Literature
Search for Audience-Specific
Best Education Practices
The purpose of this study was to identify and promote best education
practices for educating specialized audiences about water. This
involves identifying, finding, and reviewing the appropriate literature,
developing procedures for organizing the relevant literature into
useful categories, and drafting a summary of the results. The selected
literature targeted audiences listed in Table 1.
Table 1 . Specialized
Audiences Targeted by BEP Project Literature Search |
| Agricultural commodity groups |
Local decision and policy makers |
Aquaculture producers |
Loggers |
Environmental/conservation NGOs |
Neighborhood organizations |
Farmers |
Recreational water users |
Government agencies |
Retailers of water recreation equipment |
Households |
Service clubs |
Homeowners |
Soil and water conservation districts |
Industrial water users |
Specific ethnic groups |
Landowners |
Water-related recreational businesses |
Land development businesses |
Youth and college students |
| |
Youth and college educators |
The audiences in this list were identified from multiple sources.
Some were listed in the original proposal for this project based
on previously identified needs, others were suggested by members
of the advisory team, and the rest were identified in our study
of provider needs and subsequent reviews of literature on water
outreach and education. Each was included because few education
practices have been identified and tested for their relative effectiveness
with these specialized audiences.
Our search for relevant literature can be divided into two-phases.
The first phase was a learning phase in which we developed search
techniques of increasing power and sophistication, identified the
more relevant and productive electronic databases, and refined and
expanded the key words used in our searches. Table 2 lists the relevant
literature sources used in the first phase of our search.
Table 2 . Relevant literature searched
in the Phase I of the BEP Project Literature Search |
| •
References included in relevant books, book chapters, and
journal articles
• Ten years
of table of contents from environmental education, Extension,
and natural resource management journals
• Proceedings
from conferences on groundwater, watershed, water resource,
water quality, and non-point source pollution.
• Electronic
journal databases available on the UW-Madison electronic library
system using both single and developing multi-level key word
search techniques.
• Reference
recommended by our project advisory team and water resource
and education colleagues and associates in Wisconsin and around
the country. |
We concentrated our second-phase search efforts on the databases
that proved most productive in the first phase using the now matured,
multi-level key word search techniques. We also continued to welcome
personal recommendations of specific references.
Table 3 . Lists of UW-Madison
Electronic Library Databases Used in the Two Phases of Our
Literature Search
|
| Phase
I
(Winter 2002/2003 and Summer 2003) |
Phase
II
(Fall
2003 - Winter 2003/2004) |
| Cambridge
Scientific Abstracts |
Cambridge
Scientific Abstracts |
| —
Aquatic Sciences & Fisheries Abstracts
(ASFA) (1992-2003) |
—
Aquatic Sciences & Fisheries Abstracts
(ASFA) (1992-2004) |
| —
ASFA 3: Aquatic Pollution and Environmental
Quality (ASFA subfile) |
—
ASFA 3: Aquatic Pollution and Environmental
Quality (ASFA subfile) (1992-2004) |
| —
Pollution Abstracts |
—
Pollution Abstracts (1992-2004) |
| —
Water Resources Abstracts |
—
Water Resources Abstracts (1992-2004) |
| OVID
- Current Contents (1993-2003) |
OVID
- Current Contents (1993-2004) |
| WebSPIRS
|
WebSPIRS
|
| —
AGRICOLA (1992-2002) |
—
AGRICOLA (1992-2003) |
| —
Agris (1991-2003) |
—
Agris (1991-2003) |
| —
Biological Abstracts (1992-2002) |
—
ERIC (1992-2003(6)) |
| —
Biological Abstracts/RRM (1992-2002) |
|
| —
CAB Abstracts (1992-2003) |
|
| —
ERIC (1992-2002) |
|
| —
Zoological Record (1993-2002) |
|
| BiblioLine
|
|
| —
Fish and
Fisheries Worldwide (1992-2002) |
|
| —
Wildlife
World (1992-2002) |
|
| EBSCOhost
- Academic Search Elite (1984-2002) |
|
| ISI
Web, Web of Knowledge ( 1992-2003) |
|
Table 3 lists the databases used in the two phases of our search.
Table 4 lists the search terms used in the second phase of the literature
search. The key words listed in Table 4 combine the search terms
recommend by our advisory team with key words refined from the responses
of natural resource professionals contacted in our study of provider
needs.
Table 5 shows the total number of references and abstracts identified
and reviewed in the second phase our search and a breakdown of the
total by database. The databases in the second-phase searches returned
a total of 89,738 references and abstracts (counting duplicate returns).
We reviewed 15,082 of these references and abstracts (when abstracts
were provided) to determine if the referenced literature met our
selection criteria.
We filtered the literature in two stages.
We first selected the references that appeared to be topically relevant
to our project. From this subset, we selected the references that
appeared to report on research that either evaluated education practices
in a single case or compared two or more cases to identify one practice
as better than the other(s).
Most of the references reviewed did not meet
either criterion. The following is one of the rejected abstracts;
it provides an example of why we rejected so many given the specificity
of our search terms.
Abstract: Presents news briefs related to community
colleges in the U.S. as of April 14, 2003. Arrest of Rafael Diaz,
vice president at Brookhaven College in Farmers
Branch, Texas, for conspiracy to money laundering; Participation
of Chief Warrant Officer David S. Williams in the
Army reserves; Resignation of Clyde W. Johnson as director of
equal employment at Salt Lake Community
College in Utah
Table 4. Concepts
and Key Words Used in Phase II of Our Literature Search |
| Key
words used in the second phase of our literature search, grouped
by category.
