Thursday, February 20, 2020

Charity is necessary Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Charity is necessary - Essay Example Consequently, I agree with Rockefeller in that charity brings harm if it is not meant to help the them have a better life that is not dependent on well-wishers. I believe that charity is necessary and beneficial to the needy only if it alleviates their ways of living through means meant to help them develop from charity-dependent to independent citizens capable of providing for themselves. Donations that make the poor well-wishers dependent brings harm in a way that it promotes misuse of the poor by the charity organizations who obey every rule and direction of the charity organization in the bid to secure financial help. Discriminate charity is also evident to cause more harm as it is not aimed at helping the ‘supposed’ needy, but promote ethnicity and unfairness. Recently, charity organizations have been on the lookout as some have been promoting youth radicalization such as where the youth are obliged to undertake illegal rallies and campaigns only because by doing so, they are entitled to receive help for the ill-motivated charity institutions, which lead to increased harm than benefits to the society and those in need. Charity is not a guaranteed source of fund for the poor; hence, the only way to guarantee the needy of a better life is by ensuring that the help they receive help them not to entirely depend on charity. Failure to help the needy be independent from charity pose a great danger because that means that any scenario leading to reduced charity funds will lead to ultimate suffering or even death to the needy. For example, if the charity organizations that give help to regions frequently characterized by drought, then that means all those depended on charity are in a great danger of starving. Additionally, it has been observed that charity may further lead to sluggishness among the poor and instead of improving their

Tuesday, February 4, 2020

Addictions and interventions Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Addictions and interventions - Essay Example The following treatment plan and recommendations will be instituted to help make this possible.The type of therapy that will be best suited in aiding Linda to recovery is Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy. The reason this is the best option for Linda is that it will not only help her to recover the quickest, since this type of therapy is the most rapid in producing results, it is the best use of time and resources, as this sort of therapy is a very direct approach, and it is not open ended in the way that other therapies are, such as psycho-analysis (National Association of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapists, 2009). Another reason that Linda will benefit from Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy is that it will enable her to think differently about her circumstances, even if they cannot be changed (National Association of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapists, 2009). For instance, she lives in a poor part of town. While she may not be able to change that immediately or even at all, Cognitive-Behavior Ther apy will assist her in learning to view her circumstances differently. The results of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy are long term. This is due to the fact that the client will understand how and what to do in order to make things better, and then they will be able to apply it, even after therapy has ended. (National Association of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapists, 2009). Linda and I can work together, and she will feel involved in her treatment, which will give her the incentive to want to do better. As far as having others involved in working on the case, I would prefer to work with Linda alone, since it is vital that she and I establish a relationship where she is comfortable opening up to me and expressing her feelings. If too many other professionals are involved in her case, it would be to her detriment because she would not have the chance to form a bond with me that would allow her to feel comfortable enough to work with me in improving her life and setting goals. Cognitive-Behavior therapy is most effective when sessions involve only the client and the therapist, not multiple professionals (National Association of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapists, 2009). There will be a number of things that I will need to know about Linda in order for the use of Cognitive-behavior therapy to be best effective in helping her to recover. One thing that I will like to know about Linda is what she'd like to get out of life. Knowing this bit of information will enable me to help her set goals and come up with different strategies that will help her to achieve those goals. Secondly, I will like her to tell me a little about herself and what makes her feel the need to engage in using drugs. Knowing her reasons for why she feels the need to engage in this behavior will enable me to better know and understand her, so I will be able to tailor the therapy sessions to best suit her needs. Finally, I will ask her how she feels about herself and her current circumstances. Knowing about these things will enable me to help her to set goals o either change her attitude or change her world. Though I'd love to focus on every aspect of Linda, this would be impossible due to time constraints and limited resources. So in order to make the best use of the time and resources that are available to me in dealing with this case, it will be advantageous for me to focus on aspects of her life and character that are of vital importance. Two major areas that deserve the utmost attention are helping her to establish goals on fighting her addiction and helping her to think of herself and her circumstances in a different light. When it comes

