bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Evaluation of a light shelf based on energy consumption for lighting and air conditioning
Authors: Lee Heangwoo , Kim Suktae , Seo Janghoo
Published: December 2017

The shading effects of light shelves in indoor thermal environments have not been investigated to date. Thus, this study aims to identify the effectiveness and appropriate parameters required for a light shelf by evaluating its performance in the presence of lighting and air conditioning. A full-scale testbed was established in this study for evaluating the performance of the light shelf. Moreover, the performance evaluation was conducted by calculating the energy consumed for lighting and air conditioning to maintain proper temperature and illuminance. This study found the following: (1) During summer, the use of a light shelf would reduce the energy consumption for lighting and air conditioning by 0%–10.5% and 6.9%–9.3%, respectively. (2) During winter, the use of a light shelf would increase the energy consumption for lighting and air conditioning by 0%–25.3% and 0.2%–3.2%, respectively, which is undesirable. (3) Increasing the angle of the light shelf would increase the amount of light penetrating to indoors, thus would reduce the energy required for lighting. Based on these findings, we recommend the installation of a detachable light shelf that is 0.6-m wide with a 30° angle for buildings in Korea; and during winter, the light shelf should be removed to save energy.
Drinking policy or a political drink? Illegal alcohol in the Swedish press
Authors: Tryggvesson Kalle , Olsson Börje
Published: January 2018

During the last 10 years the Swedish tradition of restrictive alcohol policy has been seriously threatened. One of the most important causes of change has been Sweden's entry into the European Union. Entrance into the EU gave rise to arguments for consumer's rights and free trade. Swedish alcohol policy was questioned both with ideological arguments and on practical grounds. The alcohol policy was expected to be weakened in several ways by harmonization of taxes, demonopolization, increased import quotas and also illegal imports due to reduced boarder controls between EU-countries. At the end of the 1990s, illegal alcohol (smuggled or illegally homeproduced alcohol) became an important factor in the alcohol policy field: in 1999 the Minister of Health and Social Affairs stated that the fight against illegal alcohol is the most important issue for Swedish alcohol policy.

The aim of this study was to explore how illegal alcohol was described in 10 Swedish newspapers during 1990, 1994 and 1999.

The number of articles increased dramatically during the 1990s. In the first year most articles were found in the local press, but at the end of the period most of the articles were published in the nationwide press, indicating the greater importance of the topic. In 1990 and 1994 illegal alcohol was presented as a future problem if Sweden adapted the wrong alcohol policy. In the later years it was presented as an existing fact to which Sweden has to adjust. It was used as an argument for a wide range of liberal proposals.

There was also a change when it came to the actors in the debate as representatives of different sectors of the alcohol industry entered the field. One of the most interesting features is that the industry and the public authorities together started a media campaign against illegal alcohol with a focus on the connection between illegal alcohol and organized crime syndicates. This is also an example of how the perceived problems with illegal alcohol depend very much on the interests of the actors.

We argue that the focus on illegal alcohol can be understood as an example of the use of a good enemy. Several actors, including the public authorities, have had an interest in the fact that illegal alcohol is viewed as a serious problem. For the alcohol industry it is a way to combat a competitor, and for public authorities it can be a way of legitimizing changes in alcohol policy which they had to make anyway. Factors like this seem to have been very important in the formulation of illegal alcohol as a problem.
A programme to reduce dropout from abstinence oriented treatment of drug abusers
Authors: Hesse Morten
Published: January 2018

Keeping people with drug dependence in treatment is a great challenge in the delivery of effective treatment, especially in abstinence oriented treatment settings. The article presents preliminary data on a quasi-experimental study. New admissions to a community unit who applied for in-patient treatment were required to participate in drawing up a comprehensive plan for rehabilitation, including job training, aftercare treatment and housing, before being placed on a waiting list for in-patient treatment. Most persons admitted to in-patient treatment in the unit were opiate dependent.

After the implementation of the new policy, retention in in-patient treatment increased significantly, while the percentage of those who did not relapse during the in-patient phase dropped and the percentage of those working, studying or participating in a reemployment program rose.