The "*" is a wildcard designator
in most of the databases we searched.
- Concept 1: Resource
- (water* OR river* OR lake* OR riparian OR groundwater*
OR stream OR streams)
- Concept 2: Education
- (educat* OR outreach OR instruct* OR environmental educat*
OR pedagog* OR technolog* transfer)
- Concept 3: Participation
- (participation OR citizen participation OR public participation
OR social movement OR civic engagement OR civic empowerment
OR emancipation OR emancipatory education OR liberation
theology OR social responsibility)
- Concept 4: Best practice
- best practice* OR success* OR effective*
- Concept 5: Audience
- (adult* OR landown* OR farm* OR agricultur* OR industr*
OR small industr* OR small business* OR retail* business*
OR industr* water user* OR recreation* water user* OR decision
maker* OR homeowner* OR household*)
- Concept 6: Evaluation
- (evaluat* OR assess* OR study OR studi*)
Adding key words to
a list using the Boolean "OR" broadened the scope
of the search. Combining the concept lists using the Boolean
"AND" narrowed the scope or made it a more selective
search. A typical search would use these in combination. We
searched databases listed in Phase II of Attachment 1 using
no less than twelve combinations of these key-word groups.
The most restrictive search combined all six concepts as follows:
(water* or river* or lake* or riparian
or groundwater* or stream or streams) AND (educat* or outreach
or instruct* or environmental educat* or pedagog* or technolog*
transfer) AND (participation or citizen participation or public
participation or social movement or civic engagement or civic
empowerment or emancipation or emancipatory education or liberation
theology or social responsibility) AND (best practice* or
success* or effective*) AND (adult* or landown* or farm* or
agricultur* or industr* or small industr* or small business*
or retail* business* or industr* water user* or recreation*
water user* or decision maker* or homeowner* or household*)
AND (evaluat* or assess* or study or studi*)
The least restrictive combined
only two concepts, for example, Water AND Education:
(water* or river* or
lake* or riparian or groundwater* or stream or streams) AND
(educat* or outreach or instruct* or environmental educat*
or pedagog* or technolog* transfer) |
From the 15,082 references and abstracts
we reviewed, we identified 526 (duplicates removed) that were topically
relevant to our project. Ninety-five of the 526 provided at least
a minimal level of case evaluation and critical reflection. These
95 articles are the sources from which we will identify and promote
best education practices for educating specialized audiences about
water.
Table 5. References
Returned and Reviewed in Second Phase of Literature Search |
| Database
|
Number
of
References Returned
(counting
duplicate returns) |
Number
of Returns Reviewed To Determine if Topically Relevant to
Project
(counting
duplicate returns) |
| AGRICOLA
|
2,469
|
1,379
|
| Agris
|
11,837
|
3,554
|
| Aquatic
Science and Fisheries Abstracts (ASFA) |
7,679
|
2,701
|
| ASFA
3: Aquatic Pollution and Environmental Quality |
2,109
|
1,281
|
| Current
Contents |
52,
213 |
2,050
|
| ERIC
|
7,218
|
1,096
|
| Pollution
Abstracts |
2,086
|
1,131
|
| Water
Resources Abstracts |
4127
|
1,890
|
| TOTAL
(duplicates included |
89,738
|
15,082
|
Along with identifying target audience research, we considered
various meta-analysis methodologies for organizing and discriminating
the reviewed literature in useful ways. We drew from established
literature in education theory and practice and from the expertise
of our advisory committee to develop two detailed matrices. One
matrix would organize the literature on education practice by general
bodies of education knowledge and discriminate it by frame of reference,
components of learning, and learning management. A second matrix
would organize the literature by audience and discriminate it by
the practice and application of education programs from planning
and implementation through assessment/evaluation. Our Advisory Committee
recommended a simpler approach. We eventually found and decided
to use the framework employed in Holsman (2001) both for its relative
simplicity and record of successful use.
A BEP project review of thousands of papers,through an extensive
search of multiple education, environmental, resource, and resource
management journals and journal databases, identified studies of
adult outreach and education that could claim to identify best
education practices for specific audiences.
Listed below are the audiences that are discussed in the list of
References and Abstracts (PDF, 231 KB).
The numbers correlate to the numbers of references and abstracts
in the list for a particular audience.
REFERENCED AUDIENCES
| Agricultural commodity groups
|
1 |
Loggers |
2 |
| Aquaculture producers |
1 |
Neighborhood organizations |
0 |
| Environmental/conservation NGOs
|
2 |
Recreational water users |
6 |
| Farmers |
38 |
Retailers of water recreation
equipment |
0 |
| Government agency professionals
|
4 |
Service clubs |
0 |
| Homeowners |
8 |
Soil and water conservation districts
|
0 |
| Households |
11 |
Specific ethnic groups |
0 |
| Industrial water users |
4 |
Water-related recreational businesses
|
0 |
| Landowners |
9 |
Youth and college educators |
8 |
| Land development businesses |
0 |
Youth and college students |
15 |
| Local decision and policy makers
|
3 |
TOTAL |
112 |
We will complete meta-analysis procedures
for selected audiences during summer 2004. Recommendations for specific
target audiences will be available in the National Extension
Water Outreach Education web site.
|
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