Monday, January 27, 2020

Public Housing Policy in the USA

Public Housing Policy in the USA Public Housing Public housing, introduced at federal level in 1937, provides for low-cost housing through public financing by means of publicly owned and managed multi-family developments. Several cities began providing public housing prior to the 1937 Housing Act, through local programs of their own. Furthermore, it was these kinds of local programs that helped mold the model for the federal program. Public Housing was environed to be a solution for homelessness, but due to several problems with residents and owners it was not as successful as planned. Although there are multiple themes and topics related to public housing and its poor success this paper will solely focus on 6 themes that are critical in understanding the history and advancement of public housing. These themes are in regards to the population it was aimed for, financing, federal public housing authority, local public housing authorities, design, and urban renewal. Public housing did not originally aim to provide housing for the â€Å"extreme† lower-class, it was actually aimed towards select members of the working class. More specifically, public housing’s original design intended to serve the needs of the industrial middle class, who were temporarily unemployed or lacked adequate employment during the Great Depression.[1] After the Second World War concluded, many individuals and members of the working class were able to purchase their own homes by utilizing low-interest mortgages via Federal Housing Administration (FHA). However, discriminatory practices took place through these benefits. In their study, sociologists Douglas S. Massey and Nancy A. Denton, demonstrate the discriminatory nature of these practices. These benefits were targeted, for the most part, towards non-Hispanic whites and consequently helped move non-Hispanic whites into the suburbs, while simultaneously keeping blacks.[2] Although Massey and Denton’s study focus on the segregation of blacks other minority groups were also affected and segregated as well. Regardless of what minority group an individual belonged to, public housings were segregated and the higher end ones were mainly exclusive to whites while the lower end ones were mainly exclusive to minorities. Public housing has also been viewed and portrayed as a solution for homelessness. According to urban planner Peter Marcuse’s study, many planners, architects and social workers had a more moralistic view because they believed that adequate housing was a necessity in order to improve the quality of life for slum dwellers. Furthermore, they viewed public housing as means of aiding the state in fulfilling its responsibility to ensure that decent and affordable housing was available for everyone in the United Sates. Early examples of unequal housing were the terrible conditions of the tenements where many immigrants lived, which inclusively disgusted many early reformers. As previously mentioned, minority groups lived in terrible public housing and in order to put an end to this the early reformers initiated demolition of the poor conditioned tenements, they also got rid of the design of interior rooms containing no windows, lastly they also bettered air circulation and added more lighting to public housing. The main issue with the terrible qualities of these tenants was that they led to dangerous and unsanitary living conditions. Within time, however, housing commissions were set up in many major cities in order to improve the quality of public houses by imposing regulations on landlords.[3] Landlords were therefore now being held responsible with providing adequate living conditions for all residents regardless of ethnicity and immigration status, which was consequently a major improvement in comparison to the previous lack of regulations and treatment of minority based public housing. In 1937, after a long struggle in Congress, the first national housing legislation passed. In addition to providing low-cost housing, the housing legislation also improved the deteriorating economy by providing construction jobs. Public housing was never actually thought of as being a long-term or permanent home for the poor. The actual purpose of the act was â€Å"to alleviate present and recurring unemployment and to remedy the unsafe and insanitary housing conditions and the acute shortage of decent, safe and sanitary dwellings for families of low income†[4] A modification was actually made to the original legislation in order to be accepted by congress which was the addition of â€Å"alleviation of unemployment† as of the main purposes of the act. This housing meant to house low-income families, which congress defined as, families who could not afford to build adequate supply of decent, safe, and sanitary residences.[5] The 1937 National Housing Legislation essentia lly intended to alleviate public housing of unsafe and insanitary living conditions. Tenant screening received support from advocates of public housing because they believed that in order to for housing developments to be successful, residents needed to be employed. According to Marcuse, when public housing was first constructed, qualitative tenant screening was the norm. But, by the 1950’s and earlier, very strict tenant policies became enforced. These strict tenant policies included that large fines for property damage were imposed and unwed pregnant women could be evicted. Other criteria included that families were required to possess two parents, the head of the household needed to be employed, and families needed to have some record of good housekeeping skills. Visits were inclusively made to future tenants’ previous homes in order to see if they were suitable candidates. Occasionally checking up on public housing developments to make sure the units were being adequately taken cared of, was another common practice.[6] The Federal Housing Authority developed several policies and programs as a response to difficulties with congress and to cope with presidential administrations. Problems with congress began with the first housing act, because it funded fewer units than it was designed to. According to law and real estate expert Michael Schill, the act only funded capital costs and expected rental income to cover most of the operational and maintenance costs.[7] Congress however wrongfully blamed rising costs in public housing to poor management. The real reason for rising costs were actually due to old buildings needing to be refurbished, high inflation, and increasing expenses. High inflation took place mainly due to tenant incomes declining. Financial problems also escalated with a small affluence of public housing construction between 1969 and 1970. The need to fund construction and other physical needs to public houses had a negative economic impact on residents, especially during that time becau se they’re income was significantly lower than usual. Public housing authorities were consequently left with a nearly impossible choice of raising rents, decreasing services and maintenance, or doing both. In January of 1973, the Nixon administration sanctioned a freeze on most federal housing programs. However, according to R. Allen Hays, Nixon and his advisors later viewed public housing as a tried and true program which is why the freeze was shortly lifted and Section 8 was created. Section 8 intended to replace both low and moderate income subsidy programs, ultimately it was intended to avoid too much exclusion of people of very low incomes and too much density of very low income individuals. The impact of section 8 was not a successful one because it was the low-point of subsidized housing production for the entire decade. It was not until Carter administration’s that subsidized housing construction rose. Although Carter had many unsuccessful initiatives, public housing was an obvious exception because during his administration housing programs reached high levels of production.[8] One dispute in favor of public housing was that it couldn’t be entirely removed becaus e of humanitarian and social cost reasons. Not even Congress could bring itself to completely abolish public housing. Public housing was crucial in not only providing housing for people in legitimate need but it also proved to be economically beneficially because it meant less vagrants and also created a greater circulation of wealth. However, in means of being economically beneficially, it was not as successful as it was in providing housing. This was in fact one of the only things public housing was successful in, because it suffered from many other problems. Furthermore, Local Public Housing Authorities also suffered due to rising rents and reduction of services. This took place during the 1960s and it displeased many tenants which created a series of rent strikes, which eventually concluded with the Brooke Amendment being added to the 1969 Housing Act. [9] In 1971 the Brooke Amendment provided operating subsidies to housing authorities to pay for losses and deficits and also capped public housing rents at 25% of the household’s income. Also, in order to qualify for admission, tenants’ incomes were required to be less than 80% of the area’s median income. Low-performing housing authorities continued to struggle, because their neglect led to the need of many repairs and modernization being needed. These housing authorities delayed maintenance needs and did not adequately fund modernization. Also low percentage of the rent going wards operation costs had a negative impact of public housing. Lastly, the solution of the housing authorities was a poor and greedy one because instead of increasing the percentage they increased the rent, which only led to the continuation of maintenance problems and buildings rapidly perishing. Beginning around the early 2000’s, the majority of the federal housing dollars began to be used for tenant-based housing vouchers, known as â€Å"Housing Choice Vouchers.† The way it works is the recipient pays 30% of their income towards rent and the voucher covers any difference there may be between what they paid and the rental price of the unit. According to Carole Walker and David Varady’s study, these vouchers have failed to satisfy the need of the public to have affordable housing.[10] One of the reasons why these vouchers have had little success is because individuals with vouchers have difficulty finding a public house because landlords prefer to rent to unsubsidized families because they can charge them higher rents. Poor design of developments is another problem that many public housing residents faced. Many public houses had no ventilation and windows in their interior rooms, which made meant that these public houses had rooms filled with unsanitary air. There was also a poor amount of light, which signified that man of these rooms were very dark in the sense that they had no windows, proper air flow, and adequate lighting. These houses resembled mental institutions more than houses. Families could therefore not thrive in in that environment because it was a very neglected and gloomy environment.[11] By the early 1940’s, high-rises was seen as a solution to provide an adequate living environment for tenants and also as a way to provide a better image for public houses. High rise buildings was glorified due to providing more spacing, but economically they were not as glorified because they were not exactly the cheapest form of public housing developments. High rises were more expensive in the long run than any other development because they provided much more units which meant much more operational and maintenance costs. They were also much more expensive and difficult to build which is why in some cases architects were unable to properly execute their original architectural/design plans.[12] Due to cost reasons and in order to encourage residents to better themselves, limits on unit amenities were enforced. One way which limits on unities were made due to cost reasons was how several services were no longer provided and how poor quality units were produced. Interestingly enough, Congress and housing authorities blamed tenants for the terrible conditions of the units when in reality it was mostly their own fault. Many of the services no longer provided were reliable elevators and some of the poor units produced had inadequate floor space.[13] This led to several security problems, which is why many housing authorities put the blame on the tenants, but in reality they were the source of the problem. Many public housing developments were also designed to be separated from the rest of the neighborhood/community. An example of this is how at times zoning policies placed buildings diagonally into the pattern of the street. A break in the street grid was also implemented in order to separate the public housing development from the rest of the neighborhood.[14] Due to its peculiar institutional look, many developments have become easily to identify visually, which has led to it being subjected to stigmatization and isolation. This is why its massive structure has been negatively critiqued. All these negative results were by no means intended or anticipated, it was a complete shock to housing authorities and architects, because the result it was supposed to produce was a benefit to residents. Residents were supposed to benefit from the design because they would be able to distinguish their residences from the rest of the neighborhood and be viewed as a symbolic building, but its separa tion from the community actually led to backlash. This was also only a logical result because if tenants are separated from the community they are not allowed to coexist with everyone else and provide a better image of themselves. By being isolated they only provoke a negative image of not wanting to be part of the community. Initially Site selection was completely under local control. However, this was a problem because local authorities carried on discriminatory site selection. Racial segregation was one of the practices they carried on in which a larger amount and the better quality ones were designated for whites over blacks and any other minority group. Local housing authorities also separated each racial into their own developments, i.e. some only housed blacks, some only housed whites, some only housed Mexicans, and some only housed Chinese.[15] A clearer example is the William Houses project in Brooklyn, New York which was exclusive to whites, and no other ethnic group was allowed to reside there. Another example is the Harlem River Houses project in Manhattan, which was built exclusively for blacks. This project was also built as a way to silence the demands made by the African-American community in New York for access to public housing. Urban renewal initiated in 1949 with Title I of the Housing Act, but proved to be problematic because it made it possible for large-scale slum clearance to take place without requiring that all cleared housing be replaced.[16] Law expert, Lawrence M. Friedman, emphasized in his study the dangerous aspects of slum housing and how it was crucial that it be illegalized in order to avoid further unsanitary living conditions which could spread not only among the slum housings but among greater society as well.[17] Actions would begin to take place with laws, however some of these laws were not effective. Title I for example did not mandate construction of low-income housing. Living conditions of the poor was largely disregarded due to the fact that it did not concern most of the population, since most of the U.S. population was middle-class. However, unsanitary living conditions could affect the greater population through the spread of diseases. This was one of the reasons why actions wer e taken towards slum clearance but unfortunately they were not effective and irrational. Gans documented a horrible example of urban renewal, a slum clearance project that took place in the West End of Boston, with little support from the neighborhood residents.[18] This was especially shocking because it signified the removal of a community that appeared to be perfectly functional. What was additionally more irrational was how the renewal process would be quite lengthy and would leave large unproductive areas in the center of the city. Although actions were being made in order to clear slum housing, the process was slow and irrational. The 1949 Housing Act ordered for 810,000 units of public housing to be constructed. However, by December of 1951 only 84,600 units of public housing were actually under construction. This led to the creation of the 1954 Housing Act, which mandated that public housing be built solely in areas of urban renewal/slum clearance. Therefore, new public housing no longer increased housing supply, instead it replaced deteriorating housing. Furthermore, slum dwellers faced the problem of displacement because they had to wait for the new promised public housing to be fully functional. That is why investment in urban renewal increased, because of the decline of public housing construction.[19] To conclude, public housing was originally designed in order to provide housing for all low-income individuals and families, but as time went on the infamous question of the deserving poor was brought up and low-income individuals and families had to fit into certain regulations in order to be allowed to live in public housing. Public housing also faced many financial difficulties at the federal level due to difficulties with congress and presidential administrations. Financial problems were also present at a local level and were reflected with poor housing authorities and rising rents and reduction of services. The actual design of these public housings also proved to be problematic, and its most problematic feature were perhaps the segregation among them and the violence that arose from some of these. Overall, public housing failed to be as successful as originally environed, because in practice they suffered from overcrowdings, racial tensions, violence, poor management, and finan cial problems. Bibliography Bickford, Adam, and Douglas S Massey. Segregation in the Second Ghetto: Racial and Ethnic  Segregation in American Public Housing, 1977. Social Forces. 69, no. 4. 1991. Friedman, Lawrence M. Government and Slum Housing: Some General Considerations. Law  and Contemporary Problems. 32, no. 2. 1967. Hays, R. Allen. The Federal Government and Urban Housing Ideology and Change in Public  Policy. 2nd ed. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995. Gans, Herbert J. The High-rise Fallacy. Design Quarterly. 24. 1992. Gans, Herbert J. The urban villagers; group and class in the life of Italian-Americans.. New  York: Free Press of Glencoe, 1962. Marcuse, Peter. The Myth of the Benevolent State: Towards a Theory of Housing. New York:  Columbia University, Graduate School of Architecture and Planning, 1978. Milbert, Isabelle. Slums, Slum Dwellers and Multilevel Governance. The European Journal of  Development Research. 18, no. 2. 2006. Public Housing. Social Service Review. 11, no. 1. 1937. Schach, Janice Cervelli. Planning and Design of Public Housing an Evolution of Structure.  Landscape and Urban Planning. 39, no. 2. 1997. Schill, Michael. Distressed Public Housing: Where Do We Go from Here? 60 University of  Chicago Law Review 497. 1993. The United States Housing Act of 1937, as amended, and provisions of other laws and of  executive orders pertaining to the United States housing act of 1937, as amended. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Dept. of the Interior, U.S. Housing Authority, 1938. Walker, Carole, and David Varady. Housing Vouchers and Residential Mobility. Journal of  Planning Literature, 18.1 2003. [1] Bauman, John. Public housing, race, and renewal: urban planning in Philadelphia, 1920-1974. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987. [2] Massey, Douglas S., and Nancy A. Denton. American Apartheid: Segregation and the Making of an Underclass. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1993. [3] Marcuse, Peter. The Myth of the Benevolent State: Towards a Theory of Housing. New York: Columbia University, Graduate School of Architecture and Planning, 1978. 248-263. [4] The United States Housing Act of 1937, as amended, and provisions of other laws and of executive orders pertaining to the United States housing act of 1937, as amended. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Dept. of the Interior, U.S. Housing Authority, 1938. [5] Ibid. [6] Marcuse, Peter. The Myth of the Benevolent State: Towards a Theory of Housing. [7] Schill, Michael. Distressed Public Housing: Where Do We Go from Here? 60 University of Chicago Law Review 497. 1993. [8] Hays, R. Allen. The Federal Government and Urban Housing Ideology and Change in Public Policy. 2nd ed. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995. [9] Ibid. [10] Walker,Carole, and David Varady. Housing Vouchers and Residential Mobility. Journal of Planning Literature, 18.1 2003. [11] Schach,Janice Cervelli. Planning and Design of Public Housing an Evolution of Structure. Landscape and Urban Planning. 39, no. 2. 1997. [12] Gans,Herbert J. The High-rise Fallacy. Design Quarterly. 24. 1992. [13] Schach,Janice Cervelli. Planning and Design of Public Housing an Evolution of Structure. 1997. [14] Ibid. [15] Bickford,Adam, and Douglas S Massey. Segregation in the Second Ghetto: Racial and Ethnic Segregation in American Public Housing, 1977. Social Forces. 69, no. 4. 1991. [16] Public Housing. Social Service Review. 11, no. 1. 1937. [17] Friedman,Lawrence M. Government and Slum Housing: Some General Considerations. Law and Contemporary Problems. 32, no. 2. 1967. [18] Gans, Herbert J. The urban villagers; group and class in the life of Italian-Americans.. New York: Free Press of Glencoe, 1962. [19] Milbert,Isabelle. Slums, Slum Dwellers and Multilevel Governance. The European Journal of Development Research. 18, no. 2. 2006.

