Thursday, August 8, 2019

Exceptionalism, Isolationism, and expansionism with reference to Essay

Exceptionalism, Isolationism, and expansionism with reference to videos and assigned readings - Essay Example An examination of a developed country’s foreign policy such as America is essential in determining the importance of an effective foreign policy. A critical analysis of the American foreign policy portrays an interconnection of exceptionalism, isolationism, and expansionism. A manifestation of this interconnection is clearly seen during the Mexican - American War. This is because the war arguably marks the first steps of America’s rise to a global power. The Mexican – American War revolved around territorial disputes between America and Mexico. This implies that the entire Mexican – American War can be considered to be based upon American expansionism. This is because America sought to expand its territories into Mexico in areas considered to have some significance. America claimed that the border was at Rio Grande while Mexico argued that the border was at Nueces River. A border at Rio Grande meant that Mexico would lose a significant portion of land to America. In 1945, President Polk sent American troops under the leadership of General Zachary Taylor to the Nueces River to take over the disputed land. Polk’s actions can be considered to have been facilitated by his position as provided by America’s foreign policy where the president is recognized as the commander in chief of the army and navy. America’s presence was met by opposition from the Mexican troops at a time that saw the death of 11 Ame rican soldiers and imprisonment of several more (The Mexican American War, 2006). However, this was followed by a series of other conflicts in Mexico in which the American troops occasionally emerged victorious and consequently the occupation of Mexico City by Americans. In addition to increased expansion interests to the South, America also had keen interest in expanding the Northern borders such as California. This period that saw increased concentration on expansion can be considered to have marked America’s first attempts of becoming a

