Affective Incongruity in the Work of David Lynch

Cognitive psychology approaches to film have recently advanced to incorporating cognitive and neuroscience. With the exception of a few scholars such as David Bordwell, one of the first to bring a cognitive approach to film, film studies is only just beginning to take full advantage of the advances made in this area. We have seen some resplendent results that bring together cognitive science, neuroscience, evolutionary biology, and neuroanatomy in ways that have shed new, interdisciplinary light on the arts. Recently, emotional-affective research has added yet another important dimension to these approaches to film, enabling us to build frameworks for understanding better how viewers’ perspective and understanding of film are filtered through our affective mechanisms. In my research, I examine the incongruent emotions produced by David Lynch’s work, which push the boundaries of accepted emotions in ‘mainstream’ cinema. I use his work to study how narrative structure and stylistic techniques can effect and produce incongruent emotions, thus affecting how we make meaning and connection in the experience of viewing his film. In order to understand the connection of emotion and film, I use existing critical film theory on Lynch’s work and combine this theory with cognitive science and affective neuroscience research. The goal: to encapsulate the whole emotional process that occurs from his work and film in general. Often affective incongruity confuses a viewer, therefore acceptance and meaning from a ‘mainstream’ audience is hard to garner, especially in David Lynch’s enigmatic work. Therefore it is important to pay attention to these how these incongruent types of emotions (atypical in commercial cinema) are built into his film blueprints--and a cognitive and neurobiological approach promise to shed light on this.No embargoAcademic Major: Film Studie

Financial vs Non-Financial Gifts and Workers' Performance: An Experimental Analysis of Reciprocity in the Workplace

Background and research orientation, rationale and objectives. Gift giving or reciprocity is widely used in organisations as an attempt to further improve employee performance and productivity, which is ultimately believed to result in higher levels of organisational performance and success. Reciprocity theory, or the gift exchange view, assumes that employees and organisations pursue that which is in their own material self-interest. Reciprocity research is, however, still largely dominated by research focusing on the impact of financial rewards, despite major reward theories, models and approaches that increasingly emphasise the importance of both financial and non-financial rewards in attraction, employee engagement or motivation and retention. The aim of the current research study was to investigate the extent to which employees reciprocate discretionary effort, as indicated by higher levels of productivity, after receiving either a financial or non-financial gift or reward. Moreover, the impact of receiving either a financial or non-financial reward on perceived levels of both employee motivation and job satisfaction was measured, as well as to determine reward preference which was considered more motivating and satisfying. Research approach. The present study made use of an experimental research approach, more so, a controlled field experiment in a naturally occurring work environment. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected from employees to measure their perceived levels of motivation and job satisfaction. Productivity data was provided by the organisation employing the employees to determine the impact of the financial or non-financial reward. Composite questionnaires consisting of open-ended questions and Likert-type questions were distributed using a convenience, non-probability sampling approach. All completed questionnaires, along with the provided productivity data, were analysed using descriptive statistics, inferential statistics and content analysis. Main findings. Results of the research study indicated a significant difference in employees perceived level of motivation and job satisfaction after receiving a financial or non-financial gift. Thus, employees experienced greater levels of motivation and job satisfaction after receiving a financial or non-financial gift. Results furthermore showed that employees were more productive after receiving the gift, although the productivity did not shift any different whether they received the financial or non-financial gift. Thus, employee reciprocated discretionary effort after receiving a gift. A statistically significant association was found between the gift employees received and the gift they desired, with the likelihood of receiving a particular gift and desiring that specific gift not being random, but rather due to psychological feelings of appreciation

Magic in the Classroom: The School Story and the Implications of Discipline in Harry Potter

Set against the history of the school story in children’s literature, the Harry Potter series reinvigorates the genre. Specifically, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone addresses the significance of socializing disciplines within children’s literature while also demonstrating the effects that education has on individuality and maturation through the roles of the characters throughout the series. Perhaps much of what lends Rowling’s work its magical ability as compared to the traditional school story is its free use of traditionalism, as seen in fairy tales, in its narrative style. Rowling’s writing gestures towards the need for imagination in order to decode a text. Rowling’s whimsical and rhythmic writing style often deploys participial phrases. These phrases, seen over the course of multiple sentences, emphasize the need to use careful reading in order to more easily grasp the narrative. Many of the sentences featured throughout the series utilize these participial phrases in order to describe a series of concurrent actions. In fact, the use of these participial phrases is particularly evident in descriptions that are sandwiched between encounters and dialogue between Harry and other students or professors. To contextualize Harry Potter in the tradition of children’s Literature and the school story, this thesis examines Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone alongside Tom Brown’s School Days, written by Thomas Hughes. Hughes focuses on the challenges of negotiating the school social structure and the ethical expectations expected of a headmaster through the use of the fictional characters in his novel. Rowling imitates and explores this practice alongside the tropes of education, discipline, agency, and imagination, aligning her characters with the perceived roles that students play in her critical reception of the school story. Overall, J.K. Rowling’s writing approach in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone renders it as a revival of the school genre framed for a modern audience

