Media Choice in Multicultural Business Interactions

[EN] The aim of this study was to identify which media is chosen for Computed-mediated Communication (CMC) in multicultural business interactions when the main language of communication is English as a lingua franca. The second aim was to determine how the results of this study should be taken into consideration at Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) in curriculum development. The analyses employed in this survey followed Media synchronicity theory (MST), originally proposed by Dennis/Valacich (1997) and later refined by Dennis et al. (2008). This study was conducted using a mixed method approach with data from a quantitative survey regarding media usage of 274 respondents and qualitative theme interviews of five working life representatives. The findings indicate that the choice of media varies between different countries and is dependent on the different capabilities and synchronicity of the media. The team structure, communication processes, choice of language, cultural diversity and ethical rules of the company play an important role in communication and are meaningful when choosing the media for communication. The main conclusion is that the ability to choose the media that is suitable for varying communicative situations in working life has become essential and therefore needs to be developed as part of curriculum development work at HEIs.This work was supported by the Erasmus+ Project CoMoViWo, Communication in Mobile and Virtual Work under Grant KA 2014-1-F101-KA203-00851.Varhelahti, M.; Joshi, M.; Mikkilä-Erdmann, M.; Pérez-Sabater, C. (2017). Media Choice in Multicultural Business Interactions. Hermes. (56):163-180. https://doi.org/10.7146/hjlcb.v0i56.97230S1631805

Conceptual change challenges in medicine during professional development

This study investigates professional development during medical studies from a conceptual change perspective. Medical students' conceptual understanding and clinical reasoning concerning the central cardiovascular system were investigated during the first three years of study. Professional development was inspected from the perspectives of biomedical knowledge, clinical knowledge and skills needed to solve a patient case. Biomedical misconceptions regarding false beliefs and mental models were detected. Students with misconceptions were more likely to give lower level answers in clinical application tasks and to make inaccurate diagnoses compared to those students who had accurate conceptual understanding. Based on the results, pedagogical suggestions are discussed

Medical students' biomedical and clinical knowledge: Combining longitudinal design, eye tracking and comparison with residents' performance

This study combines longitudinal and individual process-level analyses to investigate medical students' biomedical knowledge and how they generate a diagnosis for a patient case text. The diagnostic processes were investigated using the eye-tracking method, and students' processes were compared with those of residents. The results showed that students differed in their diagnostic performance in the beginning of the clinical phase. Of the students who had biomedical misconceptions in the preclinical phase, 69% ended up with an incorrect diagnosis, while 60% of students with accurate biomedical knowledge made a correct diagnosis. The processing of a patient case text was faster among better achieving students and residents. Furthermore, residents' illness-script activation could be seen from their eye-movement data as a relatively longer reading time regarding the sentence that concerned the enabling condition of the case. Based on the results of the study, pedagogical suggestions are discussed. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

A multidimensional adapted process model of teaching

Abstract In the present study, we aimed to specify the key competence domains perceived to be critical for the teaching profession and depict them as a comprehensive teacher competence model. An expert panel that included representatives from seven units providing university-based initial teacher education in Finland carried out this process. To produce an active construction of a shared understanding and an interpretation of the discourse in the field, the experts reviewed literature on teaching. The resulting teacher competence model, the multidimensional adapted process model of teaching (MAP), represents a collective conception of the relevant empirical literature and prevailing discourses on teaching. The MAP is based on Blömeke et al.’s, Zeitschrift für Psychologie, 223, 3–13, (2015) model which distinguishes among teacher competences (referring to effective performance of teachers’ work), competencies (knowledge, skills, and other individual competencies underlying and enabling effective teaching), and situation-specific skills of perceiving, interpreting, and making decisions in situations involving teaching and learning. The implications of the MAP for teacher education and student selection for initial teacher education are discussed