Students who participate have the opportunity to ask questions for clarification, as well as expand on course material and discuss issues not necessarily covered in class.

He supports the General Psychology class with two other audio sessions, called precasts ("short, enhanced podcasts previewing material before each lecture") and postcasts ("re-explanations of concepts that might be important and/or detailed and, therefore, justify repeating" which are created following some, but not all, lectures).

I am a regular listener to both, and find them very useful. First, the explanation of psychology topics is fun because of my interest in cognitive science. Second, the podcasts are a fascinating insight into how one of "my" professors works with his students in my liaison department. Finally, they are a great example of how all educators can use new technology to enhance our teaching.

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to sit in on his recording session and it was a delight. There were about 20 students sitting around two tables, and virtually all of them were engaged with the conversation. I felt that I could see them learning, and that was a wonderful sight. The podcasts are a great, tech-oriented but not tech-dominated, way for Miller to provide additional information to students in his large introductory class. The beauty of them, it seems to me, is that they are helpful not only to the students who are able to attend the recording session, but also that they are available to other students as a podcast to listen to at their convenience, and as often as they like.

I liked the idea of podcasts-supporting-classes very much in theory, and I was even more impressed with the idea after having seen them in action. I am inspired to try to apply this to my own classes; instead of running exclusively text-based chat "office hours" for my GSLIS classes, I think I'll try Skype sessions next semester. Students who want to do text-based chat can do that, but students who learn more from hearing could benefit too.

But back to Miller: he has discussed his podcasts at various conferences and print publications; check out his 2006 article Podcasting at the University of Connecticut: Enhancing the Educational Experience in the October 16, 2006 issue of Campus Technology. Oh, and he's written his own theme song, PsychoBabble, which he discusses in a standalone podcast. For real!

For More Information

Miller, David. iCube. (on the UConn web site, and available on iTunes) ... note that he's got a shout-out to me in the Oct. 23 episode ...
Miller, David. "Writing Center: Help for Students, and Beyond," (mp3) interview with Tom Deans, Associate Professor of English and Director and director of the University of Connecticut Writing Center.
Miller, David. Podcasting at the University of Connecticut: Enhancing the Educational Experience. Campus Technology, October 16, 2006.
2007 Campus Technology Innovators: Podcasting. August 1, 2007.
Timmer, John.Moving Beyond Podcasts: Multimedia and the Academic Experience. ars technica, April 23, 2007.

Searching for Reliable Medical Information Online

2008-10-19T20:14:00.000-04:00

My medical librarian buddy David Rothman created a nifty Web search box that "searches authoritative and trusted consumer health information and patient education resources recommended by the U.S. National Library of Medicine and/or by CAPHIS (the Consumer and Patient Health Information Section of the Medical Library Association)." It's techically a Google Custom Search Engine (CSE),which is a nifty opportunity to create a Google search box that searches only web sites you select.

CAPHIS maintains a page on how to evaluate health infomation, which is useful, and it also lists some of the web sites they recommend. They also list the Top 100 Health Websites You Can Trust.

I've used David's search box for my own medical searching -- I was scrolling through commercial and vaguely unreliable results thinking "hmmm, there's got to be a way to search reliable health information on the Web. Then I remembered David's search engine and tried it with great success. I was happy to easily search medical sites that I know are reputable -- like medlineplus, the mayo clinic, and others. The search looks & works like Google, but it only searches those trusted sites.

For my CogSciLibrarian readers, I thought I would search some of the health-related topics that I've blogged about, such as

diabetes: see results from Medline and MedlinePlus, the CDC, the Harvard diabetes center, the Mayo Clinic, and familydoctor.org (the American Academy of Family Physicians). Not surprisingly, there are few results for feline diabetes, since the search engine is focused on human health.
vision therapy: see results from Medscape/WebMD, HealthCentral, MedHelp, and more.
concussion: see results from kidshealth.org (created by The Nemours Foundation's Center for Children's Health Media) and an interesting article by the CDC about their campaign with the Seattle Seahawks & the Brain Injury Association of Washington to help prevent young athletes from sustaining concussions, and information from the Medical College of Wisconsin.