Wednesday, August 7, 2019

I Want to Be a Nurse Essay Example for Free

I Want to Be a Nurse Essay Writing assessment Empire college offers a unique learning environment for the busy learner who may be juggling a number of roles, spouse, parent, manager, entrepreneur, volunteer, caregiver, and more. We offer a flexible learning environment, with individually designed degree programs, and opportunities to study online,face to face, or a combination of the two. In a type essay of no fewer than 300 words, please describe: 1. Your reason for applying to Empire State College. 2. Your personal and professional goals, and what topics or areas you hope to study 3. Your strengths and experiences (educational, employment, community and personal background) that will make you a successful student in our learning environment. MY LIFE STORY Life is a long journey to seek happiness and great joy! Sometimes we can successfully overcome some kind of hardships in life and sometimes we are still struggling and suffering but don’t ever be despondent. No matter how hard it is, as long as you stay persistent and self determined you will overcome those obstacles. There were so many stages on my risky challenge journey to find a happy life! To know who you are you must know where you began. My life starts in a small village in Viet Nam. Despite growing up with a privilege life full of food on the table, a warm bed to sleep in, plenty of toys†¦It is human nature to want what I don’t have-nurturing parents. My parents worked very hard to provide a better life that they never had. I and three of my brothers were grown up with unhappy childhood. We never had time to play with friends, go to the park or even get any gift on our birthday †¦.All of us had to work after school to help my parents earn more money for food and others basic shelters. When I was in the middle school I had to do all of the housework and trading in the market for foods. I believed that is why I am so independent on my life. MY name is â€Å"My† which is often misspelled and misunderstanding. But it carried a full meaning to my parents. First it means beautiful. Second it links to a country â€Å"United State of American†. When I was a kid my parents usually tell me about how wonderful American are which in . Wealthy, Independence and freedom In 1987 when I was born my parents escaped from Vietnam to United State of American to explore a new life with a standard living but they failed and I was named â€Å"My† to chase my parents dream. I and my Parents had shared about â€Å"American dream† since I was 10 years old. I always dreamed of get out of my small village to fulfill my family dream and make a better life to help my parents who had sacrifice themselves to raise us to become good persons. Even how hard they are we still go through school. I was always study very hard at school and look for a chance to study aboard in the promising land American. Time went by and even how hard my parents and I tried we still could not afford for going aboard. But I still kept thinking about this dream until one day I had got a chance to take risk to work aboard as a technician specialist named Chartered Semiconductor in Singapore. The day I left my country and my family was a gloomiest day that I never forget. I was very excited to explore about Singapore at the first time I came there. I heard that Singapore is a very high standard country. Living and working in this country I don’t have to suffer from any obstacle. But dream is always dream and when I started to work I knew that it is never easy to get what you want without skills and experiences. Things never come the way I expected. It s so much can be say for living and immersing myself in another country and multicultural. I had to face with a lot of horrible experiences at work. Especially it was so difficult for me to adjust to speak Sing-English. Co-worker made fun of my English. I was hurt like a deep wound cut inside. I was cried some nights and even I was mad at myself. But 2 weeks later I told myself not to be discouraged because I left my homeland for this and there was no excuse for me to give up. Slowly I tried to join at work, make friends and ask them whatever I didn’t understand. I found my own way to get help. I gradually created my life with a fully eye-open experience. I built a lot of intangible skills. Each situation was a stepped stone thread through to my life with so many little things teaches me independence, management, organization and the best is self-confidence. I also found my love destiny here. I met my husband at work who was a nice, thoughtful and caring Vietnamese-American. He helped and supported me during the time I was struggle and suffer at work and the new life here. Through him I had come to God and believed in God. God had leaded me the way to go further and fulfill my dreams. We married after 3 years dating. One Year later we moved to Germany because of my husband work and we stayed there for 1 year and 4 months. From this time, I was really enjoy my life. I has chances to experience plenty of new things with my flesh eyes which I had read in books and surfed on Internet. I knew more about amazing country over the world and I was so interested to learn so many things about social, history, custom, religious about Germany and European. I had built a very good relationship here. I will never forget about this wonderful period of my life. And I, now finally, am here in New York. Enjoy my second winter. My dream about American for a long time had come true. To me, New York was a far-away and strange land at the first time. I was scared and lonely for almost 3 months. I and my husband moved to New York last winter in October 2011 and we experienced 2 terrible storms then we settled up everything to get ready for a lot of plans. I could not forget the first time my husband teach me to drive. My heart was bumping and my palm was sweat. I tried to get my driver license other way I had to stay at home. And now I can I drive to library every week, found a good job, made good friends and had plenty of good relationships, and the best thing is I will be Baptism next month to become a Catholic Christian. Thanks God blessed for me onmy life. I had so many goals and I had made them come true. I was on phone with my Mum on my 27th birthday. She said she is so proud of about me that I made her happy and the most important she asked me â€Å"What are you going to do next?† Five years living aboard is such a long time, but it goes so fast. I did not let any hardship hold me back and I am going to go through another bigger goal which is go to college and I will never stop to achieve my dreams. I was interested in Health filed and I always wished to become a helpful nurse when I was very young. Being a Vietnamese girl learn English to become a nurse is my first and forehead goal I want to do in this coming year. I would love to care about people and make them happy. My motivation is 4 year college and then go to study beyond later if I have a chance because education never stop. There are a lot of things to do in this country. I still want to have a good future with a solid stepped stone in life and a loving family. I will raise my children to become a successful person. They will use my experience story as a role for them to work hard and to be successful in their lives. And I have to say my heart was burning when I found Empire State Community college. I really want to get my degree here so desperately. Empire State community college offer the course which I interested in with flexible study option and it have great faculty, also a warm and diverse community and interesting traditional according to students. I can decide how, where and when I sturdy to complete my education.That’s great. I have a long way to go but I will do my best to reach my goals. Yes! Everyone have a story-history that has made them the way they are to make a happy life! And that is who am I!

Tuesday, August 6, 2019

Steinbeck is interested in the ways hardship and suffering human character Essay Example for Free

