The Prentice-O'Gorman destination appraisal matrix: Iranian case study

Prentice's model was designed to challenge a tendency in contemporary destination marketing to emphasise SSPs (Standardised Selling Points) rather than USPs (Unique (or at least Unusual) Selling Points). This process of standardisation is what the French have termed Banalisation (Prentice 2006b). Prentice's model is a hybrid of traditional destination choice sets models (Crompton 1992; Sirakaya and Woodside 2005) with inputs from the Theory of Reasoned Action (Aizen and Fishbein 1980) and from heuristic choice models (Pham 1998). Prentice further differentiates USPs into UUSPs (Unique Utility Selling Points) UESPs (Unique Experiential Selling Points) USSPs (Unique Symbolic Selling Points). These may be thought of as summarising those aspects of generic imagery and product beliefs that are pertinent to destination differentiation. As specified, Prentice's model is a model of choosing on the part of potential tourists. The question arises as to how destination managers may readily operationalise Prentice's ideas in both their marketing and market based product development or, indeed, simply to think about their destination. Many managers are familiar with SWOT analysis and the operationalisation of Prentice's ideas suggested here builds on this familiarity. The demonstrated means of application is in the form of a matrix combining Prentice's expansion of USPs with a traditional SWOT analysis

The Prentice - O'Gorman destination appraisal matrix for tourism development and marketing

We ask how tourists are thought to make decisions in choosing a destination to visit. The traditional approach emphasised the sequence by which possible destinations were rejected. Prentice's ideas, instead, emphasise the processes of choosing. His approach offers information about why a destination is chosen and why other destinations are rejected by potential tourists. This is a basis from which tourism developers and marketers can predict the needs of tourists. Central to the approach are USPs (Unique Selling Points) and SSPs (Standardised Selling Points). SSPs have lead to the creation of many look-a-like destinations throughout the Mediterranean, a process described by the French as banalisation. We offer instead an approach to defining USPs designed to capture the authenticity of place and the sincerity of cultures. In doing so, the paper considers what tourists are seeking in products, in terms of utilities, experiences and symbols. It also considers how contemporary tourism products are created to achieve this. The presentation is illustrated using examples from the United Kingdom, to demonstrate how culture and commercialism can be sensitively combined to assist tourists in developing their feelings of authenticity and sincerity. The final section of the paper considers how planners and marketers should capture the sense of place and culture as USPs. A destination appraisal matrix is provided combining an analysis of USPs with a traditional SWOT analysis. The paper is concluded by demonstrating the matrix with a hypothetical example, which some people might assume to be London

Iranian hospitality : from caravanserai to bazaar to reporting symbolic experience

This paper reports case studies seeking to address one of the great problems of social science: namely, the extent to which is it possible or desirable accurately to report conscious experience (Hulburt & Scwitzgebel 2007). An interpretive ethnographic approach is used to address this problem. Caravanserais and bazaars in Iran have always offered multi-sensual experiences and represented aspects of symbolic interaction, as well as facilitating physical exchange, between travellers and locals. This is true in their origins, in their nineteenth and twentieth century usage, and in their contemporary roles which increasingly include heritage tourism accommodation or heritage retailing. Using two case studies the paper explores the role that hospitality has played and shows that it has been fundamental to their evolution and remains so, particularly for the commercial caravanserais and tea houses which now exist as refurbished heritage accommodation and restaurants

Cultural Responses to Climate Change in the Holocene

Variable Holocene climate conditions have caused cultures to thrive, adapt or fail. The invention of agriculture and the domestication of plants and animals allowed sedentary societies to develop and are the result of the climate becoming warmer after the last glaciation. The subsequent cooling of the Younger Dryas forced humans to concentrate into geographic areas that had an abundant water supply and ultimately favorable conditions for the use of agriculture and widespread domestication of plants and animals. Population densities would have reached a threshold and forced a return to foraging, however the end of the Younger Dryas at 10,000 BP allowed agrarian societies to grow in number and expand spatially. The Norse took advantage of the favorable climate conditions of the medieval warm period (800 to 1300 CE) to establish settlements off the coast of Greenland, but the onset of the Little Ice Age (1350-1850 CE) caused sea ice to block trade routes with China and led to their demise. The long and cold winters of the Little Ice Age inspired works of art and literature, and were celebrated in London, but also caused crop failures, famine and disease. The Dust Bowl drought of the 1930’s only lasted six years but caused the most devastating ecological, sociological, agricultural, and economic disaster in United States history. Multicentury and multidecadal droughts led to the collapse of the Akkadian, Classic Maya, Mochica, and Tiwanaku civilizations. The primary factors affecting global climate variations include changes in thermohaline circulation, solar irradiance, and the effects of active volcanoes. Complex societies are not completely powerless nor fully adaptive to climate change. Modern society should use knowledge of past abrupt climate changes to better prepare for the future

