Negative Stance Research Articles

Impact of Blogs on Sales Revenue

In this study, blog data were collected and network parameters were captured to represent three common measurements of online Word-Of-Mouth: intensity, influence level, and dispersion. These parameters were then analyzed using a General Estimating Equation (GEE) model to test their effects on average weekly movie box office receipts. Findings indicated that all three parameters were significant in the model. The aggregated degree, representing WOM intensity, was positively significant, which was consistent with results from extant research. Further, diameter of a network, representing WOM dispersion, was observed to be positively significant, which validated the importance of spreading WOM as far as possible. Counter-intuitively, the aggregated size node, representing WOM influence level, was ascertained to be negatively significant, which might be explained by the possible negative stance from opinion leaders with high influence level. Applying network analysis methodology to blog entries, the present work differentiated itself from extant WOM literature that has focused chiefly on content analysis. The findings also provided managerial insights to companies interested in utilizing blogs as online WOM for marketing initiatives and implications for future research.

Attitudes to perinatal postmortem: parental views about research participation

ObjectiveTo study parental attitudes to participating in questionnaire research about perinatal postmortem immediately after late miscarriage, stillbirth and termination for fetal abnormality.DesignProspective self-completion questionnaire.SettingUK fetal medicine and delivery unit.Patients35 women...

Who controls newspapers' political perspectives? Source transparency and affiliations in Korean news articles about US beef imports

By empirically investigating the political orientations of three conservative and two progressive newspapers in Korea, this study examined the source usage of these papers regarding the US beef imports issue. Results showed that while progressive newspapers took a more negative stance in reporting US beef imports than conservative ones, both papers together used sources that are more transparent more frequently compared to less transparent sources in order to build their political perspectives. At the same time, the information from more transparent sources was generally provided by more credible source categories in terms of source affiliations. These results imply that, regardless of political stances, Korean newspapers might have followed the journalistic norms that suggest using more transparent and credible sources than less transparent and credible ones. However, the authors also stress that conservative and progressive papers would have framed the story by purposely selecting favorable informants for their respective political stances, even if they originate from more transparent and credible sources, as ways of pushing for their own viewpoints.

Mannerism, modernity and the modernist architect, 1920–1950

Criticized for its artifice and stylization, and loaded with negative connotations as manieroso, the art of the sixteenth century nevertheless became, in the 1920s, a new historical and stylistic periodization and an intensely studied subject. Some aspects of that construction of Mannerism as a distinct category are intimately linked to the contemporary development of modernity, and modernism. Mannerism’s ‘discovery’ was closely related to pioneering developments in art and architecture. Furthermore, while Mannerist art was offering up captivating case studies, research on Mannerism adapted models from psychoanalysis, which was maturing in those same years and was crucial to understanding the structure of the modern self and of modern society. Finally, as we will show, the resulting image of the Mannerist architect was seminal in the styling of the figure of the new, modernist architect.

Others, the Nation, and its (Dis)integration in ‘European’ Lithuania

As in other member states of the European Union, in post-socialist Lithuania lofty ideals of pan-continental ‘integration’ are countered by local understandings of what constitutes belonging and togetherness. Rather than unquestioningly embracing the idea of the European supranation, many Lithuanians reassert their national selves and adopt an increasingly critical stance towards grand projects intended to create continental oneness. What politicians in Vilnius and bureaucrats in Brussels prescribe as integration many see as a threat to the integrity of the nation. In daily social life, for many this perceived threat is embodied by various ethnic ‘others’ who have recently settled in Lithuania as mostly economic migrants from so-called third countries. Using interviews and materials from print and electronic media collected in 2008–2009, this article examines popular perceptions of such ‘others’. It is proposed that heightened awareness of, and defensive (or offensive) dispositions toward, persons conceptualized as ‘other’ should be investigated at the intersection with the EU's agendas of supranational integration. The article further suggests that in ‘European’ Lithuania predominantly negative stances vis-à-vis people thought of as alien to the nation can be viewed as a response to broader processes of unsettling change brought about by EU expansionism and its policies promoting pan-continental unity.

