Selling the Male Consumer the Playboy Way

Under the direction of Hugh Hefner, Playboy magazine’s early success was predicated upon the unique marketing strategies of forging the persona of an idealized, imaginary reader called the playboy, with particular lifestyles and taste preferences. At the same time, it sold the value of men’s participation in the hedonistic pleasures of accessible connoisseurship of the postwar marketplace by aligning consumer desires with sexual desires as innate components of modern masculinity. The purpose of this article is to illustrate how this persona is visually and discursively articulated throughout the entire Playboy empire, from the content of the magazines including the dewy centerfolds and the What Sort of Man Reads Playboy? campaigns to the brand’s clubs and television shows. The persona undertook the dual tasks of attracting a lucrative male readership and its corresponding advertisers, while simultaneously redefining male consumer culture.     

UX and Your Library: A Scalable Model

User experience is immeasurably important for your patrons as they access your Web site. This article presents tips and strategies for testing user experience, suggests a number of different popular technologies and tools that are used in the UX field, and lays out a plan for sharing and utilizing data to make improvements on your Web site. It is the goal of this article to present a model for improving Web site usability that can be scaled up or down depending on the resources available at your institution.     

Developing the Librarians' Role in Supporting Grant Applications and Reducing Waste in Research: Outcomes From a Literature Review and Survey in the NIHR Research Design Service

ABSTRACT

Librarians and information specialists' involvement during the development of grant applications for external funding can save researchers' time, provide specialist support, and contribute to reducing avoidable waste in research. This article presents a survey of information specialists working for the National Institute for Health Research's Research Design Service within English applied health services research and a scoping review to identify other examples of librarians supporting grant applications. The survey found that support included: verifying proposed research has not already been performed; searching literature to provide background for the project; and advising on or writing systematic review methods. The scoping review found three examples where librarians were involved: in writing sections of the application; conducting reviews, and becoming a co-applicant. We recommend librarians engage with researchers by checking whether search requests are to support an application and by becoming familiar with resources and techniques to support grant proposal development.     

The cultural politics of religious defiance in Islam: how pseudonyms and media can destigmatize

Religious defiance that results in publicly leaving religion (apostasy) is an enormous taboo in Arab communities despite the recent surge in apostates’ numbers. Drawing from research on stigma, apostasy, authorship, and critical studies, I explore how a transnational Arab community, which emerges in the crossfire among democratizing politics of self-expression, regulation of public identity by digital technologies, and vast opposition networks, uses digital technologies and the politics of naming to destigmatize its identity. Extending the literatures of stigma and apostasy to ex-Muslims, I conclude that this case reveals religious and nonreligious Arabs’ common struggle against violence and the need for structural changes to protect digital technologies’ emancipatory potential.     

Color,Caste and the Public Sphere

Broadcast network newsrooms are powerful gatekeepers, setting cultural standards and attitudes for America at large via the stories they tell and the images they project. In 1968, the federal Kerner Commission chastised American news media for ignoring race, and seeing through the “white man’s eyes” and speaking from “the white perspective.” Grounded in critical and cultural studies and organizational theory, this study analyzes the experiences of 23 post-Civil Rights generation black journalists working in broadcast newsrooms who continue to struggle against anti-black cultural norms and attitudes at great physical, psychological and financial cost.     

Evidence of alphabetic knowledge in writing: connections to letter and word identification skills in preschool and kindergarten

The writing skills of 286 children (157 female and 129 male) were studied by comparing name writing and letter writing scores from preschool to kindergarten with letter and word reading scores over the same time period. Two rubrics for scoring writing were compared to determine if scores based on multiple components (i.e., letter formation, orientation on the vertical axis, left–right orientation, and correct letter sequencing) would better reflect differences in children’s writing knowledge in preschool and kindergarten than rubrics composed of one component (i.e., letter formation only). While developmental changes in writing scores were found, little additional information was provided by multiple component scoring rubrics compared to the single component rubric. Letter writing scores were more strongly related to letter and word reading scores than name writing scores but neither writing score was predictive of growth. Implications of the findings for intentional/systematic writing instruction in preschool curricula are discussed.     

Strength in numbers? Women and mathematics

Two studies were conducted to test the link between numerical distinctiveness, stereotype threat and mathematical performance among women. In the first study, stereotype threat was measured with a stereotype activation task. Women in a solo, non-solo or control condition completed word fragments and a mathematical activity. Solo women, rather than their non-solo counterparts showed mathematical performance deficits. Evidence did not support the mediating role of stereotype activation. In the second study, stereotype anxiety was assessed. According to analyses, solo women reported greater stereotype-related anxiety than non-solo women. A link between stereotype anxiety and mathematical performance deficits was also uncovered. Finally, mathematical underperformance was associated with greater interest in feminine activities. Strategies to buffer the effects of stereotype threat are discussed.     

Correction to: Development of Children’s monitoring and control when learning from texts: effects of age and test format

Metacognition and Learning - The article Development of Children’s monitoring and control when learning from texts: effects of age and test format, written by Martina Steiner, Mariëtte...