Asymmetry in Leader Image Effects and the Implications for Leadership Positioning in the 2010 British General Election

Using national survey data on voters' perceptions of party leaders during the 2010 British general election campaign, we use logistic regression analysis to explore the association between specific image attributes and overall satisfaction for each leader. We find attribute-satisfaction relationships differ in some respects between the three main party leaders, demonstrating that leader image effects are not symmetrical across leaders. We find evidence that negative perceptions have more powerful effects on satisfaction than positive ones, implying that parties should seek to determine a leader's image attribute perceptions measured against the public's expectations of them on the same dimensions. The positions that campaigners ought then to choose are those that will have the most beneficial effect in encouraging voting behaviour for each particular leader or discouraging voting behaviour for an opponent

Research Notes : Greenhouse determination of soybean tolerance to phytophthora rot

One method of determing field tolerance of soybeans to Phytophthora mega-sperma f. sp. glycinea (Hildeb.) Kaun & Erwin (Pmg) is to determine the percent of plant loss from emergence to maturity for cultivars grown in an infested field under conditions favorable for the disease (Buzzell and Anderson, 1982). Drawing upon the field results and the results of two unpublished greenhouse experiments (given below), a greenhouse technique similar to the field test was developed. 1962 Experiment : Cores of soil were obtained from a field known to be in-fested with Pmg race 1, the field having been used in a previous study (Ful-ton et al., 1961)

BPC/MRS enquiry into election polling 2015: Ipsos MORI response and perspective

This Forum article considers the unsatisfactory results of pre-election opinion polling in the 2015 British general election and the BPC/MRS enquiry report into polling by Sturgis et al., providing a response from Ipsos MORI and associated researchers at King’s College London and Cranfield Universities Whilst Sturgis et al. (2016) consider how to perfect opinion poll forecasting, why the 2015 prediction was inaccurate when the same methodology returned satisfactory results in 2005 and 2010 at Ipsos MORI is considered here instead We agree with Sturgis et al. that the inaccurate results were not due to late swing or the ‘shy Tory’ problem and with Taylor (2016) that the underlying problem is a response rate bias However, Sturgis et al. critique pollsters in their report for systematically under-representing Conservative voters but the Ipsos MORI final poll had too many Conservatives, too many Labour voters and not enough nonvoters The Sturgis et al. conclusion is convincing that the politically disengaged were under-represented due to quotas and weighting mechanisms designed to correct for response bias Nevertheless, for Ipsos MORI, this explanation does not account for why the polling methodology was inaccurate in 2015 when it had performed accurately in 2005 and 2010 For Ipsos MORI, a more likely explanation is that Labour voters in 2015 became more prone to exaggerate their voting likelihood We offer various postulations on why this might have been so, concluding that to account for the inaccuracy requires a two-fold response, to improve: (i) sample representativeness and (ii) the projection of voting behaviour from the data Unfortunately, the BPC/MRS report offers no blueprint for how to solve the problem of sampling the politically disengaged Whilst Ipsos MORI have redesigned their quotas to take account of education levels, to represent those better with no formal educational qualifications and reduce overrepresentation of graduates, polling in the referendum on EU membership suggests that the problem of drawing a representative sample has been solved but difficulties in how best to allow for turnout persist

Primary physical education, coaches and continuing professional development

This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Sport, Education and Society, 16(4), 485 - 505, 2011, copyright @ Taylor & Francis, available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/13573322.2011.589645.Physical education (PE) in primary schools has traditionally been taught by qualified primary teachers. More recently, some teaching of PE in primary schools has been undertaken by coaches (mostly football coaches). These coaches hold national governing body awards but do not hold teaching qualifications. Thus, coaches may not be adequately prepared to teach PE in curriculum time. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the perceptions of a group of community-based football coaches working in primary schools for the impact of a Continuing Professional Development (CPD) programme on their ability to undertake ‘specified work’ to cover PE in primary schools. The programme focused on four areas identified as important to enable coaches to cover specified work: short- and medium-term planning, pedagogy, knowledge of the curriculum and reflection. Results showed that for the majority of coaches the CPD programme had made them more aware of the importance of these four areas and had helped to develop their knowledge and ability to put this into practice in covering planning, preparation and assessment time. However, further input is still required to develop coaches’ knowledge and understanding in all four areas, but especially their curriculum knowledge, as well as their ability to put these into practice consistently. These findings are discussed in relation to the implications of employing coaches to cover the teaching of PE in primary schools and, if employed, what CPD coaches need to develop the necessary knowledge, skill and understanding for covering specified work in schools