Emergency medical dispatch recognition, clinical intervention and outcome of patients in traumatic cardiac arrest from major trauma : an observational study

© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2018. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study is to describe the demographics of reported traumatic cardiac arrest (TCA) victims, prehospital resuscitation and survival to hospital rate. SETTING: Helicopter Emergency Medical Service (HEMS) in south-east England, covering a resident population of 4.5 million and a transient population of up to 8 million people. PARTICIPANTS: Patients reported on the initial 999 call to be in suspected traumatic cardiac arrest between 1 July 2016 and 31 December 2016 within the trust's geographical region were identified. The inclusion criteria were all cases of reported TCA on receipt of the initial emergency call. Patients were subsequently excluded if a medical cause of cardiac arrest was suspected. OUTCOME MEASURES: Patient records were analysed for actual presence of cardiac arrest, prehospital resuscitation procedures undertaken and for survival to hospital rates. RESULTS: 112 patients were reported to be in TCA on receipt of the 999/112 call. 51 (46%) were found not to be in TCA on arrival of emergency medical services. Of the 'not in TCA cohort', 34 (67%) received at least one advanced prehospital medical intervention (defined as emergency anaesthesia, thoracostomy, blood product transfusion or resuscitative thoracotomy). Of the 61 patients in actual TCA, 10 (16%) achieved return-of-spontaneous circulation. In 45 (88%) patients, the HEMS team escorted the patient to hospital. CONCLUSION: A significant proportion of patients reported to be in TCA on receipt of the emergency call are not in actual cardiac arrest but are critically unwell requiring advanced prehospital medical intervention. Early activation of an enhanced care team to a reported TCA call allows appropriate advanced resuscitation. Further research is warranted to determine which interventions contribute to improved TCA survival.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

الگوي ارزيابي و انتخاب مقاصد توريستي پرنتايس-اگرمن Iranian applications of the Prentice - O'Gorman destination appraisal matrix for tourism

We ask how tourists are thought to make decisions in choosing a destination to visit. The traditional approach emphasised the sequence by which possible destinations were rejected. Prentice's ideas, instead, emphasise the processes of choosing. His approach offers information about why a destination is chosen and why other destinations are rejected by potential tourists. This is a basis from which tourism developers and marketers can predict the needs of tourists. Central to the approach are USPs (Unique Selling Points) and SSPs (Standardised Selling Points). SSPs have lead to the creation of many look-a-like destinations throughout the Mediterranean, a process described by the French as banalisation. We offer instead an approach to defining USPs designed to capture the authenticity of place and the sincerity of cultures. In doing so, the paper considers what tourists are seeking in products, in terms of utilities, experiences and symbols. It also considers how contemporary tourism products are created to achieve this. The presentation is illustrated using examples from the United Kingdom, to demonstrate how culture and commercialism can be sensitively combined to assist tourists in developing their feelings of authenticity and sincerity. The final section of the paper considers how planners and marketers should capture the sense of place and culture as USPs. A destination appraisal matrix is provided combining an analysis of USPs with a traditional SWOT analysis. The paper is concluded by demonstrating the matrix with a hypothetical example, which some people might assume to be London

Evaluation of intranasal particulate strategies to enhance the delivery of anti-seizure therapeutics to the brain

