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Books in Social sciences

The Social Sciences collection forms a definitive resource for those entering, researching, or teaching in any of the many disciplines making up this interdisciplinary area of study. Written by experts and researchers from both Academic and Commercial domains, titles offer global scope and perspectives.

Key subject areas include: Library and Information Science; Transportation; Urban Studies; Geography, Planning, and Development; Security; Emergency Management.

    • Digital Futures

      Expert Briefings on Digital Technologies for Education and Research
      • 1st Edition
      • Martin Hall + 2 more
      • English
      A co-branded book project with Jisc (formerly the Joint Information Systems Commitee), off the back of DigiFest 2014, a digital festival run by Jisc for the first time in 2014. The aim of the book is to bring cutting-edge discussion as heard at DigiFest to the information professional/academi... librarian readership. Digital Futures will provide expert briefings to information professionals on the emerging trends in the digital technologies that are transforming teaching and research in higher education.
    • Informed Systems

      Organizational Design for Learning in Action
      • 1st Edition
      • Mary M. Somerville
      • English
      By fostering principles of systems thinking and informed learning though an inclusive, participatory design process that advances information exchange, reflective dialogue, and knowledge creation, the Informed Systems Approach promotes conceptual change in workplace organizations. Informed Systems explores theory-based participatory action research and provides examples of agile process models for activating sustainable design, dialogue, and reflection processes in today’s organizations. This book also examines forward thinking frameworks for academic libraries, and how they can be used in the context of dynamically changing scholarly communications. Chapters further the expression of collaborative information practices that enrich information experiences by simultaneously advancing both situated domain knowledge and transferable learning capacity. Design (and redesign) activities well integrated into the workplace culture are expressed through sustainable processes and practices that produce rich information experiences. Informed learning both promotes and sustains continuous learning, including collective reflection on information sources, collaborative practices, and systems functionalities. In these ways, transferable topical understandings and information resiliency manifest action oriented intention to ensure improvements of real world situations.
    • Managing Scientific Information and Research Data

      • 1st Edition
      • Svetla Baykoucheva
      • English
      Innovative technologies are changing the way research is performed, preserved, and communicated. Managing Scientific Information and Research Data explores how these technologies are used and provides detailed analysis of the approaches and tools developed to manage scientific information and data. Following an introduction, the book is then divided into 15 chapters discussing the changes in scientific communication; new models of publishing and peer review; ethics in scientific communication; preservation of data; discovery tools; discipline-specific practices of researchers for gathering and using scientific information; academic social networks; bibliographic management tools; information literacy and the information needs of students and researchers; the involvement of academic libraries in eScience and the new opportunities it presents to librarians; and interviews with experts in scientific information and publishing.
    • Strategic Human Resource Planning for Academic Libraries

      Information, Technology and Organization
      • 1st Edition
      • Michael A. Crumpton
      • English
      Strategic Human Resources Planning for Academic Libraries: Information, Technology and Organization provides an in-depth discussion of human resources as a strategic element of a library organization, especially as staffing needs and competencies change. The book focuses on the impact of human resource practices in a library setting, discussing several aspects, including the role of human resources when the library is part of a larger organization, along with information on how to identify strategic objectives that are expected and related to workforce issues. In addition, the book reviews hiring practices, reorganizations of staff, use of temps or time-limited positions, and how students, volunteers, and internships can make a strategic difference overall.
    • A Librarian's Guide to Graphs, Data and the Semantic Web

