Preface Volume 63

AbstractThis volume contains the Proceedings of the First Workshop on Security of Mobile Multiagent Systems (SEMAS'2001). The Workshop was held in Montreal, Canada on May 29, 2001, as satellite event to the 5th International Conference on Autonomous Agents 2001The far reaching influence of the Internet has resulted in an increased interest in agent technologies, which are poised to play a key role in the implementation of successful Internet and WWW-based applications in the future. While there is still considerable hype concerning agent technologies, there is also an increasing awareness of the problems involved. Although there is a large body of work on cryptographic techniques that provide basic building-blocks to solve specific security problems, relatively little work has been done in investigating security in the multiagent system context. The introduction of mobile software agents significantly increases the risks involved in Internet and WWW-based applications. The aim of this workshop was to bring together people from the two relevant research fields, software security and agent-oriented programming. This volume covers actual research papers on security protocols and security policies to enforce security of mobile or multiagent systems but also introduces ideas how to use mobile agents to ensure security of a distributed system.The papers in this volume were reviewed by the program committee consisting, besides editor, of Sahin Albayrak(Technical University Berlin)David Basin(Department of Computer Science, University of Freiburg)Ciaran Bryce(University of Geneve)Hans-Juergen Buerckert(German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence, DFKI)Guenther Karjoth(IBM Research Zuerich)Luc Moreau(Department of Computer Science, University of Southhampton)Volker Roth(Fraunhofer Gesellschaft IGD, Darmstadt)Helmut Schwigon(Bundesamt fuer Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik, BonnVipin Swarup(The MITRE Corp., Boston)Christian Tschudin(Uppsala University)Jan Vitek(Purdue University)This volume will be published as volume 63 in the series Electronic Notes in Theoretical Computer Science (ENTCS). This series is published electronically through the facilities of Elsevier Science B.V. and its auspices. The volumes in the ENTCS series can be accessed at the URL http://www.elsevier.nl/locate/entcsWe are very grateful to the following persons, whose help has been crucial for the success of CMCS'2000: Adele E. Howe, for her help with the organization of the Workshop as satellite event of AA'2001 and Mike Mislove, one of the Managing Editors of the ENTCS series, for his assistance with the use of the ENTCS style files.December 15, 2001 Dieter Hutte

Introduction: Empirical Research on Decision-Making in the Federal Courts

The invention of the desktop computer and the widespread use of the Internet has revolutionized life in many ways over the last twenty-five years. It has also fundamentally changed the way in which we are able to study law. Since the 1980s, a vast amount of data has been collected about courts, both in the United States and abroad. We now have the requisite computing power to process and analyze these data, ultimately with the goal of learning how law works. Many law schools now house scholars who conduct empirical legal scholarship: scholarship that uses data and modern social scientific methods to understand law. At Washington University in St. Louis, the Center for Empirical Research in the Law provides infrastructure for this type of scholarship. Volume 29 of the Washington University Journal of Law and Policy contains eight excellent examples of this type of work conducted by scholars working in the legal academy, the social sciences, and their intersection. The articles focus broadly on decision-making in the federal courts. The authors use innovative data sources and state-of-the-art methodology to study all three levels of the federal judiciary. Three of the Articles in the volume look at decision-making in the federal district courts. The importance of ideology and the methodology used to detect it in the Federal Courts of Appeals is the focus of two articles in the volume. Finally, three articles look at the United States Supreme Court

Developing digital interventions: a methodological guide.

Digital interventions are becoming an increasingly popular method of delivering healthcare as they enable and promote patient self-management. This paper provides a methodological guide to the processes involved in developing effective digital interventions, detailing how to plan and develop such interventions to avoid common pitfalls. It demonstrates the need for mixed qualitative and quantitative methods in order to develop digital interventions which are effective, feasible, and acceptable to users and stakeholders

An investigation into the attitudes of academic librarians towards Internet plagiarism of HE students

This paper investigates the attitudes of academic librarians towards Internet plagiarism by higher education students in the United Kingdom (UK), examining how they define Internet plagiarism, their perceived role in combating this phenomenon, and the skills and techniques they have or will adopt to achieve this. A Delphi study was undertaken using a sample of 10 respondents. The responses demonstrated that plagiarism is a multifaceted term and not easily definable, however respondents were unanimous in their opinion that the Internet has made it easier to plagiarise. The potential for active collaboration between librarians and academics to jointly address Internet plagiarism was seen as vital by all respondents, although opinion was divided on the role of librarians and academics. A blended approach is recommended, which involves policing and prevention; in addition to ensuring that students are achieving information literacy well before they reach the gates of the University

On geography and medical journalology: a study of the geographical distribution of articles published in a leading medical informatics journal between 1999 and 2004

