Scc Fall 2012 Syllabus English 101

Welcome to English 101! This course is designed to help you attain the critical thinking, reading, and writing skills that are necessary for both academic and professional success. Course Purpose: The five general purposes of this course include teaching: 1. rhetorical and logical principles related to development of significant expository content in intelligently organized essays, paragraphs, and sentences;   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   2. critical reading; 3. acceptable diction and sentence mechanics;   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   4. the writing process with a focus on prewriting and revision strategies;   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   5. se of library's research tools and the techniques of the documented paper. Student Learning Outcomes: 1. Use the writing process to compose essays—including research papers in the MLA format—that contain unity, coherence, development, logic, gr ammatical precision, and selection of appropriate sources and their correct use. 2. Analyze written and visual texts for content, structure, rhetorical strategies, visual and written techniques, and grammatical precision. Required Texts: * Cohen, Samuel. 50 Essays: A Portable Anthology. 3rd ed. * Silverman, Jay, Elaine Hughes, and Diana Wienbroer.Customized Version of Rules of Thumb: A Guide for Writers for Santiago Canyon College. 8th ed. * Various essays and short stories that are available online and must be printed Required Materials: Internet and printing access Homework: Your homework assignments (required reading and other) are listed on the course outline. If you miss class however, email a classmate to be sure the homework has not been revised. Whether or not you did your homework will be checked through class discussions, quick writes, and pop quizzes. Homework points are factored into your participation grade. Concept Exams:There will be 4 exams in this course. The conten t will vary but it will always address concepts we’ve gone over in class and the reading assignments. Each exam is worth 25 points. Essays: There are four essays required in this course. Each essay must follow standard MLA guidelines which require the following format: * Your paper must be typed and double-spaced with one-inch margins on each side. * On the first page, you must write your name, my name, course title and date in the top left hand corner. * Your title must be centered. Capitalize principle words. Do not underline, bold-face, italicize, or do anything else to it. You can only use 12-point Calibri. * Your last name and page number must appear on the top right hand corner (header) on each page except the first one. You can refer to the MLA links provided online to find examples of MLA format. Further essay requirements will be elaborated on in class. Each essay is worth 100 points. Essay Revision Policy: You may revise and improve the grade of Essay 1 and Essay 2. However, in order to submit a revision for a better grade, you must do the following: 1) Enroll in Eng N91 and discuss your rough draft with your Writing Center instructor before you submit the essay to me. Provide proof that you have discussed your rough draft with WC instructor. ) 2) Submit your essay on time. No exceptions. 3) After you receive your grade, discuss graded essay with me before or after class so we can discuss your revision plan. 4) Submit the revised essay to me before the revision due date. **Note: If you do not meet all of the above-mentioned criteria, I will not accept your revision. You are responsible to meet all of the criteria and know all relevant due dates (see Course Outline); I will not remind you. Late Policy for Essays: Please submit your essays on time.All of our essays will be submitted online. Be aware that unwanted computer/internet/electronic issues arise and you should allow yourself enough time to deal with such issues should they occur. Critic al Thinking Paragraphs: Nearly each class session you will be given 5-10 minutes to write a paragraph in response to various prompts. Please save all your critical thinking paragraphs. At the end of the semester, I will collect them. These are worth 100 points total. Attendance Policy: You have four excused absences. After that, your grade will be deducted by 25 points.There are no exceptions to this policy. I suggest you reserve your excused absences for emergency situations. Please note that although the first four times you miss class it is â€Å"excused† and no points will be deducted just for being absent, you will not be allowed to make up any points that are earned the day you have missed. (For example, if we take a pop quiz that day for 10 points, you will not be able to make up those points. ) Also, if you are absent, you are responsible to get any material or information you have missed from a classmate or from me during office hours.Do not email me for the material /information. Also, you do not need to email me to let me know you will be absent. And please do not explain to me (via email or in person) why you were absent as you will have 4 excused absences and be penalized thereafter no matter what the circumstance. Tardy Policy: If you are not in class when class begins, you will be considered tardy. If you are more than 20 minutes late you will be considered absent. You will be excused from being tardy thrice; you will be deducted 15 points for each time you are tardy after that. The same policy applies to leaving before the nd of class. Please do not email me to let me know you will be tardy and please do not explain to me why you were late. However, if you have to leave early, I would appreciate you letting me know before class so I do not worry about you when you get up and leave. Make Up Policy: Although your absence may be excused, any exams you need to make up will be deducted by 50%. Participation: Participation is worth 100 points. Your participation grade is based on how much you are contributing to class discussions and if you are contributing to a positive and edifying atmosphere.Every student begins with a 75% (out of 100) in participation. It is up to you to bring that grade up or down throughout the semester. Points are added by behavior such as contributing a relevant comment during the discussion of