Summary and response Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 1

Summary and response - Assignment Example But your own argument has to identify the â€Å"they say† you are referring to make it clear to the audience (Graff & Birkenstein 43). Although we agree that you shouldn’t keep the readers in suspense for too long about your central argument, you also need to present that claim as part of some larger conversation. When responding to argumentative writing, it is often best to agree and disagree simultaneously. This allows you to avoid simple yes or no response and therefore present a more complicated argument. One can use templates to assist him in writing as they help one become more creative and original and I think it also provides a sense of direction too (Graff & Birkenstein 70). In â€Å"Her Point Is† Summarizing refers to any information from others that you present in your own words, including that which you paraphrase. It points out that a good summary requires balancing what the original author is saying with the writer’s own focus. One has to incorporate both the original author’s views and also give his or her own side of the coin. In summary writing you put yourself in someone else’s shoes send join in the conversation whether you are agreeing or disagreeing with the conversation. Just like how actors must convincingly become characters who in real life they detest. But the writer has to be cautious not to be carried away by his own influence and end changing the whole meaning and intent of the original text. In other words during summary, reflect both the source you are summarizing and add your own views (Graff & Birkenstein 115). However, the writer may decide to deliberately give his or her own spin to someone else’s argument in order to reveal a shortcoming in and this is referred to as Satirical Summary. The other may disagree or agree with the author or at times do

Gender Differences in Advertisements Essay Example for Free

Gender Differences in Advertisements Essay It has been evident for the past decades that advertisers still use stereotyped images of men and women in their advertisements. This can say that the pursuit for equality is still not grasped by the society. The images we see in magazines, in televisions, in billboards portray a very old perception of gender, especially the inferiority and submissive nature of women, with their bodies used as mere sexual objects, if not, still used as household caretakers. Women are also deemed to be beautiful if they have slim bodies, fair complexion and long shiny hair. Men, on the other hand, are portrayed to be strong, dominant and successful in their careers. For this essay, I will be showing two examples of images, which reveals the still existing gender inequality. I will be referring to some themes and issues to support my arguments. Also, for my basic analysis of advertisements, I will be using Katherine Frith’s [1998] approach in â€Å"Undressing the Ad: Reading Culture in Advertising† [Lukas, 2002]. It includes a surface meaning, the advertiser’s intended meaning, and the cultural or ideological meaning. For the semiotic level, which connotes the social themes in advertisements, I will be applying Erving Goffman’s [1979] approach in â€Å"Gender Advertisements. † For the first example, I will use the Gucci Magazine advertisement as shown in Figure 1 in the appendix. Just by looking at the picture, you can already see that there is gender inequality. Before dwelling into that, I will first apply a basic analysis of the ad. 1. The Surface Meaning It can be seen that there are two subjects in the picture. It is very evident that one is female, while the other one can be assumed to be male. It is because of its masculine features, as seen in the upper body though the face was not explicitly shown. The female is down on the floor, touching the shoes of the male. She is wearing a sexy gold dress. The male is standing, wearing only khaki pants. Both clothing are assumed to be under the brand, Gucci. The setting is in the desert and the overall appeal of the image is very earthy. There are no words or taglines in the ad, just â€Å"Gucci†. 2. Advertiser’s Intended Meaning The advertiser might be showcasing the earthy tones and summer styles of Gucci, as seen in the very comfortable and breezy clothes the subjects are wearing. There is still a certain class in the style, whether you put them in the dessert or just wherever. 3. Cultural or Ideological Meaning The picture obviously depicts the dominance of males over females. To be more detailed, we use Goffman’s approach by taking into consideration the social themes being depicted here. The positioning of the subject explicitly exposes gender bias. The man is standing while woman is down on floor. It just shows that men are in control and have power over women. The woman is way below under his legs, at his feet to be exact. She is even touching his shoes. It reminds me of a servant, wiping the dirt of his master in the desert. The woman here really looked inferior and if we extend the picture upward, exposing the face of the man, it can be that he is looking down on her, seeing the contraction of his abdomen in the picture. Moreover, such display of abs connotes a very masculine and strong appeal. We know that men who have well developed abs are the ones who are the most physically fit. The woman on one hand is thin and sexy, with her body parts, especially the legs and the cleavage, generally exposed. Reexamining the â€Å"Nature/Culture† Paradigm, we are reminded of the â€Å"vertical† perspective, which organizes the relationships of male and female [Tilleuil, 2002]. The woman is labeled as the dominated and the man is labeled as the dominant. According to the sociologist, Claude Herne, â€Å"In the advertising image, in order to make the woman feel inferior, signs multiply and underline the weakness, the lack of self-confidence, fragility, hesitation, dissimulation, submission, childishness and infantilization, too. [Tilleuil, 2002]. This signs are very well depicted in this ad. The woman looks fragile, and she displays a look of submission in her eyes, like a slave. This leads us to another example of an advertisement, which now depicts heavy violence to women. The ad to be examined here is figure 2 of the appendix. It is an ad from Dolce and Gabbana. 1. The Surface Meaning In the ad, there are six subjects. There are five males and one female. It looks like they are in a rooftop of some resort/hotel. Some men are wearing fitted Polos, while others are half naked. Their skins are very shiny. It looks like there’s oil or sweat in them. One man is on top of the woman, while others are watching intently to the scene in the middle. The woman is lying down on the floor, wearing a sexy black dress and high heels. 2. Advertiser’s Intended Meaning The advertiser here is showcasing the sexy formal styles of Dolce and Gabbana, with their breezy polos, classy dresses. It looks like the clothing is part of their summer collection. 3. Cultural or Ideological Meaning/Goffman’s approach It is very evident in the picture that the scene is depicting a â€Å"gang rape†. This is extreme sexual violence right at your eyes. Such violence is even portrayed in classy way, with the clothing of Dolce and Gabbana at display. We look back to the inferiority and submissiveness of the woman here. The woman is again down on the floor, but this time, she is lying down, about to be raped by the first guy on top of her. But we also see here that they are being watched by other men. One of them is already topless, while, one is semi-buttoned, with his chest exposed. There is also one who is only wearing a sleeveless undershirt, while the last guy is still fully dressed up. They all have this sultry look to the woman. The woman here is about to give herself to the man, with her hips going upward. Yet, you can see that the man is locking her arms in the floor, and it looks like she cannot get away with his grasp. The woman has been the subject of sexual pleasure. Violence here is part of the pleasure package. As we have been exposed in the media, we can recall about the whipping, the slapping of women, their being tied up to different places, exposing a lot of skin, with their bodies being molded to different erotic positions. In most cases women are victims of such violence, since men being tied up would not be a delightful sight for them. Overall, as seen in most advertisements, women are always the weaker player, being taken advantaged of men, who are more superior. Women are still being depicted as mere objects of sexual desire [Sharabi, n. d. ]. Women are seen only as domestic providers, who do not have their own decision making powers. According to the blog of â€Å"Daughter of Liberty† [2007], she said that the following are some important points to take note in advertisements: 1. Canting It can be seen through the body language that women are submissive and they have low self-confidence. For our examples, it is explicitly shown with the woman on the floor, with no control. 2. Clowning It can be seen that women are usually posed like an innocent child in the ads, which connotes ignorance (stupidity perhaps) and practically it tells us that women are easily dominated. 3. Dependence Women are seen to be very dependent to men, which can be particularly found in the first advertisement, where the woman is touching the shoes of the man. 4. Dismemberment Dismemberment is described as focusing on a particular body part. However, for our first example, it was the man who was dismembered. 5. Dominance/violence This is evidently seen in both of our examples, especially in the Dolce and Gabbana ad, which depicts a gang rape. I think ads these days have become more violent and more associated to sex than ever before, due to change of perception of our society. Sex and violence is not a taboo anymore, and we can just openly discuss those issues in a coffee table. However, being a more open society must teach us to be less discriminating and degrading. Women and men were created equally. More ads should focus on empowering women, like what is happening in Dove. We must not let ourselves, especially our children to be exposed to such violence because images convey very powerful images and it can impact one’s behavior.

Death Camps Of World War II :: essays research papers

Starvation. Mass shootings. Gas chambers. Beatings. Mass murder. In the early 1940s, perhaps the most brutal attrocities ever committed on a people in our world’s history took place. It was World War II. The Nazi Regime, led by Adolf Hitler, was waging war across Europe. Occupied Poland became the place where those prisoners and captives held by the Nazis were sent to be eliminated. From 1941 through 1945 a total of some 3.5 million Jews met their deaths in Nazi extermination camps. These â€Å"death camps† as they are often referred to had the single goal of eliminating the Jews while hiding these crimes under a shroud from the rest of the world. Unlike the â€Å"concentration camps† of the same time, where Jews were brainwashed and ordered to do labor for the Germans yet still often killed, the death camps were devised solely for the mass killings of prisoners. There was no discrimination. Men fit for work, women and children of all ages were not sorted and suf fered the same fate. These events would be known as â€Å"the Final Solution† to the Jewish problem faced by the Nazis.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Captive Jews were held in areas called â€Å"ghettos† ultimately commanded by the Germans. Following through with the elimination of the Jews, the Nazis gave them fierce living conditions often housing dozens of people in small buildings. Food was administered in very small amounts. Those that did not starve to death were either shot or sent to camps. Some were sent to concentration camps. There were also labor camps. During some of these trips, prisoners would be told that they were being relocated. Many of these people instead arrived at the extermination camps never to be heard from again. The Polish town known as Kulmhof, though more popularly known as Chelmno, was the first place where mass killings by gas took place as part of the â€Å"Final Solution.† It was established in December of 1941. The first man in charge of this operation was Herbert Lange. This â€Å"Sonderkommando† or special commander, was once in charge of a T4 euthanasia program in which he was the overseer of the murder of psychiatric patients in the town of Posen. He had control of about 150 assorted German security police and uniformed police. Twenty members had posts within the camp as well as many secondary units. There was also a group, called the Waldkommando, who operated in the surrounding forest to make sure no one could see what was happening inside.

