Young women's use of a microbicide surrogate: The complex influence of relationship characteristics and perceived male partners' evaluations

This is the post-print version of the article. The official published version can be found at the link below.Currently in clinical trials, vaginal microbicides are proposed as a female-initiated method of sexually transmitted infection prevention. Much of microbicide acceptability research has been conducted outside of the United States and frequently without consideration of the social interaction between sex partners, ignoring the complex gender and power structures often inherent in young women’s (heterosexual) relationships. Accordingly, the purpose of this study was to build on existing microbicide research by exploring the role of male partners and relationship characteristics on young women’s use of a microbicide surrogate, an inert vaginal moisturizer (VM), in a large city in the United States. Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with 40 young women (18–23 years old; 85% African American; 47.5% mothers) following use of the VM during coital events for a 4 week period. Overall, the results indicated that relationship dynamics and perceptions of male partners influenced VM evaluation. These two factors suggest that relationship context will need to be considered in the promotion of vaginal microbicides. The findings offer insights into how future acceptability and use of microbicides will be influenced by gendered power dynamics. The results also underscore the importance of incorporating men into microbicide promotion efforts while encouraging a dialogue that focuses attention on power inequities that can exist in heterosexual relationships. Detailed understanding of these issues is essential for successful microbicide acceptability, social marketing, education, and use.This study was funded by a grant from National Institutes of Health (NIHU19AI 31494) as well as research awards to the first author: Friends of the Kinsey Institute Research Grant Award, Indiana University’s School of HPER Graduate Student Grant-in-Aid of Research Award, William L. Yarber Sexual Health Fellowship, and the Indiana University Graduate and Professional Student Organization Research Grant

Cultural identity in literary response:Studying a political poem in different territories

This paper presents research examining the cultural knowledge students draw on when they discuss literary texts. The data suggests the significance of literary study and literary classrooms as spaces where cultural identities are articulated and explored, and that manifestation of cultural knowledge is an essential part of collective literary study. The research project involves senior students (16-18) in schools in England, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. The research used the poem ‘Easter, 1916’ by W.B.Yeats as a focus for classroom discussions. The poem is studied in each of the three territories, though each has its own curriculum and its own relationship with the Irish Easter Rising. The theoretical model that has dominated literary study in England for several decades is strongly influenced by I. A. Richards’ Practical Criticism [1]. In practice, this has led to teaching and assessment that diminish reference to the context of a text’s production or to the cultural context of the students considering it. A poem such as ‘Easter, 1916’ highlights the limitations of such a model. The transcripts in this study point to the fallacy of decontextualized literary response, showing where and how cultural knowledge informs students’ responses and when teachers choose to activate it. The paper introduces a project still in progress, presenting data from its first stage conducted in Northern Ireland. It presents transcripts arising from sixth-form (age range 16-18) classroom discussions of the poem drawn from two schools. The transcripts allow consideration of what students say but also how they build responses and interpretation collectively, and with their teacher. The poem’s detail is highly specific to Irish history. Questions relevant to the data include: What part, if any, does the tacit cultural knowledge of students play in their initial engagement with the poem? What do students already know and bring to the discussions? How do teachers guide and develop students’ responses, and when do they deem it necessary to supply contextualising detail? To what extent are national perspectives apparent and to what extent do they shape interpretation? The methods described in the paper continue the author’s innovative application of Conversation Analysis to classroom study of literature, which has focussed on the structure of students’ discussions and the ways in which they construct interpretations of texts collectively [2,3]. In particular, the transcripts afford examination of how the presentation of a poem influences students’ responses. A new area of interest arising from this study concerns the strategies teachers use to activate and organise the cultural knowledge of students relative to the text. What techniques do teachers use to elicit students’ cultural knowledge? Once that knowledge is articulated how do teachers use it to develop the responses of students across the whole class? The transcripts indicate that teachers’ deploy a mixture of strategies. These include direct questioning, overt presentation of contextual information, humour and parody, use of multimodal texts and management of remarks offered by different students. Conversation Analysis supports examination of how these strategies work in combination, and how they are tailored to the specific requirements of the immediate text for study – in this case ‘Easter, 1916’

Migrants’ experiences of material and emotional security in rural Scotland: implications for longer-term settlement

Drawing on qualitative research with Central and East European (CEE) migrants living and working in rural areas of Scotland, this article explores what it is that facilitates a desire to stay longer term and how this relates to theorisations of social security and migrant-led understandings of normality. The article makes three original contributions: (i) new empirical insight into the relationship between material and emotional aspects of migration and settlement in Scottish rural contexts; (ii) greater understanding of rural migrants' diverse lived experiences; (iii) attention to the changing nature of migration to rural contexts through a focus on longer-term settlement rather than seasonal or circular migration. The article is structured by three key questions: To what extent are rural destinations actively chosen by migrants? How are migrants' experiences shaped by the realities of rural life in the particular Scottish contexts studied? How do migrants interpret these experiences through their understandings of a normal life and how does this impact on longer-term plans? The qualitative insight which the article provides has wider relevance and significance for policy and practice across other rural contexts and can help to reveal ways in which rural social systems could better respond so that areas of ‘new’ migration may develop into positive places of settlement