Of course, there are terrific library resources for consumer health as well, such as:

Alt HealthWatch (from EBSCO) - the "alt" stands for "alternative & complementary"
Health and Wellness Resource Center and Alternative Health Module (from Cengage Gale)
Health Reference Center Academic (from Cengage Gale)
Health Source Consumer Edition (from EBSCO)

... and many more ... ask a librarian for assistance!

So ... if you or someone you know is doing consumer health research, check out David's Consumer Health and Patient Education Information Search Engine and browse the list of trustworthy general health web sites, or head to your local public library.

Library License Plate in Mass!

2008-10-16T09:08:00.003-04:00

The Central Mass Regional Library System is reporting that the state of Massachusetts is offering a library license plate. CMRLS says that

The idea for the plate emerged during a ‘promote libraries’ brainstorming activity at a CMRLS Executive board workshop. After a joint meeting with RMV officials in April and consultations with other library organizations, CMRLS decided to launch the drive to gather the required prepaid applications to produce the specialty plate.

CMRLS states that "proceeds will benefit public, academic, special and school libraries across the state that belong to a Regional Library System" and notes that "funds will not be used to supplant library budgets."

The initial cost of the plates will be $60: $28 for the Library Grant Fund; $12 to the RMV for manufacturing costs, and a $20 "swap fee" when you pick up the plate. Renewals will happen every two years & will cost $81 ($41 RMV registration fee and $40 for the specialty plate fee that continues to go to the Library Grant Fund).

The RMV must have at least 3,000 pre-paid applications before they will commit to making the plates; after they get 3,000 applications, it will take approximately 6 months to manufacture the plates and for them to reach the RMV branches.

What an ingenious fund-raising idea!

For More Information

Press release about the plate: online ... pdf
Application form for the Mass Libraries license plate (pdf)

Interesting Research @ UConn

2008-10-14T12:05:00.003-04:00

I'm catching up on some old issues of the UConn Advance, the newspaper of news and events at the University of Connecticut, and I noticed some interesting cognitive-related research going on -- in different departments, as you might expect.

Closest to me as the library adviser to the department of communication sciences, is the Sept. 29 article on assistant professor Melissa Tafoya, highlighting her research in "the dark side of human behavior," or as she elaborates: "the real-life stuff - infidelity, jealousy, aggression, and conflict." The Advance article describes her work in several areas, including assessment of the long-term relationships between step-siblings, and the physiological effects of communication. The Advance says:

In one study, she examined how people’s stress levels were reduced by expressing affection through writing a letter.
The participants’ cortisol levels, heart rates, blood pressure, and blood glucose levels were measured. “We found that participants’ stress levels were significantly reduced when they wrote a letter of affection to somebody they cared about,” she says.

I was also interested to read the October 6 article on the creation of a database to compare international sign languages. Linguists Harry van der Hulst and Rachel Channon are developing a database called SignTyp -- which will eventually be available on the Web for all to peruse -- that contains information on nearly 12,000 signs from six different sign languages. Van der Hulst is a phonologist who says “When I started studying sign languages, it changed my perspective on what human languages are. Sign languages are extra interesting in the domain of phonology, because the medium is not sound but visual display.” He adds that since linguistics has traditionally focused on sound, the field has to redefine what it means by phonology to allow for the fact that sign language doesn't have consonants and vowels.

Check out the Advance article for images of Van der Hulst demonstrating the sign for "recognize" in ASL; presumably a taste of what's to come in the SignTyp database.

For More Information

Citations to Professor Tafoya's publications are available on her CV.
UConn Linguistics Department SignTyp site.

Library Tip o' the Month: ILL rocks

2008-10-01T09:55:00.006-04:00

There's a great library service for UConn community members who want library materials but don't have the time / energy / physical ability to come over to the Homer Babbidge Library

The Library's DD/ILL staff (library jargon for: "if we don't have it, we'll get it for you" department) is now scanning items at the Babbidge Library as well as items we don't own.

What does that mean to you?