Just In Time Systems Essay -- essays research papers

Devising an efficient system of counting and maintaining a stock of inventory items has long been an arduous task for many business owners. The old method of cataloging by part or item number has all but disappeared since the proliferation of electronic catalogs and the use of computer software and web-based ordering/monitoring systems. Inventory management is necessary for owners who want to maintain a stocking service for quick turnaround to help ensure total customer satisfaction. An item on a managed inventory list must be maintained to avoid shortages of frequently used items. Even when utilizing an inventory management system, occasional shortages will still occur. To be successful in today's fast-paced, highly-competitive environment, business’ need to have the necessary parts in stock or have reliable suppliers to meet customer demands at a moment's notice. Either way, shops must have a practical, efficient method for managing inventory in order to stay in business an d satisfy their customers. The most efficient way to get this done is through the use of a Just-In-Time (J-I-T) system of inventory management. The service that Cardinal Health provides is an example of this type of J-I-T system which allows them to get the right quantity of goods to the right place and at the right time. Efficient inventory management is essential in order to provide the customer with a high level of service. The ability to ship inventory on schedule and get just the right amount of product where it needs to be in a timely manner is one of the major factors that helps determine customer satisfaction. Consumers do not like to wait in lines, come back later, or shop somewhere the product is often out of stock. These are the types of problems that lead to a customer walking across the street to the find a particular product somewhere else. In addition, efficient inventory management leads to a more cost-efficient operation (Reid Ch 12, 2002). The goal is to keep inventory on the shelves for the least amount of time as possible. This prevents a high percentage of capital from being tied up in inventory. Through the use of automation and computer based systems, companies are able to control their inventory based on real-time needs instead of historical projections. This helps reduce the g uess work in how much inventory to stock and when to stock it. Regardless of whether or... ... out without the hassle of long lines or confusion. This is directly related to how the inventory is managed throughout the supply chain. Just-In-Time inventory management is an attempt to create the perfect inventory system. The idea of getting the right product to the right place and at the right time is at the core of this system. Although not always perfect, the goal is to identify problems and always strive to make it better. This can only be implemented through the use of automation and technology. Cardinal Health has integrated handheld technology, wireless web, the internet, and many other cutting edge technologies to provide just this type of service. They provide inventory management that is flexible, relatively simple, and gives power to the consumer to help control inventory based on what is actually needed instead of historical models or guesswork. REFERENCES Frederick, James (2003). Upgraded distribution network grows supply chain, inventory capacity. Drug Store News, pg 15. Reid & Sanders (2002). Independent Demand Inventory Management. Operations Management, Ch 12. Reid & Sanders (2002). Just-In-Time Systems. Operations Management, Ch 7.

Animal Farm and Lord of the Flies Essay

In 1887 Lord Acton wrote in a letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton, â€Å"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.† It has often been noted that this is the primary theme in both Animal Farm and Lord of the Flies. In addition, these books share two sub-themes related to this primary theme. One sub-theme is that people will often abuse power when it’s not earned. The other is that when given the opportunity people will often degrade others to ensure their own security. Both books rely heavily on symbolism, as well as the actions of their characters, to express these ideas. Consequently, both these novels show us what a frightening place the world can become if people ignore the principles of civilization as we know it. In both books, for different reasons, the characters create their own governments, and some of them soon begin to usurp and abuse power. For example, in Animal Farm seven commandments were written on the wall, a few of them were: â€Å"No animal shall sleep in a bed, No animal shall kill another animal, No animal shall drink alcohol.† When one of the pigs, named Napoleon, took over he gradually changed the commandments. For instance, he changed the commandment â€Å"No animal shall kill another animal.† to, â€Å"No animal shall kill another animal without cause.† In Lord of the Flies there are several examples of characters abusing power. One of the characters, named Ralph, had originally started a democratic form of government. Two of the boys, Roger and Jack, eventually started there own form of government and took over. Jack fell in love with his new found power and became dictator to the boys. He even started a hunt to kill Ralph simply because he felt Ralph was a threat to this power. Because several of the characters in both books were insecure, they would often degrade others to improve their own security. This occurred in Animal Farm several times. For instance, there were two characters who always seemed to disagree (Snowball and Napoleon). Whatever one said the other would put it down or find something wrong with it, even if he actually agreed. Napoleon even urinated on Snowball’s plans for a windmill and ruined  them. In Lord of the Flies there are several examples of insecure characters downing others to improve their own security. For example, Roger, Jack, and even Ralph make fun of one of the other boys they call â€Å"Piggy† because he is overweight. Roger is so insecure he even kills Piggy because Piggy makes him feel threatened by contradicting his ideas and putting forth his own ideas that were sometimes better than Rogers. These books are both amazingly written and similar in several ways, but there is one major difference. The two books end with completely different views of civilization. Animal Farm ends with the animals not being able to tell the humans and the pigs apart, showing that evil had won. However, in Lord of the Flies, Ralph realizes when he sees the pig’s head (which is used to represent evil) in its pristine state, that even in all this savagery and evil some good may occur. Right after he realized this, a ship pulled up and rescued the boys. The themes of both books are true to the dark side of human nature. Golding holds out a tiny thread of hope; Orwell lets us see the bad things that could happen and leaves us to figure out how to prevent them.

Bread Or Butter. Professor Ramos Blog

Bread Or Butter. After reading the short passages â€Å"Bread† and â€Å"There Was A Man, There Was A Woman† by Sandra Cisneros, she tells a similar story of two people dealing with internal conflict, urged to accept inanimate objects or physical touch as a temporary solution for a long term affair. These stories are very similar in the way that they both convey a message dealing with two people struggling to find words for the emotions they are feeling, resulting in their thoughts being silenced. Cisneros tells stories of the man and woman of each story attempting to fill their void within with â€Å"butter†. A topical, temporary solution for a deeper issue when what they are looking for is the long term, deeper fix of the problem, their â€Å"bread† In â€Å"There Was a Man, There Was a Woman†, Cisneros is very repetitive. What one does, so does the other. â€Å"Every payday, every other friday,† (Cisneros) she says. They visit the bar with their newly earned money, every payday. Unfortunately for the two, the man is â€Å"paid on the second and the fourth friday of the month.†, while the woman is â€Å"paid on the first and the third friday.† (Cisneros) People with such similar habits and routines, seemingly so compatible, are so far apart. At the end of each of their night out filled with loud laughs and good company, neither left satisfied. They left with an unaccomplished goal, stuck with the unease of that feeling unable to leave more readily. â€Å"At home when the night came down and the moon appeared,† (Cisneros) the woman gazed into the sky as she weeped of unease while the man contemplated a million thoughts. â€Å"Mute and lovely† (Cisneros). As Cisneros wrote in the stor y â€Å"Bread† she similarly wrote in this passage, â€Å"Now blue light streamed inside his window and tangled itself with the glow of the sheets.† (Cisneros). This, meaning all of the troubles of the world, can come into ones life. The glow of the sheets, whether clean or dirty, the good and the bad in the world, is up to the individual to decide. â€Å"The man looked and swallowed.† (Cisneros), ready to take on the challenge of the new day. In this passage Cisneros does not mean to create the idea of a possible relationship unfortunate enough to be separated by different pay days. The meaning of this passage is to show the hardships in life can be dealt with in many ways and at many times. Everybody deals with hardship and difficult times, but the outcome is left up to how one interprets the situation whether it be the glass half empty or half full. These are simple stories with lots of meaning behind them. Cisneros conveyed her message by simply creating a man and a woman dealing with internal struggles. Showing that in our society, the man is looked at to be â€Å"charming† and â€Å"mute† (Cisneros) unable to deal with internal conflict. In â€Å"Bread†, the man seems to ignore the inner challenges, the bread, and focuses more on the butter of the situation. â€Å"Him kissing me between big bites of bread.† (Cisneros). Focusing on the present situation with little emotion and thought put into the underlying meaning of how the woman may be feeling. He tries to create a better now. In the second passage, the man while similarly going to the bar for a drink, contemplates â€Å"lovely† (Cisneros), and is to look at the light of situations. For a woman on the other hand, her thoughts and feelings are suppressed. In â€Å"Bread†, she struggles with the internal conflict of his past. He r significant other previously had a joyous life filled with love, happiness, and a family. All while she has to struggle with the idea of being his second love and only hope to ever live up to the expectations and provide him enough happiness. Again, in the second passage, Cisneros exemplifies this concept by saying, â€Å"the woman raised her pale eyes to the moon and cried.† (Cisneros). She disgruntled, yet unable to freely speak her mind. The woman believed that by going to the bar and consuming a few beers, â€Å"her feelings would slip out more readily.† Our society has created a form of emotional expectations, silencing the feelings of those with afflicted thoughts and ideas. Throughout relationships of my own, I have experienced similar miscommunication and muffled feelings. As discussed with â€Å"Bread†, my relationship has seen its â€Å"whole car smelt of bread† and my relationship has seen the â€Å"That’s just how it is. And that’s how we drove.† (Cisneros), moments.   What Cisneros wrote about, was a series of indirect messages implying that we need to break these poor communication barriers and better communicate with out loved ones to protect the mental health of both man and woman. Relationships experience hardship due to lack of clarity and lack of communication. As a result of the inability to freely express how one feels, we turn to physical touch or get into situations where one goes to the bar every payday in hope to freely let loose of pent up thoughts and words, all to suppress our emotions in hope to â€Å"patch† issues we may have. Work Cited Cisneros, Sandra. Woman Hollering Creek, and Other Stories. New York: Random House, 1991.

lagaan essays

lagaan essays Lagaan is an Indian movie created in Bollywood. The word lagan means tax in Hindu, where in this movie it pertains to the tax the British set on the small Indian village called Champaner, in India. It is a movie about common men, led by a strong-minded man who stands his ground for a cause against the powerful British general. The British treat the Indians as second-class citizens in their own country; which causes the natives to hate the British with a passion. The movie takes place in a small village in India, where the British army has taken over. There is a tax that the Indian villagers must pay to the British generals every year. The British general who is in charge of this village is Captain Andrew Russell, viewed in this movie as a greedy, unfair and very proud man. Captain Russell decides to double the taxes for the villagers. The village is starving as it is, and the increased tax will only give the villagers more hardships. In response to the new tax, the villagers gather in front of the British headquarters. Bhuvan, a young strong-minded man, stands up to the British general and demands fairness. The British general surprised and ignorant decides to deceive the Indians by challenging them to a cricket match. And who ever loses will have to pay, not double but triple the tax, in doing so, Captain Russell knows that the Indians were not familiar with the game. Bhuvan, without consent of the rest of the village, aggress to the match. At first the villagers are furious with Bhuvan. They know that their chances of winning are very slim. But Bhuvan determined to win, convinces slowly one by one each. Soon enough they have formed a team. But still they have not yet fully understood the game of cricket. One day when spying on the British playing cricket, they are approached my Elizabeth, Captain Russells sister. Feeling bad for the villagers, Elizabeth decides to help Bhuvan, without the consent of he...

