The primary objectives of the study were to determine the principal influences of electronic mediation on text‐based communication as perceived by experienced users and to provide…
Abstract
The primary objectives of the study were to determine the principal influences of electronic mediation on text‐based communication as perceived by experienced users and to provide a basis for additional research including nonusers and novice users. To achieve the first objective, the Delphi technique was employed to obtain the opinions of experienced users of computer‐based communication systems. The members of the Delphi panel failed to reach consensus on any of more than eighty issues, and the three rounds of questionnaires showed little movement in the direction of consensus. The study thus confirms reports of wide variation in style and content of computer‐based messages and underscores the need for additional research in techniques and strategies that influence the readability and effectiveness of electronic messages.
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Games are rapidly becoming a site where cultural ideas are explored and consumed and have recently become an arena for debate around representations of gender. This chapter draws…
Abstract
Games are rapidly becoming a site where cultural ideas are explored and consumed and have recently become an arena for debate around representations of gender. This chapter draws attention to key debates occurring in the field of video games that are also applicable to film studies. This interdisciplinary approach demonstrates the relevance to game studies of a rich vein of scholarship on the gendered action body in film studies. Drawing on research by Yvonne Tasker (1993, 2015), Lisa Purse (2011) and Jeffrey Brown (2011), this chapter seeks to unpick the tensions around gender and violence in the reception of The Last of Us Part II (Naughty Dog, 2020), particularly regarding the surprisingly vehement backlash against the unconventionally muscular deuteragonist Abby.
This chapter asks what happens when the ‘spectacular’ and ‘hard’ bodies of the action heroine enter the soft virtual world of the video game. A focus on whether Abby's body is realistic in the reception of the game leads to a discussion of the ontological status of games as a virtual medium. I argue that the process of motion capture and the real-world reference of CrossFit athlete Colleen Fotsch trouble the conventional dichotomy that understands the medium of games as virtual and film as indexical. Throughout, I use the more ambiguous and ambivalent historical reception of the body of Lara Croft as a useful point of contrast. I argue that the obsessive, hysterical response to Abby's muscular body is indicative of larger tensions between conservative ‘hardcore’ fandoms and the industry's recent drive for progressive change. By denying Abby's authenticity such players also deny female access to traditional masculine pursuits and identities, whether that be bodybuilding or gaming. This is because virtual female action stars, just as much as their real-world counterparts such as Linda Hamilton, trouble the gendered norms that underpin both second-wave feminist accounts of muscular women and the audience of hardcore video game players. As Fron, Fullerton, Morie, and Pearce (2007) critique in their article ‘The Hegemony of Play’, a double standard therefore exists in which such women must justify the reality of their musculature through a kind of ‘proof of process’. Ultimately, I conclude that a similar demand is made of the emergent female audience of gamers, who are continuously made to justify their right to play in a traditionally male space.
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Celal Perihan, Mack D. Burke, Lisa Bowman-Perrott and Joel Bocanegra
The purpose of this study was to investigate the quality of current studies that assess and treat anxiety symptoms in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). More…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study was to investigate the quality of current studies that assess and treat anxiety symptoms in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). More specifically the study aimed to answer the following questions: What are the qualities of the current studies using cognitive behavioral therapies (CBTs) to treat anxiety symptoms in children with ASD? Did studies make necessary modifications and adaptations to CBTs according to the evidence-based strategies and implement these versions of CBTs with precise fidelity? Were the selected measurements appropriate for assessing the anxiety symptoms in children with ASD?
Design/methodology/approach
A systematic review protocol was developed from the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (Moher et al., 2009). A rubric was adapted based on the CEC (Council for Exceptional Children; Cook, 2014) group comparison studies standards and the Evaluative Method for Determining EBP in Autism (Reichow et al., 2007). The 3-point Likert Scale (Chard et al., 2009) was adapted to score each study based on the rubric.
Findings
CBT is a first-line treatment with significant mixed results. Current studies use adapted versions of existing CBTs for children with ASD without reporting empirical evidence to these adaptations and changes. Reporting of the implementation fidelity is still an issue in the treatment of anxiety. Anxiety measurements that were designed for typically developing children failure to detect unusual anxiety symptoms in children with ASD.
Research limitations/implications
The first limitation of this study was including a variety of studies across CBT programs and types of anxiety symptoms. Types of anxiety and CBT treatments may require separate analyses with specific indicators. Due to the limited studies, reviews could not be analyzed across types of CBT programs. The second limitation was the types of studies. Most of the studies were pilot studies. Pilot studies might use various instruments and CBTs components for making selections to produce the best effects and results. The final limitation was the lack of examination of the data analysis process.
