Data Visualization as Participatory Research: A Model for Digital Collections to Inspire User-Driven Research

The emerging creative practices of digital collections are increasing in prominence thanks to the access to, and appeal of, data visualizations. Interactive data visualizations, such as a map, timeline, chart, graph, or artist’s rendering of data, enable users to pursue their own research interests within a collection and participate in new areas of research. Use of these data visualizations enhances the scope of the collection and enables a modern and diverse thematic collection to emerge. This article considers the question: Does the addition of data visualizations affect how users participate with a research collection? Impacts on collection development, application of user-centered design, and analysis of users’ exploratory strategies are discussed. Examples of data visualizations used in digital humanities projects and digital collections are presented as case studies.     

Financial Feeling: An Investigation of Emotion and Communication in the Workplace

There is growing interest in the role of emotion when considering communication in the workplace. This work has most often considered workers in front-line service positions in investigations of emotional labor, and human service workers in investigations of empathy and emotional work. In this study, we consider processes of both emotional labor and emotional work in the financial planning profession. Financial planners occupy a role requiring ongoing relationships with clients, conversations about the often emotional topic of money, and a need to manage emotion in a variety of interaction contexts. Thus, from extant theory and literature regarding emotion and communication, we proposed research questions regarding the roles of emotional labor and emotional work in the financial planning profession. These questions were investigated in a web-based survey study of almost 300 professional financial planners and supporting interviews with 14 financial planners. Results indicate support for existing theory on emotional work, extensions to current research regarding emotional labor, and important implications for the role of emotion and communication in a range of professional service roles.     

A Model for Quantitatively Analyzing Representations of Social Class in Screen Media

Content analyses of prime-time television provide a picture of predominant cultural stereotypes and social trends. The present research is a quantitative content analysis of social class in popular broadcast and cable television in the United States. This research advances scholarship by systematically analyzing character class in addition to more commonly examined variables such as race and gender. A model for the operationalization of class for quantitative content analyses of mediated texts is offered. This proof of concept study demonstrates the viability of studying media representations of class quantitatively to systematically document patterns of portrayal.     

A post-American world? Assessing the cognitive and attitudinal impacts of challenges to American exceptionalism

A number of voices have emerged in U.S. political discourse questioning the legitimacy of American exceptionalism, suggesting we are in a “post-American world.” Our research examines the effects that political messages that explicitly challenge American exceptionalism can have on U.S. public opinion. Drawing upon social identity theory, we find that explicit challenges to American exceptionalism significantly impact Americans’ views toward their own nation, their willingness to denigrate foreign publics, and their broader foreign policy preferences.     

Setting a Non-Agenda: Effects of a Perceived Lack of Problems in Recent News or Twitter

The mere perception that news has given certain problems more coverage can lead the audience to assume that those problems are more important. Given that the news media, at times, obsesses over relatively trivial matters, and given that the audience is increasingly able to filter media exposure, it is worth asking what happens when audience members perceive that recent media coverage has not emphasized any very important problems. In such cases, audience members might assume that any problems facing the nation must not be particularly important. We explicate this attitude of political complacency, test whether perceived media agendas lacking important problems can influence it, and explore whether complacency helps explain political disengagement. We also explore whether these effects generalize beyond news, to new media gatekeepers such as Twitter. Two experiments tested effects of a perceived absence of important problems in recent news or Twitter content. In the case of news, but not Twitter, this increased complacency in both studies. Study 2 added a no-exposure control and found that effects on complacency were driven by the cueing of nonproblem stories, not by the absence of problem story cues. Both studies validated complacency as a predictor of political disengagement.