JFK Assassanation essays

JFK Assassanation essays The Assassination of John F. Kennedy Over thirty years ago, John F. Kennedy was assassinated. He was supposed murdered by Lee Harvey Oswald. Many suspect differently. What does the proof say? What proof is real? Who can we trust? On November 22, 1963, President Kennedy arrived in Dallas Texas. He was touring the United States as part of his campaign to run for president in 1964. The motorcade left the airport. A short time later when the limousine was traveling through Dealey Plaza, a shot rang out. Then two or three more shots were fired. The president and the governor were both wounded. One half hour later the president was announced dead. The authorities immediately began questioning eyewitnesses and then started to search for the assassin or any trail he left behind. Patrolmen J.D. Tippit and M.N MacDonald were following the suspect behind a theatre. Officer Tippit opened fire and the suspect, later identified as Lee Harvey Oswald, returned fire killing officer Tippit instantly. After Oswald was subdued he was taken to the police station were he was interrogated immediately. Oswald denied having anything to do with the murder of John Kennedy, but Captain Will Fritz was quoted saying He hasnt admitted anything yet, but he looks like a good suspect. Oswald was to be moved to a state prison to wait to be tried for the assassination of the president. Before he could be safely away Jack Ruby cane up to him and fired on him at point blank range killing him in front of hundreds of reporters. This was also on live television, but what connection does Jack Ruby have to the assassination. Lee Harvey Oswald, the man charged with killing the thirty-eighth president of the United States. The question why did he do it? Or did he do it? Lee Harvey Oswald was an ex-marine, said to be at a medium level of proficiency with a rifle when he was in the marines. After being discharged from the marines he went to Russia. He...

Project management Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3750 words

Project management - Assignment Example However, these kegs would be used in the years to come. Currently the problem is that manufacturing kegs would require cost and the company is not ready to make high investment and therefore it is evaluating whether it should manufacture kegs or not and if they should then in how much quantity. The management feels that so much cost would be tied up in kegs and they would only be able to use it for a month. If the company invests this amount then it can earn 10% interest income on the amount. Considerations for the management while making decision According to the accountant, cost of one keg is ?40 and if the company plans to have 8,000 kegs then a total of ?320,000 would be tied up in kegs unnecessarily. Therefore the opportunity cost of the company for making this investment is ?32,000 as the interest rate is 10%. There are three alternatives that the company currently has and these alternatives are: 1. They need to produce 8,000 kegs 2. They need to produce 4,000 kegs 3. They do n ot need more kegs These are the three alternatives that the company has currently however the management predicts that the demand of these products could increase by the following rates: There are 60% chances that the demand would increase by at least 10% in August. There are 30% chances that the demand would increase by at most 10% in August. ... ion and decisions that the company can make A Decision Mode If demand increases by 10% If demand does not increases by 10% If demand does not increase If demand increases by 10% If demand does not increases by 10% If demand does not increase If demand increases by 10% If demand does not increases by 10% If demand does not increase Decision The decision to order kegs would not only help Applegold to meet the increasing demands in August but at the same time it would impact the customer satisfaction level as well as this decision would be helpful in increasing the customer base. In addition to this, Applegold needs to think about the long term and by investing today in the kegs the company not only would be able to increase its sales for the current year but these kegs could be useful for the years to come. The current market share of Applegold in the cider is approximately 30% and this can be increased which would be helpful for the company in the long run. This decision could also im pact the customer satisfaction level and as when products are not available then customers can become dissatisfied and they might switch to competitors’ product. And once a customer has switched it is difficult to regain him therefore lost of one customer could decrease the revenues that the company might earn in the years to come. In addition to this, a lost customer might also take others with him and it could become a chain for the company and they might start losing customers. Therefore it is important that the company makes an investment as it will be beneficial in the long run. The total revenue of the company was ?60 million along with a pre-tax profit of ?6 million and with this investment the sales of the company would improve further and thus it would also improve the

Discuss Hamlet's relationship with Gertrude Research Paper

Discuss Hamlet's relationship with Gertrude - Research Paper Example She does not consider her mother to be weak in the physical state but in the emotional state (In Leavenworth, 1960, 34).   Hamlet developed a different opinion of romance and love after her mother accepted to marry his uncle shortly, â€Å"two months dead† (138). Gertrude makes Hamlet change his earlier belief that those in love need to hang on one another despite the prevailing challenges. He therefore believes that the action of Gertrude was a betrayal not just to his father but to the whole institution of marriage and love in general (Crowl, 2014, 138-139).   She had shown a lot of affection towards his late father which is evident in the statement, "Why, she would hang on him As if increase of appetite had grown By what it fed on" but she seems to have quickly forgotten that and was now deeply in love with Claudius. He regards her mother’s action as sign of poor judgment and an act of sheer cowardice (Howard, 2007, 67). The fact that she quickly gives in to the advances if Claudius is an indication that she never loved Hamlet’s father after all which angers Hamlet and increase her hatred towards her. Her action seems to confirm his suspicion that Gertrude and Claudius were having an affair before the death of his father and he suspects that they might have contributed to his untimely death. Hamlet makes a comparison of his mother moving from his late father to Claudius as one moving from the loving arms of the gods to the animals, "So excellent a king; that was, to this, Hyperion to a satyr" (Shakespeare, Act 1, scene 2). He is quick to judge his mother as being very foolish and uncaring. On her part, Gertrude considers her action as being innocent and not based on any form of malice or insincere motive and wonders how she has been misunderstood by her son. The story shows some evidence that Gertrude got into a

Ethics and Moral Theories Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Ethics and Moral Theories - Essay Example This doctrine assumes that we cannot ask others to act in their own self interest because it can negatively affect my self interest. 2) Individual Ethical Egoism: This is the belief that every individual should work for my interest. This is also termed as egotism and goes to an extreme level of selfishness whereby we believe that not only we should act for our self interests, others in the universe shall also act for our interests. There is no practical justification of this doctrine as it borders on extraordinary levels of selfishness (Pojman & Fieser, 2011). 3) Universal Ethical Egoism: This doctrine argues that all individuals should pursue their own self interest exclusively with no regard to the interest of others or no intention to contribute towards their interest. An issue with this theory is that without appropriate knowledge of the world, it will be difficult to understand our own interest. Furthermore, there can be debate over to what constitutes self interest. Act Utilitarianism:- Act utilitarianism states that our duty on any specific occasion is to act in a way that will produce greater total good and better consequences than what any other act will produce. This rule is applied directly to a selection of particular actions under particular events. Rule Utilitarianism:- Rule utilitarianism states that it is our duty to abide by rules designed for the greater total good and produce consequences better than those produced by any other rules. This doctrine is applied to a selection of a set of rules which are then used to determine what to do in particular situations. Feminist ethics is an attempt to reformulate the traditional theories of ethics with respect to the aspects that devalue women’s moral experience. It aims to correct male biases in historical and traditional ethical theory by emphasizing relationships

Problem question on consideration and promissory estoppel Coursework - 1

Problem question on consideration and promissory estoppel - Coursework Example The two lecturers wish to remain anonymous throughout the programmes. The Jubilee Media has contracted Bobby Bodgit Ltd (BB), a construction company to build a studio for filming and Voice Over facilities to safeguard the identity of the lecturers. The contractor has promised to complete the work in twelve weeks. However, after eight weeks the contractor claims that the work requires an additional eight weeks to complete and the value of the contract has to be increased by  £100,000 due to increase in the cost of labour. The Jubilee Media has agreed to pay the additional amount to the BB contractor due to the importance of the event. The Jubilee Media hired to Voice Over experts and an editing engineer to edit the voices of the lecturers. The two exerts are supposed to be paid  £1,500 each while the engineer was supposed to receive  £2,000. However, after paying the contractor the additional sum of  £100,000 the Media gets into financial difficulties and offers to pay the voice editors and  £1000 each of which they agreed to take reluctantly. Media should extend the contract period by eight weeks as requested by the contractor. Also, there is another issue as to whether the two Voice Over editors and the Voice Over engineer should accept the payment of  £1000 each from the Jubilee Media as a settlement of the entire amount or whether they should claim for the balances in accordance to the terms of contract. The issue focuses on whether these parties terminate the contract in case the other party decides to breach the agreement. The court has to determine whether the unwritten promises can form a bidding agreement between the parties. Jubilee should claim the additional  £100,000 paid to the contractor BB and request the contractor to complete the contract within the agreed duration of twelve weeks. Similarly, the Voice Over engineer should claim for the remaining balance of  £1,000 from the Jubilee Media after completing the contractual obligation. Finally,

Are the Beliefs and Traditions of the Catholic Church Outdated for Research Paper

Are the Beliefs and Traditions of the Catholic Church Outdated for Todays Culture and Society - Research Paper Example And the Church’s cover-up of perverted priests who rape and molest young children is evil and has no place in today’s world. For all of these reasons, the Catholic Church, and the Church’s teachings, does not have a realistic place in today’s society, except for the teachings which are aligned with Jesus, which are based on loving and respecting one another. Discussion The Catholic Church is outmoded in today’s society because of their firm opposition to gay marriage. For instance, a Catholic School teacher was fired in Minnesota, simply because she believed in same-sex marriage (Sobel, 2012). The opposition to homosexual acts is rooted in The Bible, Leviticus 20:13 is the scripture upon which religious institutions base their opposition to homosexuality in general, and same-sex marriage in particular, for this passage states that a man who lies with another man is committing an abomination. However, to be consistent in their religious teachings, th e Catholic Church must abide by all of the scriptures in this Book, or none at all. If one scripture can be said to be irrelevant, or not apply, because the scripture was only referring to ancient times, then the same must be said for all of the Biblical passages. Biblical passages must not be sorted through and religions cannot pick and choose which scripture to enforce, and which ones to ignore. Therefore, some Biblical passages must be illuminated to show the inconsistency of using the Leviticus passage to justify The Catholic Church’s discriminatory response to homosexuals and gay marriage. The most obvious example of an outmoded scripture is Exodus 35:2, which states that the seventh day must be kept holy, and a day to worship the lord, and whoever works on this day shall be put to death. There is not a religious institution in the world, presumably, who follows this edict, and imagine the society that would. Doctors, fire fighters, emergency workers – none of the se individuals would be allowed to work if this Biblical passage would not be followed. Therefore, one better not have a heart attack on a Sunday, one better not accidentally set their house on fire on that day, one better not be a victim of a crime on that day, and one better not get into an accident on this day, because nobody should be allowed to work. The doctors who care for the sick, the firefighters who put out fires, and the police who catch criminals on Sunday should all be put to death for violating the edict regarding the Sabbath. Ridiculous? Well, as noted above, either all scriptures are taken literally or none of them are. If this scripture regarding the Sabbath cannot be taken literally, or dismissed as being antiquated, then so must the scripture regarding the two men who lie with one another. Moreover, the Catholic Church’s discriminatory stance against same-sex marriage has led to another situation where individuals are treated as other or less-than, and not allowed to marry a person of their choice, just because the Catholic Church and other churches teach that this is wrong. This essentially takes the nation back to the days before Loving v. Virginia, 388 US 1 (1967), which is the United States Supreme Court case which stated that anti-miscegenation statutes are an unconstitutional restriction on the freedom to marry. Before this case, states had laws on the books making interracial fornicating a crime, along with miscegenation. The arguments against miscegenation were that such

