Mohd Ali Samsudin

Publication Trends in Physics Education: A Bibliometric study

A publication trend in Physics Education by employing bibliometric analysis leads the researchers to describe current scientific movement. This paper tries to answer “What do Physics education scientists concentrate in their publications?” by analyzing the productivity and development of publications on the subject category of Physics Education in the period 1980–2013. The Web of Science databases in the research areas of “EDUCATION - EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH” was used to extract the publication trends. The study involves 1360 publications, including 840 articles, 503 proceedings paper, 22 reviews, 7 editorial material, 6 Book review, and one Biographical item. Number of publications with “Physical Education” in topic increased from 0.14 % (n = 2) in 1980 to 16.54 % (n = 225) in 2011. Total number of receiving citations is 8071, with approximately citations per papers of 5.93. The results show the publication and citations in Physic Education has increased dramatically while the Malaysian share is well ranked.

An Academic Life in Malaysia: A Wonderful Life or Satisfaction Not Guaranteed?

Reforms to Malaysian higher education have had radical implications for all aspects of the professional lives of university academics. This chapter outlines the changes brought about by the National Higher Education Plan that have affected and influenced university work environment including careers and job satisfaction of Malaysian academics. It then examines a set of available data from the 2007 CAP study to investigate whether the academic profession is still considered attractive by looking at the satisfaction level of academics in Malaysian universities. This chapter explores aspects of academic job satisfaction using three drive determinants (perception of physical facilities, perception of influence and perception of managerial support) and compares them by gender and teaching or research orientation. Overall, the data reveal that Malaysian academics show a considerable level of job satisfaction and that they have a high regard for their profession. Several implications particularly in relation to the institutional policies and practices are provided in order to foster a conducive working environment and culture that take into account the demands of the Malaysian academic profession in terms of job satisfaction along with its intrinsic and extrinsic factors.