'THE COST OF BANKING ON EASTERN PROMISES' AN ETHNOGRAPHIC STUDY OF THE IMPACT OF CHANGING BANK STRATEGIES ON EMPLOYEES

Banking is a major employment sector, which has experienced phenomenal growth over the last decade. Following the de-regulation of the financial marketplace and the entry of ‘new players', the industry has suffered from an almost ruinous internal struggle between its traditional, gentlemanly ethos (Clarke and Vincent, 1989) and the enforced adoption of aggressive sales and marketing strategies (Knights and Tinker, 1997). My research has investigated the various ways that ‘change’ (particularly strategic change consequential to the piecemeal adoption of ‘Japanese-style' systems of working and management -'HRM, TQM and lean production) have been met, experienced, negotiated, and to some extent contested, by branch-based employees working for Bank UK (one of the historic 'big four' clearing banks). Data was gathered through varying periods of participant observation in seven branches of Bank UK over two years, supplemented by group and individual interviews with managers and staff. A key informant was later recruited, who added both depth and a greater understanding of raw data. My thesis suggests that changing strategies (particularly those introduced in order to strengthen market position and expand sales opportunities) have created multiple paradoxes in the management and organisation of work in Bank UK, mostly through issues of cost At the same time as attempting to drive through a whole raft of changes that clearly involved increasing employee participation and commitment through teamworking, Kaizen activity, performance related pay and individual sales bids, the bank had been concerned to decrease operating costs in an attempt to improve key economic ratios. Between 1999 and 2000, Bank UK reduced staff expenditure by £72 million by shedding 7,300 employees. This significant loss of staff created huge difficulties in the everyday operation of branches, resulting in growing customer dissatisfaction with the service on offer, at the same time that weekly individual and branch sales targets were introduced, which clearly demanded extended customer interaction. The composition of the workforce in Bank UK has become increasingly flexible (both numerically and functionally) and two-tiered. Permanent staff enjoy the traditional 'perks' of employment, including performance related pay, whilst the growing number on 'casual' or flexible contracts (mostly ex-permanent staff) do not. Yet, paradoxically my research reveals that Bank UK's successful integration of sales and marketing strategies into the branch network can be generally attributed to the attitudes of its ‘casual' workforce who appear to have made a bigger contribution in terms of sales results and commitment to flexible working practices than their 'permanent' colleagues, despite lacking the same level of recognition and reward

Queering Belfast: Some thoughts on the sexing of space

In this paper we use data from interviews and focus groups with gay men, lesbians and bisexuals living in Belfast to provide a queer reading of the city. Drawing on the work of queer theory, we argue, contrary to much of the literature on sexuality and space, that space is neither purely encoded as ‘heterosexual’ or ‘gay’. Instead we posit that all space is queered, that the sexing of space is always partial and contested, always in a process of becoming; that heterosexist spatiality, for example, is profoundly unstable, continuously engaged in the process of reproducing itself. Reconceptualising socio-spatial relations in this way, we contend, allows for a more nuanced and differentiated, geographical reading of sexual dissidence, one that acknowledges the fluidity and complexity of individuals’ self-identifications with regard to sexual-orientation and their diverse spatialities, as evidenced in our interviews.

More Than Zero: Variation in the Tattooed Population

Sociological research treats all individuals with more than zero tattoos as being part of the tattooed population. This type of categorization fails to capture the significant differences between tattooed individuals. For example, a gang member with a criminal insignia tattooed on his or her neck would be part of the same research population as long term tattoo artists with their entire body covered in tattoos or even a middle aged man with a single tattoo on his bicep. By interviewing tattoo artists, this thesis details the unique nature of tattooing as an occupation, the changing nature of the modern tattooing world, and how tattoo artists describe the variation within their clientele. The most significant variation described by interviewees was how the clients interacted with the tattoo artists and how that interaction affected their tattooing process. Two main types of clients emerged: core clients and casual clients. Core clients interact with the tattooing process in a more involved and long-term way, whereas casual clients are less involved and more likely to consume tattoos as a commodity rather than involve the tattooing process as an ongoing part of their life. Due to the increasing acceptance of tattooing by the mainstream and the increasing professionalization of tattoo shops, both core clients and casual clients are likely to receive high quality tattoos and a positive experience with tattoo artists though casual clients are at a slightly higher risk to receive the opposite. This difference in interaction with the tattooing process highlights one significant difference between individuals with more than zero tattoos. Such variation should be considered when conducting research on tattooed individuals

Interactive task design: Metachat and the whole learner

In this chapter the focus is on conversations about language between adult learners online, in synchronous and asynchronous postings. Socio-affective and social-semiotic perspectives are used, thus distancing the work somewhat from cognitive ways of looking at tasks. Because adults come to the task with diverse knowledge of both L2 and L1, the expectation is that metalinguistic interaction will enable them to swap expert and novice roles with each other within the constantly changing dynamics of the classroom. This if shown to be the case would advance an educational agenda favouring learner-directedness. Secondly, as metalinguistic conversations develop in directions that the learners feel like following, a greater degree of contingency can arise. This is considered in this paper as motivational for adults, and also as progressive, following van Lier (1996: 180) for whom in a contingent conversation "the agenda is shared by all participants and educational reality may be transformed". However, in seeking to satisfy his condition of contingency, the problem of designing tasks for greater spontaneity proves difficult. Therefore this study provide an ethnographic account of metalinguistic conversations by learners engaged in an online task, Simuligne, designed to address this difficulty. After studying data from the project forums, chat rooms and emails, we introduce a new perspective on the function of these conversations, which holds pointers for task design

Strategic business models of platform providers in the video gaming industry - cloud gaming customer segmentation analysis

This work project examines the evolution and variation of business models within the online video gaming platform industry. In the present paper, an in-depth analysis of the recent business model of cloud gaming is provided. With large gaming audiences that differ in needs and preferences, segmentation should occur based on gamer type. The analysis reveals a large potential, especially within the non-gamer and casual gamer segments. Further, advantages and weaknesses of the business model are outlined, and overriding recommendations are presented to strategically optimize it. To conclude, key insights and limitations as well as future research are discussed

Spartan Daily, May 17, 2004

Volume 122, Issue 69https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/spartandaily/10003/thumbnail.jp