While the changes in discharge outcome can be attributed both to unmeasured changes in the population served after vs. before the implementation of the new policy, and to the policy itself, they suggest the desirability of further research into the question of adequate rehabilitation planning in residential treatment for drug dependence.
Is alcohol dependence a mediator between alcohol consumption and alcohol-related problems? A study from a clinical population in Stockholm County
Authors: Romelsjö Anders , Room Robin , Ellström Elisabeth
Published: January 2018

Several studies have been done on the prevalence of the alcohol dependence syndrome, while other studies have focused on whether the dependence syndrome can be seen as a unity, or not. Few studies have analysed the association between alcohol consumption, the alcohol dependence syndrome (ADS) and alcohol-related problems. A main issue is to what extent an association between alcohol consumption and problems is explained by the dependence syndrome or by its sub-components (drinking despite a health problem, craving, impaired control, preoccupation with alcohol, withdrawal symptoms and increased tolerance). The purpose in this paper is to elucidate this issue in analyses of data from the health care-based clinical sample of the study “Women and Men in Swedish Addiction Treatment”, comprising comprehensive interviews of almost 1000 inpatients and outpatients in Stockholm County. These data cover e.g. alcohol and drug use, alcohol dependence (ICD-10) measured by the Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI), the composite-scores part of the Addiction Severity Index (ASI), sociodemographics and alcohol-related problems. Three measures of alcohol-related problems were constructed covering health and psychological problems, self-defined social problems, and social problems defined by others. In these exploratory analyses of patients with alcohol dependence as a dominating problem, a series of logistic regression analyses were done. A substantial part of the association between the consumption measures and the three outcomes could be accounted for by measures of the ADS. The predictive power of the six criteria composing the ADS varied considerably for the different outcomes. The interpretation is not straightforward, not least as the alcohol dependence syndrome also includes items of alcohol-related problems.
Finnish-born and Swedish-born patients in the Stockholm county health-based addiction treatment system
Authors: Stenius Kerstin
Published: January 2018

Even though the Finnish and Swedish alcohol cultures and societies are very similar, Finns have a reputation for drinking more heavily than Swedes. Earlier research in Sweden has shown that Finnish immigrants in Sweden experience more health problems and more alcohol related deaths than Swedes. Research results concerning their treatment consumption have been contradictory.

Based on interviews with 942 persons entering the health-based addiction treatment system in Stockholm county between November 2000 and November 2001, this article sets out to study to what extent the patients that were born in Finland (N = 82) differ from those born in Sweden (N = 771). It also examines to what extent the Finnish-born differ from Swedes if you control for work position as a sign of social status, and main drug use (alcohol or illegal drugs).

The data consists of structured interviews, conducted by trained interviewers in the research project. The results are presented as distributions and correlations tested with Pearson Chi2. In order to be able to say to what extent the problems of the Finnish born were related to their particular immigrant position compared to social status, a weighted sample of Swedes was constructed, using the variables “most common or last work position” and “main drug as reason for coming to treatment (alcohol or illicit drugs)”.

The results showed that the Finnish born patients were overrepresented in treatment. This could largely, but not fully, be explained by their social position and age structure.

The Finnish-born were a much more homogeneous group than the Swedes as they were mostly male and workers, and predominantly treated for their alcohol problems. They had a more problematic housing situation than comparable Swedes. Their alcohol consumption was somewhat higher than among comparable Swedish patients, and they had experienced some more symptoms of dependency and negative consequences of drinking, particularly those associated with health issues. They had more treatment experiences during the year before this treatment round, but not more days in treatment. Their attitudes to drinking and drug problems, and to treatment in general, as far as attitudes and expectations were concerned, seemed rather positive and very similar to the Swedish patients, however.

The fact that they received a lot of treatment but shorter treatment contacts than comparable Swedes might indicate that the Swedish system has not been able to meet their needs particularly well.
Drug use: the new generation
Authors: Hakkarainen Pekka , Metso Leena
Published: January 2018

Drug use increased in the 1990s also in Finland. The article describes the results of a postal questionnaire survey in Finland in autumn 2002. The population of the survey consisted of Finnish people aged 15–69.

A total of 2,541 persons took part in the survey, giving a response rate of 63 per cent. This can be considered reasonably high. A comparison of the results with the figures produced by surveys conducted in the same way in 1992, 1996 and 1998 provides a good indication of how the situation has developed over the past ten years.

In the 2002 survey, 12 per cent of the respondents said they had tried or used an illicit substance at some point in their life. The majority reported that this had happened one year ago or earlier. Three per cent reported drug use during the past 12 months, one per cent that they had used drugs during the past 30 days. A comparison with earlier studies reveals trends in both directions. The numbers who indicated that they had sometimes tried or used drugs have increased, over the past four years particularly among women. The figures describing recent use in 2002 do not seem to have changed since 1998.

The sharpest increase in the numbers trying drugs was seen in the age group 20–29. In 2002, around one in three men and around one in four women in this age group reported having tried cannabis at some stage in their life. In the age group under 40 the use of amphetamine and extacy also showed a statistically significant increase. The figures describing non-medicinal use of medical substances had also increased. In the metropolitan Helsinki region and in larger cities with a population of more than 100,000, drug use was more common than elsewhere in the country.