Sunday, January 19, 2020

Impacts of Artificial Climate Modification Essay -- Meteorology Weathe

Impacts of Artificial Climate Modification Controlling the weather. The very idea of it sounds enthralling and, yet, terrifying. Take a moment and think about the endless possibilities. Imagine the scenario: Hurricane Katrina is headed straight for Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas. The loss of life is unthinkable and the amount of damage is insurmountable. However, scientists have discovered a way to seed the hurricane, not only lessening its power but potentially redirecting its path. Hundreds of lives are saved and billions of dollars in damage are prevented. While extreme storm manipulation is a far reach into the future, the possibility to increase rain and snow fall and to suppress hail storms is a reality. However exciting the possibilities, there are still great concerns on how this awesome power will affect the world. Weather Modification (WM) began in the mid 1940s with three scientists at the General Electric Laboratory. Vincent Schaefer, Bernard Vonnegut, and Irving Langmuir conducted various experiments in precipitation management. Their studies showed that the use of dry ice and silver iodide in supercooled stratus clouds acted as â€Å"seeds† for rain and snow making. Simply put, seeding is the introduction of crystalline particles into a cloud to create ice crystals and water droplets that will become precipitation (Bridget, 51). These first series of experiments encouraged new rain enhancement and hail prevention projects throughout the world (List, 51). With the introduction of any new finding, there is a need for guidelines. In order to create a more universal, uniform, and organized method of researching weather modification, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) establish... ...cy Statement: â€Å"Planned and Inadvertent Weather Modification,†. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 73, 337. Bridget, C. (May/Jun 2005). Changing the Weather. Weatherwise, 58(3), 51, 53. Howell, W.E. (1977). Environmental Impacts of Precipitation Management: Results and Inferences from Project Skywater. Bureau of Reclamation Department of the Interior, 58(6), 491-492. Solak, M.E., Yorty, D.P., & Griffith, D.A. (2003). Estimations of Downwind Cloud Seeding Effects in Utah. Report: North American Weather Consultants, Inc., 35(1), 1, 2, 4. Weaver, T. & Collins, D. (Nov 1977). Possible Effects of Weather Modification (Increased Snowpack) on Festuca Idahoensis Meadows. Journal of Range Management, 30(6), 451. List, R. (Jan 2004). Weather Modification- A Scenario for the Future. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 85(1), 52, 56-57.

Saturday, January 11, 2020

Francis Bacon and Brett Whiteley

Brett Whiteley and Francis Bacon Essay Question: Discuss the way Whiteley’s work; ‘Self Portrait in the Studio’ 1976, and Bacon’s ‘Figure in Movement, 1976’ show two very different approaches to practice. How have these artists used gesture, colour, and form differently in these works to explore totally different emotional and psychological territory? Francis Bacon and Brett Whiteley show two very different approaches to their practice. They use gesture, colour and form differently in these works to explore different emotional and psychological territory.The making of an artistic practice is based on the artist’s view of the things affecting and contributing to his society and perspective on the world. Differing styles in this depend on the artist and their intent in making their artwork which is evident in the two contrasting works of Whiteley’s ‘Self portrait in the studio’ 1976 and Bacon’s ‘Figure in m ovement, 1976’. They portray their views through a range of techniques. Artistic practice is the way in which an artist goes about their work. It refers to the conceptual and making processes of an artwork.An artist will find a suitable subject matter, develop skills and use visual codes and symbols to portray their ideas and concepts to hopefully trigger a certain audience response. An artist would want to be reflective of the society and world of that time to have the audience be able to connect with ideas and concepts they want to convey. How they make it and why they make it is a testimony to their different media, styles and techniques and also their use of the visual qualities and relationships as well as the influence of their global and personal world and other artists and their movements.Francis Bacon says that he is ‘deforming and reforming reality in his paintings’ this is evident in his work ‘Figure in movement, 1976’. Distorted features of the human form are typical with Bacons figurative style. Bacon stated that his aim was to ‘not make illustration of reality but to create images which are concentration of reality’. Subject matter is not something that Francis Bacon said he traditionally looks for but he was inspired by people like Muybridge and his photography of deformities and animal locomotion.In his studio he has collection of his works spread out on a table, ‘these things spread around the table are perhaps what more conventional artists would call subject matter’. He is also inspired by medical books of x-rays and diseases of the mouth which he interprets as beautiful and interesting. He finds dead carcasses of cattle in the butcher as one of the most vibrant colour palettes and interesting forms. In the background of the work there is a pig carcass which is evidence of his interpretation of beauty .He uses a mash of dark grey colours for the forms and a bright orange base with a black background ambiguously. In the work ‘Figure in movement, 1976’ Bacon based the conceptual idea from a book which had a line ‘The reek of human blood smiles out at me. ’ This provoked a strong sense of imagery which transformed in to his art and in particular this work of two distorted forms wrestling. He successfully depicts violence in to the work which has been fuelled from that line and the audience successfully receives it.Francis Bacon is seen as an artist who creates his work very unconventionally. He uses the unprimed side of a canvas as he became accustomed to it after losing all his money and using the other side of old paintings because he couldn’t afford new canvases. He does not do sketches before taking on a painting and feels whichever way his brush takes him is the way that he wants to go. He says that ‘I have an overall image that I want to do but it’s in the working that it develops’, and ‘I believe in a deeply ordered chaos of work. Bacon never attended an art school because he thinks ‘I would have been taught all those old techniques that I just don’t want to know, I wanted to find my own techniques. You can’t any longer make illustration because it’s done so much better by the camera and the cinema. ’ He has a habit of manically working paint into a canvas not only with a paint brush but with cloths and dishwashing instruments which adds to the frenzy of his work.Francis Bacon doesn’t put much emphasis on the meaning of his work but on the mood and feeling it creates, ’I do believe that today modern man wants a sensation really without the boredom of its conveyance, a cut down of conveyance as far as possible so you just give over to sensation’, though interestingly he says ‘I never feel anything when I do paintings there’s nothing to feel. ’ Many come away with the feeling of horror from a Bacon work b ut that’s not the intention ‘what horror could I make that could compete with what goes on every single day. Brett Whiteley’s painting ‘Self portrait in the studio’ won the Archibald prize in 1976. It was one of several Archibald prizes that he one in the ‘70’s. Whiteley was known for the topics of nudes, portraits, landscapes, still lifes of the female form, birds, and abstracts which all feature heavily in his self portrait of not only him but things that are dear to him and reflect his life and work as represented in the form of his studio. In this work Whiteley is trying to express that ‘yes, this is a mirror image of myself but I am not just Brett Whiteley, I am also Brett Whiteley who is part of this environment at this time. This painting is a testimony to what he loves and his working space in which he has created his career from and his artistic practice. He expresses this by including important elements of his life. Brett Whiteley strongly uses emotive qualities of colour. The whole painting is held together by the unifying prevailing quality of blue which is his signature colour. He is recognised for this colour because he is always referencing the water especially in this painting of his studio overlooking the harbour in Lavender Bay.This colour is also spread on to the walls and acts as a calming effect on the receiving audience. The colour is rich and bright to contrast with other points of focus in the room. The way he has developed the forms and shapes in the room are meant to convey the idea of man only being as big as any other point of reference. Whiteley reinforces this idea by making all focal points distorted and exaggerated. This is a celebration of his interest in female form and his figurative sculpture works.It is evident in ‘Self Portrait in the Studio’ that Whiteley has worked with slow, spontaneous gestures and worked back in to the canvas with scratches. The drawings of surroundings are minimal and simplistic and have been drawn with free loose lines to convey emotion. Whiteley says that ‘the best times when paintings are done when I’m not in charge of it all, if I keep my ego out of it there is kind of a pure flow of that recommendation and that solution of a kind of neat rightness that goes in as best and as accurately as one can.This approach contributes to the mood, feeling and meaning of the work and the sense of the way being an artist has impacted on his life. The small self portrait in comparison to his big studio also reflects how it dominates his life but is reflected as his most enjoyable escape. The painting also has a dream like feel showing his relationship with his art. Both of these two artists have very differently developed their practices.I think an interesting comparison between them is that Francis Bacon was always referencing death and in his documentary ‘The Art of Francis Bacon’ when talking abo ut how Egyptian art inspired him said ‘I guess they were always trying to defeat death by leaving images but it won’t really make a difference. We will all be dead. ’ And that one of Brett Whiteley’s famous quote is ‘Art is the thrilling spark that beats death, that’s all. ’ I think these two conflicting statements perfectly sum up the contrast they have in ideas and show how they explore emotional and psychological territory differently.

