The influence of combined experiential learning through face-to-face instruction and immersive environment (IE) on health behavior change has not been examined extensively. The goal of the WAVE∼Ripples for Change Childhood Obesity Prevention project was to determine the effectiveness of teaching nutrition and physical activity knowledge with an IE designed to reinforce these healthy behaviors (i.e. Rippleville), and if it could improve overall diet and physical activity. Participant engagement was crucial for the participant's exposure to the decision-making process and data collection. This paper describes the strategies implemented in Rippleville to maximize participation and to engage a remote and scattered teenage population into an IE, including our mixed-reality models, as well as learning, engagement, and programming strategies.

IntroductionThe WAVE Project aims to prevent childhood obesity among active youth ages 14–19 living in Oregon via a 2‐y intervention by providing mixed‐reality learning experience, which involves the integration of physical‐world face‐to‐face lessons and virtual‐world interactions. Rippleville, the project virtual learning environment, is designed for the target audience to reinforce the face‐to‐face lesson objectives. Youth solve quests by applying their knowledge and skills learned about physical activity, nutrition, and Family and Consumer Sciences (PAN‐FCS). This pilot‐study qualitatively evaluates the participant's overall enjoyment and motivation in Rippleville, and how Rippleville has influenced their PAN‐FCS behaviors in the physical world.MethodsIn May‐Oct 2015, five quests were evaluated by Pilot Study participants (n=8) from two soccer teams enrolled in the intervention through 10 interviews/focus groups. Participants traveled to the researcher's lab. In Session 1, two staff observed and took notes while the participants completed each quest. Participants were told to create a Bug Report and shared their findings at the end of each quest. In Session 2, the same staff (1 moderator and 1 note taker) conducted an interview/focus group with the participants using Likert scale and a semi‐structured interview guide to evaluate participant's overall enjoyment and motivation, and their attitudes towards making healthy decisions in the virtual‐world vs. physical‐world. The cycle repeated until all quests were completed. Upon completion, participants received a $15/h stipend. All interview/focus group conversations in Session 2 were transcribed and analyzed to identify themes. Likert scale scores were analyzed by using descriptive statistics.ResultsFive participants evaluated all five quests and three participants evaluated two quests. Preliminary findings suggested that active youth were attracted by the detailed and real‐life design of Rippleville. They enjoyed exploring Rippleville by following clues and solving the quests (average enjoyment score was 7.7/10). Getting rewards and teaming up with friends to solve quests were perceived highly motivating. They requested additional Rippleville activities/quests and interactive features in Rippleville. Major barriers reported were the lags and glitches in Rippleville when participants moved their avatars. Girls were more attentive than boys to the ‘health bar’ that monitored the avatar's hydration and physical activity levels. Participants who completed all five quests reported that the virtual world quests had raised their awareness of healthy food choices, particularly through the display of nutrition facts. They also reported being more willing to make similar healthy food choices in the physical world.ConclusionActive youth practiced their PAN‐FCS knowledge and skills in the virtual world, and were willing to make positive health changes in the physical world. Involving active youth in the design and refinement of a virtual learning environment is critical in optimizing the community‐level efforts to prevent childhood obesity in innovative approach.Support or Funding InformationSponsor: NIFA AFRI Award No. 2013‐67001‐20418.

Book details Banerji, D. Seven Quartets of Becoming: A Transformative Yoga Philosophy Based on the Diaries of Sri Aurobindo Los Angeles, CA: Nalanda International, 2012, Pages: 441, ISBN: 978-8124606260

Objectives: Test the feasibility of a mobile application to track college students' food intake.Materials and Methods: The mobile app used a MyPlate visual concept for food data entry with a built‐in serving size estimation guide. Each user was instructed to record food intake by tapping the corresponding food group on the visual plate for each serving consumed. Subjects photographed and described their meal type, place and time of consumption and satiety upon completion. Eleven students (36% female, aged 18‐21) having two 3‐day food records participated in this feasibility study in Feb‐Mar 2013, including one online survey and a focus group). Meal photos were compared to meal descriptions, food groups, and serving sizes.Results: The mobile app was convenient to use however, meal photos were incomplete. Suggested improvements included: 1) increase number of functions (e.g. caloric intake display); 2) enable viewing and editing of past entries (e.g, to adjust for dates and times and add forgotten foods; 3) a photo‐tagging system to match photos to corresponding meal data; and 4) increase text length for meal description.Conclusion: Using MyPlate visual for dietary tracking is a feasible approach for college students who were familiar with food recordkeeping.Grant Funding Source: PacificSource Healthcare

