Do Individual Perceptions Matter in Pornography Effects? How Perceived General Acceptance and Influence of Pornography May Impact Agreement With Sex-Role Attitudes

Pornography use is often associated with less-progressive sex-role attitudes, such as endorsement of a sexual double standard between heterosexual partners, but the process by which this relationship occurs is still largely unexamined. The present study was conducted to examine how perceptions about pornography may play a role in the relationship between pornography use and sex-role attitudes. Perceived general acceptance and perceived influence of pornography on most people partially mediated the relationship between pornography use and sex-role attitudes. The more participants reported using pornography, the more they believed pornography was generally accepted and had a positive influence; however, conversely to what was hypothesized, the more positive they perceived pornography’s influence, the less likely they were to report sex-role attitudes that endorse a sexual double standard.     

Fertilization in flowering plants

After the pollen grain reaches the stigma through outsourced agents (pollinators), the next step before fertilization is to select the right type of pollen. Similar to a marriage in human beings, fiowering plants also have evolved elaborate screening process to select the right pollen grains and to reject the wrong ones. Even after initial screening for the right pollen, the pistil imposes a tough competition amongst them, comparable to a swayamvara of Indian mythology, to select the best available pollen. Flowering plants have evolved into a matriarchal society. The selection of the male partner is totally the prerogative of the mother (pistil); the boy (pollen grain) and the girl (ovule) has no say in this selection.     

Mediating effects of resistance training skill competency on health-related fitness and physical activity: the ATLAS cluster randomised controlled trial

The purpose of this study was to examine the mediating effect of resistance training skill competency on percentage of body fat, muscular fitness and physical activity among a sample of adolescent boys participating in a school-based obesity prevention intervention. Participants were 361 adolescent boys taking part in the Active Teen Leaders Avoiding Screen-time (ATLAS) cluster randomised controlled trial: a school-based program targeting the health behaviours of economically disadvantaged adolescent males considered “at-risk” of obesity. Body fat percentage (bioelectrical impedance), muscular fitness (hand grip dynamometry and push-ups), physical activity (accelerometry) and resistance training skill competency were assessed at baseline and post-intervention (i.e., 8 months). Three separate multi-level mediation models were analysed to investigate the potential mediating effects of resistance training skill competency on each of the study outcomes using a product-of-coefficients test. Analyses followed the intention-to-treat principle. The intervention had a significant impact on the resistance training skill competency of the boys, and improvements in skill competency significantly mediated the effect of the intervention on percentage of body fat and the combined muscular fitness score. No significant mediated effects were found for physical activity. Improving resistance training skill competency may be an effective strategy for achieving improvements in body composition and muscular fitness in adolescent boys.     

Mapping International Health onto Domestic Health: A Pentadic Cartography of Kathleen Sibelius’s Global Health Strategy

Pentadic cartography is a useful way to examine the motivational vocabularies of discourses and to provide alternative vocabularies for negotiating rhetorical terrains. Pentadic cartographers have used Kenneth Burke’s principles to examine and critique the motivational vocabularies of texts as their vocabularies compete against one another. This article expands the application of pentadic cartography by exploring maps as “overlays” or when two pentadic vocabularies do not necessarily compete but can complement one another. This study examines two potential competing mappings present in former Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sibelius’s (2012) speech outlining a new global health strategy, as well as an overlay map that negotiates domestic and global health. Each mapping is assessed for its abilities to open and to close the universe of discourse. The possibility of overlays as a supplement to pentadic cartography is outlined.     

Physical activity profiles and selected muscular fitness variables in English schoolchildren: A north–south divide?

The aim of the study was to compare and contrast habitual physical activity (PA) profiles and muscular fitness in schoolchildren from northern and southern regions of England. Data were collected from two secondary schools in the north east (NE) of England. The study procedures followed methods employed by the East of England Healthy Hearts Study in 10–16-year-old boys and girls based in the south east (SE) region of England and data were compared. Habitual physical activity (PAQ-A), vertical jump test, and hand-grip (HG) strength were assessed. We converted raw scores from all assessments to age- and sex-normalised z-scores. We recruited 597 children (58% boys) in the NE and compared findings to 597 age- and sex-matched boys and girls from the SE. Boys in the SE had significantly stronger HG scores, jumped higher, were more powerful (mean peak power: 2131?W vs. 1782?W; P?P?P?相似文献