The analysis presented in this article shows that the second drug wave during the 1990s in Finland is a generational phenomenon. The new drug users and experimenters come from age groups who were born in the 1970s and 1980s. It seems that the new party culture has, in accordance with international trends, arrived in Finland and the use of stimulants that is associated with nightlife have gained an increasingly firm footing in our country.
Troublesome break: Redirecting alcohol policy in Finland and Sweden from 1990 onwards
Authors: Tigerstedt Christoffer , Karlsson Thomas
Published: January 2018

For a century Finnish and Swedish regulation of alcohol production and trade was a concern of the state, aiming to minimise private profit from alcohol sales. In the 1990's both national and local alcohol policy were reshaped in both countries. This was due to influences from international trade and reorganisations in managing the nation state.

The focus of this article is, first, on how the central public administrations in Finland and Sweden reacted to the new situation. New administrative practices and the political status of new policy documents are of particular interest. Second, the text analyses the guiding principles behind the activities set out in recent alcohol policy programmes in each country.

The results of the study show that

- in reshaping alcohol policy Finland has been more favourable to international influences than Sweden. This was true with regard to the EU negotiations in the first half of the 1990's, but is also clearly reflected in national alcohol policy programmes developed after the introduction of the new alcohol legislations (1995). In the latter case Finland has leaned heavily on the European Alcohol Action Plan put forth by the World Health Organization, Regional Office for Europe.

- the size of government report on alcohol policy have shrunk in Finland. After 1989 the justifications of national policy have not been thoroughly stated. In this case, Sweden has acted very differently.

- in Finland parliamentary based state committees have been replaced by working groups run by state officials. In Sweden committees are still appreciated, but in addition to their preparatory tasks they are given an operative mandate.

- in Finland alcohol policy is given only modest political status within the state administration. In Sweden alcohol policy issues are usually submitted to the government and/or the parliament.

- for the moment Sweden is resolutely opting for an alcohol policy strategy based on professionalised “prevention coordinators”. In Finland the strategy is still under consideration.

The reaction to the break from a long-standing alcohol policy tradition has taken somewhat different routes in Finland and Sweden. Neither of the countries draws on the “Nordic alcohol policy” anymore. Rather they are choosing different policy practices.
The authority of the police in the regulation of public drinking in Finland
Authors: Törrönen Jukka , Soine-Rajanummi Seppo
Published: January 2018

Aim

The aim was to study the values, objectives, means and stances of the police in the regulation of public drinking by using interviews taken from police officers working in Helsinki, Lappeenranta and Tampere.

Method

The interviews were analysed by addressing 1) the classifications the police used in the definition of the targets of regulation, 2) what kinds of techniques they supported in the management of targets and 3) what aspirations, rights and responsibilities they assumed for those who exercise authority and for those that are to be governed.

Results

The police identified two basic groups in the regulation of public drinking: alcoholics who live in the street, and the young. Alcoholics were the main target of regulation from the 1960s to the 1980s. The young became the principal target of regulation during the 1990s. According to the police, alcoholics are a cosmetic problem of public order. Instead, the disorderly drinking of the young is a serious problem. In the regulation of the behaviour of the young, however, the main responsibility belongs to families and schools. Overall, the police emphasised that their authority to govern public drinking has dwindled with the individualization and liberalization of society. Therefore, the liability in policing has to be spread onto private agencies and organisations. On the other hand, the police pointed out that drugs have become the most acute problem of public order. In the regulation of this problem, they advocated tough measures.

Conclusions

The results suggest that the regulation of public drinking of the police has become differentiated. Policing is directed towards the young because adults are regarded as sovereign actors whose rights to express themselves in public places are difficult to limit. At the same time, however, the behaviour of adults is governed indirectly by emphasising the ethos of parenthood and through public/private alliances.
Television and drinking expectancies: the influence of television viewing on positive drinking expectanc and alcohol use among US and Norwegian adolescents: a comparative analysis
Authors: Thomsen Steven Riley , Rekve Dag
Published: January 2018

Objective

Exposure to incidental portrayals of drinking on television and cleverly crafted advertisements has been linked to the development of positive alcohol expectancies in children and teenagers. Researchers hoping to demonstrate this connection, however, have difficultly in finding adolescent groups with little or no exposure to alcohol advertising for comparative purposes. One of the cornerstones of Norwegian alcohol policy has been a government-enacted ban on all forms of advertising for alcohol products containing more than 2.5% alcohol by volume. As a consequence, Norwegian youth have almost no experience with alcohol advertising. This study represents a comparative analysis of Norwegian and US teenagers that seeks to improve our understanding of television's and alcohol advertising's potential role in shaping attitudes about alcohol.

