Cell Phone Information Seeking Explains Blood Pressure in African American Women

Although cell phone use and Internet access via cell phone is not marked by racial disparities, little is known about how cell phone use relates to blood pressure and health information seeking behaviors. The purposes of this study were to (a) describe Internet activities, cell phone use, and information seeking; (b) determine differences in blood pressure and information seeking between cell phone information seekers and nonseekers; and (c) examine cell phone information seeking as a predictor of blood pressure in African American women. Participants ( N = 147) completed a survey and had their blood pressure measured. Independent-sample t tests showed a significant difference in systolic blood pressure in cell phone information seekers and nonseekers. Linear regression revealed cell phone information seeking as an independent predictor of systolic blood pressure, despite confounders. It is possible that cell phone information seekers were using health information to make decisions about self-management of blood pressure

Mapping the landscape: Gender and the writing classroom.

publication-status: Accepte

Using electrostatic potentials to predict DNA-binding sites on DNA-binding proteins

A method to detect DNA-binding sites on the surface of a protein structure is important for functional annotation. This work describes the analysis of residue patches on the surface of DNA-binding proteins and the development of a method of predicting DNA-binding sites using a single feature of these surface patches. Surface patches and the DNA-binding sites were initially analysed for accessibility, electrostatic potential, residue propensity, hydrophobicity and residue conservation. From this, it was observed that the DNA-binding sites were, in general, amongst the top 10% of patches with the largest positive electrostatic scores. This knowledge led to the development of a prediction method in which patches of surface residues were selected such that they excluded residues with negative electrostatic scores. This method was used to make predictions for a data set of 56 non-homologous DNA-binding proteins. Correct predictions made for 68% of the data set

An investigation of methodologies for software development prototyping

The computer industry has a poor record of system development using the traditional life-cycle approach. The main cause of user dissatisfaction is the unacceptably large amount of time between specification and delivery of a system. In addition, users have limited opportunity to influence how the system will look when implemented once development has commenced. With the advent of 4GLs, system development using a prototyping approach has become a viable option. This has reduced the development tlme significantly and, together with the use of prototyping, has allowed users to become more involved in the development process. However, this change in the development process has meant that often the use of an accepted methodology/system life cycle has been ignored or altered. This has resulted in systems where the definition-of-requirements phase was often fast-tracked or omitted totally and the system documentation is insufficient for effective maintenance. Thus, this approach has not proved to be as successful as expected. However, the opportunities that prototyping offers should not be discarded because of the use of inappropriate software development methodologies, languages or tools. This study seeks to identify factors that may influence the success or failure of a prototyping project and to assess the importance of any developmentmethodologies being used. Information was gathered via interviews, questionnaires and, where deemed necessary, the reviewing of development procedures used. Conclusions have been drawn from data gathered from various organisations in Western Australia that have used prototyping for a number of projects, thus, suggesting a refinement of the development process. Two main areas appeared to affect the success of a software development project. The first is the lack of flexibility in the methodology used and inappropriateness of the development tools and languages. The second is insufficient requirements analysis. The results indicate that a methodology is required that provides a good framework, but is flexible enough to handle different types and sizes of project. It should specifically address prototyping and include guidelines as to how to select the most suitable prototyping approach for each project. It should contain examples of different deliverables and various development cycles appropriate for each type of prototyping. There should be automated tools available to handle documentation and code generation where possible. The development of a methodology with the above characteristics is required if the advantages of prototyping are to be maximised in the future

Community-based Education: Health Promotion for Farmers at the Country Market

This article describes a unique approach used by baccalaureate nursing students, enrolled in a two-semester community health course, to address the priority of health concerns of agricultural workers in their own rural communities

Information Security Policy Development Through the Lens of the Institutional Analysis and Development Framework

Organizations worldwide are increasing their information security initiatives to keep pace with the highly complex and dynamically changing operating environments. With mounting regulations, risk mitigation, and critical information protection pressures, they focus on IT governance. Using a case study methodology, this research in progress introduces an interdisciplinary common governance framework to information security policy, an important internal governance control. The Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework is part of Nobel Prize-winning work in economics and is recognized as one of the most comprehensive tools for both design and analysis of policy interventions