If you want a journal article or book chapter, and it's not available online through UConn Links, request it through InterLibrary Loan (ILL) ... you should have a pdf of the item within 2 business days. My experience with this terrific service is that scanned items can come even more quickly than that.

There is currently no charge to UConn students and faculty for this! (There is a charge to the University to do the scanning, so please ILL responsibly.)

Let me know if you have any questions or comments about this service.

Concussion Study Among Athletes

2008-09-28T08:50:00.008-04:00

Twelve retired sports players have pledged to donate their brains to Boston University’s Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy (at BU's School of Medicine) which is devoted to studying the long-term effects of concussions. The Center said last week in a press release that the brain of former Houston Oilers linebacker John Grimsley "... exhibited pronounced chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a condition that is often seen in retired athletes, such as boxers, who have a history of repeated concussions.

The New York Times notes that one of the NFL players who is donating his brain, former New England Patriots linebacker Ted Johnson, "... hoped the center would help clarify the issue of concussions’ long-term effects, which have been tied to cognitive impairment and depression in several published studies." The Times reports that the NFL believes that "... the long-term effects of concussions are uncertain."

Players do not intend their donation to be a condemnation of the NFL; the Times quotes Johnson: "I'm not being vindictive. I'm not trying to reach up from the grave and get the NFL. But any doctor who doesn't connect concussions with long-term effects should be ashamed of themselves." ESPN.com quotes former NFL linebacker Isaiah Kacyvenski: "There might be a connotation that this is a witch hunt, point the finger at the NFL. It's just not like that."

Six NFL players' brains have been examined post-mortem, and five were found to have evidence of chronic traumatic encephalopathy. Dr. Ann C. McKee, a co-director of the new brain-study center, told the Times:

“I’ve seen thousands of brains of individuals with neurogenerative diseases and debilitating diseases. I can say this is identical to the pugilistica dementia that I’ve seen in boxers in their 70s and 80s. It’s milder because the patients are younger. But once triggered, it seems to progress. The people that develop this disease, most of them show symptoms 10 or 20 years after retirement. It progresses inexorably until death.”

While it's only five cases, McKee says, it is a strong argument for "unequivocal evidence that on-field impacts were a primary cause of the damage, perhaps in association with genetic and other factors her program will attempt to identify."

Boston University released a statement about the study on September 26, which includes some convincing images of brain damage which is an "an indicator of the degenerative brain disease CTE." The images from Dr. McKee show a "microscopic brain section from a 65-year-old control subject," along with a creepy image of linebacker John Grimsley's brain, and a disturbing image of the same cells of "a 73-year-old world-champion boxer with end-stage CTE and dementia."

The press release at Boston University quotes John Grimsley's wife Virginia, who says she plans to reach out to more NFL players, urging them to consider participating in the BU study. "The stigma needs to go away that you’re a sissy if you come out of the game and don’t go back in. A concussion is a big deal. It’s not just a ding."

For More Information

Former players to donate brains for study of concussions. ESPN.com, September 24, 2008.
Daniloff, Caleb. NFL, U.S. Soccer Athletes Donate Brains to BU: New Center to Study Concussions and Permanent Damage. BU Today: Science & Technology. September 26, 2008.
Schwartz, Alan. 12 Athletes Leaving Brains to Concussion Study. New York Times, September 24, 2008.

Brain Plasticity and Psychotherapy

2008-09-24T15:12:00.006-04:00

Australia's terrific cognitive science radio show All in the Mind just had a two-part series called The Power of Plasticity in which host Natasha Mitchell interviewed psychiatrist Norman Doidge (Columbia University and the University of Toronto) and Jeffrey Schwartz (UCLA) about "neuroplasticians" (Doidge's term).

As Mitchell notes on the episode page, "the adult brain was a rigid, unchangeable organ, but that pessimistic perspective is now being radically revised;" she talks with Schwartz and Doidge about the many ways they know that the brain is, in fact, changeable and adaptable.