Method

Self-report data on television viewing, normative beliefs about teenage drinking, and alcohol expectancies were collected from convenience samples of 972 junior high students in the US and 622 junior high students in Norway.

Results

Although students in both countries watch about the same amount of television and about equal numbers have tried alcohol, the Norwegian students were more likely to see drinking as a normal teenage behavior and to have more positive outcome expectancies. For students from both countries who had no personal experience with alcohol, frequent television viewers were more likely than light viewers to see drinking as a normative behavior with positive outcomes. This was particularly true for Norwegian students who viewed large amount of US and British programs as well as music videos.

Conclusion

The absence of alcohol advertising in Norway may be overshadowed by the general cultural acceptance of adolescent and young adult drinking. For students with no personal experience with alcohol, however, television may be functioning as an important socializing agent, providing them with portrayals of drinking behaviors, cultivating normative beliefs, and presenting opportunities to cognitively model and rehearse the behaviors shown.
Risk, pleasure and information – notes concerning the discursive space of prevention
Authors: Bergmark Anders
Published: January 2018

In this paper the notions of risk, pleasure and information are discussed with reference both to their utilization within the prevention discourse and to their relation to a process of de-traditionalization. It is suggested that the current lack of options for moral discourse directed towards the individual's freedom of choice, restricts the vocabulary of prevention to deal only with the harm produced by alcohol consumption. Prevention discourses can-not address the motivational structure connected to the individual's pursuit for pleasure and self-fulfilling experiences.

This constraint can be seen as a contributing factor to the centrality of risk in alcohol prevention discourses. Although risk-information is produced within the scientific community by a logic of its own, it is also related to the individuals expanding menu of choices that follows with subject-centered individualism with little or no room for moral discourse concerning the individual's construction of lifestyle and identity. When morality is no longer present, only risk can fill its traditional role, that of being a reason for renouncing. It is not by chance that the most important actors on the alcohol policy scene in traditional temperance societies now are professionals and bureaucrats and not voluntary temperance organizations and that the latter have increasingly adopted their arguments from the former.
Mobile information seeking and political participation: A differential gains approach with offline and online discussion attributes
Authors: Yamamoto Masahiro , Nah Seungahn
Published: December 2017

This study, derived from a differential gains model, examines how mobile-based political information seeking is associated with offline and online political participation in interaction with three political discussion features: frequency, size, and heterogeneity. Data from a Web survey of an online panel indicate that the link between mobile information seeking and offline and online political participation is greater for respondents who discuss politics with others face to face and online more frequently and a greater diversity of others face to face and online.
Critical racial literacy in homes, schools, and communities: Propositions for early childhood contexts
Authors: Nash Kindel , Howard Joy , Miller Erin , Boutte Gloria , Johnson George , Reid Lisa
Published: December 2017

Grounded in critical and emancipatory theories, five critical ethnographies about the lives of children, grandchildren, colleagues, students, and teachers are analyzed and synthesized to illuminate the ways in which individuals are racially socialized over their lifespans. Three propositions for early childhood contexts were apparent across the studies: (1) racial identity and dysconsciousness are learned over time and across multiple spaces; (2) critical racial literacy is a complex, cyclical, and sometimes contradictory process; and (3) critical racial literacy demands acknowledging and confronting blind spots. Building on these propositions, the authors present implications for enacting practices that promote critical racial literacy in early childhood education settings around the globe.
Internal shear cracking in bulk metal forming
Authors: Christiansen P , Nielsen CV , Bay N , Martins PAF
Published: December 2017

This paper presents an uncoupled ductile damage criterion for modelling the opening and propagation of internal shear cracks in bulk metal forming. The criterion is built upon the original work on the motion of a hole subjected to shear with superimposed tensile stress triaxiality and its overall performance is evaluated by means of side-pressing formability tests in Aluminium AA2007-T6 subjected to different levels of pre-strain. Results show that the new proposed criterion is able to combine simplicity with efficiency for predicting the onset of fracture and the crack propagation path for the entire set of test cases regardless the amount of pre-strain derived from previous upsetting under near frictionless conditions. The new proposed criterion can be easily implemented in existing finite element programs and its scope of application allows extending previous work on the opening modes in surface cracking to internal cracks formed under three-dimensional states of stress that are typical of bulk metal forming.
Determination of an average quasi-linear viscoelastic model for the mechanical behavior of rat cervix
Authors: Ashofteh Yazdi Alireza , Esteki Ali , Dehghan Mohammad Mehdi
Published: December 2017