The Better Eating Starts Today (B.E.S.T.) Project is an intervention to support healthy campus initiatives to prevent obesity among college students. The project is integrated into multiple offerings of a required health and fitness course at Oregon State University running Sep 2012‐Mar 2014. A 24‐item online pre/post survey measures health related behavior changes resulting from the class intervention. This abstract describes self‐reported baseline pre‐survey data from 281 consenting participants recruited from the Fall 2012 enrollment of 1,876. Mean age was 19.2 ± 3.2 years (55% female) and mean Body Mass Index was 23.3 ± 4.7. More than half (52%) of all participants self‐reported meeting at least one or more behavior recommendations 3 days/week including: servings of fruits and vegetables, consuming at least half dietary grains as whole grains; having ≥ 30 minutes of physical activity at moderate/vigorous intensity, or getting adequate sleep. A mean score (0 = very low; 5 = very high) for participant‐perceived ability to achieve/maintain a healthy diet was 3.6; physical activity was 3.7; and to manage stress was 3.5. Post data surveys will be collected in Dec 2012 for pre‐post comparisons, which will include participant self‐analysis of their own healthy diet and activity goal achievement. This research is supported by PacificSource Healthcare.

The award of the 2003 Barwise Prize to Daniel Dennett by the American Philosophical Association signifies Dennett's importance in the developing area of philosophical inquiry into computing and information. One source of Dennett's intellectual stature is his command of scientific and engineering ideas, which he effectively applies to philosophical debates over machine intelligence, consciousness, and intentionality. Dennett regards the computer as both a model and a tool that will transform the ways that philosophy is pursued in the 21st century. In order to understand Dennett's conception of how philosophy changes and fares, if his mechanistic and reductionist conception of the life of the mind succeeds, we turn to an examination of a central idea in Dennett's thought: the intuition pump.

ties embrace Internet delivery of distance education, critics have repeatedly decried this trend as a threat to effective pedagogy and creative control over instruction (e.g. Farber 1998; Noble 1998). However, sociologists have at their disposal analytical tools and skills for considering the nonobvious and potentially positive implications of this development (Portes 2000). Rather than embrace a solely negative stance, Merton (1967) would have us consider the latent functions of distance education. This endeavor would steer us away from naive moral judgments (Merton 1967:124), allowing us to examine whether or not the explicit goals of Web-based distance education might unexpectedly strengthen classroom experiences on campus. Such an examination speaks to enduring questions about how new technologies may shape the classroom experience for teacher and student (Cuban 1986). Into the debate over the merits of distance

Summary The objective of this article is to examine some of the valuable philosophical resources available on the Internet, especially for librarians who need to determine what resources to provide to faculty, students, and staff. Some main uses of the Internet for philosophical research are: accessing texts, using search strategies to examine the texts, reading and writing electronic journal articles, accessing information from encyclopedias and dictionaries, browsing through paths of interlinked Web sites, searching the Internet for sources, and participating in online discussion forums. This article examines the Internet as a source of primary and secondary texts, journal literature, research databases, reference works, specialized limited area search engines, organizational information, and discussion lists. The article ends with a philosophical reflection on the transformative effect of information technology on the growth of knowledge.

Being unable ‐ when we surrender ourselves to philosophical thought ‐ to help saying such‐and‐such; being irresistibly inclined to say it ‐ does not mean being forced into an assumption …

A traditional model for a distance education course locates the bulk of the stu- dents at satellite campuses receiving electronically transmitted instruction from a teacher at a central location. Of course, that location is central only to the teacher and the handful of students able to attend class in the broadcast studio that serves as the classroom. This type of distance education helps bring educa- tion to students physically remote from the campus, but tends not to differ in presentation from the traditional classroom. A different distance education model incorporates the technological capa- bilities of the Internet and the World Wide Web, allowing radical changes in the level of interaction among students and teachers while staying true to course content. Classes taught via the Web can be constructed to rely heavily on writ- ing, yet offer flexibility to accommodate other forms of communication (pic- tures, graphics, sound, etc.) supportable by the students' and teachers' technology. The InterQuest (IQ) course at Oregon State University is an introductory philosophy course conducted virtually via the Web. The virtual nature of the course allows students to enroll and participate in the course as long as they have a computer connection to the Web. This inter-institutional course accom- modates university, community college, and advanced placement high school students simultaneously. These students interact with each other and the teacher by reading course content on the Web and engaging each other, and that con- tent, via e-mail. InterQuest is based on a distance education pedagogy that be- lieves students can learn effectively in a computer-supported communication environment. This chapter addresses many of the issues associated with developing a Web- based course using e-mail writing as its dominant form of communication. The next section of the chapter provides a description of the InterQuest course. A discussion of developing a communication-intensive distance education course follows, using InterQuest as an exemplar. 117