Aesthetics and Affect: Engaging Energy Communities

ABSTRACT

Engaging publics in participatory events has become a central means to introducing lay people's voices into processes of technoscientific innovation and governance. However, little attention has been paid to the role of aesthetics, especially in terms of opening up potential ways of critically and creatively engaging with technoscientific matters of concern. The terms semblamatic and matters of potentially are proposed as addressing this dimension of aesthetics. Drawing on practice-based design research, a probe workshop with members of energy communities was implemented. Three probe exercises served to open up potential re-articulations of such core themes as energy, communities and futures. Our goals were to examine the whether such probes enabled semblamatic responses and the emergence of matters of potentiality. Findings were mixed. The continued retention of standard meanings of these core themes suggested that such events can be anaesthetic, blunting access to the semblamatic aspects of engagement. Conversely, there was some opening up in which the core themes were creatively re-articulated. The present perspective, with its three novel terms - semblamatic, matters of potentiality, and anaesthetic - might prove useful in alerting scholars to the complex role of aesthetics in the methodological and analytic practices entailed in engagement with publics.     

Influence of properties of layered silicate minerals on adsorbed DNA surface affinity,self-assembly and nanopatterning

We report on the specific interaction between DNA and some mica-family minerals and other layered silicate structures. The interaction depends on mineral surface's crystallography, chemistry and potential. These properties are responsible for a remarkable variety of adsorption mechanisms and can be used to modulate surface self-assembly and nanopatterning of DNA. The controlled deposition of DNA onto non-conductive mineral regions with atomically flat boundaries has very attractive applications in nano-biotechnology (for example, microelectronics, microarrays and sensors). In addition, the extreme affinity discovered for some mineral surfaces, together with their ability to organize the DNA molecules, could be an indication of their catalytic potential. It may also have had relevance in the prebiotic environment, with important implications for the earth and life sciences.     

Relatedness Support and the Retention of Young Female Golfers

In this study, self-determination theory was used as a guiding framework to understand the putative role of relatedness support for retention in golf among young females. Data were collected using semi-structured interviews with 10 female participants (M_age = 21.40, SD = 3.13). Content analyses revealed 5 distinct factors that contributed to the provision of relatedness support: Parents, Peers, Coaches, Golf Club, and Institutional and Societal Support. Findings highlighted that retention of female golfers may be facilitated through promoting valued relationships with parents, peers, coaches, and golf clubs. Policies that decrease the perceived marginalization of female participants may also be perceived as a form of relatedness support and may promote retention within this cohort. This study underscores the importance of relatedness support for young women and identifies strategies that may help to improve female retention in sport.     

Social Networking Sites: Mediating the Self and its Communities

What do social networking sites reveal about the relation between the self and the community? We conceptualise social networking sites as technologies of the self and the community enabling individuals to self‐present and also objectifying the community's evaluation of individuals (through ‘structures of recognition’ such as page views, friends and lovehearts). We analyse the way in which 37 Scottish adolescents used the social networking site Bebo in nonprescribed and creative ways. First, they challenged the single authorship of profiles by co‐creating multi‐authored profiles. Second, they used creative language to obscure meaning from the preying eyes of parents, teachers and potential employers. We conclude by discussing the simplistic assumptions that Bebo makes about the relation between the self and the community. In contrast, newer social networking sites such as Facebook and Google+ are increasingly enabling people to present different facets of themselves to different communities. How people use social networking sites, and how these sites are developing to attract more users, reveals how the multiplicity of human identity is related to the multiple communities that people participate in. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Efficacy of Group Therapy in a Case of Marriage Neurosis

Abstract

Corruptogenic organizational dynamics have been largely ignored in reporting about recent corporate scandals. Using a large group framework, the author identifies factors within an organization that create a breeding ground for unethical or illegal behavior and attract individuals unconsciously looking for ways to damage themselves or others. An organizational culture that promotes questionable attitudes and behaviors along with subgroups that produce powerful corruptive forces can destroy a firm and damage the economy. Enron and the Madoff investment group are identified as corruptogenic organizations put together by founders and a leadership core bent on self-destruction and traumatizing the community–outcomes beyond that which are usually linked to greed. Suggestions are provided to organizational consultants and policy makers as to how to determine the potential for corruption hidden in their midst and to implement countervailing structures and processes.     

IV. A Family Group Therapy Technique for a Stalemate in Individual Treatment

Abstract

This paper explores the trend away from offering process-oriented groups on inpatient units, given decreasing lengths of stay, increasing acuity levels, and current biases toward psychoeducational groups and cognitive-behavioral treatments. A model for doing process-oriented groups that provides a structure while allowing a theme to emerge and maximal interaction to take place is presented. A case is made for the benefits of process-oriented inpatient groups as compared to, and complementary with, psychoeducational, cognitive, and behavioral approaches. Clinical vignettes illustrate typical themes and dynamics emerging in process-oriented inpatient groups.     

The Leftward Cradling Bias and Prosody: An Investigation of Cradling Preferences in the Deaf Community

Popular theory on the tendency to cradle an infant to the left side points to the specialization of the right hemisphere for the perception and expression of emotion. J. S. Sieratzki and B. Woll (1996) recently suggested that more emphasis be placed on the auditory modality, specifically focusing on the role of prosodic information. In this study, the direction of the lateral cradling bias in a group of profoundly deaf children, a group of deaf adults, and a control group of adults with no hearing impairment was investigated. The authors found a strong leftward cradling bias in all groups, a bias that was, if anything, stronger in the deaf participants. Given that people who are profoundly deaf, especially those who have been deaf from birth, have not been exposed to auditory prosody, the data do not support the suggestion that such prosodic information is the basis for the leftward cradling bias.     

Profiles of Chronic Illness Knowledge in a Community Sample of American Adults

The author identified profiles of chronic illness knowledge (i.e., heart disease, cancer, diabetes) in a community sample of American adults and examined the effect of sociodemographic influences on relations of illness knowledge to health practices and well-being. Participants were 181 women and 120 men who completed measures of illness knowledge, sociodemographics, personal health practices (e.g., diet, exercise, substance abuse, adaptive healthcare use), well-being (e.g., self-rated physical health, depression, social support), and perceived illness risk. Two-step cluster analyses performed on random subsets of the sample identified three levels of illness knowledge: low, medium, and high. Knowledge groups were differentiated on most measures of health practices, well-being and perceived illness risk. However, effects were substantially attenuated after controlling for differences in age and SES. Findings indicate that age and other sociodemographic factors are related not only to levels of illness knowledge but also to the application of knowledge in relation to health practices and well-being.