Ideology, affect, and socialization in language shift and revitalization: The experiences of adults learning Gaelic in the Western Isles of Scotland

ABSTRACTThe intertwined role of language ideologies and affect in language shift and revitalization can be understood by taking a language socialization perspective on local micro-level interaction between adult Gaelic learners and fluent Gaelic-English bilinguals. Seven adults living in the Western Isles were interviewed about their efforts to learn and speak Scottish Gaelic, a minority language spoken by 1–2% of Scotland’s population. Their negative affective stances in describing their interactions with local Gaelic-English bilinguals indicate that they were being socialized into an ideology of local Gaelic-English sociolinguistic boundaries: an “etiquette of accommodation” to English speakers and wariness about public Gaelic speaking. This socialized combination of ideology and negative affect reduces opportunities for Gaelic speaking, hindering both Gaelic learners’ efforts to become fluent speakers and their potential contribution to language revitalization. In contrast, however, the interviewees described “sociolinguistic mentors” who socialized them into a more inclusive vision of Gaelic speaking laden with positive affect.1

The Issue of Rhetoric for Christian Apologists in the Second Century

Viewing rhetoric as a product of pagan culture, the Apologists take a negative stance toward it. For Justin the art of persuasion may be useful in all areas ofpublic life but it is useless when it comes to the metaphysical truth of Christianity. The strength to teach or interpret Christianity, Justin posits, comes from God, not rhetoric. For his part, Tatian dismisses forensic rhetoric on the grounds that it often subverts Christian ethics by defending injustice, sycophancy and money-making, in effect promoting that which is not virtuous. As for Theophilus, he places greater value on the substance and meaning of Christian purposes and less on the orator’s virtuosity and linguistic means of expression.

Complaints about Misbehaviour

AbstractThis paper is concerned with complaints to close friends about the misbehaviour of third non-present parties. In this sequential environment, we seek to identify the basic sequential as well as the distinctive features of complaints in Cypriot Greek ordinary conversations. Thus, this study analyzes the production of complaints as distinct topics with easily identifiable beginnings and endings. As it is shown, a crucial part of complaining is the expression of negative moral stance towards the non-present party's misbehaviour. This is followed by a description of the non-present party's misbehaviour which includes overdetailed and exaggerated reporting of the other's misbehaviour. Added to that, a critical point in the complaints analyzed is the reporting of the oppositional conversation the teller had with her opponent. By quoting this conversation, the teller enables the recipients to see the teller's innocence and the other's wrongdoings in their own words. Also considering that complaints are recipient designed, the recipients' responses are given their own analytical attention since they occur as affiliative interjections within the telling sequence, but also as affiliative evaluations upon complaint completion.

An inventory of programmes, capacity and interventions available at Emfuleni Municipal Area in the fight against HIV/AIDS

South Africa experiences the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence in the world and is home to approximately thirteen per cent of the people infected with this pandemic. Contrary to the South African government’s earlier negative stance towards HIV and AIDS which has been resoundingly criticised both nationally and internationally, the government’s recent commitment to providing management and introduce antiretroviral treatment programmes is welcomed by all, including civil society, employers and local government. This exploratory study was undertaken to establish an inventory of programmes, capacity and interventions available within the Emfuleni Local Municipality, which is one of three local municipalities that constitute the Sedibeng District Municipality, in the fight against HIV and AIDS. It focused on the primary healthcare centres, civil society organisations, and the employers within the municipal area and their response to the disease. A comprehensive literature study on HIV/AIDS was conducted. Based on this study, a separate questionnaire using a 5-point Likert type scale ranging from 1 =strongly agree to 5= strongly disagree was developed for each of the selected sample groups. The questionnaires were content analysed by two researchers and a senior health professional independently. After pre-testing, the questionnaires were administered to primary healthcare facilities, employers, and the non-governmental organisations (NGOs) within the Emfuleni municipal area. The data were captured on Excel and frequencies and descriptive statistics were used to report on the data. The study found weak links between the private sector and NGOs and in some cases between the clinics, and the NGOs. Staff shortage has been identified as a challenge in some clinics and the biggest challenge thus constraint facing municipal clinics in their fight against HIV and AIDS are space limitation for general consultation and counseling. Recommendations on the findings were made.