The objective of this study was to determine an average quasi-linear viscoelastic model for the mechanical behavior of rat cervix. The average model is applicable at defined displacement rates for virgin and pregnant tissues in the last trimester of pregnancy. After preconditioning, the displacement of 2 mm was applied to the distal halves of five pregnant rat’s cervices and 1 mm to the five virgin samples circumferentially. Uniaxial tension tests were employed at the displacement rates of 0.01, 0.1 and 1 mm/s randomly and were held for 10 min while the tissues were relaxed. Tensile and load-relaxation curves were well described by a quasi-linear viscoelastic model. Two average quasi-linear viscoelastic models were fitted to all 30 curves obtained from experiments for virgin and pregnant tissues. The average quasi-linear viscoelastic model coefficients were extracted using the average model equations. Cervical tissue is strongly viscoelastic. Determination of an average viscoelastic model of rat cervix may lead to a more precise description of the mechanical behavior of the virgin and pregnant tissues in the assessment of cervical insufficiency.
Improving surface roughness of the 3D printed part using electroless plating
Authors: Dixit Nitesh Kumar , Srivastava Rajeev , Narain Rakesh
Published: December 2017

The effect of electroless metallic coating on 3D printed acrylonitrile–butadiene–styrene plastic parts surface has been studied. Owing to its excellent toughness, good-dimensional reliability, good-process capability, chemical resistance and cost-effectiveness, acrylonitrile–butadiene–styrene is used for fabrication of parts using a 3D open source printer. These parts are further metallic coated using electroless copper deposition technique. Two different surface preparation processes, namely aluminium paint paste and aluminium epoxy paste have been used for electroless coating. After the surface conditioning of parts using these methods, copper is deposited electrolessly using acidic solution, containing 12.5 wt% copper sulphate with 7.5 wt% of sulphuric acid. Deposition of copper, for two different methods, has been carried out using different temperature conditions and different time of deposition. In the first case, the temperature of the solution is initially kept at 45±2 ℃ and is allowed to come to the room temperature as the deposition is completed. In the second case, the temperature of the solution is maintained at room temperature throughout the process. Further, copper-deposited 3D printed parts were characterized based on their surface roughness measurement, electrical conductivity measurement, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive spectroscopy and adhesion evaluation test. It has been found that both the methods used for coating show better electrical performance and more uniform copper deposition. Adhesion between copper layers and 3D printed acrylonitrile–butadiene–styrene substrates is found to have good strength for Al-Epoxy-coated parts.
The many voices of business: Framing the Keystone pipeline in US and Canadian news
Authors: Wood Tim
Published: December 2017

Corporations rarely enter political battles alone. They have long partnered with trade associations to articulate industry views, and more recently have begun routinely creating their own activist organizations to act as allies. Amid this turn toward grassroots corporate organizing, how is the voice – or perhaps voices – of business articulated in the news? Using the case study of coverage of the Keystone bitumen pipeline, I offer a framing analysis of 480 news items from six outlets in the United States and Canada, showing which voices and frames dominate the debate. My data demonstrate that while corporations have a robust voice in news, trade associations participate only sparingly, and corporately funded grassroots campaigns are almost wholly omitted. Furthermore, key silences characterize corporations’ mediated voice, with companies neglecting to comment on issues such as climate change; anti-pipeline activists, meanwhile, maintain their own forms of strategic silence. Proponents and detractors alike promote their ‘owned issues’, offering discourse more akin to a shouting match than a debate.
Bounding and bonding community: Ethnic diversity and the ethic of inclusion in hyperlocal news
Authors: Zhang Chi
Published: December 2017

Amid the changing communication environment, there has been a growing interest from practitioners, policy makers, and scholars in harnessing the potential of hyperlocal news to strengthen communities and revitalize the condition for civic action. Hyperlocal news is often taken to signify a form of information provision by and for the community, leaving the boundaries, meaning, and assumed normative value of community unquestioned and uncontended. This article highlights the blind spots in the current research in hyperlocal news and argues that increasing ethnic diversity in local communities requires confronting the challenge of communication in and across difference. Citing empirical evidence from a small multiethnic city, this article argues that the concept of community is ultimately unproductive for positively thematizing the role of hyperlocal news in the context of ethnic diversity, and recasting hyperlocal news as a public discursive realm with differently situated publics points to new normative values and directions for research.
The business of news in the attention economy: Audience labor and MediaNews Group’s efforts to capitalize on news consumption
Authors: Nixon Brice
Published: December 2017

