Stealing fame: lifestyle celebrity and the dubious cultural politics of Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring

ABSTRACT

In this essay, I theorize the lifestyle celebrity as a figure whose fame is premised on their aspirational status. I offer lifestyle celebrity as a complementary analytic to ordinary celebrity that allows for more precise distinction between celebrity figures. I engage Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring as a film that positions the desire for lifestyle celebrity as dangerous and irresponsible. I argue that the film places the burden of maintaining a “healthy” relationship with celebrity culture entirely on consumer-participants and affirms the class and gender performance hierarchies that structure the valuation and distribution of lifestyle celebrity.     

Categories in conflict: Combating the application of an intuitive conception of inheritance with category construction

The idea that characteristics acquired by an organism during its lifetime can be inherited by offspring and result in evolution is a substantial impediment to student understanding of evolution. In the current study, we performed a preliminary examination of how acquiring physical changes in a question prompt may differentially cue intuitive and scientific justifications of inheritance and evolution and how this varies based on how student learned the concept. Middle school students in a suburban northeastern district (N = 314) either learned about evolutionary change with a category construction task (with different levels of feedback support) or completed a worksheet. Three days later students responded to two free response scenarios (one where a physical change is acquired). Responses were coded based on student justifications for either science accuracy or intuitive nature. Specific reasons were coded by justification type with high inter-rater agreement (k > 0.93). Results showed that students were more likely to apply intuitive reasoning when a physical change was acquired (50%) than if the change was behavioral in nature (16%). Additionally, students who completed the category construction task provided significantly more scientifically accurate justifications about inheritance (M = 1.12) than control students (M = 0.47), and significantly less intuitive justifications (M = 0.67) than control (M = 1.13). Finally, category construction produced the most scientific reasoning when feedback was provided. Taken together, these results suggest that intuitive reasoning is differentially applied based on physical organismal changes, intuitive reasoning is less frequent when learning via category construction, and the category construction task is more effective for this population with the inclusion of feedback.     

The Effect of Teacher–Child Race/Ethnicity Matching and Classroom Diversity on Children's Socioemotional and Academic Skills

Mounting evidence suggests teacher–child race/ethnicity matching and classroom diversity benefit Black and Latinx children's academic and socioemotional development. However, less is known about whether the effects of teacher–child matching differ across levels of classroom diversity. This study examined effects of matching on teacher-reported child outcomes in a racially/ethnically diverse sample of teachers and children, and classroom diversity moderation using multilevel models. Data were drawn from a professional learning study involving 224 teachers (M_age = 41.5) and 5,200 children (M_age = 7.7) in 36 New York City elementary schools. Teacher–child race/ethnicity matching was associated with higher child engagement in learning, motivation, social skills, and fewer absences. Classroom diversity moderated matching such that teacher–child mismatch was related to lower engagement, motivation, social skills, math and reading scores in low-diversity classrooms, but not in high-diversity classrooms. Implications for practice and policy are discussed.     

Rejoinder: Spanking and externalizing problems: Examining within-subject associations

This study examined the effects of spanking on externalizing on a within-subject level, while excluding causally irrelevant between-subject variance. Results from two longitudinal studies which used participants from the Child Development Project (n = 585) were reanalyzed with a random-intercept cross-lagged panel model using yearly measurements over ages 6–8. After removing between-subject variance, there were no significant effects of general spanking on externalizing (β = .06, .07). However, when done without objects and at a rate of about once per month or less, spanking showed beneficial effects (β = −.17, −.21). Results suggest that previous findings may be due to a failure to separate between-subject and within-subject variance. Additionally, results illustrate the need to examine limited spanking separately from more general forms of physical punishment.     

Snap-N-Send: A valid and reliable method for assessing the energy intake of elite adolescent athletes

To ensure that elite adolescent athletes meet their unique training, growth and maturation demands, it is imperative to have access to valid measures of energy intake. Contemporary methods demand close attention-to-detail, meaning that athletes often do not fully adhere to real-time protocols. This study represents the first investigation of a real-time dietary assessment designed using a comprehensive behaviour change framework (COM-B). In a crossover design, 12 elite adolescent male rugby players recorded their energy intake via an estimated food diary (est-FD) and photography-based mobile assessment (‘Snap-n-Send’), combined with a 24-h dietary recall interview. Two 4-day assessment periods were divided into three separate recording environments: 96?h free-living and researcher-observed; 72?h free-living and 10?h researcher-observed. Assessment periods were one month apart. All foods and beverages were provided and weighed by the research team to quantify actual intakes. ‘Snap-n-Send’ reported a small mean bias for under-reporting across 96?h (?0.75?MJ?day^?1; 95% confidence interval [CI] for bias?=??5.7% to ?2.2%, p?<?.001), 72?h (?0.76?MJ?day^?1; 95% CI for bias?=??5.6% to ?2.1%, p?=?.004) and 10?h (?0.72?MJ?day^?1; 95% CI for bias?=??8.1% to ?0.1%; p?=?.067) environments. The est-FD reported a moderate mean bias for under-reporting across 96?h (?2.89?MJ?day^?1; 95% CI for bias?=??17.9% to ?10.2%; p?<?.001), 72?h (?2.88?MJ?day^?1; 95% CI for bias?=??17.9% to ?10.1%; p?<?.001) and 10?h (?2.52?MJ?day^?1;?26.1% to ?5.3%; p?=?.023) environments. Results evidence the ability of ‘Snap-n-Send’ to accurately assess the diet of elite adolescent athletes, signalling the exciting promise of this comprehensive and theoretical behavioural approach within valid dietary assessment.     

A cynomolgus monkey with naturally occurring Parkinson's disease

Evidence for the existence of mon-keys with spontaneous Parkinson's disease(PD)has been lacking.Here,we screened macaque colonies at the Kunming Primate Researc...     

The Influence of Direct and Overheard Messages on Children's Attitudes Toward Novel Social Groups

Individuals often develop negative biases toward unfamiliar or denigrated groups. Two experimental studies were conducted to investigate the extent to which brief negative messages about novel social groups influence children's (4- to 9-year-olds'; N = 153) intergroup attitudes. The studies examined the relative influence of messages that are provided directly to children versus messages that are overheard and examined whether the force of these messages varies with children's age. According to implicit and explicit measures of children's intergroup attitudes, children rapidly internalized messages demeaning novel groups, thus forming negative attitudes toward outgroups merely on the basis of hearsay. These effects were generally stronger among older children, and were particularly pronounced when the message was provided directly to children.     

Gaining Visitor Consent for Research: Testing the Posted‐Sign Method

One method for studying visitors in museums is to audiotape their conversations while videotaping their behavior. Many researchers inform visitors of the recordings by posting signs in the areas under scrutiny. This study tests the assumptions underlying that method—that visitors notice, read, and understand such signs. Signs were posted at the entrance to an Exploratorium exhibit which was being audio‐ and videotaped. Researchers interviewed 213 adult visitors as they exited the exhibit. The interviews revealed that 75 percent of the visitors had read and understood the sign. Of the 52 visitors who had not, 8 reported that they felt bothered to some degree by the recordings being made. The implications of these results are discussed.