We are looking at how new forms of document interface can be used to support new forms of scholarly discourse, and ultimately, new models of scholarly publishing. Towards this end, we have been using specially designed computer-meditated conferencing technology to realize an innovative peer review model within an academic e-journal – The Journal of Interactive Media in Education. In essence, th...

This paper is about simulating the spread of opinions in a society and about finding ways to counteract that spread. To abstract away from potentially emotionally laden opinions, we instead simulate the spread of a zombie outbreak in a society. The virus causing this outbreak is different from traditional approaches: it not only causes a binary outcome (healthy vs infected) but rather a continu...

This research investigated the influence of smoking attitudes and norms on quitting intentions in two predominantly collectivistic countries (Malaysia and Thailand) and four predominantly individualistic Western countries (Canada, USA, UK and Australia). Data from the International Tobacco Control Project (N = 13,062) revealed that higher odds of intending to quit were associated with negative ...

This article addresses some of the key issues in developing culturally relevant approaches to drug abuse treatment and recovery, using the HAFC/Glide African-American Extended Family Program as a positive example of effective cultural adaptability within recovery. Cultural points of resistance to the recovery process are also addressed, including the perception that 12-Step fellowships are excl...

Cultural evolution studies are characterized by the notion that culture evolves accordingly to broadly Darwinian principles. Yet how far the analogy between cultural and genetic evolution should be pushed is open to debate. Here, we examine a recent disagreement that concerns the extent to which cultural transmission should be considered a preservative mechanism allowing selection among differe...

ion from or analytic reduction of the communication process. While the rules perspective tends to make a single analytic reduction of normative and cultural processes in formulating rules (or norms as discussed above), the ethnographic perspective makes two analytic reductions in the analysis of normative and cultural processes, norms and cultural codes, respectively.

Human cultural traits typically result from a gradual process that has been described as analogous to biological evolution. This observation has led pioneering scholars to draw inspiration from population genetics to develop a rigorous and successful theoretical framework of cultural evolution. Social learning, the mechanism allowing information to be transmitted between individuals, has thus b...

It is frequently a difficult task to differentiate Actinomyces bovis from "anaerobic diphtheroids" of questionable pathogenicity. Diphtheroids, isolated from normal and pathological tissues, resemble A. bovis morphologically and in some cultural characteristics. These similarities and lack of suitable criteria for their definitive identification have been responsible for the errors in separatin...

We are looking at how new forms of document interface can be used to support new forms of scholarly discourse, and ultimately, new models of scholarly publishing. Towards this end, we have been using specially designed computer-mediated conferencing technology to realize an innovative peer review model within an academic e-journal the Journal of Interactive Media in Education. In essence, throu...