Steinbeck is interested in the ways hardship and suffering human character Essay Steinbeck is interested in the ways hardship and suffering human character. Discuss how this is portrayed in Of Mice And Men Of Mice and Men is a novel very much affected by the time in which its author lived. Steinbeck wrote and set Of Mice And Men in a time of great economic change in America, when the countrys 125,000 threshers (men who harvested grain- Californias major product) were slowly being replaced for the new and more efficient form of harvesting-mechanical combines. The Wall Street Crash in 1929 heralded the start of the Great Depression that swept America in the 1930s, and the consequences of this on farming was compacted and increased with the famous dust bowl crisis, forcing many farmers into poverty and immense debt. Migrant farm workers such as Lennie and George fuelled and made possible the intensive farming economy. They travelled many miles by foot or other cheap forms of transportation for a temporary job that would pay enough to survive on, only to be told to leave when they were no longer needed. They would then have to wait for the next vacancy available. In these conditions men most usually travelled alone- it was hard to form any stable relationships in a life where it was vital to travel so often and when self-survival was more important than anyone elses. Its in this world of self survival that John Steinbeck based Of Mice And Men, which is a portrayal of effects these conditions can have on human nature. The most prominent of these effects in the novel itself is loneliness, (a major theme) which is present in some way in every one of Steinbecks characters. The book itself has been described as a symphony of lonliness. In a world where ones own survival and well-being is priority and you are mostly alone, the workers became very isolated. The effects of the lack of friendship, love or compassion on the workers have made them unable to relate in any way to anyone but themselves, and the self-importance that is forced to become their priority renders them unable to feel much pity or empathy for anyone or anything, turning them inwards and embittered towards a world which hasnt treated them well. They all live an existence in which every day is taken as it comes, each one matters in the fight for survival. They do not think in the long term, they spend the small wages they receive as soon as they can in taverns and whore-houses, they do not have dreams of the future. Loneliness effects some characters in other ways. For example, Curleys wife lives a life rivalling and arguably, exceeding the workers in isolation and loneliness. She has entered into a loveless and -the suggestion is- brutal marriage on a ranch full of wary, frightened and suspicious men with no-one to talk to, no love or tenderness, no prospect of change or escape from it. Unlike the men, she also has no motivation to survive. The workers aim in life is to survive, to keep on going, to keep on surviving through all the deprivation, as some still have prospects for change. Curleys wife is stuck at a figurative dead-end. She has arrived at the place she will remain for most probably the rest of her life, in an incessant routine of lonely, endless monotony. It is this isolation and the dissapointment of niave dreams of Hollywood and broken trust that has turned her into the character we are presented with in the beginning chapters of the book. The whore, the slut, the jail-bait, and the tart are her own form of survival- whereas the men have had to become totally self-interested and self-dependent in order to survive, Curleys wife has had to survive by attempting to gain power and attention in the only way she can in a ranch full of men- through sexual supremacy. However it appears there are infact two characters in the novel less affected by the isolation than the other characters, Slim and Lennie. It could be argued that George is also less affected, as his friendship with Lennie saves him from turning totally inward. Lennies friendship and care stop George from becoming like the other ranch workers, as he has to think about Lennies well being in addition to his own. George and Lennies relationship is almost more like that of a parent and child than of friends, and George has to look after Lennie, therefore George thinks about someone other than himself. So far his relationship has had its downsides, because as this isnt a normal friendship and Lennie is less capable mentally, Lennie keeps getting George into trouble. This proves that George needs to become isolated, lonely and inward as the others if he wants to be able successfully to survive. The conditions of the workers affect them in sad, terrible ways, yet its interesting that they actually need to be behave in this way if they want to survive. There is a strange need for loneliness and isolation, and this is how loneliness effects George and ultimately, George and Lennies friendship.

