Welcome to Volume 10 Number 1 of JoHLSTE. I would like to start this editorial by welcoming Paul Barron to the editorial board of JoHLSTE. He takes over David Littlejohn's role as subject editor for the Hospitality part of the journal. In this edition there are eight academic papers, four practice papers, one research note and a section reviewing educational resources.

The first academic paper continues a thread that is developing in JoHLSTE related to problem-based learning and is titled Hospitality management students' conceptions about teaching and learning and their evaluation of tasks in problem-based learning. In this paper the authors Hans Otting and Wichard Zwaal from The Netherlands investigate if students with a constructivist or a traditional conception about teaching and learning prefer different types of problems. Their research shows that senior students endorse constructivist conceptions more strongly than first year students, but no significant differences could be detected between constructivists and traditionalists with regard to the preferred type of problems.

Assessing the value of using an online discussion board for engaging students is the title of the second academic paper by Julian Robinson from the UK. This paper presents the findings of a study that explores students' perceptions of the value of an online discussion board for group work. The study indicates that whilst the majority of students engaged with the online forum and found it valuable, a number of learners either did not engage with it or found it only of limited use. Robinson further discusses possible ways to encourage student engagement.

Jennie Small (Autstralia), Candice Harris (New Zealand), Erica Wilson, (Australia) and Irena Ateljevic (The Netherlands) are the co-authors of the third academic paper titled: Voices of women: A memory-work reflection on work-life dis/harmony in tourism academia. The authors note that while other disciplines have engaged with critiquing work-life balance, tourism studies has been slower in acknowledging and critically contesting the notion as it applies to the working lives of its academics. Their paper addresses this gap through collective memory-work of how four female tourism academics try to achieve work-life harmony and why it sometimes seems unattainable. In contrast to masculinist, neoliberalist values of academic performance, achievement and competitiveness, their gendered analysis reveals a preference for embodied, feminine values of caring, communion and union, or what the authors refer to as work-life harmony.

Introducing applied dissertations: Opportunities for industry connection in postgraduate study is the title of the fourth academic paper by Caroline Scarles, from the UK. Her paper explores the process of developing a model for applied dissertations in taught postgraduate tourism programmes. Scarles offers a number of key findings from her study: First, applied dissertations afford students the opportunity to engage in learning through and for work. Second, as learning demands the direct incorporation of external agents and knowledge, applied dissertations emerge as complex adaptive systems which set in motion a series of dynamic, fluid and complex interrelations. Finally, the paper explores the ways in which applied dissertations encourage students to become reflexive practitioners as they review and learn from their experiences.

Paper five in the academic section is titled Cross-cultural quality measurement of undergraduate hospitality, tourism and leisure programmes: Comparisons between Taiwan and the USA. The paper's authors are Jeou-Shyan Horng and Chih-Ching Teng from Taiwan who note as the rationale for their paper that cross-cultural comparisons of quality measurement for undergraduate hospitality, tourism and leisure programmes are rare. Their study provides evidence for cross-validation of the instrument developed by Horng, Teng and Baum (2009) based on applying confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to a sample of faculty members from Taiwan and the USA. Multi-group confirmatory factor analysis used in the study indicated some support for the proposed cross-cultural invariance. The CFA results satisfied some but not all requirements for cross-cultural equivalence. Their findings revealed that the cultural context needs to be considered in cross-cultural quality measurement.

The sixth academic paper is titled Doctoral students' research productivity: An analysis of publications in tourism and hospitality journals, authored by Jin Young Chung and James Petrick from the USA. The authors note a gap in the literature where although tourism and hospitality researchers have examined the research productivity at the level of institutions or scholars holding a PhD degree, few studies on PhD students' research productivity have been conducted. Their study therefore attempted to fill this gap. With an alternative regression model (zero-truncated count model), the study aimed to identify significant factors influencing the students' scholarly publications in major tourism and hospitality journals. The results showed that two variables - productivity of co-author(s) and US-model institutions - significantly influenced PhD student publications in the tourism literature.

David Harris from the UK is the author of the seventh academic paper. Titled Presentation software: Pedagogical constraints and potentials it offers critical discussions of electronic presentation software, initially focusing on PowerPoint but also including newer forms such as Microsoft Producer, Prezi and Xerte. Harris discusses whether teaching technologies, including face to face formats, constrain or prompt pedagogic innovation. Arguments about using presentation software in a different context to construct learning objects (stand-alone online resources) are developed, to isolate the effects of the presentation software itself. Finally, Harris addresses non-technological issues that are relevant in teaching subject specialisms like leisure studies.