Stonehenge: a unique Late Cretaceous phosphatic Chalk geology: implications for sea-level, climate and tectonics and impact on engineering and archaeology

Ground investigations for the A303 Stonehenge Tunnels revealed a unique and complex Chalk geology including the presence of the thickest (>20 m thick), and previously unknown phosphatic chalks in England, partly filling fault controlled erosional channels. The use of natural gamma-ray borehole logs to determine the presence and thickness of the phosphatic deposits is of particular value and combined with the lithostratigraphy, macrofossil and nannofossil biostratigraphy from cores has, for the first time, accurately constrained the Coniacian to Santonian age and the lenticular geometry of such deposits. Four phosphatic chalk events between 88.5–86.5 Ma are recognised associated with synsedimentary faulting. We suggest a causal link between tectonics, subsidence and channel-formation, phosphatisation events, pulses of oceanic upwelling on a frequency of about 0.5 million years to mantle-controlled plate tectonic episodes. The implications of this geology for construction of the A303 and the archaeology of the area are discussed

Sharks of the order Carcharhiniformes from the British Coniacian, Santonian and Campanian (Upper Cretaceous).

Bulk sampling of phosphate-rich horizons within the British Coniacian to Campanian (Upper Cretaceous) yielded very large samples of shark and ray teeth. All of these samples yielded teeth of diverse members of the Carcharhiniformes, which commonly dominate the fauna. The following species are recorded and described: Pseudoscyliorhinus reussi (Herman, 1977) comb. nov., Crassescyliorhinus germanicus (Herman, 1982) gen. nov., Scyliorhinus elongatus (Davis, 1887), Scyliorhinus brumarivulensis sp. nov., ? Palaeoscyllium sp., Prohaploblepharus riegrafi (Müller, 1989) gen. nov., ? Cretascyliorhinus sp., Scyliorhinidae inc. sedis 1, Scyliorhinidae inc. sedis 2, Pteroscyllium hermani sp. nov., Protoscyliorhinus sp., Leptocharias cretaceus sp. nov., Palaeogaleus havreensis Herman, 1977, Paratriakis subserratus sp. nov., Paratriakis tenuis sp. nov., Paratriakis sp. indet. and ? Loxodon sp. Taxa belonging to the families ?Proscylliidae, Leptochariidae, and Carcharhinidae are described from the Cretaceous for the first time. The evolutionary and palaeoecological implications of these newly recognised faunas are discussed

To what extent is behaviour a problem in English schools?:Exploring the scale and prevalence of deficits in classroom climate

The working atmosphere in the classroom is an important variable in the process of education in schools, with several studies suggesting that classroom climate is an important influence on pupil attainment. There are wide differences in the extent to which classroom climate is considered to be a problem in English schools. Some ‘official’ reports suggest that behaviour in schools is ‘satisfactory or better’ in the vast majority of schools; other sources have pointed to behaviour being a serious and widespread problem. The paper details four studies conducted over the past decade which aimed to explore these disparities. The aim of the research was to gain a more accurate insight into the extent to which deficits in classroom climate limit educational attainment and equality of educational opportunity in English schools. The findings question the suggestion that behaviour is satisfactory or better in 99.7% of English schools and the concluding section suggests ways in which deficits in classroom climate might be addressed. Although the study is limited to classrooms in England, OECD studies suggest that deficits in the working atmosphere in classrooms occur in many countries. The study therefore has potential relevance for education systems in other countries

Vacuolating cytotoxin and variants in Atg16L1 that disrupt autophagy promote Helicobacter pylori infection in humans

Peer reviewedPreprin