Monday, August 5, 2019

Reality Television and Audience Interaction

Reality Television and Audience Interaction RESEARCH PROPOSAL How viewers interact and engage with reality shows through voting Research aim and significance This study examines voting – a feature of interaction and engagement of audience with reality television. The study aims to investigate which factors influencing on television viewers’ decision to vote and also provide an exploration on their psychological side which may be vital for understanding their interactive behaviors. In the context of greater interaction between the programs and its audiences has been stimulating by television producers, it is significant to research this interactive form of reality television that encourages deeper audience participation. The findings of this study offer view on multiple sides involving opportunies and challenges for broadcast media companies and digital platform partners to exploit audience participation for the purposes of profit and the strategic expansion to multi-platform formats. Literature Review and Theory Since the very first reality show launching in 1990, the reality genre has rapidly developed to become the most popular experience of television nowadays. A plethora of research has been undertaking in recent years to identify the origin of reality shows’ appeal which concentrated mainly on the psychological side such as the theory of human motivations called ‘16 basic desires’ which linking the most fundamental purposes of human life to aspirations with their attention to media conducted by Reiss and Wiltz (2004) or the element of mastery sense named ‘schadenfreude’ introduced by Hall (2006). More recent studies in the last decade have focused on the power relation between the media and their publics as a key factor contributing to the growth of the reality television around the world, based on the concept of ‘audience activity’ which illustrates the level of selection when people use media and the level of involvement with the content (Rubin, 1993). Unlike many traditional television programs that only focus on the content without paying attention on audience interaction, reality program really provide the audience a participatory mode in which they are invited to influence the program’s story (Godlewski Perse, 2010; Enli Ihlebà ¦k, 2011). In its most famous form (in such series as Big Brother, The X Factor, Idol and The Voice), reality television has been transformed into interactive cross-platform media experience, soliciting direct audience participation, by telephone and the use of interactive functions of digital technology (Charles, 2012). Gr iffen-Foley (2004) argued that all of these media outlets have sought to attend their consumers as ‘textual actors’ which boosted the perception of engagement and generate a ‘loyal community’ of audience. Among them, voting is assigned as a prominent and lucrative option of viewer feedback, particularly in talent-based reality shows (Enli Ihlebà ¦k, 2011). Godlewski and Perse (2010) developed the theory of audience activity to scrutinize the relationship between viewing motivations, recognition of the participants, ‘cognitive and emotional involvement’ before, during and after exposure to media content. The scholars discovered that, instead of according with the levels of cognitive and emotional involvement during exposure, reality television provides to the audiences new kinds of post-exposure activity and also opportunities for finding previously unavailable ‘additional gratifications’ through voting to affect the program’s result. Such interactivity creates involving experiences via the active control of the media. In addition, there is a higher level of psychological engagement relating to thinking about and spending attentiveness of viewers who vote to whom they chose to vote for. Interestingly, Nightingale and Dwyer (2006) took the form on a larger scope that examined wider cultural significance and the translation into national format. This means that in multicultural nations, the audience is more likely to compose members of various dispersive communities with different degrees of loyalty. As a result, while votes are asked for supporters, the result always represents on a national scale. Audiences pay money to protect and attract the focus on their local contestants and even on their hometowns and regions. This study does not merely to understand why audience lodging vote in reality television but also explore what portrays them in regards to motivations and interactive behaviors such as the differences between age, gender, culture, socio-economic background and psychological aspect for example the level of activeness. Through this program producers could understand the desires of audience for interacting with the content via voting. Methodology Based on similar case studies involving audience activity (Godlewski Perse 2010), I will conduct one-hour interviews with five people of various age, gender and socio-economic backgrounds who are reality shows’ audience and regularly vote for their favorite shows or contestants. These interviews allow participants to elaborate on given open-ended qualitative questions and to explore from their personal experience of interaction and engagement. Before the interview, a copy of the plain language statement will be given to the participants for reading and keeping. They will be also asked to sign and return the consent form to the researchers. The interview will be recorded and transcribed for the purposes of the research paper. In the first part of the interview, participants will be asked to mention the kind of reality genre they are more likely to watch and their voting frequency. In the remaining part, participants will be invited to show how they interact with their most-liked reality shows through voting, for example explaining why they vote and determining which factors affect their decision. The information gathered will be compared and contrasted, using arguments discussed above in order to provide an insight into television producers targeted at the capitalization of audience fancy to maximize the shows’ outcome in terms of both revenue and viewer loyalty. The plain language statement, consent form and interview questions are provided below in the appendix. [918 words] Bibliography Charles, A 2012, Interactivity: New Media, Politics and Society, Peter Lang Oxford, Oxford. Enli, GS Ihlebà ¦k, KA 2011, ‘Dancing with the audience: Administrating vote-ins in public and commercial broadcasting’, Media, Culture Society, 33(6), pp. 953-962. Godlewski, LR Perse, EM 2010, ‘Audience activity and reality television: Identification, Online Activity, and Satisfaction’, Communication Quarterly, May, pp. 148-169. Griffen-Foley, B 