PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Best websites balance self-expression and functionality

2012-05-08
(Press-News.org) Giving people the freedom -- but not too much freedom -- to express themselves may help designers build more interactive web portals and online communities, according to Penn State researchers. The researchers found that people increased their interactivity and developed a greater sense of community when they could write their own blog posts, change the look of their site and add gadgets, such as weather and news feeds, to personalized websites or portals. However, the researchers noted that interactivity and satisfaction dropped if participants had the option to choose from a large number of functional gadgets. "Interactivity is more about user psychology, rather than the more-is-better approach that some engineers and designers choose to take," said S. Shyam Sundar, Distinguished Professor of Communications and co-director of the Media Effects Research Laboratory. "We need to strategically use interactive tools to help people interact in ways that are beneficial to both the users and site owners." Sundar said offering too many choices may frustrate or fatigue users. "Too much customization does exactly the opposite of what is intended," Sundar said. "Users feel overwhelmed when a site offers a lot of gadgets or tools and they seem fatigued by making too many decisions; but we can counter all this by providing them a chance to express themselves." The researchers, who presented their findings at the Association for Computing Machinery's Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems held today (May 7) in Austin, Texas, said that self-expression often affected how study participants interacted with their sites in unexpected ways. When participants were not allowed to add personal blog posts, they did not interact with the site as much. However, when users were not allowed to blog, but were allowed to customize the look of their site, they increased interactivity in other ways, such as by leaving comments on other community member sites. "It was curious," Sundar said. "It was almost like cosmetic customization just whetted their appetite for self-expression." Sundar, who worked with Jeeyun Oh, Saraswathi Bellur, Haiyan Jia and Hyang-Sook Kim, all doctoral students in mass communications, said the researchers designed 12 different variations of websites that either offered or did not offer participants a chance to customize the look of their site, to add gadgets and applications and write original blog posts. The version that performed the best allowed participants a chance to write blog posts and to change the sites' look, as well as offer them a limited choice of preselected gadgets to add to their site. Sundar said researchers recruited 141 participants for the two-week test. The group included 108 females and 33 males with a mean age of about 45 years and who said they were not experts in technology. The participants were sent daily emails directing them to perform tasks, such as investigating gadgets and exploring features. They could also check the site on their own. To increase realism, confederates were used to leave comments and to act as fellow website owners. The researchers sent out questionnaires at the end of each week to gauge user input and checked computer log data to verify actions, such as the number of times a user logged in and how long sessions lasted. ###The National Science Foundation supported this work.


ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Gaseous emissions from dinosaurs may have warmed prehistoric earth

2012-05-08
Sauropod dinosaurs could in principle have produced enough of the greenhouse gas methane to warm the climate many millions of years ago, at a time when the Earth was warm and wet. That's according to calculations reported in the May 8th issue of Current Biology, a Cell Press publication. The hulking sauropods, distinctive for their enormous size and unusually long necks, were widespread about 150 million years ago. As in cows, methane-producing microbes aided the sauropods' digestion by fermenting their plant food. "A simple mathematical model suggests that the microbes ...

Annals of Internal Medicine tip sheet for May 8, 2012, online issue

2012-05-08
1. Evidence Review: Screening Women for Intimate Partner Violence May Have Benefits, Few Harms Intimate partner violence, or IPV, includes a range of abusive behaviors perpetrated by someone who is in an intimate relationship with the victim. Abusive behaviors may include physical violence, sexual violence, rape, and psychological aggression – all of which have immediate health effects on the victim. While victims and perpetrators can be male or female, women are disproportionately victimized (up to 5.3 million women are affected each year in the U.S.). In 2004, the ...

Genetic abnormalities in benign or malignant tissues predict relapse of prostate cancer

2012-05-08
Philadelphia, PA, May 7, 2012 – While active monitoring of serum prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels in men over 50 has greatly improved early detection of prostate cancer, prediction of clinical outcomes after diagnosis remains a major challenge. Researchers from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine have found that a genetic abnormality known as copy number variation (CNV) in prostate cancer tumors, as well as in the benign prostate tissues adjacent to the tumor and in the blood of patients with prostate cancer, can predict whether a patient will experience ...

New rearing system may aid sterile insect technique against mosquitoes

New rearing system may aid sterile insect technique against mosquitoes
2012-05-08
The requirement for efficient mosquito mass-rearing technology has been one of the major obstacles preventing the large scale application of the Sterile Insect Technique (SIT) against mosquitoes. However, according to a new article in the next issue of the Journal of Medical Entomology, scientists at the Untited Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have developed a larval rearing unit based on the use of a stainless steel rack that is expected to be able to successfully rear 140,000–175,000 adult mosquitoes ...

Defective carnitine metabolism may play role in autism

2012-05-08
HOUSTON -- (May 7, 2012) – The deletion of part of a gene that plays a role in the synthesis of carnitine – an amino acid derivative that helps the body use fat for energy – may play a role in milder forms of autism, said a group of researchers led by those at Baylor College of Medicine (http://www.bcm.edu) and Texas Children's Hospital (http://www.texaschildrens.org). "This is a novel inborn error of metabolism," said Dr. Arthur Beaudet (http://www.bcm.edu/genetics/index.cfm?pmid=10579), chair of molecular and human genetics at BCM and a physician at Texas Children's ...