The reception of the Barmen Declaration in South Africa

The reception of the Barmen Declaration in South Africa

Comment on "Seismomagnetic Effects from the Long-Awaited 28 September 2004 M 6.0 Parkfield Earthquake" by M. J. S. Johnston, Y. Sasai, G. D. Egbert, and R. J. Mueller

We present some comments on two issues dealt with in Johnston et al. (2006), which reported that there were no electric and magnetic (EM) precursors for the 28 September 2004 M 6.0 Parkfield earthquake (EQ). The first comment is on their introduction, which, while raising critical comments on seismic electric signals (SESs) in Greece and Japan, concluded that useful prediction of EQs seems unlikely using electromagnetic data. We show point by point that their criticism is unfounded. The second comment is on their assertion of the nonexistence of SESs at Parkfield. We point out that this assertion may be premature as their efforts to identify signals appear insufficient. They show, in a timescale too coarse to recognize SESs, only band-passed magnetic and electric data for the five day period before the Parkfield EQ, which is much too short. Even if the claimed nonexistence of an electric precursor is demonstrated by further data analysis, the probability will remain that their single observation site was insensitive to SESs. They apparently have made no search effort for SES sensitive sites. Our experiences show that SES insensitive sites are not uncommon even near epicenters. On these grounds, their overall negative attitude on electromagnetic methods seems much too premature and inappropriate. Even if no EM precursors were generated for the Parkfield EQ, we suggest it would be more scientifically sound to seek the physical reason for it before negating SESs in general, which have been well observed elsewhere. Johnston et al. (2006) (J2006, hereafter), in their introduction, list four reasons for doubting the observations of SESs in Greece and Japan. Although this portion seems to have rather little to do with their own work, it demonstrates their basic negative stance against the VAN method (which is a method for short term earthquake prediction by monitoring …

John White, 1826–1891

John White occupies a minor but interesting position in the nineteenthcentury New Zealand literary scene, thanks to the series of ethnographic novels he wrote about Māori. These books, while mediocre in terms of artistic quality, are culturally significant, for they reveal in a fascinating way the attitudes of many European New Zealanders of this period towards Māori and Māori culture. White was born in 1826 in County Durham. The White family had strong Wesleyan connections, and in 1834 they emigrated from England to Mata in the Hokianga, where there was a Wesleyan missionary presence. White’s low-church upbringing had a lasting influence on him – it lay behind his generally very negative stance towards traditional Māori religion, for instance. It was combined, however, with a profound interest in Māori culture, an enthusiasm that grew out of his almost daily contact, during this early period of his life, with the local Ngā Puhi people of the Hokianga. The ethnographic knowledge White gained at this time laid the foundation for his main career as an interpreter and, later, scholar of Māori culture. It also greatly influenced his writing, which was firmly rooted in his ethnographic interests. The young White appears to have seen himself as a poet – he hung a picture of Byron on his wall, to the chagrin of his father – and he wrote quantities of mediocre English verse, some of it in the form of narrative poems modeled after Walter Scott, some of it in the shape of short lyrics addressed to a ‘lady love’. At the same time, spurred on perhaps by his reading of Ossian, he was busy collecting local Ngā Puhi material, material which would one day form the basis of his ethnographic fictions. This material included ‘New Zealand songs’ (waiata and karakia, some of which White translated into English), ‘native tales’ (tara or stories told to him by Ngā Puhi friends, which White recorded in Māori and sometimes translated), ‘NZ anicdotes’ (short descriptions or observations in English illustrating Ngā Puhi life and custom), and longer narratives, often involving accounts of warfare, drawn from Ngā Puhi oral history. Various as this material was, it is unified by a focus on utu (response or revenge). This theme, indeed, later came to dominate White’s writing about Māori. At first this material was collected quite haphazardly, in the moments White could spare from his farm work. But later on, as his