Originality/value
These findings are important because due to the variety of changes or adaptation to CBTs, inappropriate implementations and failure to detect unusual anxiety symptoms of children with ASD may cause significant differences in treatment responses and outcomes. The study demonstrated that the majority of the studies used adapted versions of existing CBTs without reporting empirical evidence for these adaptations and changes. The findings have shown that reporting of the implementation fidelity is still an issue. Moreover, the majority of studies had used anxiety measurements that were designed for typically developing children, not for children with ASD.
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Brad S. Long and Cathy Driscoll
Based on themes the authors observed in workplace spirituality texts, the purpose of this paper is to highlight the historicity of these texts and induce a model to help them…
Abstract
Purpose
Based on themes the authors observed in workplace spirituality texts, the purpose of this paper is to highlight the historicity of these texts and induce a model to help them understand how this discourse of workplace spirituality came into being.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors perform intertextual analysis to show how authors draw upon concepts available in the broader discursive context, from which the authors produced a textscape of the workplace spirituality discourse to depict these layers of discursive interconnections.
Findings
The expressed novelty and recency of workplace spirituality as a form of management knowledge, the authors argue, is made ambiguous by its heavy borrowing from other discourses. The authors show how existent spiritual, organizational and societal-level discourses create the conditions of possibility for the discourse of workplace spirituality to emerge. Most of the authors within the corpus engaged the same theories in organizational studies that created the kind of workplaces they now seek to change.
Practical implications
The power of the workplace spirituality discourse to improve the state of workers and work and achieve the expressed desire for change may be diminished through the discursive practices of its authors.
Originality/value
The authors offer a visual “textscape” in which the findings are framed and hence operationalize this idea in a novel manner that contributes to the methods of discourse analysis. The findings also call for more critical reflection into whether workplace spirituality represents a solution to organizational problems when neither the workers nor work it constructs are particularly new.
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Mathew Baker and Michael Lee Joseph
Examine how social studies preservice teachers conceptualize and enact critical historical inquiry.
Abstract
Purpose
Examine how social studies preservice teachers conceptualize and enact critical historical inquiry.
Design/methodology/approach
Critical qualitative case study.
Findings
Differing conceptual understandings and had trouble infusing their practice with the critical theory learned in the university.
Originality/value
Examine how a core practice is bolstering the practice-theory connection in teacher education.
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Philippa Collin, Judith Bessant and Rob Watts
Since 2018, millions of students have mobilised as organisers, advocates and activists for action on global warming in movements like the School Strike 4 Climate. In Australia, an…
Abstract
Since 2018, millions of students have mobilised as organisers, advocates and activists for action on global warming in movements like the School Strike 4 Climate. In Australia, an estimated 500,000 school students, some as young as five, and predominantly girls and young women, have taken part in coordinated school strikes, protest actions online and in cities and towns around the country (Hilder & Collin, 2022). While children and young people have long been central to politics, this more recent mass mobilisation raises new questions about how the various new forms of political participation and expression adopted by young people are significantly reshaping political norms, values and practices in ostensibly liberal democratic regimes like Australia. In this chapter, we propose that close attention be given to whether young people’s political views and demands for political recognition, rights and climate justice is re-constituting politics and whatever passes for ‘democracy’ in contemporary societies. Drawing on a study of the student climate movement in Australia, this chapter briefly describes the emergence of the movement globally and locally. Deploying Isin’s notion of ‘acts of citizenship’ (Isin, 2008), we examine the ways young climate activists are engaged in critical, performative, political practice, making claims for political recognition, rights and climate justice.
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Yim‐Yu Song, Thomas E. Maher, Joel D. Nicholson and Nicholas P. Gurney
Looks at the problems of logistics in military operations and today’s commercial businesses. Traces the development of logistics management from a subordinate activity within a…
Abstract
Looks at the problems of logistics in military operations and today’s commercial businesses. Traces the development of logistics management from a subordinate activity within a product producing entity to its performance by a separate entity which specializes in this area and requires a strategic alliance. Looks at this issue from the perspective of the outsourcing company and the logistical company. Considers what happens when this process is reversed and provides implications for the future.
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Warigia Bowman and Arifa Khandwalla
This essay surveys and synthesizes the academic literature, archival sources and interviews with key policy makers regarding the emergence of community technology centers in the…
Abstract
This essay surveys and synthesizes the academic literature, archival sources and interviews with key policy makers regarding the emergence of community technology centers in the US. Community Technology Centers (CTCs) came to the fore in the late 1990s through an activist nonprofit sector combined with federal government and private sector funding. Federal data indicates that CTCs now represent the most important access points to information communications technology for the poor in the US. This essay reviews the latest arguments for and against continued investment in CTCs and public access in general. In addition to providing access, which is often used beneficially for employment and education related purposes, CTCs appear to contribute to social capital as they become social gathering points. This paper concludes, that both government and nonprofits play a vital role in ensuring public access for the poor and that continued investment in CTCs is warranted.