Team care of chronic diseases seems cost-effective

Team care of chronic diseases seems cost-effective
2012-05-08
SEATTLE—The collaborative TEAMcare program for people with depression and either diabetes, heart disease, or both appears at least to pay for itself, according to a UW Medicine and Group Health Research Institute report in the May 7 Archives of General Psychiatry. Over two years, after accounting for the $1,224 per patient that the program cost, it may save as much as $594 per patient in outpatient costs. "Also, over the course of two years, people who received the TEAMcare intervention had a mean of 114 more days free from depression than did the people who received ...

Researchers discover gene that leads to severe weight gain with antipsychotic treatment

2012-05-08
Antipsychotic medications are increasingly prescribed in the US, but they can cause serious side effects including rapid weight gain, especially in children. In the first study of its kind, researchers at Zucker Hillside Hospital and the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research identified a gene that increases weight gain in those treated with commonly-used antipsychotic drugs. These findings were published in the May issue of Archives of General Psychiatry. Second-generation antipsychotics (SGAs) were used as the treatment in this study. SGAs are commonly used to treat ...

Delayed female sexual maturity linked to longer lifespan in mice

2012-05-08
An intriguing clue to longevity lurks in the sexual maturation timetable of female mammals, Jackson Laboratory researchers and their collaborators report. Jackson researchers including Research Scientist Rong Yuan, Ph.D., had previously established that mouse strains with lower circulating levels of the hormone IGF1 at age six months live longer than other strains. In research published May 7 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Yuan and colleagues report that females from strains with lower IGF1 levels also reach sexual maturity at a significantly ...

Not all tumor cells are equal: Stanford study reveals huge genetic diversity in cells shed by tumors

2012-05-08
STANFORD, Calif. — The cells that slough off from a cancerous tumor into the bloodstream are a genetically diverse bunch, Stanford University School of Medicine researchers have found. Some have genes turned on that give them the potential to lodge themselves in new places, helping a cancer spread between organs. Others have completely different patterns of gene expression and might be more benign, or less likely to survive in a new tissue. Some cells may even express genes that could predict their response to a specific therapy. Even within one patient, the tumor cells ...

Researchers see BPA effects in monkey mammary glands

2012-05-08
PULLMAN, Wash.—A new study finds that fetal exposure to the plastic additive bisphenol A, or BPA, alters mammary gland development in primates. The finding adds to the evidence that the chemical can be causing health problems in humans and bolsters concerns about it contributing to breast cancer. "Previous studies in mice have demonstrated that low doses of BPA alter the developing mammary gland and that these subtle changes increase the risk of cancer in the adult," says Patricia Hunt, a geneticist in Washington State University's School of Molecular Biosciences. "Some ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Einstein Probe releases its Science White Paper

Music-based therapy may improve depressive symptoms in people with dementia

No evidence that substituting NHS doctors with physician associates is necessarily safe

At-home brain speed tests bridge cognitive data gaps

CRF appoints Josep Rodés-Cabau, M.D., Ph.D., as editor-in-chief of structural heart: the journal of the heart team

Violent crime is indeed a root cause of migration, according to new study

Customized smartphone app shows promise in preventing further cognitive decline among older adults diagnosed with mild impairment

Impact of COVID-19 on education not going away, UM study finds

School of Public Health researchers receive National Academies grant to assess environmental conditions in two Houston neighborhoods

Three Speculum articles recognized with prizes

ACM A.M. Turing Award honors two researchers who led the development of cornerstone AI technology

Incarcerated people are disproportionately impacted by climate change, CU doctors say

ESA 2025 Graduate Student Policy Award Cohort Named

Insomnia, lack of sleep linked to high blood pressure in teens

Heart & stroke risks vary among Asian American, Native Hawaiian & Pacific Islander adults

Levels of select vitamins & minerals in pregnancy may be linked to lower midlife BP risk

Large study of dietary habits suggests more plant oils, less butter could lead to better health

Butter and plant-based oils intake and mortality

20% of butterflies in the U.S. have disappeared since 2000

Bacterial ‘jumping genes’ can target and control chromosome ends

Scientists identify genes that make humans and Labradors more likely to become obese

Early-life gut microbes may protect against diabetes, research in mice suggests

Study raises the possibility of a country without butterflies

Study reveals obesity gene in dogs that is relevant to human obesity studies

A rapid decline in US butterfly populations

Indigenous farming practices have shaped manioc’s genetic diversity for millennia

Controlling electrons in molecules at ultrafast timescales

Tropical forests in the Americas are struggling to keep pace with climate change

Brain mapping unlocks key Alzheimer’s insights

Clinical trial tests novel stem-cell treatment for Parkinson’s disease

[Press-News.org] Best websites balance self-expression and functionality