Using Relevant Humor to Moderate Inappropriate Conversations: Maintaining Student Communication Satisfaction in the Classroom

This study assessed students’ (N=195) perceptions of instructors’ relevant humor and inappropriate conversations in the classroom and used expectancy violation theory (EVT) as a lens to position instructor relevant humor as a moderator between instructors’ inappropriate conversations and student communication satisfaction. Results showed a positive association between students’ perceptions of instructors’ use of relevant humor and student communication satisfaction, and in contrast, a negative relationship between perceptions of instructors’ inappropriate conversations and student communication satisfaction. Consistent with the tenets of EVT, results also indicated that instructors who use relevant humor in the classroom may overcome students’ negative perceptions of inappropriate conversations and maintain student communication satisfaction.     

The Works of Gilbert Seldes

W.J. Baker's A History of the Marconi Company (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1972–$12.95)

Vishwa Mohan Mishra's Communication and Modernization in Urban Slums (New York: Asia Publishing House, Inc., 1972—$6.95, with paper edition available)

James R. Bradon (ed.) The Performing Arts in Asia (Paris: Unesco [available in this country from New York: Unipub, Inc.], 1971—$3.00, paper)

John A. Lent (ed.) The Asian Newspapers' Reluctant Revolution (Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1971—$12.50)

Richard L. Merritt (ed.) Communication in International Politics (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 19Y2—$15.00)

Gayle Durham Hollander's Soviet Political Indoctrination: Developments in Mass Media and Propaganda Since Stalin (New York: Praeger Special Studies in International Politics and Public Affairs, 1972—$15.00)     

Television and Radio

TVPE (1826 Spaight St., Madison, Wisconsin 53704; to begin publication on a monthly basis in February 1973 at $6.00 per year)

Television Quarterly

Terry Galanoy's Tonight! (New York: Doubleday, 1972 -- $7.95)

Gene Kievan, Turn That Damned Thing Off: An Irreverent look at TV's Impact on the American Scene (Indianapolis: Bobbs- Merrill, 1972 -- $6.95)

John Gambling's Rambling with Gambling (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1972 -- $6.95)

Mary Francis Rhymer (ed.) The Small House Halfway Up in the Next Block: Paul Rhymer's Vic and Sade (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1972 -- 9.50)

Charles E. Lowman's Magnetic Recording (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1972 -- $14.50)     

Media

Steven H. Chaffee and Michael J. Petrick's Using the Mass Media: Communication Problems in American Society (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1975—$6.95, paper)

Bibliography: Some Canadian Writings on the Mass Media (Ottawa: Canadian Radio-Television Commission , 1974—apparently free on request, paper)

Communications: Some Federal Proposals (Ottawa: Information Canada, 1975—price not known, paper)

Bernard C. Hennessy's Public Opinion (Belmont, Calif.: Duxbury Press/ Wadsworth, 1975—price not known, paper)

John G. Cawelti's The Six-Gun Mystique (Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1972—price not known, paper)

First Annual Report (Cambridge: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, December 1974—free on request, paper)     

Humor: Incongruity,disparagement, and David Letterman

Trait argumentativeness and argumentativeness in the workplace, a particular situation, were examined with regard to gender of the respondent, rank/status of the respondent in the organization, and existence of a formal employee participation program. A main effect for gender showed men displayed the trait to a greater degree than women. There was a strong correlation between general trait argumentativeness and workplace argumentativeness, measured at a two‐week interval, which adds strength and validity to the trait measure of argumentativeness. The influence of the cross‐situaiional consistency nature of the trait was evidenced in this study.     

Public Identity and Collective Memory in U.S. Iconic Photography: The Image of "Accidental Napalm"

Thirty years after the fact, the Vietnam War continues to haunt the collective memory of the United States. One of the primary embodiments of that haunting is the image of a naked girl running down a road toward the camera, screaming in pain and terror from the napalm burns on her back and arms. The photograph, often dubbed “accidental napalm,” provides a complex construction of viewer response that was uniquely suited to the conditions of representation in the Vietnam era, while it reflects a continuing struggle within public culture since that time. In this essay, we offer a close reading of the photograph as a performance of public judgment, and we explore its subsequent history of appropriation. We argue that the photograph functions as a powerful emotional and inventional resource for animating moral deliberation and democratic dissent as it mediates the “stranger relationality” central to public engagement. At the same time, the image also motivates dominant narrative responses that reinscribe liberal ideology to inhibit collective memory and public accountability. This ambivalence in the circulation of the iconic image is grounded in fundamental affinities between photographic representation, public culture, and mass media.     

The Constitutive Relationship of Social Communication Competence to Self-Compassion and Hope

Communication is constitutive—in theory. In research, however, communication is often treated as an outcome, influenced by personal attributes. The present research examines social communication competence as a constitutive influence predicting self-compassion and hope. Path analysis results support this hypothesis. Results show that social communication expressivity (β = .14), sensitivity (β = –.32), and control (β = .20) predict self-compassion. Social communication sensitivity (β = .26) and control (β = .27) affect hope agency, and social communication control (β = .29) predicts hope pathways thinking. These results provide evidence of the constitutive nature of communication.     

OER evaluation as a means of teaching information literacy in individual and small group settings

ABSTRACT

Open education resources represent a great opportunity to reduce textbook costs, but many of them have not been evaluated for quality. Librarians and former students in an introduction to engineering course collected and evaluated open education resources to supplement the course textbook in future semesters. Both searching for and evaluating these resources created opportunities for the librarians to evaluate information literacy skills of these students and to provide instruction to improve these skills.     

Social Comparisons and Need Fulfillment: Interpreting Video Game Enjoyment in the Context of Leaderboards

This study examines how social comparison information provided by video game leaderboards may influence players’ retrospective judgments of autonomy, competence, and relatedness need fulfillment. Participants played a video game and were randomly assigned to receive no postgame feedback or were shown a leaderboard that placed them in the top or bottom quartile of players. Results indicate downward social comparisons increase enjoyment by increasing competence and relatedness perceptions. However, upward comparisons did not have an opposite effect, nor did either type of social comparison influence players’ autonomy perceptions. Implications for applying Self-Determination Theory to video game enjoyment in the context of social comparison feedback is discussed.     

Free kick goals in football: an unlikely success between failure and embarrassment

We develop and use a numerical model to investigate the window of opportunity of free kicks in association football. The planar multibody forward dynamics model comprises a two segment leg model with joint actuations, a football, a wall and the turf. Contact mechanics is defined to model the impact of the foot and the ball’s interaction with the different elements in the environment. The optimum kick is determined using the global optimization algorithm differential evolution, requiring millions of kick simulations. The sensitivity of various solutions to parameter perturbation is investigated. It is concluded that toe kicks are theoretically superior to instep kicks, but are difficult to perform reliably. The results also show that small perturbations in parameters can lead to embarrassingly failed kicks.