http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles Wed, 17 May 2006 19:12:55 GMT Connecting you with the University of Missouri’s innovative research and creative activity http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles/show/24 Betty Houchin Winfield has earned a reputation for her fascinating and illuminating research, whether it concerns the roles that the media play in the reputations of such public personas as presidential candidates' wives or those individuals who undertook the Lewis and Clark Corps of Discovery expedition. As a University Curators' Professor, based in the School of Journalism, she also looks at the media's building of "social capital" in the United States, that is, people actively participating in the democratic process. In contrast to those naysayers who claim there has been a decline in social capital in the U.S., Winfield examines how the internet may reverse this trend. In fact, many internet sites actually stimulate "bridging and bonding" of like-minded individuals that seems to result in people becoming more politically involved. Wed, 17 May 2006 19:12:55 GMT http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles/show/24 (LuAnne Roth) http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles/show/34 Recently in the United States the majority of citizens have come to reside at the extremes of either the political right or the left. “Most people either love George Bush or hate George Bush,” Professor Wayne Wanta explains, with few people falling in the middle. Wanta carefully recounts his recent research concerning such polarization of attitudes, especially in terms of how the media contribute to this phenomenon. Initially he suspected that the internet (now about ten years old) was the primary factor affecting this polarization, that perhaps people were going online to get information that reinforces their already existing beliefs, resulting in those beliefs becoming more extreme. Tue, 20 Jun 2006 19:24:23 GMT http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles/show/34 (LuAnne Roth) http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles/show/46 Finding a way to transform MU’s School of Journalism into a think tank for the news and advertising industry has been the main research goal for Esther Thorson, who serves as Professor, Associate Dean of Graduate Studies and Research, and Director of Research for the Reynolds Journalism Institute. While medical schools, law schools, and engineering schools have long provided think tanks for their fields, journalism schools have never focused on the creation, research, and application of new industry ideas. Simply put, thus far journalism schools only “produce the fodder for the personnel in those companies,” but this is something Thorson aspires to change. Wed, 18 Apr 2007 15:25:13 GMT http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles/show/46 (LuAnne Roth) http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles/show/84 The idea for SyndicateMizzou, if I recall the story correctly, arose during a lunch conversation involving two Center for eResearch personnel, founding director John Miles Foley and Information Technology Manager Jamie Stephens, shortly after the center was born in April 2005. “Wouldn’t it be great,” remarked the latter, “if there were a website that could syndicate diverse content, be fully searchable, and bring MU’s innovation, accomplishment, and expertise to the rest of the world?” It was initially over soup and sandwiches that this conversation grew into a conception of SyndicateMizzou—a website created to document and promote research and creative activity at the University of Missouri-Columbia. In fact, the trajectory from idea to reality provides a worthy case study for imagining and executing an online project. Fri, 02 May 2008 05:00:00 GMT http://syndicate.missouri.edu/articles/show/84 (LuAnne Roth)