Friday, January 3, 2020

Innovations and Inventions for the Hearing Impaired

No one person invented sign language; it evolved worldwide in a natural fashion, much the way any language evolved. We can name a few people as the innovators of specific signing manuals. Each language (English, French, German, etc) developed their own respective sign languages at different times. American sign language (ASL) is closely related to French sign language. In 1620, the first book on sign language that contained the manual alphabet was published by Juan Pablo de Bonet.In 1755, Abbe Charles Michel de L’Epee of Paris founded the first free school for deaf people, he used a system of gestures, hand signs, and fingerspelling.In 1778, Samuel Heinicke of Leipzig, Germany founded a public school for deaf people, where he taught speech and speechreading.In 1817, Laurent Clerc and Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet founded Americas first school for deaf people, in Hartford, Connecticut.In 1864, Gallaudet College, in Washington, D.C was founded, the only liberal arts college for deaf people in the world. TTY or TDD Telecommunications TDD stands for Telecommunications Device for the Deaf.  It is a method of coupling Tele-Typewriters to telephones. Deaf orthodontist Doctor James C Marsters of Pasadena, California shipped a teletype machine to deaf physicist Robert Weitbrecht in Redwood City, California and requested a way to attach it to the telephone system so that phone communication could take place. The TTY was first developed by Robert Weitbrecht, a deaf physicist. He was also a ham radio operator, familiar with the way hams used teleprinters to communicate over the air. Hearing Aids Hearing aids in their various forms have provided needed amplification of sound for many persons experiencing hearing loss. Since hearing loss is one of the oldest of the known disabilities, attempts to amplify sound go back several centuries. It is unclear who invented the first electric hearing aid, it may have been the Akoulathon, invented in 1898 by Miller Reese Hutchinson and made and sold (1901) by the Akouphone Company of Alabama for $400. A device called the carbon transmitter was needed in both the early telephone and the early electric hearing aid. This transmitter was first commercially available in 1898 and was used to electrically amplify sound. In the 1920s, the carbon transmitter was replaced by the vacuum tube, and later by a transistor. Transistors allowed electric hearing aids to become small and efficient. Cochlear Implants The cochlear implant is a prosthetic replacement for the inner ear or cochlea. The cochlear implant is surgically implanted in the skull behind the ear and electronically stimulates the nerve of hearing with small wires touching the cochlea. External parts of the device include a microphone, a speech processor (for converting sounds into electrical impulses), connecting cables, and a battery. Unlike a hearing aid, which just makes sounds louder, this invention selects information in the speech signal and then produces a pattern of electrical pulses in the patients ear. It is impossible to make sounds completely natural because a limited amount of electrodes are replacing the function of tens of thousands of hair cells in a normally hearing ear. The implant has evolved over the years and many different teams and individual researchers have contributed to its invention and improvement. In 1957, Djourno and Eyries of France, William House of the House Ear Institute in Los Angeles, Blair Simmons of Stanford University, and Robin Michelson of the University of California, San Francisco, all created and implanted single-channel cochlear devices in human volunteers. In the early 1970s, research teams led by William House of the House Ear Institute in Los Angeles; Graeme Clark of the University of Melbourne, Australia; Blair Simmons and Robert White of Stanford University; Donald Eddington of the University of Utah; and Michael Merzenich of the University of California, San Francisco, begin work on developing multi-electrode cochlear implants with 24 channels. In 1977, Adam Kissiah a NASA engineer with no medical background designed a cochlear implant that is widely used today. In 1991, Blake Wilson greatly improved the implants by sending signals to the electrodes sequentially instead of simultaneously - this increased clarity of sound.