Schwartz discusses how people with obsessive compulsive disorder can take advantage of the brain's plasticity to actually change the wiring and minimize the disorder. He says that the part of the brain involved with OCD (the cordate nucleus) functions somewhat like the transmission in a car:

... what happens in obsessive compulsive disorder is you literally do get a stuck transmission and you get this error detection circuit coming in from another part of the brain in the front called the orbital frontal cortex locking, and you can't shift out of it and because you're locked in to an error detection circuit, you are bombarded with feelings that something is wrong, even though the rest of your brain and mind adequately can tell most of the time that even though this feels terrible it really doesn't make sense.

And apparently, according to Schwartz, "people could direct their own inner environment through this enhanced understanding. So I said [to myself] this is self-directed neuroplasticity."

Doidge talks about how psychotherapy can also change some of the brain's wiring; his analogy is to skiing:

plasticity is like snow on a hill in winter, if we're going to ski down that hill because the snow is plastic and pliable we can take many different paths down that hill, not an infinite number, there are rocks here and trees over there. And if we had a good pass down the first time, being human we will tend to favour a path close to that the second and third times and then because the snow is pliable and plastic we'll develop tracks which become ruts and we can get stuck in them, brain lock.

He adds that "many of the neuroplastic treatments basically find ways of setting up road blocks, so that you can get out of those ruts and learn about new pathways and grow new pathways etc."

Both Schwartz and Doidge tell some fascinating stories. The two episodes are well worth a listen, and you can read the transcript online if you prefer.

For More Information

The Power of Plasticity, Part 1 of 2. All in the Mind, September 13, 2008.
The Power of Plasticity, Part 2 of 2. All in the Mind, September 20, 2008.
See also: Norman Doidge Discusses Neuroplasticity Brain Science Podcast, December 14, 2007.

Soda or Pop?

2008-09-16T14:49:00.011-04:00

what is this carbonated beverage?

Do you call it "pop"? "soda"? a brand name soda pop? I ran across a linguistics map showing who calls it what:

Read about it at the Strange Maps blog, The Pop Vs Soda Map. They cite an article by Luanne von Schneidemesser, PhD in German linguistics and philology (University of Wisconsin-Madison) showing who calls "carbonated beverages" what. They note that von Schneidemesser is a senior editor of the Dictionary of American Regional English.

For More Information

Schneidemesser, Luanne von. "Soda or Pop?" (first page in pdf) Journal of English Linguistics, 1996 Dec; 24 (4): 270-87. [article that is basis for blog post]
Strange Maps. The Pop Vs Soda Map. August 18, 2008.

Favorite Podcasts

2008-08-31T09:14:00.008-04:00

I've had two conversations recently in which I was discussing favorite science podcasts. Since this blog serves as a long-term memory aid, I'm listing, in alphabetical order, some of the sci-tech podcasts I like right now. (read about earlier favorites)

