‘A Million Little Bonds’: Infidelity,Divorce and the Emotional Worlds of Marriage in British Women’s Magazines of the 1930s

This article examines infidelity discourse within women's magazines of the 1930s. Marking a departure from existing studies that have explored representations of ideal marriage, it uses discussions of marital breakdown as a lens through which to consider conceptualisations of love within marriage. It demonstrates how, in the interwar period, notions of mutual emotional investment were used to reinforce marriages that were deemed to be in breakdown. Muddying the perceived binary between individuals and the institution of marriage, this research highlights how the latter could be bolstered, rather than challenged, by recourse to the emotional worlds of spouses.     

Examining the relationships between challenge and threat cognitive appraisals and coaching behaviours in football coaches

Previous research demonstrates that sports coaching is a stressful activity. This article investigates coaches’ challenge and threat cognitive appraisals of stressful situations and their impact on coaching behaviour, using Blascovich and Mendes’ (2000) biopsychosocial model as a theoretical framework. A cross-sectional correlational design was utilised to examine the relationships between irrational beliefs (Shortened general attitude and belief scale), challenge and threat appraisals (Appraisal of life events scale), and coaching behaviours (Leadership scale for sports) of 105 professional football academy coaches. Findings reveal significant positive associations between challenge appraisals and social support, and between threat appraisals and autocratic behaviour, and a significant negative association between threat appraisals and positive feedback. Results also show that higher irrational beliefs are associated with greater threat, and lesser challenge cognitive appraisals. However, no associations were revealed between irrational beliefs and challenge cognitive appraisals. Additionally, findings demonstrate a positive relationship between age and training and instruction. Results suggest that practitioners should help coaches to appraise stressful situations as a challenge to promote positive coaching behaviours.     

Does exposure to orthography affect children's spelling accuracy?

It has previously been reported that exposure to visually presented correctly and incorrectly spelled words has a significant effect on subsequent spelling accuracy. Previous research investigating this process in skilled adult readers has shown very robust effects that encountering a misspelling has a detrimental effect on spelling accuracy whereas encountering a correct spelling has a beneficial effect. This effect is considered to be mediated via an implicit priming mechanism. In the current study, children with a mean age of 10 years were tested using a similar procedure to the experiments with adults but the results revealed a qualitatively different pattern. Children showed a significant beneficial effect following presentation of a correct spelling but no measurable effect of encountering a misspelling on subsequent spelling accuracy. The fact that children's spelling output was also found to be affected by depth of encoding at the point of presentation points towards an explanation of children using explicit rather than implicit processing of prior information.     

Key to Freshwater Algae: A Web-based Tool to Enhance Understanding of Microscopic Biodiversity

The Freshwater Ecology Laboratory at Connecticut College has developed an interactive, Web-based identification key to freshwater algal genera using the Lucid Professional and Lucid 3 software developed by the Centre for Biological Information Technology at the University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia. The Key to Freshwater Algae was funded by the National Science Foundation (Award #CCLI-0229531) to encourage awareness of microscopic diversity through a creative, investigative approach to learning. Users may answer questions in any order to quickly and efficiently narrow down the list of taxa to only those that match the characteristics they have chosen. All characters and terms are clearly explained for ease of use by those unfamiliar with the algae. This non-hierarchical, user-friendly key is linked to Web pages containing a wealth of resources, including images, movies, and information about the morphology, ecology, and reproduction of each organism. These materials are especially well suited for classroom use in conjunction with cultures purchased from the Carolina Biological Supply Company, a popular distributor of biological materials. Cultures from the Carolina Biological Supply Company representing nearly 75 freshwater genera from a variety of algal groups were observed and photographed using high resolution digital imaging to fully document cellular structure and highlight distinguishing features. High quality video footage of each taxon incorporating titles, diagrams, and structural terminology was outputted as QuickTime movies, on DVD, and on VHS cassettes. The Key to Freshwater Algae and supplemental materials are available online at http://silicasecchidisk.conncoll.edu to provide an innovative alternative to traditional dichotomous keys that is particularly appropriate for introducing students in undergraduate life science courses to the algal groups and genera.     

Impact of legislation on post‐school transition practice for young people with additional support needs in Scotland

A longitudinal study was conducted to understand post‐school transition practice for young people with additional support needs (ASN) before and after the implementation of key legislation, the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004, amended in 2009. Primary data were collected from one local authority in Scotland. Twelve professionals involved in post‐school transition planning were interviewed in 2004 and eight in 2010. Minutes of transition meetings from one school for three young people prior to the implementation of the Act and four after the implementation were analysed. Results show some changes since the implementation of the Act.     

‘Black and whiters’: the relative powerlessness of ‘active’ supporter organization mobility at English Premier League football clubs

This article examines the reaction by Newcastle United supporters to the resignation of Kevin Keegan as Newcastle United manager in September 2008. Unhappy at the ownership and management structure of the club following Keegan’s departure, a series of supporter-led meetings took place that led to the creation of Newcastle United Supporters’ Club and Newcastle United Supporters’ Trust. This article draws on a non-participant observation of these meetings and argues that although there are an increasing number of ‘active’ supporters throughout English football, ultimately it is the significant number of ‘passive’ supporters who hamper the inclusion of supporters’ organizations at higher level clubs. The article concludes by suggesting that clubs, irrespective of wealth and success, need to recognize the long-term value of supporters. Failure to do so can result in fan alienation and ultimately decline (as seen with the recent cases of Coventry City and Portsmouth).