Thursday, December 26, 2019

Emotion Destination Internet - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 23 Words: 6865 Downloads: 6 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Statistics Essay Did you like this example? Measuring Emotion from Holiday Destination Homepages: An Australian Context Chapter 1: Introduction Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Emotion Destination Internet" essay for you Create order As use of the Internet has spread widely into our society, cyberspace has become an important part of our daily life (Hefley and Morris, 1995). According to a recent survey on Internet usage in the Australia, 56% of the total population used the Internet in the year 2006, and that percentage increases to 63% in the year 2007 (GMID, 2008).The maturation of Internet has led to a rapid development in a variety of destination offerings, services, and information quality, which have increased the ease of use, usefulness, security, and playfulness of websites (Gretzel, Yuan, Fesenmaier, 2000; Hanna Millar, 1997; Marcussen, 1997; WTO Business Council, 1999). To enhance the shopping and browsing experience, differentiate between tourism websites, and further increase online sales, destination marketers continue to offer improved website features (Hess, 2005; Lohse et al., 2000). Research supports the influence of destination homepages features on consumer experiences and their resulting effects on consumer attitude towards a website (Cano Prentice, 1998; Gretzel et a1., 2000; Klein, 1998). Offering a destination on a website, such as virtual tour, picture of destination, animation, image interactivity is important because presentation of destination homepage facilitates positive consumer responses, due to resulting hedonic or experiential value(Bigne, Andreu, Gnoth, 2005; Ha and Perks, 2005). As a typical interface in cyberspace, destination homepages can basically be considered as collections of slides composed of diverse visual(e.g. picture,color,text, multimedia presentation) and auditory stimuli (e.g.music, sounds) designed to directly engage the user in the interaction while he/she is navigating through cyberspace (Laurel, 1993). Accordingly, homepages thus also have the potential to elicit universally shared emotions in their user. In its past destination homepages tended to focus on providing cognitively convenient functions, such as search engines or directories. Therefore, most prior studies of tourism website have focused on the cognitive aspects of homepages (e.g. Sigala, 2002). However, as users gradually grew accustomed to these basic functions, providing cognitively convenient functions is not sufficient to satisfy user needs (Picard and Andrew, 1998). The advance of computer graphics increases the importance of aesthetic design of user interfaces, which provide users with emotional experiences (Oliver, 1996; Ngo and Byrne, 2001). Empirical evidence exits in the marketing literature supporting the argument that distinct aspects of product differentiation are captured in both the utilitarian (functional) and hedonic (aesthetic/affect laden) dimensions (Chittrui, 2003). That is why not all online travel consumers are motivated by the functional and utilitarian aspects of a destination Website such as price and place. Particularly when homepages are used for holiday destination, the emotional aspects of homepages have gained increased importance (Schenkman and Jonsson, 2000). Also in a study by Huang (2003), emotional experiences in an online shopping environment were found to be positively related to a customers intention to explore or purchase from website. This is because emotions were found to influence both users memories of products and their decision processes when they purchased products (Kim, 1998; Lee, 1998a). However, in contrast to the ample amount of research focusing on cognitive functions of homepages, only a few studies have focused on the emotional aspects of destination homepages (Fesenmaier, 2007). Among these few studies on the emotional aspects have several limitations (Kim and Moon, 1998; Lee, 1998b). First, the emotional dimensions that had been used in previous studies did not reflect or useful to the characteristics of homepages of the destination specifically rather it belongs to the website, which is an extensive concept by its feature. Also, these because emotional dimensions they borrowed were found in the design of physical products (Lee, 1998b). Therefore, we cannot be sure whether the emotional dimensions used in those studies accurately measure the emotions that users feel with diverse homepages. Second, prior studies did not consider the affective qualities of the destination homepages that had been used by homepage designers to elicit diverse emotions (Kim and Moon , 1998). Finally, prior studies did not identify any quantitative relations between the affective qualities of the destination homepage and browsers emotion in response to those affective qualities (Fesenmaier, 2007). Thus it was not clear which factors are closely related to which emotional dimension, how strong that relation is and what emotions have been evoked. Site developers therefore have to depend on insights and common sense in developing homepages, since they do not know the generic emotions evoked by various homepages or ways to evoke the generic emotions efficiently using design factors. Therefore, the objective of the study is to identify the affective qualities of destination homepages to measure the affective response of the homepage browsers. to identify a quantitative relationship between the affective responses of the browser and the affective qualities of the destination homepages The present study will contribute to research on emotional aspects of consumer behavior during tourism website browsing. Structure of the Thesis In order to achieve the research objective a theoretical basis has to be shaped that will be described in chapter 2. It will present a combination of earlier research and studies related to emotional experience, homepages in general and destination homepages. Chapter 3 reports the research design and methodology of the first experiment experiments. The results of the experiment itself will be presented in chapter 4. The research design of the second experiment will be covered in chapter 5, followed by the results in chapter 6. Subsequently, chapter 7 discusses both experiments; its methodology and results. It also presents final conclusions and recommendations for further research. CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW The following areas of literature were covered to identify the proposed objective for the present study: (1) The emergence of eTourism, (2) Research in Tourism website (3) Emotional experience and Human-Computer Interaction (4) Methods used to Measuring website experience (5) Presence of emotions in destination homepages (6) Affective qualities in destination homepages (7) expression of emotions (8) Affective States (9) Measuring Emotions 1. Emergence of eTourism Tourism is an information extensive product, since it exists only as information at the point of sale, and cannot be sampled before the purchase decision is made (WTO Business Council, 1999). Unlike durable goods, intangible and variable tourism services cannot be physically displayed before purchasing. Tourism products are therefore almost exclusively dependent upon representations and descriptions, i.e. information in printed or audio-visual formats. Communication and information transmission tools are therefore indispensable to the global marketing of the tourism industry (Sheldon, 1997). The information-based nature of tourism product denotes that the Internet, which recommends global reach and multimedia capability, is gradually more important means of promoting and distributing tourism services (Walle, 1996). Tourism has become a highly competitive product over the world. Competitive advantage is vital for this industry as it is increasingly driven by science, information technology and Innovation. Tourism has become the worlds leading industry and its growth shows a consistent year to year Increase. The World Tourism Organization (2005) predicts that by 2020 tourist arrivals around the world would increase over 200%. Tourism-related services have emerged as a primary product category to be promoted and distributed to consumer markets through the Internet (Connolly et al., 1998, Sussman Baker, 1996; Archdale et al., 1992., Millman, 1998; Underwood, 1996). Travel usually rates among the top three product/service categories purchased via the Internet, as indicated by numerous consumer surveys (Heichler 1997; Tweney 1997; Yoffie 1997). Machlis (1997) suggested that travel is the single largest revenue generator among consumers on the Internet, totaling U.S. $800 million in 1997. As a primary source of tourist destination Information for travelers approximately 95% of Web users use the Internet to gather travel related information and about 93% indicate that they visited tourism Web sites when planning for vacations (Lake, 2001). The number of people turning to the Internet for vacation and travel planning has increased more than 300% over the past five years. The World Wide Web facilitated the entire interactivity and networking between computer users by using the Internet to allow instant access and distribution of tourism information as well as to support and gradually re-engineer the reservation of tourism organizations (WTO, 1995; Smith Jenner, 1998). Now more people have access from work or Internet cafes even from countries that are not technologically advanced or wealthy. This exemplifies that gradually the Internet is becoming persistent among all economic classes. Most Internet users are educated professionals who travel regularly and therefore should have a higher disposable Income. Increasingly consumers become familiar with ICTS and expect that tourism suppliers will have interactive interfaces on-line to support purchasing and discussion about specific requirements. The Internet, in particular, enables travellers to access reliable and accurate information as well as to undertake reservations in a fraction of the time, cost and inconvenience required by conventional methods. An interactive Website provides a good opportunity for the numerous suppliers involved in a tourism destination to sell different product and service which are sought by individual visitors. An interesting part is using interactive methods of guiding Individuals through the enormous range of destination options are available. In this sense the Internet is not dissimilar to traditional marketing that consumers seek to simplify their choice by using a combination of intermediaries, trusted brand names and established business relationships. Apart from simply broadcasting information to letting consumers interact with the Web site content allows the tourism organization to engage consumers interest and participation to capture information about their preferences, and to use that information to provide personalized communication and services. The content of tourism destination Web sites is particularly important because it directly influences the perceived image of the destination and creates a virtual experience for the consumer. This experience is greatly enhanced when Web sites offer interactivity (Cano Prentice, 1998; Gretzel et al., 2000) With the increasing importance of online sales for tourism and hospitality products (Visa Europe, 2003) and the growing number of online tourists patronising tourism Webstores, it is crucial to develop a better understanding of the profile and behaviour of Internet surfers and shoppers. A number of research efforts have concentrated on general tourist information search behavior (Chen, 2000; Chen