Communication and new media : broadcast to narrowcast

Presents a new way of looking at media and mass communication. Traces the history, development and theories of mass communication and the emergence of new media. Looks at questions of ethics, regulation and governance.

Finding voices: authentic learning online in the field of public communication and citizenship

A creative re-acculturation of teachers and students is occurring in virtual classrooms as traditional learning resources, pedagogy, and technology intersect in unexpected ways. This paper reports on a case of authentic, experiential, and constructivist learning developed for tertiary public relations  students. A subject titled ‘Public Communication and Citizenship’ (PCC) at  Deakin University in Australia asked students to examine the problematic and contentious areas of self interest, persuasion, power, and ethics in  contemporary contexts of mass media and globalisation. Feedback from  those students suggests that, in this case, online teaching strategies  successfully integrated with the total learning environment to achieve  higher-order learning. PCC is one example of PR pedagogy combining  theory and technology to move beyond ‘skilling for jobs’.

Body mass index and parent-reported self-estem in elementary school children: evidence for a causal relationship.

OBJECTIVE: To clarify relationships between body mass index (BMI) and self-esteem in young children at a population level. To assess whether low self-esteem precedes or follows development of overweight/obesity in children. DESIGN: Prospective cohort study in elementary schools throughout Victoria, Australia. Child BMI and self-esteem were measured in 1997 and 2000. SUBJECTS: Random sample of 1,157 children who were in the first 4 y of elementary school (aged 5-10 y) at baseline. MEASURES: BMI was calculated from measured height and weight, then transformed to z-scores. Children were classified as nonoverweight, overweight or obese based on international cut-points. Low child self-esteem was defined as a score below the 15th percentile on the self-esteem subscale of the parent-reported Child Health Questionnaire. RESULTS: Overweight/obese children had lower median self-esteem scores than nonoverweight children at both timepoints, especially at follow-up. After accounting for baseline self-esteem, higher baseline BMI z-score predicted poorer self-esteem at follow-up (P=0.008). After accounting for baseline BMI z-score, poorer baseline self-esteem did not predict higher BMI z-score at follow-up. While nonoverweight children with low baseline self-esteem were more likely to develop overweight/obesity (OR=2.1, 95% CI=1.2, 3.6), this accounted for only a small proportion of the incidence of overweight. CONCLUSIONS: Our data show an increasingly strong association between lower self-esteem and higher body mass across the elementary school years. Overweight/obesity precedes low self-esteem in many children, suggesting a causal relationship. This indicates that prevention and management strategies for childhood overweight/obesity need to begin early to minimise the impact on self-esteem.

Analysis of self-assembled monolayer interfaces by electrospray mass spectrometry : a gentle approach

A general mass spectrometry technique for the characterization of alkanethiol-modified surfaces is presented. Alkanethiol self-assembled onto a gold surface (in this case, peptides were attached to the gold surface via a thiolate bond) was reductively desorbed in 0.05 M KOH in the presence of octadecyl-derivatized silica gel. The peptide adsorbed onto the silica gel, whereupon it could be filtered, washed to remove any salts, and then eluted using a mixture of 4:1 v/v methanol/water. The eluant containing the peptide was injected into a Fourier transform ion-cyclotron resonance mass spectrometer (FTICR/MS) via electrospray ionization. The spectrum showed no fragmentation of the peptide, demonstrating the gentleness of the technique. This simple procedure is not limited to FTICR/MS and could be adapted to other mass spectrometers.

After Charlie: free speech and the political economy of communication

Three significant events at the start of 2015 have put freedom of speech firmly on the global agenda. The first was the carry-over from the December 2014 illegal entry to the Sony Corporation’s file servers by anonymous hackers, believed to be linked to the North Korean regime. The second was the horrible attack on journalists, editors, and cartoonists at the French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo on 7 January. The third was the election of leftwing anti-austerity party Syrzia in Greece on 25 January.While each event is different in scope and size, they are important to scholars of the political economy of communication because they all speak to ongoing debates about freedom of expression, freedom of speech and freedom of the press. I name each of these concepts separately because, despite popular confusion, they are not the same thing (Patching and Hirst, 2014) . Freedom of expression is the right to individual self-expression through any means; it is an inalienable human right. Freedom of speech refers to the right (and the physical ability) to utter political speech, to say what others wish to repress and to demand a voice with which to express a range of social and political thoughts. Freedom of the press is a very particular version of freedom of expression that is intimately bound with the political economy of speech and of the printing press. Freedom of the press is impossible without the press and, despite its theoretical availability to all of us, this principle is impossible to articulate without the material means (usually money) to actually deploy a printing press (or the electronic means of broadcasting and publishing).Freedom of expression is immutable; freedom of speech subject to legal, ethical and ideological restriction (for better, or worse) and freedom of the press is peculiar to bourgeois society in that it entails the freedom to own and operate a press, not the right to say or publish on a level playing field. Access to freedom of the press is determined in the marketplace and is subject to the unequal power relationships that such determination implies.It is fitting to start with the Charlie Hebdo massacre because the loss of 17 lives makes this the most chilling of the three events and demands that it be given prominence in any analysis. No lives have been lost yet because Sony’s computers were hacked and the election of Syriza has not (yet) led to mass deaths in Greece.