This article analyzes the business of news in the early 21st century through a case study of the US newspaper company MediaNews Group. It examines the company’s efforts over the past decade to create sources of revenue while the US newspaper industry faced a growing financial crisis. This article argues it is necessary to rethink the political economy of news to see that power over news consumption is the foundation of the business of news. The concepts of an attention economy and audience labor are used to reframe the process of capitalizing on news as, fundamentally, a process of gaining power over attention in order to treat it as an exploitable form of audience labor and thereby generate revenue from news consumers or advertisers. This article then presents a study of the strategies for generating revenue used by MediaNews Group from 2006 to 2016, focusing on its clusters of newspapers in California. Ownership consolidation was the company’s key strategy until its debt and the industry’s crisis forced it into bankruptcy. The company then pursued a series of digital strategies: digital advertising, paywalls, mobile distribution, citizen journalism, copyright infringement lawsuits, and Google Consumer Surveys. None proved profitable enough, and in 2016, the company returned to ownership consolidation. MediaNews Group’s efforts over the past decade demonstrate the inescapable truth that power over attention is the key to the business of news: Capitalizing on news requires power over news consumption as a form of attention that can be exploited as news audience labor.
A formative measurement approach for exploring how to form service quality in hot spring resorts
Authors: Liu Xiaoming , Fu Yi , Chao Ren-Fang , Li Jun (Justin)
Published: December 2017

In contrast to the reflective perspective of service quality measurement used in the existing literature, this paper proposes a multi-dimensional model for measuring service quality in hot spring resorts, based on a formative perspective. The formative measurement approach aims to explore how the service quality of hot spring resorts is formed. To achieve this purpose, an exploratory research study was conducted using partial least squares structural equation modelling method. A hot spring resort located in southern China was chosen as the research site to obtain the original data, by surveying customers with spa experience at the resort. Concurrently, service quality was investigated as a second-order construct using a reflective–formative model. Theoretically, this reflective–formative model provides a more comprehensive understanding of service quality in hot spring resort domains. Finally, this study confirmed the following six components of service quality for hot spring resorts: water quality, customer service, facilities, surroundings, alternative activities and convenience. The results show that these six components form service quality in hot spring resorts and may influence consumers’ attachment to such places.
The influence of menu design, menu item descriptions and menu variety on customer satisfaction. A case study of Egypt
Authors: Baiomy Ahmed E , Jones Eleri , Goode Mark M H
Published: December 2017

This study proposed a model of the influence of menu attributes on customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction studies in restaurants have not emphasized menu attributes, despite menus being critically important restaurant products. To date no study has investigated the relationship between menu attributes and customer satisfaction. Multiple regression analysis of the data indicated that menu design, menu item descriptions, and menu variety were significant predictors of customer satisfaction. The study’s findings will be beneficial for educators, students in hotel management programs and practitioners to better understand the complex association between menu attributes and customer satisfaction.
Reading aloud in an era of common core: An exploratory study of the perspectives of primary teachers serving African American children in low-income communities
Authors: Duggins Shaunté , Acosta Melanie M
Published: December 2017

Within the last decade, two large reading reform efforts have directed state and local state school reading instruction, the Reading First Initiative (2002) and the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts (2010). These initiatives have heavily shaped literacy teaching and learning with a focus on disparity reduction in literacy achievement among culturally diverse student groups. Unfortunately, the impact of such policies on student reading achievement and reading instruction is mixed. In other words, there is little consensus or firm evidence to document substantial positive outcomes of reading policy implementation. The current study explores the influence of the Common Core State Standards on the read-aloud perspectives and practices of primary-grade teachers in schools serving predominantly African American children in economically marginalized communities after adoption of the standards. Participants included 64 primary teachers across five Title I schools who completed an online survey that included open and closed ended questions. Researchers used quantitative and qualitative methods to analyse the data, guided by a critical, sociocultural perspective. Overall, findings point to a disconnect between the intentions of the Common Core State Standards in primary classrooms and the realities of how classroom teachers are interpreting the policy and providing instruction as a result, particularly in schools in low-income communities.
The thin ideal and the practice of fashion
Authors: Volonté Paolo
Published: December 2017

The thin ideal is a characteristic feature of late-modern western societies. Yet, the awareness of the harm it causes has proved insufficient to defeat it. Moreover, despite the international trend of overweight and obesity’s increase, the fashion industry and fashion consumers continue to adjust their decisions to an ideal of slenderness. This seems contradictory. This article shows that the inertia of the thin ideal can be explained by referring to the practice of fashion: The ideal of thinness has been incorporated into habits, routines, objects and the bodies themselves of those who engage in the practice. On one hand, the article shows that at the origin of the tyranny of thinness there is, among other things, a technological development in the production of fashion, namely, the application of the sizing system to the manufacture of clothing. On the other hand, it argues that the thin ideal today is not just a standard of perfection in people’s minds – for instance, in the attitude of fashion designers and consumers towards the female body – but is also incorporated in very solid elements in the process of fashion production, for instance, the models’ bodies. This makes it especially hard for all protagonists of the fashion system to change their attitude and practices towards the standards to be pursued. The inclusion of the ideal of thinness in the practice of fashion can be considered a significant reason of its resilience in a changing world.
Changing patterns of conspicuous consumption: Media representations of luxury in second homes
Authors: Walters Trudie , Carr Neil
Published: December 2017