All in the Mind Terrific 30-minute discussion of all things psychology from Australia's ABC Radio National. Host and science journalist Natasha Mitchell is very knowledgeable and has interviewed folks like Steven Pinker, Dan Dennett, and others in psychology, neuroscience, and even philosophy. I've blogged about many episodes. (note: their web site was down as I wrote this, but it should be back soon)
Brain Science Podcast Host Ginger Campbell (an ER "doc" in Alabama) conducts terrific interviews and book talks about many cognitive science topics. She's interviewed Christof Koch, linguist Alice Gaby, and Brain Rules author John Medina. She asks good, knowledgeable questions and her conversations have inspired me to buy many books for myself and for my library. You can follow Ginger on Twitter, and read what I've blogged about prior Brain Science podcasts.
Free Library of Philadelphia "Author Event" lectures, feature many types of authors including several scientists. I just listened to physicist Paul Davies' talk entitled Cosmic Jackpot: Why Our Universe Is Just Right for Life and was riveted by Simon Winchester talking about The Man Who Loved China: Joseph Needham and the Making of a Masterpiece. There are also lectures by Steven Pinker on his book The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature and Eric Kandel talking about In Search of Memory: The Emergence of a New Science of Mind. Looks like mathematician and physicist Brian Greene will be speaking this fall! These hour-long talks usually contain a 30-minute lecture then ~30 minutes of Q&A with the audience.
Future Tense 3-4 minute radio program subtitled "Public radio's daily journal of the digital age." Host (and Twitterer) Jon Gordon covers many aspects of technology, such as podcasting (not mainstream yet, apparently), PowerPoint, as well as many Mac and PC issues. I've blogged many Future Tense episodes.
GSLIScast Audio recordings from many speaker presentations at Simmons Graduate School of Library & Information Science. They usually run 60-90 minutes.
Radio Times with WHYY's Marty Moss-Coane. The majority of these 50-minute podcast are NOT about science, but the ones that are are terrific (and the others are, too). Moss-Coane has interviewed Avery Gilbert, psychologist and smell expert; Gary Marcus, Hampshire alum and director of NYU's Infant Language Learning Center; and Drew Westen, author of The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation. Unfortunately, the mp3 links have a short shelf-live at WHYY's site, so it's best to subscribe to the show via iTunes.
SirsiDynix Institute Free, hour-long workshops with library leaders about various aspects of library science, including David Lee King's primer on video on the web and the awesome Maximizing the Power of the Web: Pew Internet & American Life Project's 2007 Findings with Lee Rainie.
TED Talks 20-minute talks by prominent thinkers in many disciplines, including science, technology, arts, and more. Topics include Sugata Mitra showing how kids teach themselves; Patricia Burchat shedding light on dark matter; and Kevin Kelly on the next 5,000 days of the web. I've blogged about several TED Talks.
TVBarn Not science-related, but thoughtful conversations about TV between (Twitterer) Aaron Barnhart and a few radio talk show hosts across the country. My favorites are when he speaks with Paul Harris. They are usually 5-15 minutes but sometimes last longer.

Please add your favorite science podcast(s) in the comments!

My Public Schedule for Fall

2008-08-28T12:51:00.005-04:00

In case you were wondering, there are a few places you can see me this fall, and if you can't come see me, you can read some stuff I wrote. Here are the details:

Workshops
"Live Usability Lab: See One, Do One & Take One Home."
Thursday, September 11, 2008, 9 am-noon
Middletown Library Service Center Meeting Room
Free! Class limit: 20

Description: This innovative half-day workshop will provide background on usability and define the user experience (UX). We will offer a "live usability lab" with audience assessment of one library web site and provide time and resources to create usability scenarios for YOUR web resources. Attendees will participate in interactive usability testing to evaluate web-based library resources from the user's perspective. You will also develop questions and methodology to assess usability and the UX @ your library!

"Live Web Usability Lab," co-presenting with iCONN's Steve Cauffman and ECSU's Carol Abetelli.
CASL Conference 2008 (the Connecticut Association of School Librarians)
November 10, 2008, 2 identical sessions: 10:15 - 11 and 1:15-2:15
Crowne Plaza Hotel in Cromwell, CT

Description: What do your students think about your school library’s Web site? This session provides a dynamic way to see how usability testing can help evaluate Web resources from your students’ perspective. A panel of librarians will use an innovative, interactive method to assess iCONN; to demonstrate the potential and power of user testing; and to engage the audience by illustrating the process with live data instead of canned examples. This session is for all ages, but is best for librarians who have created web sites for their students.

Articles (forthcoming)

"Peer to Peer: UConn’s experiment with student 'ambassadors' for vendor-funded training on specialized searching." Library Journal, Sept. 15, 2008, co-authored with UConn Communication Sciences graduate student Chelsea Hammond.
"Community Connections: The Student Ambassador Program at the University of Connecticut." Elsevier Library Connect Newsletter, October 2008.

Library Tip o' the Month: Office Hours

2008-08-27T09:18:00.003-04:00

I will be holding two office hours outside of the library this semester.

On Tuesdays from noon-1, I will be in the Communication Sciences building, in room 105a.
On Wednesdays from 3-4, I will be in the Psychology building, in room 190c.

You can come to see me during those times and ask me anything (preferably about library resources, but I'm game for other topics too) -- no appointment necessary!

I can help undergraduates, graduate students, and faculty improve searches in library "search engines" like PsycINFO, Medline, and Scopus. I can also help you manage the citations / articles you've found using a nifty tool called RefWorks. Bring your questions (and your laptop if you like) and stop in to see me!