Too Little or Too Much? Untangling the Relationship Between Corporate Philanthropy and Firm Financial Performance

What is the relationship between corporate philanthropy and corporate financial performance? Some scholars argue that corporate philanthropy facilitates stakeholder cooperation and helps secure access to critical resources controlled by those stakeholders, suggesting that corporate philanthropy should be positively associated with corporate financial performance. In contrast, other scholars take a negative stance, suggesting that corporate philanthropy diverts valuable corporate resources and tends to inhibit corporate financial performance. Existing empirical studies have not found conclusive evidence on the corporate philanthropy–financial performance relationship. Integrating and extending existing perspectives, this study develops the argument that the relationship between corporate philanthropy and financial performance is best captured by an inverse U-shape. In addition, it posits that the inverse U-shaped relationship varies with the level of dynamism in firms' operational environment. Using a panel data set of 817 firms listed in the Taft Corporate Giving Directory from 1987 to 1999, we find strong support for these arguments.

A Turkish Nuclear Turnaround

T HE PROBABILITY THAT STATES or terrorist groups will detonate elaborate or crude nuclear devices increases with the spread of the materials and technology used in the manufacture of these weapons. Before it is too late, every nation must start thinking about effective ways to get rid of their existing nuclear arsenals. To that end, Turkish officials should seriously consider returning the U.S. tactical nuclear weapons that have been deployed in Turkey since the 1960s as part of NATO's nuclear posture. Turkish officials still believe these weapons have a deterrent value because the Middle East and the adjacent regions are far from being peaceful or stable due to the chaos in Iraq and the interminable Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Added to these concerns are the unknowns about Iran's nuclear capabilities and intentions, as well as Russia's negative stance regarding the implementation of the IntermediateRange Nuclear Forces Treaty and the 1990 Conventional Armed Forces in Europe Treaty. Nevertheless, it should be acknowledged that nuclear weapons have become inappropriate in the face of the new threats posed to the free world by terrorist organizations. The sui generis conditions of the superpower rivalry during the Cold War period cannot and therefore should not be used as a pretext for keeping the existing

The Baltic Churches in the Process of Transformation and Consolidation of Democracy since 1985

The author first looks at the changes that have taken place on the religious map of the Baltic States from the 1930s to the present. It is clear that the Lutheran Church is no longer a majority church in Estonia or in Latvia. Only the Catholic Church in Lithuania can claim a clear majority position. It is then pointed out that the churches in each Baltic country had a significant role in the restoration of national sovereignty, although there were interesting differences. The struggle to come to terms with the past has been a more or less essential task in all three Baltic states. Each of them set up in the 1990s a historical commission to investigate the crimes against humanity perpetrated by the Nazi and Soviet occupiers. It is obvious that in all three Baltic states the long Soviet period is generally considered more harmful and destructive than the comparatively brief Nazi occupation. In politics, Christian democratic parties have not been very successful in any of the Baltic States. In both Latvia and Lithuania, church leaders have criticized politicians for failing to take satisfactory measures against a wide range of political and social problems that cause concern for the churches. The mainstream Churches in all three Baltic states were clearly in favour of the EU membership. The post-Communist theological landscape in the Baltic Countries can be desribed as conservative. This has manifested itself especially in two things. The first is the rejection of the ordination of women, especially in Latvia, and the second is the negative stance on the blessing of homosexual partnerships combined with a general homophobic atmosphere. Theological discussion and controversy is to a large extent considered a luxury the churches can not afford.