Gursoy, 2000; Fodness Murray, 1999; Gitelson Crompton, 1983; Schul Crompton, 1983; Snepenger, Megen, Snelling Worrall, 1990; Vogt Fesenmaier, 1998). However, insufficient research attention has been paid to online consumer search behavior in the travel and tourism field. Despite the wide-spread discussion of e-commerce advantages, research of e-commerce business models in the tourism literature has, to date, focused primarily on organisational, business and technical factors (Sigala, 2004). In contrast psychological factors (e.g emotion, motivation, attitude, mood) which influencing the shape and adoption of tourism website have not been adequately addressed. But it is important to understand the needs that consumers have with respect to being involved in e-commerce within the tourism and hospitality context. Investigative rather than simply descriptive information about online travelers should help tourism and hospitality firms make better decisions about their marketing strategies, segmentation and personalisation practices (Sigala, 2004). Thus, in addition to demographics, tourism and hospitality marketers need to know the intrinsic as well as extrinsic benefits/value that e-shoppers seek when engaging in e-shopping as well as the atmospheric and environmental signs that can influence Webstore adoption and use. To achieve this other under-utilised sub-fields of psychology can also be considered as potential explanatory patterns of e-commerce adoption and use (Aldersey Williams, 1996). Specifically to design and develop techniques to measure the affect of non-verbal response behavior of prospective travelers when considering holiday de stinations by using tourism websites. (2)Research in Tourism website This chapter reviews the research in tourism website. In line with the growth of online travel, there has been an increase in academic and practitioner publications equipped at understanding how to effectively build and evaluate hospitality and tourism websites. Researchers also investigate the challenges of identifying, attracting and retaining customers in the online market as well as the issue of understanding consumers perceptions towards destination website. Some of the researchers also aim to identify the determinants that influence potential travelers to use the Internet for travel planning and to show their interrelations. Murphy et al. (1996) were among the first researchers to examine online marketing effectiveness in hospitality and tourism. These researchers evaluated 36 restaurant websites using the categories of email contact, online sales promotions, frequent specials, directions, reservations, email newsletter, franchising, coupons, recruiting and contests. ). During this period a variety of approaches have been suggested or used for measuring the effectiveness of tourism and hospitality Websites. Murphy, Forrest, Wotring and Brymer (1996a) analysed the Websites of 36 hotels in late 1995, and identified 32 categories of hotel Website features, which they subsequently grouped into promotion and marketing, service and information, interactivity and technology, and management. In the mid-to-late 1990s, practitioners and academics tried to understand the Web and the people who were using it to for travel information and bookings (Bonn, Furr, Susskind, 1998, 1999; Jung, 1999; Kasavana, Knutson Polonowski, 1997; Smith Jenner, 1998; Walle, 1996; Weber Roehl, 1999). In the late 1990s, other factors such as accessibility, segmentation, positioning, consumer research and timeliness emerged, and were also used to evaluate various tourism and hospitality websites (see Morrison et al., 1999; Weeks and Crouch, 1999). By 2000, academic papers on website evaluation expanded to include, visitor attraction centres, convention centres, tour wholesalers, travel agents and ski resorts. Other factors that emerged as important in the evaluation of hospitality and tourism websites were levels of information on websites, availability of virtual communities to share travel experiences, the actual customer decision making process (looker vs. booker behaviour), and special online pricing and promotion (Dellaert, 2000; McLemore and Mitchell, 2000; Tierney, 2000). Perry (2002) employed relationship marketing mechanisms such as reservations, loyalty programmes, newsletters, feedback, consumer services, public relations, information, special gestures, value-added services. Frsich and Robins (2002) explored the use of the Internet in terms of constructing a self-image for the world. In 2003, the balanced scorecard tool introduced to evaluate the Web marketing efforts of Bed Breakfasts, Destination Marketing Organi zations (DMOs), NTOs and convention centres (Kim et al., 2003; St. John et al., 2003; so and Morrison, 2003). Apart from the balanced scorecard approach, Choi (2003) evaluated 100 restaurant websites in terms of information clearing house, public relations, interactive brochure, virtual storefront and direct sales, marketing research, and encouragement. Murphy et al. (2003) explored email management, online relationship, and electronic customer service of hotel websites. Other factors such as product, price, promotion, place, In 2004 and early 2005, researchers continued to use the modified balanced scorecard approach to evaluate the marketing effectiveness of hospitality and tourism websites (Douglas and Mills, 2004; Kline et al., 2004; Lee et al., 2004; Morrison et al., 2004; Myung and Morrison, 2004; Yuan et al., 2004 Additional factors emerged in the research stream included facilities information, customer contact, and perceived ease of use, surrounding area information and usability performances (Law et al., 2004; Vrana et al., 2004; Yeung and Law, 2004). A model of online consumer attitudinal change (Han and Mills, 2005) and pictorial and textural analysis (Hellemans and Govers, 2005) were also developed to examine DMO websites. In 2005 Sigala developed an evaluative framework of Web interpretation practices to examine tourism websites. Few papers examined website effectiveness through surveys, textual analysis and experiments (Dellaert, 2000; McLemore and Mitchell, 2000; Tierney, 2000; Frsich and Robins, 2002; Nysveen et al., 2003; Stergiou and Airey, 2003; Gretzel and Fesenmaier, 2005; Kao et al., 2005). From the above discussion it is imperative to say that most of the previous research contemplates the functionality or usability of the destination website. Only recently a few specific research (Douglas et al., 2007; Kim and Fesenmaier, 2008)have been targeted the evaluation of non instrumental qualities of the destination website and their impact on browser. More specifically, there is not a single research that targeted the non instrumental qualities of destination homepages. Where as studies by Levene (2006) and Widyantoro and Yen (2001) seem to suggest that when an online travel planner first evaluates a Web site, he or she evaluates the Web site within a short period of time in an attempt to form an overall impression of it. That is, these studies indicate that when information searchers access a Web site, a rapid and almost unconscious but complex thought process is activated (Gladwell 2005; Lindgaard et al. 2006; Winter, Saunders, and Hart 2003). In their research, Kim and Fe ssenmier 2008 describes, that first impressions aroused through an immediate interaction with Web page enables information searchers to make a quick choice about the particular Web site and even subsequent decisions. Importantly, these reactions have a potentially long-lasting effect (i.e., halo effect) whereby they support the search for or interpretation of, information in a way that confirms ones preconceptions (Lindgaard et al. 2006; Nickerson 1998). That is why this research attempts to explore a new emotional aspect of destination homepages through investigating the affective qualities of destination homepages and measuring browsers perceived affective qualities. The next chapter will review the emotional experience in Human-Computer Interaction. 3. The Emotional experience in Human-Computer Interaction This chapter describes the importance of emotion in HCI Most of the earlier HCI design guidelines for websites have focused on the cognitive efficiency of websites. However, as functionality and reliability improved, users needed to be satisfied in other ways. The growing possibilities of the internet (Web 2.0) and the advance of computer graphics, offered web developer the platform to provide users with more positive emotional experiences (Oliver 1996; Ngo and Byrne 2001). Designing interfaces for emotion proved to be an effective method to improve the communication in the online environment (Picard and Klein 2002) and to maximize the effect of online advertising in homepages (Singh and Dalal 1999). Visual design plays an important role in this step, but is more than that. Pleasurable interfaces are also fun to play with. The fluidity of the graphics is engaging, and provides visceral experiences (Norman 2006). These are experiences that appeal to the senses. It can therefore be said that it is worth striving for a positive user experience, as it will satisfy the user and will most likely improve his feelings about the producer of the product. Furthermore, customers will leave the websites that they experience as negative. Schenkman Jonsson (2000) were among the first to propose that evoking specific emotions should be a part of a web developers overall site design strategy. Mahlke Thring (2007) proposed a model to understand emotional experience in interactive contexts. They believe that perceived instrumental qualities that are related to the usability and usefulness of a system, and perceived non instrumental qualities that result from a systems appeal and attractiveness draw attention to the system users. Both types of quality are likely to influence the third component: the emotional reactions that accompany the users interaction with the system. Perceived instrumental qualities are related to the usability of the system. Perceived non-instrumental qualities as the quality aspects of an interactive system that address user needs that go beyond tasks, goals and their efficient achievement. Over the past few years, various concepts of these noninstrumental qualities were discussed (e.g. Jordan 2000; Rafaeli and Vilnai-Yavetz 2003; Hassenzahl 2004; Lavie and Tractinsky 2004; Norman 2004).. In order measures emotion, it is important to know how the noninstrumental qualities relate to the elicited emotions. The non instrumental qualities (aesthetic dimensions and hedonic attributes) are measurable and seem useful for the analysis of a HCI system. Not much is known about the influence of the perceived non-instrumental qualities on emotional reactions. (4) Method used to Measuring website experience Numbers of methods implemented to examine HCI experience but in this study only most widely used method is introduced. Data Logging The most common way to measure internet behaviour is by logging persons website usage. How long does a user stay on a site, where did he come from and where is he going to? Where did he leave in an ordering process? And which keywords were used to get to the site? Questionnaires A common way to evaluate user experience is by questionnaires. As example to study non intstrumental qualities of the website Hassenzahl (2004) and Lavie Tractinsky (2004) are most widely used. Webqual (Loiacono, Watson et al. 2000) is another website quality measurement questionnaire. It measures the likelihood that a person will revisit or make a purchase from a specific site in the future Mouse Behaviour A small number of studies has been conducted that focus on mouse behaviour as a user experience response. Chen, Anderson et al. (2001) indicated a relationship between gaze position and cursor position