Career Commitment of Postprofessional Athletic Training Program Graduates

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Elegy For The Eastern Cougar: Forgotten Souls Of Appalachia

The eastern cougar once ranged from eastern Canada to Georgia, thriving in the mountains and forests of Appalachia and its surroundings. Before Europeans arrived, cougars roamed freely. Soon after the European colonization of the United States, settlers came to see the eastern cougar as a threat. For centuries, cougars were killed mercilessly and recklessly. State governments placed bounties on the cougars, paying citizens for the cats’ torn away scalps. By 1850, eastern cougars were considered rare. By 1900, they were almost entirely extirpated south of the Mississippi. However, although the last known eastern cougar was killed in Maine in 1938, the cougar was not formally declared extinct until 2018. For those 80 years, legends and misperceptions kept the animal alive. Even today, the Fish and Wildlife Service receives hundreds of reported eastern cougar sightings each year. Ninety percent are other animals; the remainder are escaped captives or cougars migrating from the west. This piece, combining narrative, poetic voice, and scientific and anthropological data, will examine the life and death of the eastern cougar, the parts humans have played in its actual extinction and the denial of its extinction, and human impact on biodiversity and extinction today

Comparison of Squat Strength and Muscle Activity Between Female Athletes With Varus Versus Valgus Knee Angles During Jumping

This investigation examined squat strength and muscle activation during jump landings between female athletes who landed with a varus knee position versus a valgus knee position. Twenty-one female athletes were recruited from Appalachian State University. Subjects had at least two years of resistance training experience, and played basketball or volleyball at least 4 hours per week. All subjects performed a one repetition maximum (1RM) in the back squat and performed three of each of the following jumps: countermovement jump, 20 cm, 40 cm, and 60 cm drop jumps. Knee position was calculated using 3D videography at the moment of peak knee flexion. EMG activity was collected on the Vastus Lateralis (VL), Vastus Medialis (VM), Biceps Femoris (BF), and Gluteus Maximus (GM) using wireless electrodes. Average muscle activity for 100 ms prior to peak knee flexion was averaged for the left and right leg and EMG activity of the VL and VM were averaged together to represent quadriceps activity. Activation of quadriceps, BF, GM, absolute 1 RM and relative 1RM were not significantly different between the valgus versus varus knee angle groups. Significant differences were observed in knee angles between the valgus and varus groups in all jump conditions (p =0.05)

An Examination of the Residual Covariance Structures of Complex Performance Exercises Under Various Scaling and Scoring Methods

Large-scale assessment programs are increasingly including complex performance exercises along with traditional multiple-choice items in a given test. These performance assessments are developed in part to measure sets of skills that are part of the trait to be measured, but are not easily assessed with multiple choice items. One approach to creating and scoring these items is to create a set of tasks within a scenario that can be objectively scored using a set of scoring rules to yield dichotomous responses. Including complex performance items introduces two potential challenges: first, the performance items are developed to measure something distinctly different and may introduce some degree of multidimensionality into the test; second, as the set of measurement opportunities stem from a common stimuli and are scored with a set of elaborate rules, contextual and scoring dependencies are likely to arise. Both multidimensionality and statistical dependencies may create a situation where non-zero residual covariances are present. This study uses a computer simulation to create different amounts of association among the CPE item due to the three sources mentioned above. The magnitude and distribution of the residual covariances are assessed under two different methods for scoring the simulations (dichotomous or polytomous scoring) and under different Item Response Theory based scaling methods (creating separate scales for the two item types or joint calibrations of all items). The results indicate the following: If only contextual/scoring dependencies are present in the data, polytomous scoring is effective in eliminating some of the extreme dependencies due to scoring factors, but does not decrease the average amount of residual covariance among the measurement opportunities of the performance items. Treating performance exercises and selected response items as two separate and distinct scales was effective in controlling the amount of residual covariance regardless of the underlying dimensional structure. However, when the correlation between traits was moderate to high, the joint calibration approaches show similar amounts of residual covariance among performance exercises as the separate scale approach, and produce score estimates that are more precise. Last, when dependencies are the result of all the sources mentioned above, only the separate scales approach couple with the polytomous scoring approach is successful in reducing the residual covariance to zero levels. Choosing a joint scaling approach and polytomously scored items when the data is two-dimensional, even when context or scoring dependencies are present, leads to large amounts of residual covariance

