Building Codes and the Dreaded Deck Question

Faithful readers of this blog will know that the librarians in the Reference Department of this and other public libraries answer questions about any topic on earth to the best of our ability. Where is the 'Consumer Reports' issue about cars? How much is my used car worth? What is the cost value of this old stock certificate I found in my sock drawer? How can I open an offshore bank account to avoid taxes? (True question.)  If you click on 'Reference Questions' in the label cloud on the blog sidebar, you will find all the posts where we wrote about weird and interesting questions that we enjoy. The reference books you see in the pictures on this post are of local ordinances and rules about building codes. These books are used to help library patrons find information about building a deck or other construction issues. Truthfully, only a trained construction official can really slog through these codes without bursting into tears of frustration. These books will be going with the Reference Department to our new, temporary location because, much as we are perennially puzzled by the Deck Question, we can't go anywhere without our local building code books.

College Guidance Online with Library Databases

The Berkeley Heights Public Library subscribes to Infobase (formerly Facts on File) databases which include history, science, and literature materials for students as well as a  career and college guidance information which can be found in Infobase's  Ferguson's Career Guidance Center.
Ferguson's Career Guidance Center includes a database of more than 4,000 undergraduate institutions and a wealth of valuable new career information.
BHPL patrons may search the database for schools based on a number of factors--such as admissions difficulty, curriculum offerings, housing options, location and setting, student body, and tuition--to identify ones that best match their career aspirations, educational needs, and personal preferences. All schools included have full accreditation or are pre-accredited and grant degrees at the associate's and/or bachelor's level. College data is provided by Peterson's, a leading producer of educational databases and planning information.



All databases should be accessed through the library's "Databases & Articles" link where you will be prompted to enter your library barcode number and pin. Choose Ferguson's or Infobase from the list of databases to find college and career information.

The library also has college guidance books to check out and in the Reference Collection, such as Peterson's, College Board, and Barron's guide books. The Dewey Decimal number is 378.73.

 

 

 

 

 

College and Financial Aid searchable database available from the library

Financial Aid resources searchable database available from the library

        

Fortune Cookie Wisdom

'Getting the right answer is only possible when you have asked the right questions.'

That is the pithy advice I just found in a fortune cookie and a more appropriate cookie aphorism could not have been written for a reference librarian. The principle of answering patron's questions is to first pepper them with more questions to get at the specifics of what they want to know. That is called the 'reference interview' in libraryland.

Patron: Do you have Kovel's Antiques & Collectibles Price List?
Librarian: Yes, we do; the latest edition is a reference copy, but you can take out the older editions. Is there some particular kind of antique you are researching?
Patron: Yes, I don't suppose what I want is in Kovel's anyway, because I don't want the price, I want to know what the mark means.
Librarian: We do have books of silver marks and china marks and so on. What kind of piece do you have?
Patron: China.

The patron then went on to describe the piece and to tell me that she wanted similar pieces, but could not read the mark and did not know how to look up information about it. I set aside several books on china marks and identification and also suggested that she take a picture of her china for the antique dealer if she didn't want to carry it with her. If we had just stopped the conversation at the Kovel's guide, the patron may not have gotten the answer she needed. I hope she gets back to me about whether she was able to identify her china.

Blog favorites: 'The Psychopath Test'

The recent May 18, 2013 release of the 'DSM - 5', the fifth edition of the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, has been met with some controversy. To read more about the new DSM - 5, read Lizzie Crocker's article in the Daily Beast. In general the criticism is that the listed diagnoses have changed, either been eliminated or added; and the widely held belief that normal human behavior is being assigned a mental health diagnosis. Whether you agree, disagree, don't care or don't know, as a reference librarian I find it fascinating that any new addition of a reference book can stir up readers' feelings to such a degree. When we receive the latest edition of most books in our reference collection, the event is marked only by the reference staff logging it in and shelving it. All this led me to reposting my review of a very funny non-fiction title that does discuss the medicalization of normalcy.

Are You a Psychopath? Take this Test

The Psychopath Test, a journey through the madness industry by Jon Ronson starts with the author, a journalist, being asked to find out who anonymously sent a cryptic self-published book to many psychiatrists worldwide, which then leads him somehow, circuitously to a Scientologist who gets him into Broadmoor Prison to interview a criminally insane inmate who claims he's not insane. Scientologists famously do not believe in psychiatry so they advocate for the prisoner. The author then goes on to learn about the Hare Psychopathy Checklist at a workshop lead by the list's creator Bob Hare himself. Armed with his newly acquired psychopath-spotting ability, the author goes all over the world for a year or so interviewing both diagnosed and suspected psychopaths and mental health professionals while dipping into the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders and exploring the latest top psychiatric diagnoses like bipolar disorder in children. The irony of his research is that Ronson presents himself as an anxious neurotic; he worries a lot about being tracked down by some of the killers he meets and he worries about whether he might have some psychopathic tendencies, constantly referring back to the checklist to self-diagnose.  The book is about at least two topics: psychopaths, or course, but also how mental illness came to be diagnosed by checklists in the DSM and the subsequent increase in number of diagnoses of mental disorders and the increased development of drugs to treat them. That is an ambitiously broad range of topics to cover in only 275 pages. What is  psychopathy? How do we diagnose it? Why has there been an increase in the number of mental illnesses listed in the DSM which seem increasingly close to a normal state?  Are there more psychopaths in positions of great power, like CEO's of corporations?  Ronson raises a lot of questions, so if you are interested in related titles, you could read the following books: (call #'s follow the title)

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders (Ref 616.89 Dia)
The books of psychiatrist Oliver Sacks
The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande, which is not about psychiatry or madness, but about medicine's use of checklists.(610.28 Gaw)
Opening Skinner's box: great psychological experiments of the twentieth century by Lauren Slater (150.72 SLA)

Related websites:


Laura Miller's review in Salon
Robert Hare's website 

original posted by Anne
http://bhplnjbookgroup.blogspot.com/2011/06/are-you-psychopath-take-this-test.html