Problem question on consideration and promissory estoppel Coursework - 1

Problem question on consideration and promissory estoppel - Coursework Example The two lecturers wish to remain anonymous throughout the programmes. The Jubilee Media has contracted Bobby Bodgit Ltd (BB), a construction company to build a studio for filming and Voice Over facilities to safeguard the identity of the lecturers. The contractor has promised to complete the work in twelve weeks. However, after eight weeks the contractor claims that the work requires an additional eight weeks to complete and the value of the contract has to be increased by  £100,000 due to increase in the cost of labour. The Jubilee Media has agreed to pay the additional amount to the BB contractor due to the importance of the event. The Jubilee Media hired to Voice Over experts and an editing engineer to edit the voices of the lecturers. The two exerts are supposed to be paid  £1,500 each while the engineer was supposed to receive  £2,000. However, after paying the contractor the additional sum of  £100,000 the Media gets into financial difficulties and offers to pay the voice editors and  £1000 each of which they agreed to take reluctantly. Media should extend the contract period by eight weeks as requested by the contractor. Also, there is another issue as to whether the two Voice Over editors and the Voice Over engineer should accept the payment of  £1000 each from the Jubilee Media as a settlement of the entire amount or whether they should claim for the balances in accordance to the terms of contract. The issue focuses on whether these parties terminate the contract in case the other party decides to breach the agreement. The court has to determine whether the unwritten promises can form a bidding agreement between the parties. Jubilee should claim the additional  £100,000 paid to the contractor BB and request the contractor to complete the contract within the agreed duration of twelve weeks. Similarly, the Voice Over engineer should claim for the remaining balance of  £1,000 from the Jubilee Media after completing the contractual obligation. Finally,

Electronic frontier Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Electronic frontier - Assignment Example The giants who own the market in the digital world try to kill any competition that they get but this can no longer be done as I can simply challenge any of the plea with the use of the EFF. With the help of the organization I can make sure that my circle of privacy is not violated by the state authorities. I can make a fine line when I want to be anonymous on the internet and express my views accordingly. With the help of EFF I believe that I can challenge anyone who finds my anonymity illegal or tries to find my identity and threaten me in any case. If I find out that anyone is trespassing the line of my privacy I can always approach the organization and inform my government regarding the necessary issues so as to avoid any legal repercussions. I believe that I can protect my privacy to the fullest of extent if given the knowledge provided by the organization. The newest technology allows one to detect when anyone is trying malinger against you or is trying to impose something that I may not have even done. My information and logs should not be accessed by any given company unless they have issues of national security against

The Negative Impact of Drugs on Sports Entertainment Essay Example for Free

The Negative Impact of Drugs on Sports Entertainment Essay The non-medical use of performance enhancing drugs among adolescents and young adults is of growing concern.   As many as half a million Americans under age 18 may be abusing anabolic/androgenic steroids to improve their athletic performance, appearance and self-image.   A growing body of evidence suggests that medically unsupervised drug use may pose severe risks to physical and psychological health (Kashkin and Kleber, 1989).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Shockwaves went through the sports world when Canadian track superstar Ben Johnson was denied his gold medal at the 1988 Olympics after tests showed that he had taken anabolic steroids.    The incident called international attention to the use of anabolic steroids and in general, performance enhancing drugs among world-class athletes to gain competitive advantage.   Still, athletes and non-athletes alike persist in taking them.   And, in fact, it is known that athletes participating in the original Roman Olympic Games consumed them too (UNRV, 2003)!   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   There are reports of male adults in physically demanding professions like law enforcement also using performance enhancing drugs to appear tougher as well as more formidable (Lombardo 1990).   What is more, as these drugs grow in popularity, so does awareness of the serious side effects of their use.   One of the most alarming side effects is the threat of AIDS; HIV — human immunodeficiency virus — can be transmitted if shared needles are used to inject the drug.   Potential harm to physical and psychological health is only one aspect of this troubling trend, though (Lombardo, 1990).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The non-medical use of performance enhancing drugs such as steroids, raises ethical and moral issues.   Engaging in steroids use is illegal and users are likely to find themselves acquiring these drugs through illicit and expensive channels. The heavy demand for anabolic steroids has given rise to black market, with sales estimated at as much as $400 million a year; moreover, supplies, which are often illegally manufactured and do not meet established standards, may be unhygienic (Miller, 1987).   Second, athletes who use these drugs are cheating because they gain an unfair advantage over opponents and violate the ban on steroids imposed by most major sports organizations.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Performance enhancing drugs may be addictive.   Users of steroids demonstrate an unwillingness to give them up even in the face of possibly dire consequences to their health.   As the health risks of anabolic steroids become more apparent, efforts to curtail their use — through education, legislation, and medical practices — are intensifying.   For those already hooked, kicking the steroids habit is the best chance to escape devastating side effects; for potential users, the solution, of course, is to never take the drug at all.   There are other ways to be a winner athletically and socially without harming health, and without cheating (Miller).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The use of performance enhancing drugs is spoiling the sports entertainment business today.   It is only fair for all athletes to give up drugs, or for all of them to take the same drugs with the same dosage at the same time.   If only a few athletes consume the drugs, it would be cheating on their part.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Still, it is best for all athletes to give up drug use altogether, seeing that there are harmful side effects, both psychological and physiological, related to the use of these drugs.   Given that many athletes are using performance enhancing drugs today, while the rest are not consuming them, these drugs most definitely have a negative effect on sports entertainment. References Kashkin, K. B., and Kleber, H. D. Hooked on Hormones? An Anabolic Steroid Addiction Hypothesis. Journal of the American Medical Association, December 1989. Lombardo, J. A. Anabolic/Androgenic Steroids. NIDA Research Monograph 102, 1990. Miller, R. W. Athletes and Steroids: Playing a Deadly Game, II.† FDA Consumer, November 1987. UNRV: Roman History. Archaeological News. â€Å"Drugs, Cheating Were Part Of Original Olympics Too,† 2003. Available at http://www.unrv.com/newsletter/newsletter-edition1.php. (5 February 2007).

