In the present chapter it is carried out an evaluation of the motivations which lead to the launching and the subsequent development of the Human Genome Project. In this respect, then ideological, biosanitary and economic factors are considered. Although the importance of the sanitary applications is admitted, both in then diagnostic aspect and, the long term, in the therapeutic one, it is argu...

Why do activists choose the organizational forms they do? Social movement scholars have tended to focus on activists’ instrumental assessment of organizational forms’ costs and benefits or on activists’ efforts to balance instrumental calculations with a commitment to ideological consistency. Neither explanation is adequate. Organizational forms, like strategies, tactics, and targets, are often...

Mammography represents an interesting chapter in the history of American medical technology. Throughout much of the 20th century, physicians showed little interesting in using x-rays to help diagnose breast cancer. But beginning in the 1960s, with the growing interest in early detection, the professionalization of radiology and cancer activism, and the increasing allure of visual imagery in med...

Fostering autonomous learning has become one of the key concerns of course designers and curriculum planners in the last 20 years which has been validated on both ideological and psychological grounds. However, estimating learners’ readiness to accept autonomous education is an important step prior to moving toward autonomous education. Thus, the current research investigated the patterns of au...

In the context of a national election, this study explores more than 69,000 Twitter messages containing mentions of political parties and about 2,500 related user profiles to investigate the network structure of political microbloggers with respect to, first, their party preference and, second, the topics they discuss. We find that political microbloggers tend to follow like-minded peers. Micro...

Attitudes towards foreign policy have typically been explained by ideological and demographic factors. We approach this study from a different perspective and ex amine the extent to which foreign policy preferences correspond to genetic variation. Using data from the Minnesota Twin Family Study, we show that a moderate share of individual differences in the degree to which one's foreign policy ...

This mixed methods study investigated the impact of learning about homelessness on the civic development of privileged adolescents. Pre–post surveys, classroom observations, and qualitative interviews revealed that the participating adolescents developed a more complex understanding of the factors that contribute to homelessness; however, this deeper understanding of homelessness was not accomp...

This article examines Spain’s neutrality during the Great War, highlighting factors such as the lack of military resources; the division of public opinion and internal conflicts; and actors such as King Alfonso XIII (whose mediating role helped to determine Spain’s neutral position). It also analyses the impact of the war in Spain until the immediate post-war period – unequal economic growth, s...