Law Enforcement\u27s Assistance to the Mental Health Community

Mental health calls are an overwhelmingly consistent part of the law enforcement profession. With the lack of resources for the mental health community, law enforcement officers are becoming the contingency strategy. Relationships between the law enforcement and mental health communities are becoming imperative for every community. While developing these relationships, law enforcement officers can begin to develop response teams to handle mental health calls for service. Bringing on board clinical and non-clinical professionals from the mental health community can provide different intervention and therapy programs. Basic ethical principles, accepted in culture, include but are not limited to respect, honesty, and loyalty. Law enforcement officers can overcome a current issue plaguing communities and the profession by using the basic level of ethical principles and implementing them in a specialized team for mental health calls

Nutrition For The Pregnant Teen

This brochure is intended to provide basic advice to pregnant teenagers on ways to create daily habits. It provides a brief definition of healthy defaults, and why they are important during pregnancy. It contains an overview of the food groups, and how to incorporate them into daily life. It also provides some web resources and names of food assistance programs that may be beneficial for them. Finally, it also suggests ways to use family and friends as source of support as well.https://dune.une.edu/an_studedres/1045/thumbnail.jp

Choice, Coercion, Capabilities and Conflict: Multilingualism, Human Development and Peacekeeping in a Globalized World

The development of English into an international lingua franca is not an inevitable result of globalizing forces. Instead, the “triumph” of the English language and the consequent decline of the world’s linguistic diversity cannot be viewed in isolation of its parallel history of conquest, violence, power and exploitation. Today, the languages privileged by the powerful—not only English, but also other dominant languages or standard varieties of those languages—determine access to social, economic and political mobility. This fact renders any discussion of language “choice” irrelevant—when a choice yields the sacrifice of basic human capabilities on one hand and the denial of cultural liberty on the other, the issue becomes one not of choice, but of coercion. Both Amartya Sen and the UNDP Human Development Report (2004) argue that the expansion of freedoms and choices is a prerequisite to human-centered development. Additionally, the UNDP claims that protection of cultural diversity is essential to peacekeeping. Drawing on these premises, this paper explores the notion of linguistic choice by analyzing the personal narratives of multilingual individuals, with the ultimate conclusion that the ability to choose ones language must be understood as an essential resource for human development and conflict prevention

Seasonality, variation in species prevalence, and localized disease for Ranavirus in Cades Cove (Great Smoky Mountains National Park) amphibians

World-wide amphibian declines sparked concern and encouraged investigation into potential causes beginning in the 1980’s. Infectious disease has been identified as one of the major potential contributors to amphibian declines. For example, Ranavirus has caused amphibian die-offs throughout the United States. Investigators isolated Ranavirus from dead or moribund amphibians during large-scale die-offs of amphibians in the Cades Cove area of Great Smoky Mountains National Park in 1999-2001. In 2009, after nearly a decade without follow-up monitoring, I undertook an investigation to determine if the virus persisted in the area, and if so, to assess spatial, temporal, and taxonomic patterns in prevalence. Three amphibian breeding ponds, including Gourley Pond, the site of these earlier mortality events, were monitored for Ranavirus during the 2009 amphibian breeding season. A peak in prevalence occurred at Gourley Pond corresponding to a massive amphibian die-off. Prevalence varied among three different taxonomic groups during this mortality event with the highest prevalence, 84%, detected in larval Ambystomatids, 44.4% prevalence in adult Newts, and no virus detected in adult Plethodontids. I did not detect virus at either of the other two breeding ponds despite equivalent sampling effort, similar community composition, and close proximity to Gourley Pond. These results suggest that the severity and spatial extent of Ranavirus in Cades Cove remains unchanged since its initial detection a decade ago. Also, despite the observed massive die-offs there is no evidence of local amphibian extinction at Gourley Pond

Analysis of Arabidopsis thaliana Protein Phosphatase 2A C subunit expression

Reversible protein phosphorylation is required for presumably most biological pathways. One of the major enzymes involved in eukaryotic dephosphorylation is Protein Phosphatase 2A (PP2A). PP2A is composed of three subunits: A (scaffolding), B (regulatory), and C (catalytic). Our lab is interested in determining the function of the five C subunits (C1, C2, C3, C4 and C5) in Arabidopsis thaliana. We have identified a Na+-induced altered root growth phenotype in c4 mutant plants. The goal of this project was to determine expression of the five C subunit genes throughout the life cycle of Arabidopsis with emphasis on correlating the location of C4 subunit expression to the known root phenotype. C4 gene expression was observed in the roots and expression was not changed in the presence of additional NaCl or mannitol. Expression of all C subunits was ubiquitous and similar throughout the Arabidopsis life cycle with the highest expression in the root tips