Detecting Plasma Leakage in Patients with DHF

Detecting Plasma Leakage in Patients with DHF CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Dengue disease is one of the most rapidly spreading mosquito-borne viral disease in tropical and sub-tropical regions around the world. Dengue has become a major international public health concern. The incidence of dengue has grown dramatically around the world in recent decades. Over 2.5 billion people over 40% of the worlds population are now at risk from dengue. WHO currently estimates there may be 50–100 million dengue infections worldwide every year. Dengue is transmitted to humans by the bite of Aedes mosquitoes. According to WHO (2014), â€Å"Dengue causes a severe flu-like illness, and sometimes a potentially lethal complication called dengue haemorrhagic fever†. About 2.5% of those that are infected by dengue die since dengue has neither treatment nor vaccination.Plasma leakage is the major cause of mortality and morbidity in patients with dengue hemorrhagic fever. So that early recognition of plasma leakage and prompt initiation of appropriate treatment are vital. There are only few researches which are done for plasma leakage detection in patients with DHF. Dengue virus infections may be asymptomatic or may lead to undifferentiated fever, dengue fever (DF) or Dengue haemorrhagic fever (DHF) with plasma leakage that may lead to Dengue shock syndrome (DSS). DF is generally an acute febrile illness, with severe headache, myalgia, arthralgia and rashes. Leucopenia and thrombocytopenia may also be observed. Although DF may be benign, it could be an incapacitating disease with severe headache, muscle and joint and bone pains. Occasionally unusual haemorrhage such as gastrointestinal bleeding, hypermenorrhea and massive epistaxis may occur. Undifferentiated fever and classical dengue fever can be managed as any other viral fever with symptomatic treatment. However, often it is difficult to differentiate DF from DHF in the early phase (febrile phase) of the illness. DHF is characterized by the acute onset of high fever and is associated with signs and symptoms similar to DF in the early febrile phase. Plasma leakage is the hallmark of DHF which occurs soon after the end of the febrile phase. There is a tendency to develop DSS due to plasma leakage. Therefore suspected DF and DHF patients should be closely monitored to identify patients with DHF. The degree and the rate of plasma leakage in DHF can vary. It can be minimal in some patients while in others it can be very significant. The leak usually starts slowly, increases gradually, slows down and then ceases altogether at the end of leakage phase (usually within 48 hours from the onset). (Ministry of Health, 2012) 1.1 Description of the Research project The main purpose of this research study was to design a system to detect the plasma leakage in patients with DHF by analyzing patients’ medical records .Further, by using this system doctors can intervene early treatment of shock. In recent years machine learning methods have been widely used in medical diagnosis. Medical diagnosis is one of major problem in medical application. Several research groups are working world wide on the development of neural networks in medical diagnosis. Neural networks are used to increase the accuracy and objectivity of medical diagnosis.Detecting plasma leakage is considered as a non-linear problem that shows the complex causal relationship between the variables. However, an artificial neural network that is suitable for problems of extreme complexity not addressable with conventional technologies, either by the conventional computer programming or statistical method. In this research project multilayer feed forward neural network was used to train and test medical records of patients with DHF and DF. The trained network used to test more records of DHF patients to see the network performance and in order to make system practical to use in a real time hospital setting. The diagnostic performance of the proposed network is validated with Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) analysis to evaluate the sensitivity and specificity. 1.2 Literature Survey 1.2.1 Current methods for plasma leakage detection 1.2.1.1 Hemoconcentration Currently, clinical identification of plasma leakage is difficult until DHF develops. The most common method of monitoring leakage relies on identification of haemo-concentration, determined by tracking changes in HCT measurements, with a rise of more than 20% from baseline considered evidence of significant leakage. However, this method can be rather insensitive, particularly if the patient is receiving parenteral fluid therapy, and it is also limited by the fact that an individual’s baseline value is rarely known. (Ministry of Health, 2012) 1.2.1.2 Ultrasonography Studies using ultrasound have demonstrated that pleural effusions, ascites and gall bladder wall oedema are common during the critical phase, and correlate with disease severity. In addition, serial ultrasound studies indicate that subclinical plasma leakage can be detected as days 2 to 3 of fever, and is better at predicting likely disease progression than other marker of plasma leakage such as HCT measurements. Gallbladder wall oedema appears to precede the development of ascites and effusions, and may therefore be a helpful early predictor of outcome. Thus ultrasonography is a useful monitoring tool, and where available, should be considered in the overall assessment during the febrile phase. However, there are certain limitations, particularly the lack of defined normal ranges for the parameters of interest, the variability in measurements obtained by different operators, and the lack of specificity of the findings. (Srikiatkhachorn, Krautrachue, Ratanaprakarn, al, 2007) 1.2.1.3 Chest X-Ray Chest X-ray is recommended to increase the sensitivity of detecting pleural effution. Pleural effusion detected clinically may not be obvious in a Chest X Ray (CXR)-PA, but may be seen only in a CXR right lateral decubitus film. (Ministry of Health, 2012) 1.2.2 Expert Systems An expert system can be divide into two sub-systems the inference engine and the knowledge base. The knowledge base represents facts and rules. The inference engine applies the rules to the known facts to deduce new facts. Inference engines can also include explanation and debugging capabilities CHAPTER 2: BACKGROUND AND THEORY 2.1 Vital Parameters 2.1.1 Pulse The pulse is how many times a minute that our arteries expand and contract in response to the heart. This rate is exactly equal to the heartbeat. 2.1.2 Pulse Pressure 2.2 Neural network 2.2.1 Artificial Neural network vs Biological Neural Network An artificial neural network is a mathematical model or computational model based on biological neural network. In other words, it is an emulation of biological neural system. An ANN is a network of highly interconnecting processing elements (neurons) operating in parallel. Natural neurons receive signals through synapses located on the dendrites or membrane of the neuron. When the signals received are strong enough (surpass a certain threshold), the neuron is activated and emits a signal though the axon. This signal might be sent to another synapse, and might activate other neurons.(Gershenson,2003) 2.2.2 Model of Neural Network Artificial neuron is a highly abstracted model of the natural neuron. Inputs of artificial neuron behave like synapse of a biological neuron which are multiplied by weights (strength of the respective signals), and then computed by a mathematical function which is called Transfer function (also known as Activation function) in order to determine the activation of the neuron. The model of a neuron also includes an externally applied bias (threshold) that has the effect of lowering or increasing the net input of the activation function. 2.2.3 Multilayer Feed forward (MLF) Neural Network A MLF neural network consists of neurons that are ordered into layers. The first layer is called the input layer, the last layer is called the output layer, and the layers between are hidden layers. A neural network that has no hidden units is called a Perceptron. However, a perceptron can only represent linear functions, so it isn’t powerful enough for the kinds of applications. A multilayer feed forward neural network can represent a very broad set of nonlinear functions. Therefore, it is very useful in practice. 2.2.4 Transfer function The behaviour of an ANN depends on both the weights and transfer function that is specified for the units. There are three transfer functions most commonly used for multilayer networks. 2.2.5 Supervised Learning Supervised learning is an approach to find the input-output relationship based from the training using a set of data. Fig. 2.6 represents the block diagram of supervised learning. Learning system is fed with the input data and generates output, which is then compared with the target to compute the error signal by arbitrator. The error is sent to the learning system for further training until the minimum value of error is generated. (Muhammad Akmal Sapon, 2011) 2.2.6 Backpropagation Algorithm The backpropagation algorithm is used in feed-forward ANNs. Artificial neurons are organized in layers and send their signals â€Å"forward†, and then the errors are propagated backwards. The network receives inputs by neurons in the input layer, and the output of the network is given by the neurons in the output layer. There may be one or more intermediate hidden layers. The backpropagation algorithm used for supervised learning. The network computes the error that is the difference between output and desired target and the backpropagation algorithm calculate how the error depends on the input, output and weights. The backpropagation technique reduces this error, until the ANN learns the training data. 2.2.7 Training the network CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY AND IMPLEMENTATION In this research project Microsoft Excel 2010 was used to analysis the collected data and MATLAB R2013a (8.1.0.604), 64-bit(win64) software was used as a tool to implement and to train the Neural Network. 3.1 Data Collection The records of 10patients with DHF and 6 patients with DF from September 2013 to April 2014which are obtained from centre for clinical Management of Dengue and Dengue Hemorrhagic fever government hospital in Negombo. The data consists of total 1081 instances which 164 instances belonged to the leaking phase and 139 instances belonged to the non-leaking phase. Each data consists of 10 variables such as heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressures, PCV, Temperature and all are coded as numeric values. The patients are both male and female between 18 to 60 years old and who have over 50kg weight. These measurements are taken at equally spaced time points (hourly) since the patient was admitted to the hospital. 3.2 Data Preparation One of the most important parts in data preparation is to determine the best variables that contribute to the decision-making. The data selection step requires some detailed knowledge of the problem domain and the underlying data. Therefore, the selections of the variables are based on the advice of the doctors and also the review of the literatures. Even though there are quite a number of variables entered into the Observation Chart, only five variables are identified as the important variables that contribute to the detection of plasma leakage. They are as follows, 3.3 Neural Network Training The training method was supervised training. Input vector contained 490 data for leakage phase and 591for non-leakage phase. The respective target for each was2-element class vector with a 1 in the position of the associated leaking or non-leaking. A two-layer feed-forward network with 20 sigmoid hidden neurons was created. The tansig(Tan-Sigmoid) is chosen as the transfer function for both hidden and output layers. The input vectors and target vectors are randomly divided into training, validation and test sets. From input vector 70% are used for training set,15% are used to validate that the network is generalizing and to stop training before overfitting, and the last 15% are used as a completely independent test of network generalization. The network was retrained until the network performance approach a satisfactory level (beyond 85%) of supervised training by using different training algorithms and increasing number of hidden neurons. 3.4 Testing The trained neural network saved and it was used to test the new dataset. The new dataset consist of 50 leakage phase and 50 non-leakage phase data. Correct classifications and misclassifications were recorded. CHAPTER 4: DATA AND ANALYSIS AND RESULTS 4.1 Performance Performance is measured in terms of mean squared error, and shown in log scale below figure 5.1. It rapidly decreased as the network was trained. Performance is shown for each of the training, validation and test sets. The version of the network that did best on the validation set is was after training. This figure does not indicate any major problems with the training. The validation and test curves are very similar.If the test curve had increased significantly before the validation curve increased, then it is possible that some over fitting might have occurred. 4.2 Confusion Matrix Confusion matrix contains information about actual and predicted classifications done by a classification system for supervised learning system. In confusion matrix, diagonal cells (in green cells) show the number of cases that were correctly classified, and the off-diagonal cells (in red cells) show the misclassified cases. The blue cell in the bottom right shows the total percent of correctly classified cases (in green) and the total percent of misclassified cases (in red). In this study, as shown in above figure 5.2, accuracy of training, testing and validation process are 90.9%, 80.9% and 79.0% respectively. Overall accuracy for correct classification is 87.6% and misclassification is 12.4%.Therefore the results show fairly good recognition. 4.3 Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves The coloured lines (green and blue) in each axis represent the ROC curves for training, testing and validation. The ROC curve is another visualization of quality of the network. It is a plot of the true positive rate (sensitivity) versus the false positive rate (1-specificity) as the threshold is varied. A perfect test shows points in the upper-left corner, with 100% sensitivity and 100% specificity. In this study, the network performs fairly good.

The Self-Concept of Father-Absent Children in Middle Childhood Essay

The Self-Concept of Father-Absent Children in Middle Childhood   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Man’s individuality embodies numerous traits and self-concept holds the predominant of these traits according to Rogers. It helps the person understand personality and social development, for it is through the developing self-concept that man form increasingly stable picture of their selves, partly, reflected by others in their surroundings (Craig;1996,p.367). As the person interacts with his environment, such as peer groups, school, community and most especially the family, these concepts are constructed. Many developmentalists believe that infants are born without a sense of self (Shaffer, 1989), therefore, we can say that we develop our self-image as we continuously grow.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Families are believed to be the first, the closest, and most influential social group in the child’s life. They provide children with the definition of right and wrong, the patterns of behaviors, the expectations and the evaluations of actions on which children base their own ideas (Craig, 1996). It is in the family where a child spends a great portion of his life mainly during the formative years. It is from the family that he receives his earliest training in proper behavior. Thus, it is the family which plays the major role in the development of his self-image (Medina, 1991). As a child grow, he begins to realize who he really is and what he is and at the same time aware of his capability.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The person’s general view of self is made up of other, more specific concepts, including the nonacademics sefl-concept, self-concept in English, and self-concept in mathematics. This self-concept evolves through constant self-evaluation indifferent situation (Shavelson & Bolus, 1992). Children and adolescents are continually comparing their performance with their own standards and with the performance of peer and also gauge the verbal and nonverbal reactions of significant people.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Moreover, a harmonious home environment can create confidence in ones own perspective of himself because it provides not only a place of residence but also an identity of mutual security and support (Sevilla, 1989). However, through the changing nature of the family structure, there are broken families and marital dissolution. Single parent families, usually are fatherless, continuously growing up which affect both their children’s ... ...hey are free to ask questions. Furthermore, the researcher will assure the subjects that the test results will be treated with utmost confidentiality. Scoring Procedure   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The instruction of the scoring will be taken form the manual fo the test instruments. Corresponding points are provided for each answer. Then the number points are counted. Scoring will follow a given equivalent and through the local norms of the test, the level of self-concept of the subjects will be identified. REFERENCES: Craig, Grace. Human Development, 7th edition. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Inc. 1996 Davidson, Kenneth J.Jr Marriage and Family: Change and Continuity. Massachusetts: Ally and Bacon: Simon & Schuster Co., 1996 Elliot, Stephen N. et al. Educational Psychology: Effective Teaching/Effective Learning. 2nd edition. USA: Brown and Benchmark Publishing,1996 Tan, Earnest L. The Development of Self-Concept Quezon City. Values Education Program of Mirian College Graduate School, 1991. Medina, Belen T.G. The Filipino Family: A text with selected Readings. Philippines: Office of Research Coordination, U.P. 1991 Easten,Nina J. Los Angeles Time Magazine, 9June 1992): 15-16, 18, 44-46.