This article examines the potential of utilising representations of luxury in second homes to chart the changing patterns of conspicuous consumption. It is situated within a New Zealand context and based on the analysis of representations of luxury in second homes in an architecture/lifestyle magazine from 1936 to 2015. A qualitative thematic analysis was carried out on the written and visual text of 305 second home articles. The findings are divided into time periods which relate to distinct socio-cultural, political and economic events and ideologies that have influenced New Zealand society. The analysis reveals a change from ‘quiet luxury’ during the war years to the luxury of imported products, reflecting a fascination with first American and then European style in the mid-century. It also shows a change from a reputed cultural reticence to display one’s wealth to the flagrant conspicuous consumption of luxury goods and services in the 1980s which aligns with the rise of new wealth after the introduction of neoliberalism in the country. Finally, the variance between representations of luxury during recessionary times in the 1970s and 2000s demonstrates a change in attitude towards conspicuous consumption.
Reading a water menu: Bottled water and the cultivation of taste
Authors: Biro Andrew
Published: December 2017

The market for bottled water is growing and increasingly segmented. How do we explain not just the willingness to pay for a substance (water) that is almost free but also the increasing discernment in a drink generally considered tasteless? We argue that bottled water market segmentation is a leading edge of processes of water commodification, associated with the crisis of Fordism and rise of consumerist capitalism, where the assertion of status through commodity consumption is increasingly necessary. The extensive Ray’s & Stark water menu is analyzed to show how the taste for bottled waters is cultivated. In the menu, references to gustatory sensation are limited. Instead, the tastefulness of water inheres in the distance from anthropogenic influence, made visible through scientific (geological) discourses. The tension between the desire to consume unmediated nature and the scientific abstraction necessary to recognize it reveals the social character of the taste for bottled waters. The highly refined sense of taste that the water menu’s readers are presumed to have is a reflection of consumerist capitalism’s distinctive ways of reproducing socio-economic inequality and metabolizing non-human nature.
Understanding the food preferences of people of low socioeconomic status
Authors: Baumann Shyon , Szabo Michelle , Johnston Josée
Published: December 2017

Scholars have long studied consumer taste dynamics within class-stratified contexts, but relatively little attention has been paid to the taste preferences of low-socioeconomic-status groups. We analyze interview data from 254 individuals from 105 families across Canada to explore the cultural repertoires that guide low-socioeconomic-status consumer tastes in food. Empirically, we ask which foods respondents prefer, and for what reasons, across socioeconomic status groups. Analytically, we argue that low-socioeconomic-status respondents demonstrate aesthetic preferences that operate according to four cultural repertoires that are distinctly different from that of high-socioeconomic-status omnivorous cultural consumption. Our respondents display tastes for foods from corporate brands, familiar “ethnic” foods, and foods perceived as healthy. While low-socioeconomic-status taste preferences in food are shaped by quotidian economic constraints – what Bourdieu called “tastes of necessity” – we show how cultural repertoires guiding low-socioeconomic-status tastes relate to both material circumstances and broader socio-temporal contexts. Our findings advance debates about the nature of low-socioeconomic-status food ideals by illuminating their underlying meanings and justifications and contribute to scholarly understanding of low-socioeconomic-status consumption.
Can we rely on ‘climate-friendly’ consumption?
Authors: Boström Magnus , Klintman Mikael
Published: December 2017

In policy and research on sustainable consumption in general, and climate-oriented consumption specifically, key questions centre around whether people are motivated and prompted to support such consumption. A common claim in the scholarly debate is that policy makers, in face of fundamental governance challenges, refrain from taking responsibility and instead invest unrealistic hopes in that consumers will solve pressing environmental problems through consumer choice. Although green consumption is challenging, specifically climate-friendly consumption is even more so, due to the particularly encompassing, complex and abstract sets of problems and since climate impact concerns the totality of one’s consumption. Nevertheless, consumers are called to participate in the task to save the planet. This article draws on existing literature on climate-oriented consumption with the aim of contributing to a proper understanding of the relation between consumer action and climate mitigation. It provides a synthesis and presents key constraining mechanisms sorted under five themes: the value-action gap, individualisation of responsibility, knowledge gap, ethical fetishism and the rebound effect. This article concludes with a discussion of perspectives that endorse a socially embedded view of the citizen-consumer. The discussion indicates pathways for how to counteract the constraining mechanisms and open up room for climate-friendly citizen-consumers.
Cold chains in Hanoi and Bangkok: Changing systems of provision and practice
Authors: Rinkinen Jenny , Shove Elizabeth , Smits Mattijs
Published: December 2017