      • 1st Edition
      • James Powell
      • English
      Graphs are about connections, and are an important part of our connected and data-driven world. A Librarian's Guide to Graphs, Data and the Semantic Web is geared toward library and information science professionals, including librarians, software developers and information systems architects who want to understand the fundamentals of graph theory, how it is used to represent and explore data, and how it relates to the semantic web. This title provides a firm grounding in the field at a level suitable for a broad audience, with an emphasis on open source solutions and what problems these tools solve at a conceptual level, with minimal emphasis on algorithms or mathematics. The text will also be of special interest to data science librarians and data professionals, since it introduces many graph theory concepts by exploring data-driven networks from various scientific disciplines. The first two chapters consider graphs in theory and the science of networks, before the following chapters cover networks in various disciplines. Remaining chapters move on to library networks, graph tools, graph analysis libraries, information problems and network solutions, and semantic graphs and the semantic web.
    • Fundamentals of Forensic Science

      • 3rd Edition
      • Max M. Houck + 1 more
      • English
      Fundamentals of Forensic Science, Third Edition, provides current case studies that reflect the ways professional forensic scientists work, not how forensic academicians teach. The book includes the binding principles of forensic science, including the relationships between people, places, and things as demonstrated by transferred evidence, the context of those people, places, and things, and the meaningfulness of the physical evidence discovered, along with its value in the justice system. Written by two of the leading experts in forensic science today, the book approaches the field from a truly unique and exciting perspective, giving readers a new understanding and appreciation for crime scenes as recent pieces of history, each with evidence that tells a story.
    • Domain Analysis for Knowledge Organization

      Tools for Ontology Extraction
      • 1st Edition
      • Richard Smiraglia
      • English
      Domain analysis is the process of studying the actions, knowledge production, knowledge dissemination, and knowledge-base of a community of commonality, such as an academic discipline or a professional community. The products of domain analysis range from controlled vocabularies and other knowledge organization systems, to scientific evidence about the growth and sharing of knowledge and the evolution of communities of discourse and practice.In the field of knowledge organization- both the science and the practice­ domain analysis is the basic research method for identifying the concepts that will be critical building blocks for knowledge organization systems. This book will survey the theoretical rationale for domain analysis, present tutorials in the specific methods of domain analysis, especially with regard to tools for visualizing knowledge domains.
    • Interpreting Biomedical Science

      Experiment, Evidence, and Belief
      • 1st Edition
      • Ülo Maiväli
      • English
      Interpreting Biomedical Science: Experiment, Evidence, and Belief discusses what can go wrong in biological science, providing an unbiased view and cohesive understanding of scientific methods, statistics, data interpretation, and scientific ethics that are illustrated with practical examples and real-life applications. Casting a wide net, the reader is exposed to scientific problems and solutions through informed perspectives from history, philosophy, sociology, and the social psychology of science. The book shows the differences and similarities between disciplines and different eras and illustrates the concept that while sound methodology is necessary for the progress of science, we cannot succeed without a right culture of doing things.
    • Security Supervision and Management

      Theory and Practice of Asset Protection
      • 4th Edition
      • IFPO
      • Sandi J. Davies + 2 more
      • English
      Security Supervision and Management, Fourth Edition, fills the basic training needs for security professionals who want to move into supervisory or managerial positions. Covering everything needed from how to work with today’s generation security force employees to the latest advances in the security industry, Security Supervision and Management, Fourth Edition, shows security officers how to become a more efficient and well-rounded security professional. Security Supervision and Management, Fourth Edition, is also the only text needed to prepare for the Certified in Security Supervision and Management (CSSM) designation offered by International Foundation for Protection Officers (IFPO). The IFPO also publishes The Professional Protection Officer: Practical Security Strategies and Emerging Trends, now in its 8th edition.
    • Psychology of Learning and Motivation

      • 1st Edition
      • Volume 63
      • English
      Psychology of Learning and Motivation publishes empirical and theoretical contributions in cognitive and experimental psychology, ranging from classical and instrumental conditioning to complex learning and problem solving. Each chapter thoughtfully integrates the writings of leading contributors, who present and discuss significant bodies of research relevant to their discipline. Volume 63 includes chapters on such varied topics as memory and imagery, statistical regularities, eyewitness lineups, embodied attention, the teleological choice rule, inductive reasoning, causal reasoning and cognitive and neural components of insight.