Pain into Beauty Essay -- Personal Narrative Emotional Verbal Abuse Es

Pain into Beauty People look back on their childhoods in different ways. Some see it as a time of joy and laughter, love and learning. Many feel a bittersweet mixture of happy nostalgia, and painful moments. Some prefer not to look back at all, seeking only to move forward. Then there are people like me, who look back in anger, bitterness, and sorrow. It seems that few people enjoy a pain-free upbringing. In fact, the very idea of childhood is a fairly new concept. In the early part of the last century, children were considered miniature adults, and were expected to act that way. Abuse, as defined today, was ignored and sometimes encouraged. â€Å"Spare the rod and spoil the child.† Today, abuse is carefully defined and is illegal, but many cases slip through cracks, for many reasons. One big reason is that the abuse is not physical, or sexual. Emotional and verbal abuse is very hard to prove. I was certainly unable to prove it. I'm not even sure my parents are aware they abused me. It is said that our past make us who we are and I often wonder what my past has made me. I entered this world normally enough, in Tucson, Arizona; in the second hottest month of the year (July); at the hottest time of day (mid-afternoon). I had a mother and father who doted on me. At least, I assume they did. Tragedy struck early in my life, taking my mother from me at the age of two months. She died of a seizure caused by a tumor on her adrenal gland. I never knew her, so I always assumed that her death never really affected me. My boyfriend and therapist feel differently. After all, I may have been an infant, but I still suffered a terrible loss. Had my mother lived, I would likely be writing a happier tale. Yet all was not lost, after all I was not... ...do and think things I never thought I would do, and so in desperation I went to a therapist, before I ruined my relationship altogether. It was here I learned the truth, and it was here I saw how deep the damage goes. It is a black shadow on my heart, and it is one that I am unsure will ever leave. So where is the beauty? It's underneath that shadow, struggling to break free. I see it in the grades I earn and the bills I pay. I see it in my hobbies, and I see it somewhere in myself, a glimmer in my grey eyes. It keeps the fear of loss at bay, and keeps me from making decisions based on that fear. But most of all, I see it daily, in the eyes of my love. I could not have won his heart if I was all of the things my step-mother claimed I was. I could not love him if I was any of those things. So there is beauty inside the pain, and I chip at it daily, working it free Pain into Beauty Essay -- Personal Narrative Emotional Verbal Abuse Es Pain into Beauty People look back on their childhoods in different ways. Some see it as a time of joy and laughter, love and learning. Many feel a bittersweet mixture of happy nostalgia, and painful moments. Some prefer not to look back at all, seeking only to move forward. Then there are people like me, who look back in anger, bitterness, and sorrow. It seems that few people enjoy a pain-free upbringing. In fact, the very idea of childhood is a fairly new concept. In the early part of the last century, children were considered miniature adults, and were expected to act that way. Abuse, as defined today, was ignored and sometimes encouraged. â€Å"Spare the rod and spoil the child.† Today, abuse is carefully defined and is illegal, but many cases slip through cracks, for many reasons. One big reason is that the abuse is not physical, or sexual. Emotional and verbal abuse is very hard to prove. I was certainly unable to prove it. I'm not even sure my parents are aware they abused me. It is said that our past make us who we are and I often wonder what my past has made me. I entered this world normally enough, in Tucson, Arizona; in the second hottest month of the year (July); at the hottest time of day (mid-afternoon). I had a mother and father who doted on me. At least, I assume they did. Tragedy struck early in my life, taking my mother from me at the age of two months. She died of a seizure caused by a tumor on her adrenal gland. I never knew her, so I always assumed that her death never really affected me. My boyfriend and therapist feel differently. After all, I may have been an infant, but I still suffered a terrible loss. Had my mother lived, I would likely be writing a happier tale. Yet all was not lost, after all I was not... ...do and think things I never thought I would do, and so in desperation I went to a therapist, before I ruined my relationship altogether. It was here I learned the truth, and it was here I saw how deep the damage goes. It is a black shadow on my heart, and it is one that I am unsure will ever leave. So where is the beauty? It's underneath that shadow, struggling to break free. I see it in the grades I earn and the bills I pay. I see it in my hobbies, and I see it somewhere in myself, a glimmer in my grey eyes. It keeps the fear of loss at bay, and keeps me from making decisions based on that fear. But most of all, I see it daily, in the eyes of my love. I could not have won his heart if I was all of the things my step-mother claimed I was. I could not love him if I was any of those things. So there is beauty inside the pain, and I chip at it daily, working it free

Anne Frank †Short Essay Essay

The session that I attended at The Anne Frank Project on September 11, 2009 was Beyond the Diary: Behind the scenes of a Jewish Family in Hiding with Sophia Veffer. Even though I learned some things about the Holocaust during middle school, there still were things that I did not know. The reason why I attended this session is because I wanted to know how some of the Jews were able to survive the Holocaust and I also wanted to know what Sophia’s experience was like actually being a child during the Holocaust. This session connected to the overall theme of the conference because Sophia talked about what she and Anne Frank both had to go through and how some people in different countries still go through similar situations. Today there are still people who get treated differently because of what they look lie or where they come from. Sophia said that if Anne Frank were still alive she would probably try to make a difference by putting an end to these genocides. I was very glad that I got a chance to sit in Sophia’s session because I got to learn about the Holocaust from an actual survivor. She told us how her and her family had eleven different hiding places. I couldn’t even imagine what her childhood must have been like. She had to get rid of everything she owned even her identity. She also talked about how some Jews were not able to go in hiding and the reason was is they had to have money. The only families that went into hiding had money and they knew non Jewish people who would let them hide in their homes. One thing that really upset me is when Sophia said that the Germens pretended as if they did not know what was going on with the Jews. This really made me sad because how could you know that someone is doing wrong and not care to try to change it and make a difference? There are many different issues going on in the world today. One global issue that is of concern to me is homelessness. Every time I see a person out on the street I always think to myself their shoes can fit my feet. I do not mind helping others because after I do a good deed I always feel really good about myself and nothing can take that feeling away. This issue inspires me to try 2 make a small difference by giving them change or bringing them food. One day when me and my sister were driving up the street we saw sum homeless people and their sign said that they were hungry so we went to Mcdonalds and brought them sum burgers. Making a difference starts with a small deed then before you know it your changing the world.

Junk Food Vs Healthy Food Essay

Life today is not like how it was ahead. A long time ago, people ate foods that are really safe for their wellness. People also took in a bunch of time to prepare their own nutrients. So those people were not being impressed by the intellectual nourishment that they rusted, because all of the foods that they had were natural foods and healthy. Nowadays, most of people in the world are extremely busy. Thus, It’s no secret, that people don’t have time to cook at home. That’s why people prefer to eat foods that are easily cooked or ready cooked. Sometimes They do not think about what they eat, and if it can affect their health or not. Research has shown that the quality of eating that the human eats, affect his health. Foods can be classed into two types, healthy food and unhealthy (junk). see more:paragraph on junk food is bad for health Healthy food †¢Healthy food is very important to have a good life and a better communication. Also, it can lower your risk of developing a range of chronic. As an illustration, eating more fruit and vegetables can help lower blood pressure and may lower your risk of certain types of cancer (such as colorectal, breast, lung and prostate cancer. Also can help those people have some types of disease such as diabetes, high cholesterol and blood pressure. People those eats food which has vitamins, proteins, iron and other important nutrients, they will be free from diseases, and they can enjoy their life. Unfortunately, many people think that the healthy food is not affordable, taste bad, and cannot prepared quickly. However, that’s not true healthy food can be a reasonable price for example all the vegetables are affordable. Also most fruit are tastes good. In this Encouraged many investors to open restaurants in different types day’s most peoples’ awareness what is the best for their wellness. This that provides healthy food. For example: subway which is offered healthy fast food. Or sweet frog the store how think up with the new idea of a new kind of ice-cream that is frozen yogurt. Fast foods (junk) Junk food is an informal term for food that is of little nutritional value. Junk foods typically contain high levels of calories from sugar or fat with less protein, vitamins or minerals. Common junk foods include salted snack foods, gum, candy, sweet desserts, fried fast food, and soda. However, fast  food is one of the easiest and cheapest ways of eating. It saves a lot of time and money, especially for people who are coming home from work. Everyone should think twice before deciding to eat fast food. The health risks aren’t worth your life, and animals that live in slaughter houses aren’t treated properly or hygienically before their death, which can cause many food-borne illnesses to inhabit food. Although it is easy to buy and cheap, risking a life for something that isn’t good for any person in the first place could cost thousands of dollars in hospital bills. It is important to eat healthy and make good choices when deciding what to put in your body. Don ’t be lazy and pick up fast food on your way home from work. Make the right choice and eat some vegetables.

Nutrition in the Early School System Research Paper

Nutrition in the Early School System - Research Paper Example An understanding of these food classes enables learners to determine the role of each category in the body, for example, carbohydrates provide energy while proteins build body muscles. Fruits, on the other hand, help the body to fight and prevent diseases (Prelip, Kinsler, Thai, Erausquin, & Slusser, 2012). Students will also have identified the effects of over or under consumption of each food to their bodies. The children will have determined the amount of food that they can consume from each class to avoid the undesired effects of unplanned consumption. Children will spread the awareness to their parents and friends from other schools after the lesson. This will create national awareness, which will improve health in the society. The outcome of the second objective is that children will identify the diseases that arise from poor nutrition, for example, obesity, hypertension, dyslipidemia, and diabetes among others. Children contract obesity more than the other diseases; therefore, the lesson will focus on this ailment. Students will understand the negative psychological and physical effects of having an overweight body, and the foods that lead to the ailment. Students will be able to determine the measures to undertake to avoid suffering from the diseases. The learners will also identify the actions to take in case they contact the disease. Students will identify various ways of exercising their bodies by the end of the lesson. The knowledge of the techniques will enable students to recognize the significance of exercise, for example, reducing weight, strengthening muscles, decreasing depression, and preventing diseases (Avery, Johnson, Cousins, & Hamilton, 2013). Teaching Plan Subject: Healthy nutrition... This report approves that students should understand and explain various food classes, which include fruits and vegetables, carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. An understanding of these food classes enables learners to determine the role of each category in the body, for example, carbohydrates provide energy while proteins build body muscles. Fruits, on the other hand, help the body to fight and prevent diseases. Community resources are the materials that can help students to understand the health, and they are available in the society. The resources include journals and health magazines that are available in community libraries. Students can read these materials and learn new ways of living healthy lives. Students may also attend health conferences conducted by humanitarian organizations such as the Red Cross Society. The conferences usually involve presentations of diseases and techniques of preventing the ailments. Learners practice what they learn from the projects to avoid the ai lments. This essay makes a conclusion that the increase in obesity and overweight among children has given rise to the need for nutrition awareness in the society. Teaching is the best technique to create awareness because it takes place in schools where the major stakeholders are parents, teachers, children, and the government. The objectives of teaching healthy nutrition in a class include teaching food categories, malnutrition diseases, and the need for exercise. An instructor may use books, presentations, and games as techniques to help students understand the topic. Community resources such as health magazines and nutrition conferences, which are conducted by various institutions, also help in achieving the objectives.