We know that patterns of domestic consumption are situated within broader systems of provision and that home appliances like the fridge freezer bridge between practices of cooking, shopping and eating, on one hand, and increasingly global systems of food production, distribution and diet on the other. In analysing the uses of fridge freezers in Hanoi and Bangkok as expressions, in microcosm, of complex and evolving processes of urbanisation and food provisioning, this article provides new insight into how specific configurations, dependencies and patterns of consumption take hold and how they vary and change. Our analysis of systems and practices in flux has the dual function of showing how household strategies reflect and contribute to more extensive transformations, and of demonstrating how these are shaped by ongoing tensions and relations between new and established forms of urban food supply and associated concepts of freshness and safety. The result is a subtle account of the multiple routes through which consumer ‘needs’ evolve.
Paying minorities to leave
Authors: Gerver Mollie
Published: December 2017

In April 1962, white segregationists paid money to African Americans agreeing to leave New Orleans. In 2010, the British National Party proposed paying non-white migrants money to leave the UK. Five years later, a landlord in New York paid African American tenants to vacate their apartments. This article considers when, if ever, it is morally permissible to pay minorities to leave. I argue that paying minorities to leave is demeaning towards recipients and so wrong. Although the payments are wrong, it is not clear if they are impermissible, given the benefits for the recipients. I argue that payments are impermissible if at least one of two conditions are met: The payments demean or harm other members of society, or the payments are provided to recipients who have failed to consent to the payments.
Navigating amid uncertainty in spatial planning
Authors: Zandvoort Mark , Van der Vlist Maarten J , Klijn Frans , Van den Brink Adri
Published: December 2017

In view of the need to adapt to uncertain climate change through spatial interventions, this article explores how spatial planners might navigate amid uncertainty. To draw out insights for planning, we examine planning frameworks which explicitly recognise uncertainty and uncertainty descriptions from studies in environmental risk and climate uncertainty. We build our case by addressing the implications of different characteristics of uncertainty and describe how planners can handle uncertainty based on the nature, level and location of uncertainty. We argue that a plural–unequivocal characterisation of uncertainty helps planners in their search for adequate and warranted interventions amid uncertainty.
Between conflict and consensus: Searching for an ethical compromise in planning
Authors: Chan Jeffrey Kok Hui , Protzen Jean-Pierre
Published: December 2017

To resolve conflicts and disagreements in planning, a compromise is often necessary. Where immediate consensus is unlikely and where antagonistic conflicts can lead to worse outcomes, a compromise is especially valued. Yet a compromise is also likely the least desired resolution, except for failure to reach a resolution. In this way, a compromise educes a mixed morality: A compromise has to presume some cooperative goodwill, yet forging a compromise often means violating important principles or abandoning some desired goods. If planners compromise, then this compromise ought to be an ethical one. But what is an ethical compromise in planning? In this article, we examine three cases of planning conflict: namely, the case of the Storm Surge Barriers in the Eastern Scheldt, the Netherlands; the case of the Cross Island Line in Singapore; and, finally, the case of the Calamity Polders, the Netherlands. Through these case studies, we draw out and illustrate three different ideal types of compromises important to planning and further describe the practical and ethical implications of a compromise.
Putting one’s best foot forward: Finnish prospective adoptive parent’s strategic interaction in statutory pre-adoption services
Authors: Eriksson Pia K
Published: December 2017

In an inter-country adoption process, the private issue of becoming a parent takes place within a regulated institutional setting and process with professionals acting as gatekeepers along the way. This qualitative study based on 19 narrative interviews scrutinizes the strategic interaction used by prospective adoptive parents to navigate the controlling institutional setting of statutory pre-adoption services. This social interaction with the professionals is analysed as power negotiations and discussed by utilizing Goffman’s conceptual framework of expression management and stage play. The study shows that prospective adoptive parents, whose primary aims differ from those of the professionals, play on different teams than the professionals. Therefore, they utilize expression games through information, emotion, and team management in order to put their best foot forward in the pre-adoption services. But along the inter-country adoption play the audience shifts and the professionals often join the same team as the future adoptive parents. Further, the article discusses the consequences of this on the relationship between the professionals and prospective adoptive parent as a client within a global inter-country adoption scene.