Sociometric status and leisure media consumption

Background. In the context of mass communication research a special value is placed on the discussion of the connection between using various means of mass communication and their particular features. One of the important personal characteristics is the sociometric status of a person in a group. The Objective of the empirical research presented in the paper is to reveal whether there is a connection between leisure media consumption and the sociometric status of a person in small groups. If the assumption about the unified nature of communication processes in interpersonal and mass communication is deemed as the initial theoretical premise, it is reasonably assumed that sociometric characteristics of a person should correlate with the parameters of his address to the means of mass communication. Design The study involved 110 people aged 25 to 28 years old, employed with 10 departments of two companies. According to the results of a special questionnaire used together with a sociometric questionnaire, media consumption parameters are determined: preference of media channels (print media, radio, television, the Internet)), intensity of access to these media channels, functional orientations (e.g. information, entertainment, cultural and educational). Based on the data obtained, special indices are calculated: sociometric status index; four indices of media channels preferences (print media, radio, television, the Internet); four intensity indices of media consumption (reading print media, radio listening, television watching, using the Internet); three indexes of functional orientation (index of information function, index of entertainment function, index of cultural and educational function). Research Results. Popular respondents choose the print media much more often than others, while the unpopular ones choose television; more popular respondents use do print media and radio much more intensively, while unpopular respondents used television; with respect to the Internet, no significant differences were found; popular respondents are much more focused on cultural, educational and informational functions, and unpopular ones are focused on entertainment. For the sociometric status index, the following findings are true: strong direct relationship with the radio consumption index (R = 0.713) and with the print media consumption index (R = 0.693); mean value of television consumption index (R = -0.541); mean value of the Internet consumption index (R = 0.471). Conclusion. The obtained results correlate quite well with the results of the research conducted in the 1980s, although they were obtained in other socio-cultural and socio-economic conditions, as well as in a different social group. This proves the existence of a connection between sociometric status and media preferences, not only in high school students, but also in young adults. Hence it is logical to assume that such kind of connections should be observed in other social groups. At the theoretical level, there is an issue of developing an explanatory socio-psychological model that would organically link the interpersonal communication and mass communication patterns

Biological Earth observation with animal sensors

Space-based tracking technology using low-cost miniature tags is now delivering data on fine-scale animal movement at near-global scale. Linked with remotely sensed environmental data, this offers a biological lens on habitat integrity and connectivity for conservation and human health; a global network of animal sentinels of environmen-tal change

Глобальное информационное онлайн-пространство в 2020 г.: динамические характеристики

The article presents a study, which purpose was to identify dynamic characteristics of the global online media landscape in 2020. The media landscape is considered within linguistic and thematic boundaries of FACTIVA — a specialized monitor system for political, economic and social information. FACTIVA's resource base includes more than 30,000 online sources in 25 languages, representing 91.7% of the Internet's content. As a result of the study, a number of dynamic patterns have been identified. Firstly, an increase in the number of the materials, which FACTIVA operates, confirms the trend for the Internet expansion. Secondly, the production of new materials follows a strict weekly cycle based on the alternation of weekdays and weekends. The latter, in turn, depends on traditions of different countries and the type of culture prevails in them (Christian, Muslim, etc.). Thus, in countries of the Christian tradition, a minimum of new publications is observed on Sundays, in Muslim countries — on Fridays. On a global scale, the peak in the number of published materials falls on Thursday. Thirdly, two new dynamic concepts — “global media splash” and “global media storm” have been introduced into scientific use, as well as a criterion for measuring their strength has been proposed. “Global media splash” describes a significant increase in the number of materials over several days compared to similar days in the previous week. The “global media storm” is manifested in comparison with the previous month. The article proposes to consider global media splashes and media storms as strong when the amount of the media materials increases by at least 15%. The global media storm may not be related to short-term sensational stories. For example, in January 2020, a global media splash which turned into a media storm was recorded in connection with the assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani and subsequent events. The most powerful global media storm in 2020 was caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, but there were no strong global media splashes during this period. Acknowledgments. The work was performed at the Faculty of Communications, Media and Design within the framework of the research project “Transformation of the world picture in the global information online space under the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic”

Weather conditions explain variation in the diet of Long-eared Owl at winter roost in central part of European Russia

The influence of weather conditions on the winter diet of the Long-eared Owl was studied in 2005-2013 at one roost site in Moscow, Russia. Pellets were collected every week from November to March. The diet composition of the owls included 6 rodent species, 2 in-sectivore species and 18 bird species. Common Vole was by far the most frequent prey (70.0%), followed by Ural Field Mouse (10.8%) and Brown Rat (7.5%). Among birdprey (5.3%), House Sparrow, Great Tit, Bullfinch, Tree Sparrow and Blue Tit were the most numerous species. The winter diet showed marked interannual fluctuations. In terms of weather conditions, depth of snow cover appears to be the most important factor affecting the availability of the most frequent prey species and prey groups in the diet of the Long-eared Owl. Wind speed and precipitation do not play a significant role in predating on voles and mice. The proportion of bird prey was relatively low, but increased with precipitation, indicating the high importance of birds as an alternative prey for owls. The results thus suggest that specific features of behavior and activity of prey in different weather conditions explain their proportions in the diet of the Long-eared Owl

TOP MANAGERS OF THE LEADING MEDIA OF RUSSIA: SOCIAL-DEMOGRAPHIC PORTRAIT OF THE COMMUNITY

The article presents the results of a special study of top-managers of Russian media. The authors’ goal is to compile their generalized socio-demographic portrait. The study was conducted in two stages. The result of the first stage was a validated list of four criteria, on the basis of which the surveyed top managers were selected - 50 people for different media segments (television, radio, press) who worked as heads of the leading Russian media enterprises in 2000-2015. At the second stage, the biographies of selected top managers were analyzed. The collected data was subjected to statistical processing (calculation of percentage and average values)

A comparative laboratory study of the preservation of different rodent bones in pellets of Strigiformes

Studies of variation in preservation of different skeletal elements in the pellets of birds of prey helps us understand which bones should be used for effective and reliable diet analyses. The preservation of cranial and postcranial elements of skeletons of laboratory mice was studied in owl pellets. The research was conducted with three male individuals of three species: Long-eared Owl, Tawny Owl and Pygmy Owl. The owls were fed with adult and immature mice in laboratory conditions. The preservation of bones was defined as the ratio of the number of whole specimens of a certain bone to the total number of bones which were contained in the body of one mouse. The largest and the most massive bones had a high preservation. The upper part of cranium and the large bones of limb girdles had the highest preservation in the owl pellets. The bones of immature mice had higher preservation in the pellets of Pygmy Owl compared to Long-eared and Tawny Owl. Age differences in bone size and thickness were explained the variation in preservation of immature and adult mouse bones