This chapter analyses energy relations through a prism of three interlinked concepts: administration, politics and security. This triad describes the basic approaches to questions about technical, politicised and securitised energy. These three concepts are logically linked to one another and represent an elementary matrix; a prism through which…

Parent involvement is widely acknowledged as a central component in both overall school success and the academic success of individual children. Recognizing this, the federal No Child Left Behind Act mandates that states, districts and schools make extraordinary efforts to enhance effective parent involvement. Now, more than six years after the…

One of the most prevailing characteristics of children with autism is their deficit in social communication skills. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of a peer-mediated social skills training (SST) program combined with video feedback, positive reinforcement and token system in increasing social communication skills in…

This paper contrasts Edward Hall's microcultural analysis method of teaching members of different cultures how to interact with the others, with Norma Flores' macrocultural Intercultural Assessment of Communication Competency and English Speaking Skills (I ACCESS) method of giving members of different cultures an opportunity to collaborate with…

Issues in nonverbal communication and their implications for school personnel directors are examined in this literature review. The first section presents research findings pertaining to the nonverbal behavior of school administrators, particularly that of principals. Literature on nonverbal behavior exhibited during the employment interview is…

This paper reports on a research project to identify school program criteria producing the highest teacher stress levels for three new middle schools. The middle-school environment embodies specific concepts endemic to educating adolescents. The new middle schools opened with teachers who were unfamiliar with both middle-school concepts and with…

Despite the emphasis on improving physician-consumer communication, patients, families and friends of patients, and other consumers still report frustrations during communication interactions with physicians. Some of those problems could be alleviated by more physician training in effective communication. Others could be alleviated by reducing the…

This paper suggests that language training should be founded on an initial student familiarization with the dimensions of intercultural communication. Using as exemplars problems encountered by Japanese familiar with English but unfamiliar with communication theory, the paper argues that while limited linguistic competency may make it difficult…

It is productive to think about literacy in ecological terms inasmuch as the literacy problem is a system of interdependent components. Illiteracy must be a concern of writers of the myriad of forms on which both the private and public sectors rely to function in this information-intensive society. In addition to helping readers, adult literacy…

A content analysis examined the narratives of 3,868 patients at 6 health care institutions, who described critical incidents during hospitalization and ambulatory health care. Results indicated that from the patient perspective, assessments of quality have less to do with clinical and administrative quality, than with providers' communication…

Recommendations are presented for dealing with difficult students and the questions they ask during classroom discussions. Brief ideas are provided for handling argumentative individuals, long-winded questioners, and questions for which the instructor does not have a good answer. A discussion of curved or loaded questions (pseudoquestions)…

The concept of language barrier has its derivations in the fields of dialectology, sociology and psychology. In contemporary usage however, the concept has two meanings i.e. regional-cultural barrier and socio-cultural barrier. (Text is in German.) (DS)

Impediments to implementing quality assurance programs include the condition of clinic records and individual charts, lack of established criteria for care, communication problems during evaluations, manpower availability, choice of evaluation methods, and methods of implementing corrective action. (Editor/PG)

This investigation concerned specific verbal and nonverbal sources of communication problems between blacks and whites in the U.S. Army. Special reference was made to the problems which lead to misinterpretations and social offensiveness. (SW)