Wearing Eye Tracking Technology During Batting Practice: Assessing the Experiences of Professional Baseball Athletes

Utilizing wearable technology in sport allows for the collection of motor behavior data during task engagement. This data can be assessed in real-time or retrospectively. Although enriching the scope of performance data, the consequences of wearable technology on the athlete-user, specifically the cognitive effects, has not been fully investigated, hence the purpose of this study. This qualitative study examines the cognitions of 57 professional baseball players who wore eye tracking technology whilst engaged in batting practice. Their verbal self-reports were framed by temporal context: before-during-after task. Three themes emerged during the pre-task segment: social appearance anxiety, claimed self-handicapping, and curiosity. During the task of batting, verbal behavior contained motivational and instructional overt self-talk while claimed self-handicapping was sustained. The final, post-performance segment was marked by the re-emergence of curiosity from the pre-task period as well as self-evaluation/appraisal. Given the participants were professional athletes, their performance has greater career implications than amateur competitors. Nonetheless, the verbal behavior elicited while wearing eye tracking technology indicates an awareness of the equipment by the user. This study found cognitive effects from wearable technology; more research is required to under-stand the scope and nature of those effects on cognitive and motor behaviors.

Professional Practice in Learning and Development: How to Design and Deliver Plans for the Workplace

Introduction The world is changing! It is volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous. As cliché as it may sound the evidence of such dynamism in the external environment is growing. Business-as-usual is more of the exception than the norm. Organizational change is the rule; be it to accommodate and adapt to change, or instigate and lead change. A constantly changing environment is a situation that all organizations have to live with. What makes some organizations however, able to thrive better than others? Many scholars and practitioners believe that this is due to the ability to learn. Therefore, this book on developing Learning and Development (L&D) professionals is timely as it explores and discusses trends and practices that impact organizations, the workforce and L&D professionals. Being able to learn and develop effectively is the cornerstone of motivation as it helps to address people’s need to be competent and to be autonomous (Deci & Ryan, 2002; Loon & Casimir, 2008; Ryan & Deci, 2000). L&D stimulates and empowers people to perform. Organizations that are better at learning at all levels; the individual, group and organizational level, will always have a better chance of surviving and performing. Given the new reality of a dynamic external environment and constant change, L&D professionals now play an even more important role in their organizations than ever before. However, L&D professionals themselves are not immune to the turbulent changes as their practices are also impacted. Therefore, the challenges that L&D professionals face are two-pronged. Firstly, in relation to helping and supporting their organization and its workforce in adapting to the change, whilst, secondly developing themselves effectively and efficiently so that they are able to be one-step ahead of the workforce that they are meant to help develop. These challenges are recognised by the CIPD, as they recently launched their new L&D qualification that has served as an inspiration for this book. L&D plays a crucial role at both strategic (e.g. organizational capability) and operational (e.g. delivery of training) levels. L&D professionals have moved from being reactive (e.g. following up action after performance appraisals) to being more proactive (e.g. shaping capability). L&D is increasingly viewed as a driver for organizational performance. The CIPD (2014) suggest that L&D is increasingly expected to not only take more responsibility but also accountability for building both individual and organizational knowledge and capability, and to nurture an organizational culture that prizes learning and development. This book is for L&D professionals. Nonetheless, it is also suited for those studying Human Resource Development HRD at intermediate level. The term ‘Human Resource Development’ (HRD) is more common in academia, and is largely synonymous with L&D (Stewart & Sambrook, 2012) Stewart (1998) defined HRD as ‘the practice of HRD is constituted by the deliberate, purposive and active interventions in the natural learning process. Such interventions can take many forms, most capable of categorising as education or training or development’ (p. 9). In fact, many parts of this book (e.g. Chapters 5 and 7) are appropriate for anyone who is involved in training and development. This may include a variety of individuals within the L&D community, such as line managers, professional trainers, training solutions vendors, instructional designers, external consultants and mentors (Mayo, 2004). The CIPD (2014) goes further as they argue that the role of L&D is broad and plays a significant role in Organizational Development (OD) and Talent Management (TM), as well as in Human Resource Management (HRM) in general. OD, TM, HRM and L&D are symbiotic in enabling the ‘people management function’ to provide organizations with the capabilities that they need.

The Metaethics of Nursing Codes of Ethics and Conduct

Nursing codes of ethics and conduct are features of professional practice across the world, and in the UK, the regulator has recently consulted on and published a new code. Initially part of a professionalising agenda, nursing codes have recently come to represent a managerialist and disciplinary agenda and nursing can no longer be regarded as a self-regulating profession.This paper argues that codes of ethics and codes of conduct are significantly different in form and function similar to the difference between ethics and law in everyday life. Some codes successfully integrate these two functions within the same document, while others, principally the UK Code, conflate them resulting in an ambiguous document unable to fulfil its functions effectively. The paper analyses the differences between ethical- codes and conduct-codes by discussing titles, authorship, level, scope for disagreement, consequences of transgression, language and finally and possibly most importantly agent-centeredness. It is argued that conduct codes cannot require nurses to be compassionate because compassion involves an emotional response. The concept of kindness provides a plausible alternative for conduct-codes as it is possible to understand it solely in terms of acts. But if kindness is required in conduct-codes, investigation and possible censure follows from its absence. Using examples it is argued that there are at last five possible accounts of the absence of kindness. As well as being potentially problematic for disciplinary panels, difficulty in understanding the features of blameworthy absence of kindness may challenge UK nurses who, following a recently introduced revalidation procedure, are required to reflect on their practice in relation to The Code. It is concluded that closer attention to metaethical concerns by code writers will better support the functions of their issuing organisations.

Developing Professional Practice in L&D

The first theme of the book is ‘Directions’. This theme concerns the present and potential future expectations that L&D professionals may face in their practice. Chapter 1 is about ‘Developing professional practice in L&D’. In the first section, I discuss what is ‘professionalism’ and what it means for L&D professionals in terms of their development. In this chapter, I argue that expectations of L&D from senior management are growing. L&D professionals need to be able demonstrate ability to influence decision making by developing new competencies that enable them to provide senior management with new insight, which in turn increases L&D’s strategic credibility. In examining the diverse activities and tasks that L&D professionals currently, and may be expected to undertake in the future, four roles emerge; capacity and capability builders, boundary spanners, consultants and change agents. Capacity building primarily concerns creating space, time, and cultivating the right environment for the workforce to develop, which can be a challenge given how fire-fighting appears to be prevalent in many organizations today. Capability building involves enhancing knowledge, developing skills and competencies of the workforces, whilst boundary spanning involves networking and growing partnerships within and outside the organization. ‘Being a consultant’ is briefly touched upon as it is further discussed in Chapter 5, whilst the role of a change agent involves instigating and managing change. This chapter concludes with a discussion of twelve important knowledge, skill and capability areas that L&D professionals must develop to advance their practice.