BACKGROUND: Studying the contribution of individual countries to leading journals in a given discipline can highlight which countries have the most impact on that discipline, and also give some idea about the geographical outreach of those journals. This paper examines the number of countries that contributed articles to one leading medical informatics journal, Medical Informatics & the Internet in Medicine, and the amount of their contributions between 1999 and the first half of 2004. METHODS: The PubMed citations of all indexed articles from the chosen journal (n = 128) were retrieved online (up to Volume 29, Number 2/June 2004 issue, the latest indexed issue as at 28 January 2005). The country of corresponding author's affiliation for each retrieved citation was recorded. The five-year-and-half corpus of abstracts retrieved from PubMed was further explored using MetaCarta Geographic Text Search . RESULTS: The examined journal has an international outreach, with authors from 24 countries, spanning four continents, contributing to the journal during the studied period. The journal is dominated by a very large number of articles from Europe (81.25% of all articles counted in this study), and in particular from the UK (15.63%) and Greece (15.63%). There were no contributions from Africa or South America. CONCLUSION: A detailed discussion and interpretation of these results and ideas for future analyses are provided. MetaCarta can prove very useful as a bibliometric research tool

The determinants of web-based investor relations activities by companies operating in emerging economies : the case of Jordan

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Utilization of Media-Driven Technology for Health Promotion and Risk Reduction among American Indian and Alaska Native Young Adults: An Exploratory Study

Across the developmental spectrum, American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) adolescents and young adults experience considerable behavioral and mental health disparities, including substance abuse, depression, and engagement in sexual behaviors which enhance risk of pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. Health-focused interventions utilizing digital and media technology hold significant promise among tribal communities, as they have the capacity to eliminate geography-based barriers. Utilizing a sample of 210 self-identified AI/AN students attending tribal colleges, this study identified the most effective technologies and intervention strategies, as well as health seeking patterns and preferences, which may impact implementation and sustainable use in tribal settings. The use of technology was both diverse and pervasive among AI/AN young adults, mirroring or exceeding patterns of young adults from the broader population. These data suggest that technology-based interventions may effectively deliver information, resources, and behavior change tools to AI/AN young adults, particularly when reflecting their unique worldviews and social contexts

Internet-based CBT for depression with and without telephone tracking in a national helpline: randomised controlled trial

BACKGROUND Telephone helplines are frequently and repeatedly used by individuals with chronic mental health problems and web interventions may be an effective tool for reducing depression in this population. AIM To evaluate the effectiveness of a 6 week, web-based cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) intervention with and without proactive weekly telephone tracking in the reduction of depression in callers to a helpline service. METHOD 155 callers to a national helpline service with moderate to high psychological distress were recruited and randomised to receive either Internet CBT plus weekly telephone follow-up; Internet CBT only; weekly telephone follow-up only; or treatment as usual. RESULTS Depression was lower in participants in the web intervention conditions both with and without telephone tracking compared to the treatment as usual condition both at post intervention and at 6 month follow-up. Telephone tracking provided by a lay telephone counsellor did not confer any additional advantage in terms of symptom reduction or adherence. CONCLUSIONS A web-based CBT program is effective both with and without telephone tracking for reducing depression in callers to a national helpline. TRIAL REGISTRATION Controlled-Trials.comISRCTN93903959.Funding for the trial was provided by an Australian Research Council Linkage Project Grant (LP0667970) (http://www.arc.gov.au/). LF is supported by an Australian Postgraduate Award Industry scholarship. KG is supported by a National Health and Medical Research Council Fellowship (No. 525413) and HC is supported by a National Health and Medical Research Council Fellowship (No. 525411)

A Winning Hand: A Proposal for an International Regulatory Schema with Respect to the Growing Online Gambling Dilemma in the United States

While a multitude of Internet enterprises folded in the 1990s, online gambling websites not only have held strong, but appear to be ready to increase the stakes. No business relating to the Internet currently generates more revenue than online gambling, and that trend does not look like it will change soon. While many Americans desire to participate in this form of cyber-gambling, the current legality of their ability to do so remains vague. For the most part, an American\u27s ability to gamble currently resides under the purview of state law and a hodgepodge of antiquated federal wire acts. The nature of the Internet, however, mandates that any scheme, regulatory or prohibitory, be constructed in the international arena. For various reasons, there have been efforts by members of Congress to create strong prohibitory legislation specifically targeting Internet gambling. The Author analyzes not only whether a domestic prohibition schema is the best model to implement, but also whether such a model could even be truly effective. The Author further shows that an international regulatory model can provide a legitimate method of control while allowing individual countries to maintain discretion over the form of online gambling they allow to their citizens. At the same time, this international regulatory schema would still provide a valid international enforcement net against offenders. Under this regulatory schema, problem gamblers can be protected while still preserving the opportunity for other patrons to get lucky and hit it big

Investigating e-business practices in tourism :a comparative analysis of three countries

This study examined the behaviour of tourist companies in relation to the adoption of e-business technologies and applications. The study aimed to identify groups of companies with homogenous behaviour among three European countries (Greece, Portugal and Norway). Based on data from a European survey, the study employed two-step cluster analysis which revealed 14 clusters of common behaviour (five clusters in Greece, five in Portugal and four in Norway). These clusters were named as: Leaders’ ‘Technology Experts’, ‘Fast Adopters’ ‘Beginners’, ‘Late Adopters’. In Norway, the group ‘Late Adopters’ also included companies characterised as ‘Beginners’ in the other two countries. We suggest further investigation among European countries in order to reveal more groups of similar behaviour toward e-business adoption