Did you know?

You can search Medline & PsycINFO together!

About: Library Tip o' the Month

2008-08-27T09:11:00.006-04:00

This summer, I was appointed the librarian for the department of psychology at UConn. UConn's department of psychology is organized into six sections, covering Behavioral Neuroscience, Developmental, Clinical, Perception, Action, Cognition, Industrial/ Organizational, and Social psychology. They also offer programs in Language & Cognition and Ecological Psychology. You can see some of the faculty's recent publications in this Scopus feed -- very interesting indeed!

This is great news for me, as I'm quite a psychology buff, and I'm excited to work with some actual cognitive scientists. As part of my new duties, I am going to integrate this blog with my work for psychology and communication sciences (where I am also the liaison). So interspersed with cog sci news & info will be periodic posts providing a "Library Tip o' the Month."

Stay tuned!

Seeing Sound

2008-08-26T13:13:00.005-04:00

The Talking Books librarian blogs about an article at the BBC about software which helps the deaf to "see" sound. Using the newly-developed software Lumisonic, sound is represented by moving rings which radiate, and change depending on the pitch, volume, etc. It helps people with hearing difficulties understand the sounds they make, such as how loud it is, as well as its texture and quality. There's a neat video, which features kids using a Wii controller to change the sound that they are "seeing" on a computer: "I wanted to see some crazy circles" said one. As he said that, sound poured from the machine, which he was controlling, even though he can't hear.

The BBC article reports that musicians from the London Philharmonic Orchestra played for / with deaf children at Whitefields School in East London. They quote Dr Mick Grierson from Goldsmith's, University of London: "It gave them a way of interacting with sound and music, with musicians who are highly skilled. It enabled them to work with music in a way they haven't been able to before."

For More Information

Helping the deaf to 'see sound.' BBC News, August 13, 2008.

Favorite Albums by Year

2008-08-24T10:22:00.005-04:00

Finally, a meme I can (want to) write about! Liam, over at Panorama of the Mountains, lists his Favorite Albums by Year, starting with the soundtrack to Wattstax, back in 1973. I don't think I can go back that far (if I did, it would include things like Carly Simon's Hotcakes, Al Stewart’s Past, Present, and Future, and ELO's Out of the Blue) with my musical favorites. Instead, I'll start my list when I started making my "Favorite Songs of the Year" CD. I can't limit myself to one CD, so I'll list the best and the runner up.

2001: Kirsty MacCall ... Tropical Brainstorm (RIP)

Runner up: Eliza Carthy ... Angels & Cigarettes

2002: Mark Knopfler ... Ragpicker's Dream

Runner up: Raul Malo ... Today

2003: Belle & Sebastian ... Dear Catastrophe Waitress

Runner up: Fountains of Wayne ... Welcome Interstate Managers

2004: Chumbawamba ... Un

Runner up: Michael Franti & Spearhead ... Everyone Deserves Music

2005: Winterpills ... Winterpills

Runner up: Dido ... Life for Rent

2006: Jenny Lewis with The Watson Twins ... Rabbit Fur Coat

Runner up: The Guggenheim Grotto ... Waltzing Alone

2007: Camera Obscura ... Let’s Get out of this Country

Runner up: Steve Forbert ... Strange Names and New Sensations

Note that these are my favorite albums during that year, which doesn't mean that the album was released in that year. For instance, Today was released in 2001, but heard and fell in love with it in 2002.

If you're into this kind of list-making, consider yourself tagged for this blog meme.

Thoughtful Talk about Positive Psychology

2008-08-19T08:46:00.004-04:00

Martin Seligman, the founder of positive psychology ("a field of study that examines healthy states, such as happiness, strength of character and optimism") spoke at the Ted Conference back in 2004, and the video has just been made available online:

He talks clearly about the state of positive psychology today, including some background. Psychology (arguably, clinical psychology, though he doesn't explicitly say this) has long been known for making "miserable people less miserable" - but Seligman argues that there is a cost to this: we become "victimologists," ignore "normal people" and genius, and we don't work on developing "interventions" on helping people become happier.