Enhancing flexible business training through computer-mediated communication

A previous article in this journal, by the same author, reported on research that indicated that flexible training for business learners in the workplace needed to take account of their need for instructor guidance and direction, and of their preference for learning in affiliative environments with fellow learners and trainers. In this article the use of computer-mediated  communication (CMC) is explored as one training method that can assist with flexible training of this clientele. Some specific strategies for the successful use of CMC are suggested.

Relationship between body mass index and the use of healthcare services in Australia

Objective: To examine the relationship between body mass index (BMI) and the use of medical and preventive health services. Research Methods and Procedures: This study involved secondary analysis of weighted data from the Australian 1995 National Health Survey. The study was a population survey designed to obtain national benchmark information about a range of health-related issues. Data were available from 17,033 men and 17,174 women, 20 years or age. BMI, based on self-reported weight and height, was analyzed in relation to the use of medical services and preventive health services. Results: A positive relationship was found between BMI and medical service use, such as medication use, visits to hospital accident and emergency departments (for women only); doctor visits, visits to a hospital outpatient clinics; and visits to other health professionals (for women only). A negative relationship was found in women between BMI and preventive health services. Underweight women were found to be significantly less likely to have Papanicolaou smear tests, breast examinations, and mammograms. Discussion: This research shows that people who fall outside the healthy weight range are more likely to use a range of medical services. Given that the BMI of industrialized populations appears to be increasing, this has important ramifications for health service planning and reinforces the need for obesity prevention strategies at a population level.

Learning through computer-mediated communication: a comparison of Australian and Chinese heritage students

Twelve Australian and 12 Chinese heritage students from a third-year university computer ethics subject completed a Readiness for Online Learning Questionnaire; and six students from each of these two groups participated in a student-facilitated problem-solving discussion through computer-mediated communication. The questionnaire comparisons showed that the two groups of students were equally willing to self-manage their own learning, but that Australian students were significantly more comfortable with e-learning. The analysis of student postings in the CMC component showed that, collectively, Australian students posted more messages than did the Chinese students. Both groups participated equally in socialisation online; although Chinese heritage students posted a higher number of messages associated with organisational matters; and Australian students posted a larger number of message components associated with intellectual contributions to the discussion. These results are interpreted in a theoretical context and implications for practice are drawn.

Conceptualizing the ιnfluence of the self-service technology context on consumer voice

The self-service technology (SST) context is characterized by consumer participation in service production and delivery, independent of service personnel; a lack of interpersonal interaction between consumers and service personnel; and consumers being required tointerface and interact with technology. With these features of the SST context in mind, in situations where SSTs fail to perform as promised, some challenges arise: consumers who are dissatisfied do not have the security or reassurance of service personnel to assist them; service personnel do not have the opportunity to prompt consumers to voice their dissatisfaction; and consumers need to initiate their own complaint response. If consumers fail to report their dissatisfaction directly to the organization, organizations will not know that a problem exists and may experience negative consequences such as consumer switching behavior. As reports of consumer dissatisfaction with SSTs become increasingly common, it is important, therefore, to investigate how organizations with SST-based offerings can encourage consumers to voice their dissatisfaction directly to the organization. Although the antecedents of consumer voice are well documented in the interpersonal services context, in the context of SSTs they have been subject to very little conceptual or empirical scrutiny. This paper argues that voice needs to be revisited with respect to SSTs due to their unique characteristics compared to interpersonal services, and presents a conceptual model of the antecedents of consumers' voice behavior in the context of SSTs.