Evaluation of the opinions of the school administrators about the effects of globalisation on education

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of globalisation on educational institutions in Turkey (to be specific, in the provinces of Amasya, Samsun and Tokat) by means of a series of inquiries carried out among secondary school administrators.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative method has been used in the study which attempts to lay bare the effects of globalisation on education via questions directed to school principals. A “configured questionnaire” has been employed as the method for collecting data, and all the administrators have been asked the same questions. The configured questionnaire form is made up of six open‐ended questions focusing on the effects of globalisation on education policies.FindingsThe findings gathered demonstrate that school administrators entertain different attitudes towards the effects of globalisation.Originality/valueThe most striking upshot is the finding that school administrators do have an awareness of the effects of globalisation, whether they hold a negative or positive stance towards the issue.

Opposition from Christians to Myers–Briggs personality typing: an analysis and evaluation

Myers–Briggs personality typing is widely used in the Christian church as an aid to individual self‐understanding and spiritual formation. However, some Christian leaders have expressed doubt about its validity in understanding human personality and also opposition to its use in nurturing spiritual growth. The aim of the work reported was to identify and examine the reasons for this negative stance towards personality typing. It was achieved by content analysis of published writings and, in a few cases, by correspondence with persons known to have a critical stance. The analysis showed five principal areas of concern: misuse of personality typing in spiritual formation; personality typing as a simplistic analysis; personality typing as a restrictive pigeon‐holing; unethical use of personality typing; and the Jungian derivation of personality type theory. Evaluation of this unease reveals significant semantic and epistemological issues and also a concern that personality typing, while not denying the tenets of Christian belief, could rival them for primacy in the hearts and minds of Christians.

Positively Promoting Pilgrimage: Media Representations of Pilgrimage in Japan

It is widely argued that the Japanese mass media generally only report on religions and religious organizations negatively. This paper shows, however, via an examination of mass media portrayals of pilgrimage in Japan, that there are contexts in which activities at religious centers are very positively presented in the mass media. Since the 1920s, pilgrimages have been represented in an extremely favorable light by broadcasters, journalists, newspapers and national television broadcasting organizations, with such representations making a significant contribution to the growth of pilgrim numbers in recent times. However, a close examination of how pilgrimages are presented in the mass media, indicates that they are treated primarily as symbols of culture and tradition rather than as manifestations of religion—a differentiation that raises questions about the reasons behind the seeming negative stance of the mass media towards religious organizations and religion in general.

The first naturalist novel in Greek: evidence from a close reading of Xenopoulos’ Nikolas Sigalos

This article argues that Xenopoulos’ first extended novel, Nikolas Sigalos (1890), deserves to be analysed in greater detail than has been the case to date. The basis for this claim is two-fold: against the background of a nuanced vision of the nature of naturalism, Nikolas Sigalos proves to be a genuine offspring of this European literary movement, featuring remarkable similarities with the poetics of Emile Zola, whereas a profound critical analysis using the same literary model points to a number of structural shortcomings which exemplify the author’s subsequent negative stance towards his first-fruits. The methodology for conducting the proper textual analysis consists of such narratological concepts as story-line, description, semantic content, narrator and focalization.

On the Metaphysics of Linguistics

Mind–body dualism has rarely been an issue in the generative study of mind; Chomsky himself has long claimed it to be incoherent and unformulable. We first present and defend this negative argument but then suggest that the generative enterprise may license a rather novel and internalist view of the mind and its place in nature, different from all of, (i) the commonly assumed functionalist metaphysics of generative linguistics, (ii) physicalism, and (iii) Chomsky’s negative stance. Our argument departs from the empirical observation that the linguistic mind gives rise to hierarchies of semantic complexity that we argue (only) follow from constraints of an essentially mathematical kind. We assume that the faculty of language tightly correlates with the mathematical capacity both formally and in evolution, the latter plausibly arising as an abstraction from the former, as a kind of specialized output. On this basis, and since the semantic hierarchies in question are mirrored in the syntactic complexity of the expression involved, we posit the existence of a higher-dimensional syntax structured on the model of the hierarchy of numbers, in order to explain the semantic facts in question. If so, syntax does not have a physicalist interpretation any more than the hierarchy of number-theoretic spaces does.