El reciente debate en torno a los medios innovadores en España

Department of Geography, Faculty of Arts, University of Peradeniya

When I was interviewing the students for the special degree program, I noticed that students’ second semester results are better than first semester results. When I asked them reasons for the low results in the first semester they replied that lack of freedom during the first semester due to ragging could be the main reason.

There are a lot of studies which addressed the social and psychological aspects of ragging but there are hardly any studies which examine the consequences of ragging on academic performances of students. Studying the impact of ragging on the academic performance of students is important because when students start their university career with low performances it will affect their future academic success. Therefore, I have attempted to study the impact of ragging on the academic performance of students using non-parametric statistics.

This study was performed using first year Arts Faculty students of the 2009/2010 academic year of the University of Peradeniya. Students’ Grade Point Averages (GPA) for the two semesters and ragging related information were gathered from questionnaires administered to the students. A proportionate sample was taken and sample size was 30.To compare first and second semester students’ performance, I used the Sign test and Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test. To analyse the association between ragging and student performances, I used a Chi-Square test.

The second semester GPA was significantly higher than the first semester GPA (p < 0.0001). The p values (p < 0.000) for students in Sinhala and Tamil medium streams were similar and it was concluded that second semester GPA is better than the first semester GPA in both mediums. However, results for English medium students were different from the other two mediums. There was no significant difference between first and second semester GPAs in English medium students (p = 0.9331). Results of the Chi- square test for Sinhala (p = 0.030) and Tamil medium (p = 0.002) students indicated that there is an association between ragging and the performance of the Sinhala and Tamil mediums students but there was no such association for English medium students.

In the Arts Faculty undergraduate programme, there are two semesters for one academic year. When new students come to the University, there is a period which is known as a ragging period. This period is not well defined and it may be as long as three months or more. During this period, new students are not allowed to go to the library and most of their time is wasted and they are under various stresses. However, there are some students who are against ragging and the above situation does not affect them. Almost all the Sinhala and Tamil mediums students are subjected to ragging while English medium students are not affected.

Proceedings of the Peradeniya University Research Sessions, Sri Lanka, Vol. 16, 24th _{November 2011}

7

A Bibliometric Study on W.H.O. Publications Available in the Peradeniya Medical Library

S. Perera

Medical Library, Faculty of Medicine, University of Peradeniya

The collection of publications by the World Health Organization (WHO) in the Medical Library contains documents since 1950 to date. It provides valuable information and is available to the library free of charge. The collection is very much under-used. A bibliometric study on the collection was carried out with the objective of making the readership and the library staff aware of what is available in the collection, as a means of indirectly improving the usage.

The entire collection of WHO publications in the Medical Library as at end-of-July 2011 was used for the study. A head count on the total publications was obtained, excluding journals. The numbers of items in major subject divisions and in popular subject areas within these divisions were counted separately. Various types of publications (excluding journals) were also counted separately when numbers of those types were large. Contents of the publications in the collection were carefully perused in order to identify any specific topic or aspect of health on which the coverage was dominant. Geographical coverage of the publications also was examined when it was possible. A chronological evaluation of the collection was done by counting publications in each decade from 1950 to 2011.

The total number of publications in the WHO collection was 2791 (excluding journals). Various types of publications within the collection were identified. Disciplines which were covered by the collection substantially, with respect to the total number are: Statistics 1.1%; Social services 1.3%; General Medicine 9.4%; Health care 8.2%; Environmental health 30.5%; Pharmacology 11%; Clinical Medicine 19.7%; Surgery 1.8%; and Gynaecology and Obstetrics 1.5%. Further analyses for specific topics covered by the publications in Clinical Medicine showed that there are 40 publications on AIDS; 22 on Tuberculosis; 18 on Cancer; 19 on Mental health; 14 on Malaria; 15 on Medical education; and 4 publications on Dengue. General topics which were prominent in coverage were: World Tobacco Control; Global Alcohol Control; Public Health; Reproductive Health; Control of Tropical Diseases; Global AIDS Epidemic; Influenza Epidemic; Family Health; Health System Planning and Services; and Drug Information. The study revealed that the content of 70 publications had relevance to global issues; 24 publications were on issues relevant to developing countries; 17 publications were on South East Asian regional matters; and there were four publications specifically on Sri Lanka. The rest of the publications had an international coverage. Distribution of publications according to year of publication showed that 20% of the WHO collection was published after 2000 and around 48% of it is published after 1990 indicating that the content provides information relating to recent times. There were only 20 publications (0.72%) published in 2010/ 2011.

The study provides an insight into a valuable, though much under-used, collection of health information that has been made available by the World Health Organization. The collection contains information on various health-related topics at international, regional and global levels; in addition, it contains information on developing countries, tropics and South East Asian regional countries. The collection needs to be improved by acquiring current publications.

Proceedings of the Peradeniya University Research Sessions, Sri Lanka, Vol. 16, 24th _{November 2011}

8

School-Based Assessment: Facilitation or Inhibition of Effective Science Teaching