Epilepsy is a common and serious neurological disorder to which a high proportion of patients continue to be considered “drug-resistant” despite the availability of a host of anti-seizure drugs. Investigation into new treatment strategies is therefore of great importance, one such strategy being the use of the nose to deliver drugs directly to the brain with the help of pharmaceutical formulation to overcome the physical challenges presented by this route. The overall aim of this thesis was to establish and apply a seizure model to the investigation of two types of particulate intranasal delivery systems; microparticles and cubosomes. Chapter One introduces the topic of intranasal delivery of anti-seizure drugs, covering the link between the nose and seizures, pathways from the nose to the brain, current rudimentary formulations in clinical use, animal seizure models and their proposed application in studying intranasal treatments, and a critical discussion of relevant pre-clinical studies in the literature. Upon this, Chapter Two begins by validating a seizure model based on the Maximal Electroshock Seizure Threshold (MEST) test with the intention of using it to detect the effects of intranasally administered therapeutics. The design attempts to address previously scarcely acknowledged issues of sensitivity in the MEST model and confounding by anaesthetics which are currently necessary to reliably and ethically perform intranasal administration to the olfactory region in rats. The results show that the model was able to clearly detect a change in seizure threshold after administration of the positive control, intravenous phenytoin, which was supported by therapeutic brain and plasma concentrations of the drug as determined using an internally developed Liquid Chromatography Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS) assay. Importantly, this effect was able to be detected despite the use of the inhaled anaesthetic, isoflurane, to briefly sedate the animals 60 minutes prior to stimulation. In Chapter Three, the seizure model is applied to the evaluation of tamarind seed polysaccharide (TSP) microparticles as a proposed intranasal delivery system for the pharmacokinetically troublesome anti-seizure drug phenytoin. In this first pharmacodynamic study, to the author’s knowledge, of a dry powder mucoadhesive microparticle formulation for seizure treatment, the model identified a peak anti-seizure effect time of 120 minutes after administration, which coincided with peak brain concentrations and supported its utilisation in intranasal delivery screening. Furthermore, the complementary demonstration of a histologically intact nasal epithelium and simultaneous measurement of phenytoin’s major metabolite, 5-(4-Hydroxyphenyl)-5-phenylhydantoin (4-HPPH) in brain tissue and plasma, supported the hypothesis of a direct intranasal delivery to the brain and the suitability of the microparticles for further trials. In Chapter Four, the seizure model is applied to explore a potential new type of anti-seizure therapeutic, the endogenous endocannabinoid-like molecule, oleoylethanolamide (OEA), which has not yet had an effect on seizures documented. A cubosome dispersion was selected as the delivery vehicle, presenting one of the few pharmacodynamic in vivo studies conducted with this class of formulation to date. Given the unknown effects of oleoylethanolamide, it was firstly administered intravenously as a control, but no effect on seizure threshold was evident. Considering the complex nature of the hydrolysis-susceptible oleoylethanolamide and the self-assembling cubosome dispersion, complementary in vivo pharmacokinetic studies (utilising an internally developed LC-MS assay) and in vitro structural stability studies (utilising Small-angle X-ray Scattering (SAXS)) were conducted to further explore confounding factors. Despite presenting with complexities of their own, they overall supported the lack of pharmacodynamic effect seen after systemic administration. Intranasal studies were conducted in an attempt to bypass the challenges of systemic administration, but also demonstrated no measurable change in seizure threshold. Histological studies to determine a safe dose uncovered a toxicity of cubosomes to the nasal epithelium at the highest dose, independent of lipid type, which has not yet been described in any in vivo liquid crystalline nanoparticle studies to date and should be considered in future related work. In summary, this thesis presents a tailored seizure model for screening intranasal delivery systems, a practical template for studying these systems in vivo, and a pre-clinical evaluation of two such systems. Notwithstanding the discussed limitations, it concludes that dry-powder mucoadhesive microparticles appear to be a promising platform for future study of intranasal anti-seizure drug delivery, while cubosomes and oleoylethanolamide may be better suited to other applications until a more thorough in vivo exploration of their respective fields exists

Iranian hospitality : embodiment, experience and representation

This paper seeks to triangulate methods to locate the essence of Iranian hospitality within heritage settings. It uses caravanserais, hostels for travellers and their trains of animals, and bazaars, covered markets, as its foci. These buildings have always offered multi-sensual experiences and represented aspects of symbolic interaction, as well as facilitating physical exchange, between travellers and locals. Hospitality has been fundamental to their evolution and remains so, particularly for the commercial caravanserais and tea houses which now exist as refurbished heritage accommodation and restaurants. There has always been a strong tradition of hospitality in the Islamic world, and Islamic practice emulates Ibrahim in the Koran. The first method used is to interpret physical structures, and in particular to show how the physical form of caravanserais traditionally embodied dimensions of expectation and behaviour that have characterised hospitality since it was first codified. The second method recognises the importance of personal sensing and reflection as a method, articulating personal experiences between individuals to come to a group experience. Bazaars are the focus of this second method. These were communities within communities, and had commonly caravanserais, tea houses, houses, workshops, baths, mosques and madrasas sited within them. Their architecture is commonly geometrical and enclosed. Personal sensing is used as a means of representing the felt experiences of authenticity and sincerity which these buildings and their communities and users facilitate, and the role of hospitality within this. The third method used is a content analysis of the representations of utilitarian, experiential and symbolic selling points collated from Iranian tourism and hospitality knowledgeables. The third method operationalises the Prentice-O'Gorman Destination Appraisal Matrix methodology, as a means of understanding the experiential and symbolic products offered by contemporary Iranian hospitality. Particular attention is paid to authenticity and sincerity within the hospitality and wider tourism offering of Iran

The Rebirth of Airships

Until the outbreak of the Second World War, uncertainty existed whether airships and airplanes would dominate intercontinental passenger transportation. The massive investments in fixed-wing aircraft during these hostilities made airplanes the decisive winner, and relegated airships to a negligible role in transportation. As the 21st Century progresses, airships are making a comeback fueled by the 21st Century progresses, airships are making a comeback fueled by the growing demand for air cargo, the unique environmental and operational characteristics of buoyant flight, and advances in engineering science and materials. This paper examines the market niche for airships that exists between air and marine transport and the inherent advantages and disadvantages of this mode of transportation. The economics of airships are considered in light of their past achievements and current designs. The paper concludes with the discussion of two potential applications. A long haul mission for airships between Hawaii and the U.S. mainland is considered for perishable freight, and a short haul mission for airships in northern Canada is considered for the transport of freight and passengers to remote communities