2004, ‘From Tit-Bits to Big Brother: A Century of Audience Participation in the Media’, Media Culture Society, vol. 26, no. 4, July, pp. 533-548. Hall, A 2006, ‘Viewers Perceptions of Reality Programs’, Communication Quarterly, vol. 54, issue 2, May, pp. 191-211. Hill, A 2007 , Reslyting Factual TV: Audiences and News, Documentary and Reality Genres, Taylor Francis, New York. Holmes, S 2004, ‘Reality Goes Pop!: Reality TV, Popular Music, and Narratives of Stardom in Pop Idol’, Television New Media, vol. 5, no.2, May, pp. 147-172. Holmes, S 2004, ‘‘But this time you choose!’: Approaching the ‘interactive’ audience in reality TV’, International Journal of Cultural Studies, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 213-231. Kajus, Y 2009, ‘Idolizing and Monetizing the Public: The Production of Celebrities and Fans, Representatives and Citizens in Reality TV’, International Journal of Communication, pp. 277-300. Nightingale, V Dwyer, T 2006 ‘The audience politics of ‘enhanced’ television formats’, International Journal of Media and Cultural Politics, vol. 2, no.1, pp. 25-42 Papacharissi, Z Mendelson, AL 2007, ‘An exploratory study of reality appeal: Uses and Gratifications of reality TV shows’, Journal of Broadcasting Electronic Media, vol. 51, issue 2, June, pp. 355-370. Reiss, S Wiltz, J 2004, ‘Why people watch Reality TV’, Media Psychology, vol. 6, issue 4, November, pp.363-378. Roscoe, J 2010, ‘Multi-Platform Event Television: Reconceptualizing our Relationship with Television’, The Communication Review, vol. 7, issue. 4, pp. 363-369. Ytreberg, Y 2009, ‘Extended liveness and eventfulness in multi-platform reality formats’, New Media Society, vol. 11, issue 4, pp. 1-19. Interview questions 1. What kinds of reality television do you often interact with through voting? + How many times do you vote for your favorite reality programs on average? 2. Are you member of a fanclub of any reality show’ or reality show’ contestant? + Do you mobilize your family/ relatives/ friends/ community to vote for your favorite contestants? 3. Which factors do you think will affect your decision for vote? + Are the contestants’ performance and the estimations of the judges important to you? + If your favorite contestant is facing elimination, do you try your best to keep he/she staying in the competion? 4. Do you think that voting is a symbol of audience democracy? + To what extent do you believe that audience can control the result of a reality show by voting? + Do you think the results reflect properly the audience desire? 5. How do you feel if the contestant that you voted for lose? + Do you often compare between your local contestants and contestants from other regions? 6. Do you think voting is the best way to interact and engage with your favorite reality shows? + Which other kinds of interction and engagement do you like? GRADUATE SCHOOL OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES CONSENT FORM FOR PARTICIPANTS Project Title: Reality television and audience interaction – How viewers interact and engage with reality shows through voting Name of participant: Name of researcher: Truc Tuong Thi Lam 1.I consent to participate in this project, the details of which have been explained to me, and I have been provided with a written plain language statement to keep. 2. I understand that after I sign and return this consent form it will be retained by the researcher. 3.I understand that my participation will involve an interview and observation and I agree that the researcher may use the results as described in the plain language statement. 4.I acknowledge that: (a) the possible effects of participating in the interview and observation have been explained to my satisfaction; (b) I have been informed that I am free to withdraw from the project at any time without explanation or prejudice and to withdraw any unprocessed data I have provided; (c) the project is for the purpose of research; (d) I have been informed that the confidentiality of the information I provide will be safeguarded subject to any legal requirements; (e) I have been informed that with my consent the interview will be audio-taped and I understand that audio-tapes will be stored at University of Melbourne and will be destroyed after five years; (f) my name will be referred to by a pseudonym in any publications arising from the research; (g) I have been informed that a copy of the research findings will be forwarded to me, should I agree to this. I consent to this interview being audio-taped à ¢- ¡ yes à ¢- ¡ no (please tick) I wish to receive a copy of the summary project report on research finding à ¢- ¡ yes à ¢- ¡ no (please tick) Participant signature:Date: GRADUATE SCHOOL OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES PLAIN LANGUAGE STATEMENT Project Title: Reality television and audience interaction – How viewers interact and engage with reality shows through voting Name of student: Truc Tuong Thi Lam Telephone: 0426 998 078 Email: [emailprotected] Name of lecturer: Dr. Esther Chin Telephone: (03) 8344 3411 Email: [emailprotected] Dear participant, I am a Master of Global Media Communication student at the University of Melbourne currently enrolled in the subject MECM40003 Researching Audiences and Reception. A major component of the subject assessment requires students to carry our research on media audiences such as yourself to understand reception and consumption patterns and to determine how audiences interpret and interact with media types. I will be carrying out open-ended interviews with participants approximately 45 minutes in length. Your honest responses are extremely important in giving validity to this study. With your permission, I will audiotape your responses for transcription and inclusion in my study. Interview responses will be analysed and included in a research report for submission at the end of the current semester. Date will be destroyed after being kept securely at the University of Melbourne for five years. Your responses and identity will be given a pseudonym in the research report and every effort will be made to ensure your confidentiality. As soon as the research report is returned after examination a copy will be made available to you upon request. This research project is being carried out with approval from the University of Melbourne’s Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC). If you have any concerns or further questions you may contact my lecturer (as above) and/or the Human Research Ethics Office: Executive Officer, Human Research Ethics, University of Melbourne VIC 3010 Telephone: (03) 8344 2073. If you would like to participate in this research please read and sign the accompanying consent form. Thank you. Yours sincerely, Truc Tuong Thi Lam