on a computer screen during web browsing. Mueller Lockerd (2001) developed a tool that records the changes in mouse location throughout the user interaction. (5) Presence of Emotion in Destination Homepages. According to the destination industry expert, destination homepage, as a communication tool is the potential to offer high level virtual experiences. Through the progress of media technology in recent years, most consumers can now view the photos and read information about scenic spots through the Internet in order to experience the sights in advance (Klein, 1998). Direct product experiences have consistently been shown to lead to stronger beliefs and attitudes than other media(Marks Kamins, 1988; Smith Swinyard, 1988). Furthermore, Bigne and Andreau (2004) argue that the recognition of these on-line experiences as a distinct product offering is the key to future economic growth when 75% of consumers are lured back to their favourite websites after a positive experience (Ha Perks, 2005). Research confirms the effect of tourism catalogue on experiential value. Destination image in tourism catalogue helped consumers generate a mental scenario or fantasy and resulting in pleasure (Fiore Yu, 2001). Destination homepages also offers experiential value, which is augmented by fantasy, feelings, and fun derived from a virtual product experience (Song, Fiore, Park, 2006). Song et al. (2006) found that homepage features, as virtual tour, photograph, videos, layout and other aesthetic contents positively affected consumer fantasy, which led to browsing enjoyment Shih (1998) proposed that vividness of the image had a positive effect on approach responses towards the Web site. Therefore, level of realism of the image or completeness of sensory information created by an image interactivity function may result in a positive relationship with level of approach response variables. In another study, Griffith et al. (2001) reported that interface design influenced consumer involvement, or perceived relevance of the product to the consumer. An enjoyable and involving experience should enhance approach responses toward the environment (Mehrabian Russell, 1974). Therefore, the image interactivity functions including text and other aesthetic attributes of a homepage may increase approach responses toward online products and stores. The hedonic consumption paradigm in tourism suggests that in many situations consumers seek fun, amusement, fantasy, arousal, sensory stimulation and enjoyment (Holbrook Hirschman, 1982). Emotional experience plays a primary role in creating this enjoyment. Excitement, a combination of pleasure and arousal (Russell Pratt, 1980), can increase approach tendencies, unplanned purchases, and hedonic shopping value (Dawson et al., 1990; Babin Darden, 1995). The homepage may enhance escapist, esthetic and entertainment experiences, which generate pleasure and arousal (Li, Daugherty, Biocca, 2001). With the features of high level of interactivity, vividness, and thus high level of involvement with its users, the homepage enables visitors to transform experiential attributes into more searchable attributes. Thus, in a highly involved virtual environment, tourism marketers has the potentiality of moving tourist from the status of watcher (i.e., passive participation) to player (i.e., active participant) in the realm of experience (Pine Gilmore, 1998) by increasing the level of interactivity and vividness Since the homepage design (including the aesthetic and functional content) will dominate a users evaluation at first sight, and influence users decision making while surfing on the web site, emotional factor certainly should be considered as an important cue when designing the website (Brave Nass, 2003).Meanwhile, there are many studies indicating that emotional factor is an essential element on emotional design. Previous studies in the marketing field provide support for the view that consumers, who respond in a positive emotional way to commercial websites, are more likely to change their attitudes and purchasing intentions. Yet, online consumer search behaviour in the travel and tourism field has drawn little attention (Ha Perks, 2005; Jang, 2004; Kim, Lee Choi, 2003). As the growing number of online tourists are adopting tourism Webstores, it is important to develop a better understanding of the profile and behaviour of Internet surfers and shoppers as well as to link emotions (and to a certain extent attitudes and behaviours) Understanding consumers affective responses becomes critical (Szymanski Henard, 2001; Wirtz et al., 2000; Zins, 2002). Such understanding is vital in tourism services, with important emotional involvement regarding the tourist experience (Barsky Nash, 2002; Ryan, 1999). Thus, much research is required to know as how browser emotionally response to the destination homepages. Knowledge of the process of emotion, i.e. how emotions are evoked, can enhance our understanding of what makes us enjoy interacting with a tourist website. So far, however, little is known about how people respond emotionally to a destination homepage and what aspects of design or interaction trigger emotional reactions. To measure emotional responses can support exploration of relationships between subjective affective responses, and objective interaction and design characteristics. The next chapter will review the affective qualities of destination homepages. (6) Affective qualities in destination homepages It is important to introduce core affect before defining affective quality (AQ) and perceived affective quality (PAQ). In combining various views and studies on affect in psychology over the past several decades, Russell described core affect as a neurophysiological state that is consciously accessible as a simple, nonreflective feeling that is an integral blend of hedonic (pleasure-displeasure) and arousal (sleepy-activated) values (Russell 2003, p.147). Hedonic value refers to the extent to which one is generally feeling good or bad; and arousal value refers to the extent to which one is feeling engaged or energized (Russell 1980). Core affect is primitive and universal. A person always has core affect at any given conscious moment. Core affect per se is free of objects and thus free of the cognitive structures implied (Russell 2003). This concept is similar to what is commonly called feeling, affect (Watson and Tellegen 1988), and mood (Morris 1989). Whereas core affect exists within a person, affective quality exists within a stimulus. Affective quality refers to a stimulus ability to cause a change in a persons core affect (Russell 2003). A stimulus can be a person, place, condition, event, state of affairs, physical object, behavior, etc. In this study, a destination homepage is considered as such a stimulus that contains certain affective quality. Perception of affective quality (PAQ) is an individuals perception of a stimulus affective quality (Russell 2003). PAQ begins with a specific stimulus and remains tied to that stimulus (Russell 2003). The perception of affective quality of the exposed stimuli typically impinges at any one time (how pleasant, unpleasant, exciting, boring, upsetting, or soothing each is), then influences subsequent reactions to those stimuli (Russell 2003). PAQ is considered as the second most primitive concept after core affect (Russell 2003). Note that certain homepage features that are attractive to one person may not be so to another. PAQ reflects such subjectivity. The structure of affect and affective quality has been interpreted in several different ways, each with its own measurement model, conceptual framework, and accumulating literature (Larsen and Diener 1992; Reisenzein 1994; Russell 1980; Schlosberg 1941; Thayer 1989; Watson and Tellegen 1985; Wundt 1912/1924). In the destination web environment, researchers have found that certain affective reactions can be evoked by some aesthetic features of the website, such as colors, music, shapes, layout, information load, images, graph, menu, and so on (Huang 2003; Hwang, et al. 2001; Kim, et al. 2003; Mundorf, et al. 1993; Scheirer and Picard 1999; Schenkman and Jonsson 2000; Tractinsky, et al. 2000; van der Heijden 2003). Aesthetic features of a homepage refer to visual items that can raise the interests of online travellers such as pictures, colours and graphical layout. These visual items would attract the attention of first time visitors and form an initial image of the destination. There are two sub factors in this category destination visualisation and Web design. The Internet allows a website to function not only as a substantive information tool, but also as an online multimedia which can satisfy the visual as well as information seeking behaviour of consumers (Murphy et al., 1996; Cano and Prentice, 1998; Countryman, 1999; Morrison et al., 1999; Benckendorff and Black, 2000; Palmer and McCole, 2000; Jeong and Lambert, 2001; Ismail et al., 2002; Kim et al., 2003; Mills and Morrison,2003). Visuals refer to the quality of the pictures of the attractions, logos and slogans of the destination. The use of colours that match with logos, destination pictures and aesthetically appealing backgrounds also contribute to the visual appeal at destination websites. Such visual features enhance online travellers interests as they provide a glimpse of the unknown destination. Online video clips, newsletters or brochures can provide more intense impact as they aid recall and awareness of the destination. The elements that enhance online attributes are site maps, homebuttons, search engines for website contents and directories. Other aspects include a memorable website address, availability of accuracy of links and correct spelling, clear and readable text, clean and uncluttered Web page. The presence of such visualisation elements enhance both the visual experience and the reliability and trustability of information presented by online users. all these factors can be considered as the affective qualities of a homepage in general but till now there is no research that confirmed if picture, color, logos; graphical layouts can be defined as the generic affective qualities for a destination homepages and how they perceived. (7) Expression of emotions According to Desmet (2002) there are four expressive components that shape emotions: Behavioral components: the actions or behaviors one engages in when experiencing an emotion. Such as approach, inaction, avoidance and attack (Arnold 1960). In the face of danger or fear people want to run away and when in love people want to approach and caress. Expressive reactions: the facial, vocal and postural expressions that accompany the emotion. Physiological reaction: the changes in activity in the autonomic nervous system which accompany emotions (activation, arousal, changes in heart rate) Subjective feeling: the conscious awareness of the emotional state one is in. experiencing an emotion. Using expressive and physiological reactions to measure emotions will be limited to interpret. First, the results are related to a select group of discrete (basic) emotions as fear, anger and happiness. While it is believed that for measuring emotions in HCI, more emotions are relevant. Second, the influence of the measurement tool is noticed by the participant, which may distort the results. The focus is therefore moved to the measuring of subjective feelings of participants. This is subject to self-report and therefore applicable in an online environment The field of psychology focuses on dimensional method to analyze emotions by subjective feelings. The following chapter will review the affective state of the browser (8) Affective States Figure: 1 Differentiating affective states (Desmet 2002 p. 4) The term emotion is often misused for a wide variety of experiential phenomena, such