Motivational Design Plan Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Motivational Design Plan - Term Paper Example This is due to the fact that while one employee will only be motivated by a mere word appreciation others will require material rewards while others still value their welfare such as good treatment and day off at work for their motivation. This motivational design plan therefore refers to an act whereby resources are arranged as well as procedures laid in an organization in order to bring about changes in how the company stakeholders are motivated. This form of design plan is applied to the motivation of the employees to work, to develop specific motivational characteristics in individuals as well as to improve people’s skills when it comes to motivation. When making such design plans some form of creativity and understanding of the people, who work for you is required. This is because not all employees will find the same form of reward worthwhile for him or her given the uniqueness of each individual. Another consideration, which is even termed a challenge, is the mode of com ing up with a flexible and cost effective way of ensuring that all the employees are engaged in their work. There are many ways of motivating employees but according to by plan, I am going to talk about informal rewards, specific achievement and activities, formal rewards (Keller). Just as their names suggest, informal rewards reflects on the sincere and honest appreciation of individual employees efforts through a mere thank you or by writing them an appreciation letter. This mode of motivation does not have any significant costs to the organization while it influences so much in terms of its impact on the employee and organizational output as a result. The employer can as well give random time offs like early dismissal, full day off or late arrival at work and an employee will feel much motivated to work. Occasionally, the HR departments can organize events like sports, dinners or any form of social gathering and this enhances bonding. Employees also may feel part of the organizat ion if occasionally they are involved in decision-makings process to bring new ideas into the organization. Such informal rewards or motivational techniques bust the employee confidence while enhancing their management and how they relate. Therefore, such rewards ought to be consistent and immediate. As an HR, one must take note of the needs of specific individuals in the organization. Those whose needs are growth in the firm must be recognized for promotions and incentives as they show their prowess. Such specific achievement and activity rewards are formulated and publicly awarded to the achievers as all the other company employees watch. Such efforts can be recognized in the weekly newsletters or simply pinning a notice on a notice board for the rest of the company to see. Employee ideas that save the company money have to be recognized through rewards such as trophies, this may to an extent entail an award like an employee of the month trophy with the employees name engraved on them. Bonuses may also be given to employees recognized by customers are exemplary. The basic idea with such a phase of the plan is to reward the specific achievements of employees who does extra for the organization. This will make them even do more and as well influence the whole work force to start competing, which would be healthy for the organizations success in terms of productivity, revenue and competitiveness as well as customer service (Keller). Formal

Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Research Paper Example The energy from a rubber band for moving an object can make for a great idea. The idea behind using the rubber band is that the rubber band stores energy while being stretched and then while released can provide energy to make something â€Å"go†. One can find the amount of energy a rubber band has by studying the rubber band while it is at rest. This works by allowing the rubber band to first rest. Once the rubber band is at rest it can be stretched. The stretching of the rubber band stores energy. Once the stretched rubber band is released it releases energy as it returns back to its pre stretched state. The energy released from the rubber band can provide enough force to power an object with wheels. If the weight is light enough for the elasticity of the rubber band, the object will move. It is important to make sure the strength of the rubber band is suitable for the object. The rubber band has to be strong enough to release enough energy to move the object. Tests can help indicate which rubber band is strong enough for the object. When the rubber band is twisted instead of stretched it can store more energy. The rubber band once twisted has double the strength. As the rubber band untwists itself it can release much energy.

Principle of Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3500 words

Principle of Management - Essay Example At the same time, international consolidation and aggressive pricing approaches have concerted the market dominance within certain major players and reinforced their control on the suppliers. The international sourcing of raw materials has created new business prospects for supermarkets such as Tesco to carry out import activities from locations with cheap labour and cheap resources. In fact, Tesco presently captures a major share of supermarket in the UK. In last decade, the opportunity for supermarkets to purchase from manufacturers had increased intensely (Brown & Sander, 2007). Tariff declines, trade liberalisations, modernisations in communication technology, enhanced transport system and better capital flexibility have transformed the supply chain system for supermarkets. The international sourcing has generated new prospects for Tesco in the developing nations to sell the products. However, the global sourcing has also created numerous manufacturers, which in turn has intensif ied competition among organisations. The challenges faced by supermarkets nowadays include the aspects of increasing the return of the shareholders, maintaining low cost for product offerings, increasing flexibility by ‘just-in-time’ delivery and strengthening control related to product quality and providing utmost customer service standards (Brown & Sander, 2007). Supermarkets are the first and the foremost commercial organisations that perform in highly competitive environment with high concern on end result. The increased globalisation, changing life patterns and demographics have opened opportunities for supermarkets in developing nations. However, in order to stay competitive in the market, supermarkets require significant information on... This paper describes the four functions of the management are considered to be substantial for Tesco to overcome many challenges and to take the advantages of the opportunities. In order to be successful in the future endeavours of the business, Tesco can use the managerial functions to a great extent and can turn the business to be effective and efficient. Better management is helpful for Tesco to develop an environment which can provide enhanced flexibility in business. In order to stay competitive, systematising the business plays a vital part for organisations which can only be accomplished though effective managerial functions as observed in the discussion provided. This essay tells that the four managerial functions can be adopted by Tesco in several aspects of business which would provide great effectiveness in the international market. The managerial functions are beneficial for Tesco to gain competitive advantages and to exploit the business opportunities. Better management will definitely lead to gain cost efficiency and make the company feasible to compete with upcoming difficulties in the global as well as the local markets. It concluded that Tesco has also adopted enhanced planning procedures in the business for increasing the customer service. It is one of the significant challenges for Tesco to provide personalised services to the customers. Through collaborative planning, Tesco has enhanced its supply chain capabilities for making better anticipation of the demands of the customers and providing customised services to them accordingly. Therefore, it can genuinely lead to better customer satisfaction

Research project on agrotourism in brazil Essay

Research project on agrotourism in brazil - Essay Example The farmers would open their farms and give tourists an opportunity to visit remote rural parts of the world that normally people would not have an opportunity to visit. For this project, the research work was carried out in South America, and specifically in Brazil. Tourist could view activities, such as harvesting and provide hands on help in the process, and actually observe how sugar canes, locally grown fruits, corn, coconuts, etc. were harvested in the country of origin. From a farmer’s perspective, the objective of agritourism by welcoming tourism into their community was to receive income from tourism activities, thus enabling the farmers and local communities to benefit financially. In this project, the local community would not be a part of an overseas operation that took a higher proportion of their lively hoods, by corrupt methods. Agritourism would strive for the economic development, cultural preservation, rural development, and achieve sustainable growth in the future. The project aims to benefit not only the farmers or the people directly involved in the project, but also contribute to the growth and development of the whole community. Thaise Guzzatti has developed such a plan for Brazil, and according to her, agritourism model brought new sources of income for rural families, prompting rural development and preserved local culture and community, while benefiting the tourist simultaneously (â€Å"Thaise Guzzatti,† 2007). With the help of agritourism, it would be possible to develop the remote rural areas and make them more sustainable in the future. An agricultural tourism model should be designed to help compliment the local community, blend with the community, and offer support and encouragement, rather than overwhelm it with tourism activities. It should help promote better infrastructure, stability in the community, more jobs

The Taming of the Shrew Essay Example for Free

The Taming of the Shrew Essay William Shakespeare’s play, The Taming of the Shrew, is a controversial play that introduces a battle between a man and woman. The woman, whom is strong-willed, must show submission to her husband. As this play has been read by many people, there has been a wide range of different reactions about the play. Whether people agree with the morals of this play or disagree, it is based upon ones beliefs of what role women play in society. Petruccio, the man who is trying to tame Katherine, tries to â€Å"teach [her] that she must obey him [and he] acts the part of ‘shrew tamer’† (159). Katherine is quite reluctant to Petruccio trying to tame her, and she has the right to the anger she feels toward him. Katherine is a very strong woman who feels the need for independence in her life. Petruccio, however, would like to hold power over her so that he may tame her. Throughout the play the audience is guided along Katherine’s journey of complete submission to Petruccio, whom eventually becomes her husband. The end of the play marks the most important and significant part of the play. Katherine shows her submission to her husband, Petruccio. In Katherine’s speech at the end of the play she admits: â€Å"Such duty as the subject owes the prince, Even such a woman oweth to her husband, And when she is forward, peevish, sullen, sour, And not obedient to his honest will, What is she but a foul contending rebel, And graceless traitor to her loving lord?† (Lines 159-164) This part of her speech signifies that women are supposed to treat their husband as a servant would treat their royal prince. This is putting men in a higher reign of power and acknowledging them as rulers of their women. This is not agreeable by any means because women should have the right to equality in a marriage. In a sermon, titled ‘Of Domesticall Duties: Eight Treatises’ by William Gouge, it is noted that wives are to be â€Å"in subjection to obey [their] own husbands† (1). It is also said that if the â€Å"wives be stubborn, froward, and malapert, their husbands are compelled thereby to abhor and flee form their own houses even as they should have battle with their enemies† (1). This quotation is immoral because when a man and women are married, the man should not be allowed to flee at his own discretion. In those times, however, this unfortunately was permitted. After studying the play further and reading through relatable sermons, it is evident that womanly independence was highly discouraged. A woman having a man in her life, who gives her some direction, is not terrible. The ways that a man holds power over a woman and essentially becomes the boss of her however, is not right. There is a fine line between being a woman’s husband, and being a woman’s boss. A woman should be entitled to her own independence and sovereignty. Looking at the period where this play originated, it is common to discourage women from having equality to men. However, it still doesn’t make their views correct. It is encouraging to see our time period evolve since then, as it is less common to have a man trying to tame his wife. It is heartbreaking to see that some people still live by those same morals in our society. I believe that we as a generation have done a better job of trying to disregard the same views that were held during Shakespearea n times.