Sunday, August 4, 2019

DuPont An Investment Analysis :: essays research papers

DuPont makes a variety of high-value products for industry today, including polymers, chemicals, fibers, and petroleum products...products for agriculture, electronics, transportation, apparel, food, aerospace, construction, and health care. DuPont serves customers in these and other industries every day, offering "better things for better living" as the company prepares to begin its third century of scientific, technological, commercial, and social achievement. DuPont is a research and technology based chemical and energy company with its annual revenue exceeding $39 billion. Eleuth‚re Ir‚n‚e du Pont de Nemours, a French immigrant, established DuPont in 1802 in a small Delaware town. E.I. du Pont was a student of Antoine Lavoisier, the father of modern chemistry, and when he came to America he brought some of the new ideas about the manufacturing of consistently reliable gun powder. His product ignited when it was supposed to, in a manner consistent with expectations. This was greatly appreciated by the citizens of the growing nation, including Thomas Jefferson, who wrote thanking du Pont for the quality of his powder, which was being used to clear the land at Monticello. Many other heroes of early America owed their success, and their lives, to the dependable quality of DuPont's first product. This represents a good, strong start for a company. DuPont, which is moving through the last decade of the twentieth century and toward its third century, emphasizes several things; competing globally; sharpening its business focus; increasing productivity; committing to safety, health, and environmental excellence; and continuing to extend its significant science and technological achievement. One of DuPont's major strategies is to focus on businesses in which DuPont has core competencies, where DuPont can build competitive advantage. The most notable example of this focus was the 1993 transaction in which DuPont acquired ICI's nylon business and ICI acquired DuPont's acrylics business. This strengthened the company's position in the global nylon business while divesting a business that no longer fit its portfolio. Another major factor in the transformation of the company in the1990s was the focus on reducing costs and improving productivity. This was necessary to give the company the flexibility for competitive pricing and to grow market share and earnings. DuPont had strong plants in several countries around the world for many years, and their globalization trend continued in the 1990s. New plants opened in Spain, Singapore, Korea, Taiwan, and China, and a major technical service center opened in Japan. In 1994, a Conoco joint venture began producing oil from the Ardalin Field in the Russian Arctic--the first major oil field brought into production by a Russian/Western partnership since demise of the Soviet Union.

