Using Puppets to Elicit Talk During Interviews on Engineering with Young Children

Interviewing can be tricky at best, but with a younger audience (\u3c 5 years) there are some additional barriers that inhibit the interview process such as shyness, short attention span,lack of vocabulary, and level of parental guidance (Clark, 1999). When in an interview, a child may try to ‘second guess’ what the researcher wants them to say, especially if they believe that the interviewer may already know the answer (Gallop, 2000). Additionally young children tend to give monosyllabic answers to open ended questions (Tizard &Hughes, 1984), and might require more prompting than adults.One aide that has been recently investigated is the use of puppets to elicit children’s talk for research (Epstein et al., 2008). Puppets have been shown to: • Decrease children’s fears of the interview process • Lower anxiety levels • Help assess children’s knowledge • Help children to adjust to environment • Provide effective communication and teaching tools. Most research focuses on puppets within clinical contexts, but recently the use has been extended towards other applications such as qualitative interviews (Epstein et al., 2008),mathematical lessons (Cauley, 1988), promoting science engagement (Naylor et al,2007), and teaching phonics (Johnston & Watson, ???). However, there has not been any documented use of this research approach within engineering education.There are three common interview techniques involving puppets in practice: the Alien Puppet Interview (API) (Krott and Nicoladis, 2005), the Puppet Interview (PI) (Cassidy,1988; Verschueren, Buyuk and Marcoen, 2001) and the Berkeley Puppet Interview (BPI) (Measelle et al., 1998; Ablow et al., 1999). Each technique has a different strategy depending on how the child interacts with the puppet.As part of a larger project, children ages 3-5 were interviewed about an engineering task that they had just completed with their parents during a museum event. The interview was a hybrid mix of the Alien Puppet Interview and the Puppet Interview, depending on the way in which the child interviewee chose to interact with the puppet. Thirty interviews were analyzed for children’s interaction, quality of answers, and behavior toward the puppet.In the paper, we will provide more details about the specific interview approach used for our study (as well as insights into how children responded to this interview approach) in addition to a larger discussion of the three interview techniques in order to provide a research methodology resource for other pre-college engineering education researchers to use

Vorapaxar in the secondary prevention of atherothrombotic events

Item does not contain fulltextBACKGROUND: Thrombin potently activates platelets through the protease-activated receptor PAR-1. Vorapaxar is a novel antiplatelet agent that selectively inhibits the cellular actions of thrombin through antagonism of PAR-1. METHODS: We randomly assigned 26,449 patients who had a history of myocardial infarction, ischemic stroke, or peripheral arterial disease to receive vorapaxar (2.5 mg daily) or matching placebo and followed them for a median of 30 months. The primary efficacy end point was the composite of death from cardiovascular causes, myocardial infarction, or stroke. After 2 years, the data and safety monitoring board recommended discontinuation of the study treatment in patients with a history of stroke owing to the risk of intracranial hemorrhage. RESULTS: At 3 years, the primary end point had occurred in 1028 patients (9.3%) in the vorapaxar group and in 1176 patients (10.5%) in the placebo group (hazard ratio for the vorapaxar group, 0.87; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.80 to 0.94; P<0.001). Cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, stroke, or recurrent ischemia leading to revascularization occurred in 1259 patients (11.2%) in the vorapaxar group and 1417 patients (12.4%) in the placebo group (hazard ratio, 0.88; 95% CI, 0.82 to 0.95; P=0.001). Moderate or severe bleeding occurred in 4.2% of patients who received vorapaxar and 2.5% of those who received placebo (hazard ratio, 1.66; 95% CI, 1.43 to 1.93; P<0.001). There was an increase in the rate of intracranial hemorrhage in the vorapaxar group (1.0%, vs. 0.5% in the placebo group; P<0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Inhibition of PAR-1 with vorapaxar reduced the risk of cardiovascular death or ischemic events in patients with stable atherosclerosis who were receiving standard therapy. However, it increased the risk of moderate or severe bleeding, including intracranial hemorrhage. (Funded by Merck; TRA 2P-TIMI 50 ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT00526474.)