Examining The Importance Of System Investigation Information Technology Essay

Examining The Importance Of System Investigation Information Technology Essay Fact-finding is an important activity in system investigation. In this stage, the functioning of the system is to be understood by the system analyst to design the proposed system. Various methods are used for this and these are known as fact-finding techniques. The analyst needs to fully understand the current system. The analyst needs data about the requirements and demands of the project undertaken and the techniques employed to gather this data are known as fact-finding techniques. Tools, such as data and process models, document facts, and conclusions are drawn from facts. If facts are not collected, tools can ¿Ã‚ ½t be used effectively and efficiently. After gathering needed information of the system the analyst should record them in a proper way which is known as fact-recoding methods. What are the facts to be collected Any information System can be examined in terms of four building blocks:  ¿Ã‚ ½ Data: The raw material used to create useful info.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Processes: The activities that carry out the mission.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Interfaces: How the system interacts with people.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Geography: Where data is stored, processes interfaces happen. Fact-finding skills must be learned and practiced. Systems analysts need an organized method of collecting facts. They especially need to develop a detective mentality to be able to discern relevant facts. When do perform fact-finding  ¿Ã‚ ½ System Analysis Phase. ? Study Phase. ? Definition Phase. ? Selection Phase.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Design.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Post Implementation Review. Fact-finding techniques Various kinds of techniques are used and the most popular among them are, 1. Interviews. 2. On-Site Observation. 3. Investigation. 4. Questionnaire. 1. Interviews Interview is a very important data gathering technique. Analysts can use interviews to collect information about the current system form the potential users. Here the analysts discover the areas of misunderstanding, unrealistic exception and descriptions of activities and problems along with resistance to the new proposed system. Goal of interview  ¿Ã‚ ½ Find facts, verify facts, and clarify facts.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Generate enthusiasm.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Get end user involved.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Identify requirements. Steps involved  ¿Ã‚ ½ Set the stage for the interview.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Establish rapport; put the interviewee at ease.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Phrase questions clearly and succinctly.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Be a good listener; avoid arguments.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Evaluate the outcome of the interview. The interviews are of two types namely, Structured Interview Structured interviews are those where the interviewee is asked a standard set of questions in a particular order. All interviewees are asked the same set of questions. The questions are further divided in two kinds of formats for conducting this type of interview.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Open-response format e.g. Why are you dissatisfied with the current scheduling method?  ¿Ã‚ ½ Closed-response format e.g.. Are you satisfied with the current scheduling methods? Do you think that the manual scheduling procedure be changed with some automated procedure? Unstructured Interview The unstructured interviews are undertaken in a question-and-answer format. This is of a much more flexible nature than the structured interview and can be very rightly used to gather general information about the system. Here the respondents are free to answer in their own words. In this way their views are not restricted. So the interviewer gets a bigger area to further explore the issues pertaining to a problem. Advantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Can motivate the interviewee to respond freely.  ¿Ã‚ ½ More feedback can be probed.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Can adapt or reword questions for each individual.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Extra information from body movement and facial expressions. Disadvantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Time consuming.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Requires good communication skills.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Requires good interviewing skills.  ¿Ã‚ ½ May be impractical due to location constraints.  ¿Ã‚ ½ The interviewee may not answer/give appointment. 2. On-Site Observation On-site observations are one of the most effective tools with the analyst where the analyst personally goes to the site and discovers the functioning of the system. As an observer, the analyst can gain first hand knowledge of the activities, operations, processes of the system on-site, hence here the role of an analyst is of an information seeker. This information is very meaningful as it is unbiased and has been directly taken by the analyst. This exposure also sheds some light on the actual happenings of the system as compared to what has already been documented, thus the analyst gets closer to the system. This technique is also time-consuming and the analyst should not jump to conclusions or draw inferences from small samples of observation rather the analyst should be more patient in gathering the information. This method is however less effective for learning about peoples perceptions, feelings and motivations. Mainly observation categorized into two, Formal observation  ¿Ã‚ ½ Observation a person by him being noticed. Informal observation  ¿Ã‚ ½ Observing a person without him being noticed. Do ¿Ã‚ ½s  ¿Ã‚ ½ Obtain permission from appropriate supervisors or managers.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Prepare special forms to record data.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Determine who, what, where, why, when and how of the observation.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Takes notes immediately or after the observation.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Review the observation notes with appropriate individuals.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Also observe during low, normal, and peak periods of operations. Don ¿Ã‚ ½ts  ¿Ã‚ ½ Don ¿Ã‚ ½t interrupt the individuals work.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Don ¿Ã‚ ½t focus on trivial activities.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Don ¿Ã‚ ½t make assumptions. Advantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Observation of people at work provides first hand experience of the way that the current system operates.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Data are collected in real time and can have a high level of validity if care is taken in how the technique is used.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Observation can be used to verify information from other sources or to look for exceptions to the standard procedure.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Baseline data about the performance of the existing system and of users can be collected. Disadvantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ The act of observation alters the behavior.  ¿Ã‚ ½ The act of made may not involve the difficulty and volume normally experienced during that time period.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Some task may not always be performed in the manner in which they are observed.  ¿Ã‚ ½ People may not let u see what you want to see. 3. Investigation Third fact finding technique is to thoroughly investigate the application and problems. The analyst has to read computer journals, reference books, internet white papers and case-studies for investigation. The Analyst can visit other companies or departments which have addressed similar problems. Advantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Can save time if solution already exists.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Investigator can see how others have solved similar problems or met similar requirements.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Keeps investigator up to date with current developments. Disadvantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Requires access to appropriate sources of information.  ¿Ã‚ ½ May ultimately not help in solving problem because problem is not documented elsewhere. 4. Questionnaire Questionnaires are another way of information gathering where the potential users of the system are given questionnaires to be filled up and returned to the analyst. Questionnaires are useful when the analyst need to gather information from a large number of people. It is not possible to interview each individual. Also if the time is very short, in that case also questionnaires are useful. If the anonymity of the respondent is guaranteed by the analyst then the respondent answers the questionnaires very honestly and critically. Just like the interviews and on the same lines questionnaires are of two types. Open-Response Based Questionnaires The objective of open-response questionnaire is to gather information and data about the essential and critical design features of the system. The open-ended question requires no response direction or specific response. This form is also used to learn about the feelings, opinions, and experiences of the respondents. This information helps in the making the system effective because the analyst can offer subsequent modifications as per the knowledge gained. e.g. What additional reports would you require from the System? Closed-Response Based Questionnaires The objective of closed-response questionnaire is to collect the factual information of the system. It gives an insight in how the people dealing with the system behave and how comfortable are they with it. In this case the respondents have to choose from a set of given responses. Thus the respondent can express their liking for the most favorable one from the possible alternatives. The closed questions can be of various types and the most common ones are listed below. e.g. 1. Yes/No Question Do you print reports from the existing System? (please circle the appropriate answer) Yes No 2. Multiple Choice Questions How many new surgery appointments do you obtain in a year? (please tick one box only) 3. Scaled Questions How satisfied are you with the response time of the patients ¿Ã‚ ½ records update? (please circle one options) Advantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Can be answered quickly.  ¿Ã‚ ½ An economical way of gathering data from a large number of people.  ¿Ã‚ ½ If the questionnaire is well designed, then the results can be analysed easily, possibly by computer. Disadvantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Good questionnaires are difficult to construct.  ¿Ã‚ ½ There is no automatic mechanism for follow up or probing more deeply, although it is possible to follow up with an interview by telephone or in person if necessary.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Postal questionnaires suffer from low response rates. Conclusion Interview is the most suitable fact-finding technique of gathering information for Victoria Hospital System. Because there are small numbers of people are working, hence result can be produced in a short period of time, easy to evaluate the result, more feedback can be a probed and new ides may arise. Fact-recording methods and standards The fact recording is a reverence for facts and knowing how to look for them. You do not go into data collection with a predetermined opinion of the design of the final procedure. You let the facts tell you what shape the procedure should take. But, you must be able to find facts and know how to record them. This is done by breaking down the procedure into steps and listing them in proper sequence, without leaving things out. The analyst keeps his or her attention on the subject being charted, follows its flow, step by step, and is not distracted by other subjects that could easily lead off onto tangents. The analyst becomes immersed in the data collection, one flow at a time. Record what is actually happening, not what should happen or could happen. When later you have them neatly organized and present them for study the facts will assert their authority as they tell their story. Software Standard A Software Standard is a standard, common format of a document, file, or data transfer accepted and used by one or more software developers while working on one or more than one software programs. Software standards enable interoperability between different programs created by different developers. Software standards consist of certain terms, concepts, data formats, document styles and techniques agreed upon by software creators so that their software can understand the files and data created by a different software program. To be considered a standard, a certain protocol needs to accepted and incorporated by a group of developers who contribute to the definition and maintenance of the standard. Developers prefer using standards for software development because of the efficiencies it provides for code development and wider user acceptance and use of the resulting application. The followings are computer and paper based fact-recording methods and standard documentation techniques, which are being used in software development.  ¿Ã‚ ½ Data flow diagrams  ¿Ã‚ ½ Context diagrams  ¿Ã‚ ½ Flow charts  ¿Ã‚ ½ Decision tables  ¿Ã‚ ½ Grid charts Data flow diagrams  ¿Ã‚ ½ Graphically describe the flow of data within an organisation  ¿Ã‚ ½ Composed of four basic elements represented by standard symbols: Basic data flow diagram Context diagrams  ¿Ã‚ ½ Show major data flows into and out of a system  ¿Ã‚ ½ Describe each subsystem as a process showing interrelationship of those subsystems and their relationship to main system  ¿Ã‚ ½ Depict logical flow of data in summary form  ¿Ã‚ ½ The starting point for studying any system  ¿Ã‚ ½ Depict the system at its highest level  ¿Ã‚ ½ Referred to as level zero data flow diagrams Flow charts  ¿Ã‚ ½ Document physical flows determined after logical data flows have been documented using data flow diagrams Flow chart symbols Advantages and disadvantages of flow charts Advantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Enable any system to be represented in easily understandable manner  ¿Ã‚ ½ Overall picture of system easily seen  ¿Ã‚ ½ Highlight relationship among different parts of the system Disadvantages  ¿Ã‚ ½ Creation can be time-consuming  ¿Ã‚ ½ Numerous symbols can be confusing  ¿Ã‚ ½ Process may not be completely representable using symbols There are three types of flow chart, namely 1. System flow charts  ¿Ã‚ ½ Show the relationship between input, processing and output including data, documents and storage  ¿Ã‚ ½ Represent the relationship between various processes 2. Document flow charts  ¿Ã‚ ½ Emphasise the flow of documents between various people, groups and departments of an organisation. 3. Program flow charts  ¿Ã‚ ½ Show the detailed steps of a computer program  ¿Ã‚ ½ Show the logic and processing steps used to develop a computer program Decision tables  ¿Ã‚ ½ List the decision logic of a program flow chart in tabular form  ¿Ã‚ ½ Constructed with two main columns and two rows: ? First row is further divided into a number of rows of conditions ? Second row is further divided into a number of rows of actions The decision table tells us the following  ¿Ã‚ ½ if stock is not available and floor stock is not being sold, collect 10% advance  ¿Ã‚ ½ if stock is available but delivery is not within three days, collect 10% advance  ¿Ã‚ ½ if stock is available and delivery within three days, collect full value of sale  ¿Ã‚ ½ if stock is not available but floor stock is being sold within three days, collect full value of sale  ¿Ã‚ ½ if stock is not available but floor stock is being sold after three days, collect 10% advance Grid charts A grid chart is a type of chart that shows the interaction of two data points at the grid intersection of their respective axes.