The final paper in the academic section of the journal asks the question Why don't females do sport degrees? It is authored by Dave Elliott and Lindsay Sander from the UK who start with the observation that in the UK, sport degrees (e.g., sport science and sport studies) attract a predominantly male cohort. Their study examines the reasons behind this bias, sampling female students who were engaged in further education in the North of England. A series of statements that were designed to assess attitudes towards sport degrees were presented. The research identified six factors: value/relevance; interest in sport; male dominated; suitability for females; academic value; and career opportunities. Only the factor value/relevance could be seen as pertinent. In addition, participants were also asked to rate a series of sport degrees for their level of attractiveness. The authors found that those which incorporated health and psychology were considered more attractive than those which focused upon sport and exercise.

In the first practice paper Cihan Cobanoglu and Katerina Berezina from the USA discuss The impact of the use of blogs on students' assignment engagement. Noting that blogs are a common marketing tool in the hospitality industry, the authors suggest that they also show promise as an educational tool. Their paper examines the impact of the use of blogs on students' engagement. An experimental design was employed with 52 students in a course at a Northeast American university. Findings indicated that students who used blogs as an assignment posting platform used significantly more words, and possibly spent more time working on the assignment.

Mandy Aggett and Graham Busby from the UK are the co-authors of the second practice paper - Opting out of internship: Perceptions of hospitality, tourism and events management undergraduates at a British University. Aggett and Busby address the paradox that despite the irrefutable benefits, the number of students at HEIs in the UK opting to undertake a work placement is in decline. This paper research identifies the reasons that Tourism, Hospitality and Events students at one British university opt out of the placement year, and subsequently identifies what support mechanisms are required in order to increase students' participation.

The third practice paper is titled The Perceptual Learning Styles of Hospitality Students in a Virtual Learning Environment: The Case of Taiwan and its author is Liwei Hsu from Taiwan. The paper starts by observing that the application of modern technology makes learners' perceptual learning styles play a decisive role in the process of interaction between the instructor and learners. This study deployed a Learning Style Inventory to examine participants' perceptual learning styles and six types of perceptual styles were yielded from clustering analysis.

Sally Bethell and Kevin Morgan from the UK are the co-authors of the final practice paper titled Problem based and experiential learning: Engaging students in an undergraduate physical education module. The aim of their study was to employ a combined problem based learning (PBL) and experiential learning theory (ELT) methodology as a means of engaging students on an undergraduate physical education (PE) and sport pedagogy module. Focus groups were conducted at the end of the module to investigate the students' and tutors' responses to the teaching approach. The results indicated that the method of teaching was associated with students feeling confident about their critical knowledge and understanding of contemporary issues in PE and their presentation and discussion skills and a positive engagement with the module. The study also found that tutors were supportive of the PBL approach and engaged with the constructivist teaching skills that needed to be employed to facilitate the students' learning.

Seoung-Hoon Shin from Korea and Timothy Jeonglyeol Lee from Australia are the authors of a research note tilted Degree of motivation of international hospitality students in their work place. Their research investigated international students' levels of motivation to work in the hospitality industry. The authors conducted a survey with 193 international hospitality students in Brisbane and the Gold Coast, Southeast Queensland, Australia. The research, using expectancy motivation theory, found that the level of motivation during their industry experience programs was not high. The authors thereby provide valuable information for education providers and industry practitioners who wish to improve motivation levels of international students who study hospitality programmes overseas.

Finally the Educational Resource Review section reviews an interesting case of the introduction of a new course for which there were sparse educational resources. It offers a review of a text book that was used, a review by a student about how new social media were used and a review by a lecturer of a blog that was developed to support the course.

Reference

Horng, J.-S., Teng, C.-C., & Baum, T. (2009). Evaluating the quality of undergraduate hospitality, tourism, and leisure programmes. Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport & Tourism Education, 8(1), 4-14. doi:10.3794/johlste.81.200

Author affiliation:

John Tribe (j.tribe@surrey.ac.uk)

Chair of the Editorial Board

DOI:10.3794/johlste.101.ed

© Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism Education