He describes three kinds of "happiness:"

The "pleasant life" includes having as many pleasures and pleasant emotions as possible. Some drawbacks: much of this is "heritable," meaning that you are born with it or you're not; and like tasty food, pleasant emotions can be "habituated," (Seligman analogizes French vanilla ice cream: the first bite is scrumptious, but by the sixth bite, you forget it's the best ice cream you've ever had).
The "good life," which Seligman describes as being about "flow:" when time stops, you have intense concentration, and you are totally consumed by what you're doing.
Meaning. Knowing what your strengths are and using them to good effect for yourself and others.

Finally, Seligman talks about successful "positive interventions" which help improve people's happiness. He assures the audience that studies for these interventions are done in the same "rigorous" manner in which drug effectiveness is tested, including long-term studies, placebo controlled, and random assignment of therapies. He describes some interesting activities which enhance the pleasant life:

Plan a beautiful day
Gratitude visit
Strengths date (with couples)
Fun vs. philanthropy (note: philanthropy has longer-lasting "pleasant" results than fun)

Watch the video for details about these activities, and check out his web site for even more information.

For More Information

Seligman, Martin. What Positive Psychology Can Help You Become. TED Talks, February 2004.
Authentic Happiness, Seligman's home page at the University of Pennsylvania. It includes:

Strengths test - find what your strengths are to improve meaning, and a whole bunch of other questionnaires.
Seligman, Martin, Tracey Steen, Nansook Park, and Christopher Peterson. "Positive psychology progress: Empirical validation of interventions." American Psychologist 6.5 (2005):5-14.
Links to more resources about positive psychology.

Olympic Medals & Emotions

2008-08-15T08:43:00.003-04:00

My favorite brain science podcaster alerted me to a new-to-me psychology podcast called the Psych Files. In this week's episode, Psych Files host Michael Britt talks about the emotions of (some) Olympic medal winners.

Quick, who do you think is happier:
Silver medal winners?
Bronze medal winners?

(I think we can probably surmise that gold medal winners are the happiest of the three, but that isn't addressed in the podcast)

Answer: Bronze medal winners.

Britt summarizes a neat 1995 study in which non sports fans analyzed video of silver and bronze medal winners in the 1992 Olympics to see which winners were happier. With some degree of reliability, subjects agreed that bronze medal winners were happier. Britt and the study's authors suggest that this is because the bronze medalists were happy because they won a medal, while silver medalists were less happy because they didn't win the gold.

Britt's podcast summary is: "Psychologists say that winning the silver medal - coming in second - is actually less satisfying than coming in third - the bronze. Why is that? Sounds weird, but it also sounds right, doesn’t it? Have you ever come in second in a contest or received an A- instead of an A? Find out why winning the silver is…a bummer."

The article's abstract is:

Research on counterfactual thinking has shown that people's emotional responses to events are influenced by their thoughts about "what might have been." The authors extend these findings by documenting a familiar occasion in which those who are objectively better off nonetheless feel worse. In particular, an analysis of the emotional reactions of bronze and silver medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics -- both at the conclusion of their events and on the medal stand -- indicates that bronze medalists tend to be happier than silver medalists. The authors attribute these results to the fact that the most compelling counterfactual alternative for the silver medalist is winning the gold, whereas for the bronze medalist it is finishing without a medal. Support for this interpretation was obtained from the 1992 Olympics and the 1994 Empire State Games. The discussion focuses on the implications of endowment and contrast for well being.

I particularly enjoyed Britt's analysis of the article, and his (minor) critique. He also offers some intriguing suggestions for extensions of the study. If you want some psychology to go along with your Olympics, this is a good place to look.

For More Information

Britt, Michael. The Olympic Silver Metal? What a Bummer! The Psych Files, episode 67.
Medvec, Victoria Husted; Madey, Scott E.; Gilovich, Thomas. When Less is More: Counterfactual Thinking and Satisfaction Among Olympic Medalists (pdf at Cornell). Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, Oct 1995, Vol. 69 Issue 4, p603-610. (cited by 85 in Scopus [subscription required])