Methodological issues of LCA application to building sector: challenges, risks and opportunities

Methodological issues of LCA application to building sector: challenges, risks and opportunities

The evaluation of the WIN 2 program : methodological issues and some initial results /

Available from the National Technical Information Service, Springfield, Va.

Policy evaluation with travel behavior models : methodological issues and case studies.

Mode of access: Internet.

Probing expert anticipation with the temporal occlusion paradigm: Experimental investigations of some methodological issues

Two experiments were conducted to examine whether the conclusions drawn regarding the timing of anticipatory information pick-up from temporal occlusion studies are influenced by whether (a) the viewing period is of variable or fixed duration and (b) the task is a laboratory-based one with simple responses or a natural one requiring a coupled, interceptive movement response. Skilled and novice tennis players either made pencil-and-paper predictions of service direction (Experiment 1) or attempted to hit return strokes (Experiment 2) to tennis serves while their vision was temporally occluded in either a traditional progressive mode (where more information was revealed in each subsequent occlusion condition) or a moving window mode (where the visual display was only available for a fixed duration with this window shifted to different phases of the service action). Conclusions regarding the timing of information pick-up were generally consistent across display mode and across task setting lending support to the veracity and generalisability of findings regarding perceptual expertise in existing laboratory-based progressive temporal occlusion studies.

Conceptual, methodological and ethical issues in children's research in Portugal

Methodological issues in research with children have sparked a growing interest by the Sociology of Childhood since the last decades. In Portugal, this interest is more recent, but it has had a significant increase. Considering several researches, namely master thesis, supervised by the authors on the framework of Sociology of Childhood, this proposal intends to characterize some methodological complexities in research with children in Portugal, when we consider their voice and agency in the knowledge producing about them. The goal of this paper is to contribute to the methodological discussion on research with children through the identification of a set of challenges related to: (i) the diversity of methodologies uses in children’s research, (ii) ethical concerns and (iii) the role of the researcher.

Methodological assessment of HCC literature.

Despite the fact that the hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) represents a major health problem, very few interventions are available for this disease, and only sorafenib is approved for the treatment of advanced disease. Of note, only very few interventions have been thoroughly evaluated over time for HCC patients compared with several hundreds in other, equally highly lethal, tumours. Additionally, clinical trials in HCC have often been questioned for poor design and methodological issues. As a consequence, a gap between what is measured in clinical trials and what clinicians have to face in daily practice often occurs. As a result of this scenario, even the most recent guidelines for treatment of HCC patients use low strength evidence to make recommendations. In this review, we will discuss some of the potential methodological issues hindering a rational development of new treatments for HCC patients.

Methodological rigour in assessing participatory development

There have been few rigorous assessments of the effectiveness of participatory processes for natural resource management. In Bangladesh an approach known as Participatory Action Plan Development (PAPD) has been developed and applied. By combining problem identification and solution analysis by separate stakeholder groups with plenary sessions it is claimed to result in consensus and more effective community based management. Methodological issues in assessing the effectiveness of such development are discussed and good practice illustrated. Under the same project there were sites where PAPD had been used and others without its use so a comparative assessment could be made. However, for an appropriate assessment it is important to identify clear testable hypotheses regarding the expected benefits, appropriate measures, and other factors which may affect or confound the outcome. The paper illustrates how participatory assessment involving both individual opinions and focus groups can be systematically recorded, quantified and used with other data in statistical analysis. By using statistical modelling methods at an appropriate level of aggregation and controlling for other factors, benefits from PAPD were found to be significant. The systematic approaches and practices recommended from this example can be applied in similar situations to test the effectiveness of participatory processes using participatory assessments.

Second language listening strategy research: methodological challenges and perspectives

This paper explores methodological issues related to research into second language listening strategies. We argue that a number of central questions regarding research methodology in this line of enquiry are underexamined, and we engage in the discussion of three key methodological questions: (1) To what extent is a verbal report a valid and reliable way of eliciting information about strategies? (2) Should we control for learners' level of linguistic knowledge when examining their listening strategy use? and (3) What are the problems surrounding the analysis of data gained through verbal reports? We discuss each of these three methodological issues within the framework of a research project investigating listening strategies deployed by learners of French in secondary schools in England. Implications from these findings for future research are discussed.