as passions, sentiments, temperament and moods. Desmet (2002) defines these phenomena as affective states and distinguishes them into four different segments (after Frijda 1994), as shown in Table 1. The affective states are differentiated, based on two considerations. Affective states can be intentional and non-intentional: states that involve relationship between the person and a particular object are intentional, whereas those that do not involve such a relationship are non-intentional (Desmet 2002 p. 4). Intentional Non-intentional Acute Dispositional Emotions Moods Sentiments Emotional traits Affective states can be acute or dispositional: states that are limited in time are acute: states that are not limited in time are dispositional. Emotions are intentional. They are related to a particular object, whether that object is a person, a product or a website. For example: one is in love with a person, proud of a product or angry at an interface. This also implies that people are usually able to identify this object of their emotion (Ekman and Davidson 1994). However, in some cases a person may be unaware of the cause of their emotion. Emotions are furthermore acute, and their duration is limited to seconds, or minutes at most. Emotions are distinguished from moods, sentiments and emotional traits. Moods tend to have a relatively long-term character but are still limited in time. One can be sad or cheerful for a few hours or several days. They are, in contrast with emotions, not intentional for they are not directed at a particular object but at the surroundings in general (Frijda 1994). Emotional traits are descriptions of ones character and can be seen as long-lasting moods. For instance, being in a sad mood does not mean one is a gloomy person, since a mood is only temporal. Finally sentiments are the dispositional component of emotions, they are long-term attitudes towards particular objects or events. One can love ice-creams or Apple products and have a general disliking of products that are produced by child labour. Because of the acute state of emotions, they are hard to measure. In order to try and measure them, it is therefore important to know how emotions are elicited and how they are manifested by persons. These subjects will be he handled in the following sections. (9) Measuring Emotions This paragraph introduces some methods that are currently used to measure subjective feelings by the dimensional and discrete approach. Measuring Emotions with a Dimensional Approach The dimensional approach captures subjective feelings in a three-dimensional space. This space consists of the dimensions of valence (positive negative), arousal (calm -excited), and tension (tense-relaxed, and sometimes indicated as control, or potency). Because of the difficulty of identifying the third dimension many theorists have limited themselves to the valence and arousal dimensions. Russell (1980) believes affective states as emotions and moods are grounded in simple structures as feeling good or bad, and feeling energized or activated. He proposed a circular structure to map emotional feelings into a two-dimensional (see figure) Basically, in this dimensional approach participants are asked to evaluate how positive/negative and how excited they feel. The answers to these questions determine the position participants take in the circular structure, which serves as an indicator of their emotional state. The dimensional approach of measuring emotions has been used for a long time. Wundt (1896) already discussed the dimensions of pleasure, tension and inhibition in 1896. Mehrabian Russell (1974) used the Semantic Differential Scale (SDS) to measure the three dimensions of value, arousal and dominance on 18 bipolar adjective pairs. Self-Assessment Manikin (SAM) Because there were issues about the reliance of a verbal rating system in SDS, Lang (1980) developed a picture-oriented instrument called the Self-Assessment Manikin (SAM). Just like the SDS, the SAM uses a 9-point rating scale for each dimension, the items are however nonverbal SAM has been applied for many studies in the field of psychology and consumer research.Tests with SAM (Bradley and Lang 1994) proved that the two dimensions of valence and arousal are pervasive organizers of human judgements. Pleasure reflects ones tendency to approach a stimulus, whereas arousal indexes the amount of vigour associated with a given behavioural choice. Bradley Lang assume that judgements of dominance indexes the relationship between the perceiver and perceived. SAM is limited because it only describes the values of three constructs. It may furthermore prove to be difficult for users to interpret the images without help. Measuring Emotions with a Discrete Approach In the discrete approach of measuring emotions, a list of emotion words is presented. Participants have to rate the intensity of the words. Many verbal questionnaires with different sets of emotion words have been developed in the past. In this section, two instruments of measuring discrete emotions are presented. The first instrument is still under development and approaches the measuring of discrete emotions in a new way by combining it with their position on two dimensions. The second, is a non-verbal approach of rating discrete emotions. Geneva Scherer (2005) developed the Geneva Emotion Wheel, a tool for the verbal report of emotions. It includes 16 emotions categories that are positioned in a circle that is based around two dimensions. The first dimension is the level of perceived control in the situation that generates the emotion. The second dimension is the positive/negative quality judgement of the situation and of the resulting feeling. The user is able to rate the intensity of each emotion category on a four-point scale, represented by the size of the circles next to the emotion words. PrEmo PrEmo is a measurement tool developed by Desmet (2002) to measure fourteen discrete emotions which are elicited by product appearance. Each emotion is portrayed by an animated figure by means of dynamic facial, bodily and vocal expression. The character expresses seven positive emotions (inspiration, desire, satisfaction, pleasant surprise, fascination, amusement, admiration), and seven negative emotions (disgust, indignity, contempt, disappointment, dissatisfaction, boredom, and unpleasant surprise). In experiments with PrEmo, participants were first presented with the image of a product and subsequently instructed to use the animations to report their emotions evoked by the product. This is possible by scoring a three-point scale which is presented on the left side of the animation. The scale represents the following ratings: I do not feel the emotion I somehow feel the emotion I do feel the emotion. Visual feedback of the scorings is provided by the background colour of the anim ation frame.PrEmo is an original way to rate emotions. The most common doubt about the discrete emotion words is whether the labels really express the experienced emotions and to what extent they do express them. A participant might want to respond with a word or category that is not provided in the list. This may force the person to respond with a close alternative. Additionally, the use of expressions (e.g. colloquial language or psychological terms) could make people misunderstand the word. Finally, as researchers often use self-composed lists of discrete emotions, it is hard to compare results of discrete emotion measurements. Therefore from the above discussion we can conclude that dimensional method is the simplest to process and in that case self report seems to be the most practical method to use. METHODOLOGY Participants: the number of participant for the first is 20 and they are all iniversity students. To measure the affective qualities of the destination homepages, each of the samples will be given the printed picture of 25 different destination homepages. The homepages are selected as they are not popular and as obscure to reduce the bias to a particular homepage. The text used in the homepages is in English language. After viewing each of the pages for ten seconds the sample will be asked to rate the pages in a five point Likert scale from strongly agree to strongly disagree to identify the affective qualities of the homepgaes. Following the first test a panel of homepages will be selected and will be used in the second test to measure the affective state of the browser. In the second test the Russels dimensional scale of emotion will employed to measure the perceived affective qualities. Justification of the survey questionnaire in the first test Color Vision is one of the most important senses of human beings. We see everything through eyes. People have different responses to different objects with colors. For example, food with different color designs will give consumers different perceive flavors. (Garber, Hyatt, and Starr, 2000). Also, consumers judge the quality of things by colors. Previous researches found that color is a direct indicator for consumers to evaluate the quality, for instance, tomatoes, citrus and cranberries (Francis, 1995). In the era of e commerce, companies are losing customers as a result of having color on websites that do not accurately show the actual color of product which is being sold (Nitse, Parker, Krmwiede and Ottaway, 2004). Therefore, color has been influential in consumers decisions. There have been numbers of studies that have investigated that the application of colors on websites, such as that the influence of color on time perception (Gorn, Chattopadhyay, Sengupta, Tripathi 2004.), the per formance in a visual search task of color and website design(Robert and Paul, 2003), the influence of color on click rate (Zviran, Teeni, and Gross, 2006), the effect of visual stimuli, (i.e. the design of color) on mail survey response rates (LaGarce, R. and Kuhn, L. D. 1995), the effect The studies about the effect of colors on emotions, feelings, and series of purchasing behavior are all positive. Question 1, 2, 11 have been supported by these theories. Picture Viewing affective pictures elicits a number of physiological reactions in cardiovascular, electrodermal, and somatic systems. For instance, skin conductance responses are larger when viewing emotionally arousing pleasant or unpleasant pictures, compared to neutral pictures. Findings from another (Jeong and Choy, 2004) study indicated that if a hotel Website provided a variety of pictures of the hotel and featured service personnel or guests in the pictures, customers tended to have more favorable attitudes toward the hotel Website because they could mentally picture the overall image of the hotel and benefits of the service, and imagine actually experiencing the service.It is clear that affective pictures are effective cues in activating emotional response. Question 3, 4,7,11 correspond with these theories. Pleasure Pleasure is the extent to which the visitor perceives the homepage wattching to be enjoyable and is considered a prerequisite for a successful site. Chen et al. suggest that the level of entertainment offered by a web site is a key predictor of user attitude towards the site. Childers et al. (2002) argued that the extent to which a web site evoked hedonic feelings significantly affected the Internet shopping experience of the customer. This was further confirmed by Eroglu et al. (2003). Provision of multimedia elements, such as graphics, audio, video, and backgrounds, is considered significant in enhancing web site content and increasing attractiveness. Further, using interesting themes, flashy graphics, or appealing site design may make a web site experience entertaining and increase visitors likelihood to conduct business. Question 5,6, 8,9,10 supported by these theories. please see the attached survey