Correction to: “Offensiphobia” is a Red Herring: On the Problem of Censorship and Academic Freedom

The Journal of Ethics -     

Feast your eyes: hunger and trait reward drive predict attentional bias for food cues

Appraisal theories of emotion predict that the relevance of a stimulus to a person's needs and goals influences attentional allocation. We used a modified visual probe task to examine the influence of hunger and trait reward drive on food-related attentional bias. Both hunger and trait reward drive predicted degree of attentional "disengagement" from food images at short (100 ms), but not long (500, 2,000 ms) stimulus durations. Effects of hunger were found for both bland and appetizing foods, while effects of reward drive were restricted to appetizing foods. Our findings extend previous research showing delayed "disengagement" from threat-related stimuli, suggesting that both organismic- and goal-relevance are key biasing factors in attentional competition.     

Violent Female Action Characters in Contemporary American Cinema

This research is a content analysis of violent female action characters (“VFAC”) shown in American action films from 1991 through 2005. The analysis focused on three aspects of VFACs: (1) gender stereotypes, (2) demographics, and (3) quantity and type of violence. Findings showed that 58.6% of VFACs were portrayed in a submissive role to the male hero in the film, and 42% were romantically linked to him. The average VFAC was young, white, highly educated, and unmarried. VFACs engaged in masculine types of violence yet retained feminine stereotypes due to their submissive role and romantic involvement with a dominant male hero character. The findings suggest continued gender stereotypes set within a violent framework of contemporary American cinema.     

A Comparison of Within- and Across-Activity Choices for Reducing Challenging Behavior in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders

Offering children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) choices between activities (e.g., working on math or English), instructional materials (e.g., using a pen or pencil), or environmental arrangements (e.g., where to sit) has been shown to reduce challenging behavior maintained by escape from task demands. However, the majority of research investigating choice-based interventions for challenging behavior has examined across-activity choices (i.e., choosing between activities) and relatively few studies have examined within-activity choice (i.e., choosing between instructional materials or environmental arrangements). The purpose of this study is to replicate and extend previous research on choice-based challenging behavior interventions by comparing the effects of across-activity choices and within-activity choices on the escape-maintained challenging behavior of 4 children with ASD. An alternating treatment design was embedded within the “B” phase of an ABAB design in which the “A” phase represented a no-choice baseline condition. Both choice formats resulted in less challenging behavior than the baseline condition for all participants. Across-activity choice resulted in less challenging behavior than within-activity choice for 3 participants. Implications for research and practice are discussed.     

Dancing with identity: Narrative resistance strategies of male and female stripteasers

Using life history interviews with 14 female and 10 male striptease dancers, the researchers examined how the language of deviance is used in the life narratives of exotic dancers. Past studies have oriented toward striptease as an occupational curiosity for men and as deviant for women. This article addressed both genders in one study. Eschewing typical deviance vocabularies of analysis, the authors drew upon “biographical work” as our theoretical orientation to frame the life history interview materials and to develop the concept of “narrative resistance.” Rather than assuming that deviance is inherent to striptease dancing for women, but not men, the authors demonstrated how deviance is a socially constructed narrative resource that all dancers may draw upon to construct an account of self. The narrative resistance strategies discussed here include two deviance exemplars: sleaze and immersion. The authors concluded with two discussions: one regarding gender and biographical work and the other regarding the generalizability of narrative resistance as a biographical work strategy.