Saturday, August 3, 2019

Focus Groups Essay -- essays research papers

Focus Groups   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Focus groups are a qualitative form of marketing research that can help a marketer assess consumer needs and feelings in a way that simple questionnaires can not. In a focus group, you bring together a small group to discuss issues and concerns about the features of a product. Participants are usually paid a fee for their time. A marketer can gain valuable information such as gaining a customer’s attitudes and determining advertising persuasiveness. The group is typically run by a moderator who maintains the group's focus. Some recent topics of interest regarding this subject are focus groups for advertising, Online focus groups, and political focus groups.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Traditional focus groups usually deal with a consumers reaction to a product, whether it be good or bad. In today’s ad-packed media, marketers need to worry about how consumers react to their advertising. Many marketers have set up focus groups to do just that: gauge how efficient an ad is, whether or not the group was interested, and if the ad and brand name can be recalled from the spot.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Companies such as Motorola have used focus groups to gauge the effectiveness of commercials. When the company chose to launch the â€Å"Wings† campaign, they were unsure of what song would be appropriate for the T.V spot. An overwhelming response from a focus group led to the use of the Rolling Stones song â€Å"You Can’t Always Get What You Want†. Marketers at Motorola raised concerns of whether or not the song was appropriate, based on the title. After a positive response from their focus group, the company ran the ad. â€Å"overwhelmingly positive focus-group response to the Rolling Stones as a transgenerational and transgeographic icon confirmed people were more interested in the emotion of the music than the lyrics.† (Adage.com, Snyder)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  While traditional focus groups and their face to face method of collecting data has proven to be effective, the internet has proven to be both more effective and more convenient. A traditional focus group normally consists of about 10 people, while an online group can reach thousands of participants. The DiscoverWhy group is one such group that holds online polls and focus groups for various companies. In order to test the effectiv... ...se the information wisely can gain valuable insight to difficult problems.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   http://adage.com/search97cgi/s97_cgi?action=View&VdkVgwKey=%2E%2E%2F%2E%2E%2F%2E%2E%2Fadage%2Fwww%2Fnews%5Fand%5Ffeatures%2Ffeatures%2F19980420%2Farticle2%2Ehtml&DocOffset=35&DocsFound=92&QueryZip=focus+group&SearchUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fadage%2Ecom%2Fsearch97cgi%2Fs97%5Fcgi%3Faction%3DSearch%26QueryZip%3Dfocus%2Bgroup%26Filter%3Dadage%255Fbak%252Ehts%26ResultTemplate%3Dadage%255Fresults%252Ehts%26QueryText%3Dfocus%2Bgroup%26ResultStart%3D31%26ResultCount%3D10& http://adage.com/search97cgi/s97_cgi?action=View&VdkVgwKey=%2E%2E%2F%2E%2E%2F%2E%2E%2Fadage%2Fwww%2Finteractive%2Farticles%2F20000327%2Farticle1%2Ehtml&DocOffset=17&DocsFound=92&QueryZip=focus+groups&SearchUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fadage%2Ecom%2Fsearch97cgi%2Fs97%5Fcgi%3Faction%3DSearch%26QueryZip%3Dfocus%2Bgroups%26Filter%3Dadage%255Fbak%252Ehts%26ResultTemplate%3Dadage%255Fresults%252Ehts%26QueryText%3Dfocus%2Bgroups%26ResultStart%3D11%26ResultCount%3D10& http://www.adcritic.com/corporate/ http://www.mtv.com/sendme.tin?page=/mtv/news/chooseorlose/features/feature_0306.html

Friday, August 2, 2019

AIDS/HIV Essay -- Health, Diseases

Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), can be transmitted through unprotected sexual intercourse, sharing contaminated needles and syringes, mother to child (perinatal) and contaminated blood product (National Association of Health Authorities, 1988). 1.2 PURPOSE OF THE RESEARCH Late HIV diagnosis remains a major problem among black Africans in England. In 2007, about 42 per cent of black Africans diagnosed with HIV were diagnosed late (HPA, 2008a). This compromises their survival chances because evidence indicates that starting treatment with a CD4 cell count below 200 copies/mm3 (a measure of the degree to which an individual’s immune system is compromised) increases the risk of disease progression and death (Gazzard, 2008). The reasons for late diagnosis among black Africans are not clear, but include persistent HIV-related stigma and discrimination (WHO, 2006). Fakoya et al. (2008) identified cultural, social and structural barriers, such as access to testing and care, fear of death and disease, lack of political will, restrictive immigration policies and lack of African representation in decision-making processes. There is a desperate need to understand the social context of the disease both in terms of the migrants' region of origin as well as in their new United Kingdom (UK) communities. The British government is yet to address the steep rise in rates of the disease among heterosexuals and a new Aids awareness campaign targeted at those most at risk of spreading it is imperative. It is a campaign that the government is reluctant to undertake because of the sensitivities around immigration, race and perceptions of neo-colonialism (Chinouya and Davidson, 2003). The prevalence of diagnosed HIV in black African and bl... ...n found that higher levels of knowledge, perception of risk, and having a friend or relative with AIDS were associated with effective behaviour change (Sambisa 2008). The notion behind personal experience or knowing someone who is infected is that for some people HIV/AIDS does not become real, or denial is preferable including denial of risk, until one witnesses someone ill or dying of AIDS. This means that trying to shift people’s perception of risk in order that they choose behaviours that are safe requires a detailed understanding of culture, context of perception, and experience of risk (Kesby, et al., 2003). This is related to the fact that ‘culture’ in its anthropological sense, is a complex interplay of meanings, action, structure, and change that exist within all social relations and in all social settings (Mayisha II Collaborative Group 2005).