Effect of Bacrobial® Skin Cleanser on the Prevention of Muscle Cramps

Anecdotal evidence supports the use of Bacrobial® skin cleanser for preventing muscle cramps; however, empirical evidence is lacking. OBJECTIVE: To examine whether Bacrobial® prevents muscle cramping in the triceps surae. DESIGN: Randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, crossover study. SETTINGS/LOCATION: Laboratory. SUBJECTS: Seventeen cramp-prone participants (11 male, 6 female; age 21 ± 2 yrs; 79.72 ± 19.75 kg; 175.86 ± 11.76 cm) volunteered. INTERVENTION: Participants completed two trials, at least one week apart. On the first trial, Bacrobial® was liberally applied to the skin over the triceps surae musculature of one leg, while placebo was applied to the other leg. At 1, 5, 10, and 20 min after application, participants were instructed to induce a cramp in the triceps surae via maximal voluntary contraction. For the second trial, treatments were applied to the opposite leg as in trial one and the cramping procedure was repeated. OUTCOME MEASURES: Incidence of cramping was the main outcome measure and event-odds tables, risk reduction and NNT (numbers needed to treat) or NNH (numbers needed to harm) were calculated at the time intervals of 1, 5, 10 and 20 minutes. RESULTS: No significant differences between treatments were found in cramping incidences at all time intervals. Bacrobial® decreased the risk of cramping by 12.5% at one minute (NNT = 8), while causing a 5.3% increased risk at five minutes (NNH = 5.3). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings indicate Bacrobial® skin cleanser is not an overall effective treatment for muscle cramp prevention. However, the observed results at one minute may be useful to clinicians who treat cramp-prone patients

The effects of salinity and irradiation on the intracellular free amino acid pool of the grass shrimp Palaemonetes pugio

The purpose of this study was to investigate the hypothesis that both salinity and low levels of gamma-irradiation effected the osmoreregulatory ability of the estuarine grass shrimp, Palaemonetes pugio. Groups of grass shrimp were acclimated at three salinity levels and subjected to levels of Co-60 gamma irradiation from 200 to 1800 rads. Changes in the intracellular free amino acid pool were investigated over a period of time after the initial irradiation exposure. The concentrations of ninhydrin positive substances were shown to vary directly with ambient salinity in P. pugio. Non-essential amino acids, glycine, proline and alanine, contributed noticably to the change in the intracellular free amino acid pool. Taurine, a sulfonated arnine, is also present in muscle tissue in significant quantities but not directly related to ambient salinity. The effects of radiation exposure on the intracellular free amino acid pool were both time and salinity dependent. This was seen most noticeably in arginine. Although salinity was the overriding effector of changer, in intracellular free amino acids, radiation also effects the amounts of free amino acids In the period of time following the initial exposure to irradiation

Five college students' involvement in creating mathematics and the resulting effects on their perceptions of the nature of mathematics, on their perceptions of their creative ability, and on their creative behavior

This study was concerned with the development of original material, called triometry, a variation of trigonometry, and its use as reference material in a teaching experiment in creating mathematics. The expressed purposes of triometry were to give undergraduate mathematics or mathematics education majors exposure to new mathematical ideas, to serve as a medium through which students could engage in creating their own mathematics, and to change students' personal beliefs about the nature of mathematics and their own abilities to be creative. The teaching experiment was one half of a semester course of specials topics in mathematics offered as an elective. The subjects were five undergraduates who were either majoring or minoring in mathematics or mathematics education. The materials were evaluated by four professional mathematics educators as well as the subjects themselves. Evidences of changes in the perceptions and creative behaviors of the subjects were collected from surveys, interviews, questionnaires, student journals, assignments, and observations and were analyzed qualitatively

The Efficacy Of Live Versus Taped Progressive And Autogenic Relaxation On Reducing Two Measures Of Physiological Arousal

The effects of abbreviated progressive (P.R.) and autogenic relaxation (A.R.) presented live and tape recorded were compared with a self-relaxation control procedure on reducing two measures of physiological arousal

A Comparison Of Teachers' Perception Between Communicatively Impaired Children And Their Peers

The purpose of this study was to determine if public school teachers perceive communicatively impaired children differently when compared with non-communicatively impaired peers in the same classrooms

Understanding consumer demand for new transport technologies and services, and implications for the future of mobility

The transport sector is witnessing unprecedented levels of disruption. Privately owned cars that operate on internal combustion engines have been the dominant modes of passenger transport for much of the last century. However, recent advances in transport technologies and services, such as the development of autonomous vehicles, the emergence of shared mobility services, and the commercialization of alternative fuel vehicle technologies, promise to revolutionise how humans travel. The implications are profound: some have predicted the end of private car dependent Western societies, others have portended greater suburbanization than has ever been observed before. If transport systems are to fulfil current and future needs of different subpopulations, and satisfy short and long-term societal objectives, it is imperative that we comprehend the many factors that shape individual behaviour. This chapter introduces the technologies and services most likely to disrupt prevailing practices in the transport sector. We review past studies that have examined current and future demand for these new technologies and services, and their likely short and long-term impacts on extant mobility patterns. We conclude with a summary of what these new technologies and services might mean for the future of mobility.Comment: 15 pages, 0 figures, book chapte