the reading; points are subtracted by behavior such as playing on your phone during class. Homework points will also be factored into participation. You will see a 75% on your grade in the beginning of the semester and it will not be updated until the end of the semester. If you are unsure about how I perceive your participation in class, you may ask me.Because participation is worth a large amount of points, I encourage you to reflect on your participation. If you do not participate very often, challenge yourself to contribute to class discussions; if you feel that you do more talking than anyone else in t he class, allow room for your classmates to contribute. Please turn your cell phones and other devices to SILENT. If you are caught using your phone in class, 5 points will be deducted from participation grade. If your cell phone rings in class, you must dance in front of class or bring snacks. Or you may choose to have 10 points deducted from your final grade. ) Almost no electronic device use is allowed in class. Participation points will be deducted if you are playing on your laptop, tablet, phone, iPod, or other electronic device in class. The only time using such devices is allowed is when you write your critical thinking paragraphs or when you are copying notes from the white board. Every other time I will assume you are doing things that are not conducive to learning. You are not permitted to take photos or record me, any of your classmates, or my course material without consent.This includes voice and visual recordings, and any other form of privacy or intellectual infringem ent. Please be open-minded, yet truthful, in your participation in class. I do not mind if you do not like a work I have assigned or if your point of view is different from the majority of the class; I simply ask that you share your insight in an intellectual and respectful manner. Email: Check your email. Throughout the semester I will email Eng 101 updates and reminders and it’s your responsibility to check your email for this information.When emailing me please be efficient, clear and respectful as I will be to you. Also please be considerate of how many students email me daily; if you have a question or comment that can be discussed in/before/after class, please wait till then to ask me; if you don’t get a quick reply from me, please be patient and/or consider whether or not your question is already answered in your syllabus or online or has been repeated several times in class. (Note: if you miss class it is not my responsibility to go over everything you missed v ia email. Contact a classmate or visit me during office hours. Grading Matrix: Exams: 100 pts Critical Thinking Paragraphs: 100 pts Essays: 400 pts Participation: 100 pts Pop Quizzes: 0-50 pts Your final points will be converted to a percentage. Your grades will be measured on the simple letter grade system. 100%-89. 5% is an A, 89. 4%-79. 5% is a B, 79. 4%-70% is a C, 69%-60% is a D, and 59% and below is an F. In order to meet the G. E. requirement, you will need to achieve a minimum grade of a â€Å"C† to pass this course. Plagiarism Plagiarism is the unacknowledged and inappropriate use of the ideas or wording of another writer.Because plagiarism corrupts values in which the university community is fundamentally committed – the pursuit of knowledge, intellectual honesty – plagiarism is considered a grave violation of academic integrity and the sanctions against it are correspondingly severe. Plagiarism can be characterized as â€Å"academic theft. † If I discover that you have in fact plagiarized, then you will immediately receive a failing grade for the assignment and possibly for the course. For your writing assignments, you will submit your essays to the anti-plagiarism program called Turnitin. com.To avoid plagiarism, just be certain that everything that you borrow—words or ideas—has been properly documented, using standard MLA form. For more information on Academic Integrity, please visit: http://www. sccollege. edu/Library/Pages/plagiarism. aspx Special Needs Santiago Canyon College is committed to providing reasonable accommodations for students with verifiable disabilities when requested by the student. If you require special services, it is your responsibility to alert your instructors and the Disabled Students Programs and Service (DSPS) as early as possible in the semester, so please let me know if you need assistance.To arrange for services at Santiago Canyon College, contact DSPS by phone: 714. 628. 486 0; 714. 639. 9742 (TTY/TDD- for students who are deaf) or stop by the DSPS Center in room E-105. Emergency Response Please take note of the safety features in and close to our classroom as well as study the posted evacuation route. To report serious crimes or emergencies on campus, please contact the campus safety and Security Office at 714. 628. 4730, located in U-100. Syllabus This syllabus is subject to change. You will always be given a proper announcement and reasonable time to adjust to any changes.The information and policies provided in this syllabus is your course contract. Being registered in this course acknowledges that you accept the terms and conditions listed in the syllabus. Course Outline The course outline includes of list of readings that will be discussed that day (therefore you must read the essay beforehand) and any exams that will be taken or essays that will be due. Because I want to ensure that every assignment is done at an appropriate time, I may (and prob ably will) adjust the schedule throughout the semester.It is your responsibility to account for the changes that I announce in class. Also, as college students, it is your responsibility to be aware of when exams and other assignments take place. I may not (and probably won’t) remind you. Course Outline (Subject to Change) Week 1 8/27: Introduction to English 101 8/29: Bring textbook to class Week 2 9/3: Labor Day-No Class 9/5: Discuss â€Å"The Value of Science† (available online); Discuss â€Å"The Ways We Lie† Week 3 9/10: Discuss â€Å"How to Tame a Wild Tongue† 9/12: Discuss â€Å"End of the World,† Bring Thesis to Class Week 4 /17: Essay 1 Rough Draft Due (bring print copy) 9/19: Exam 1 Week 5 9/24: Essay 1 Due; Introduction to Argumentative Unit; Discuss â€Å"Why Don’t We Complain† 9/26: Discuss â€Å"Letters from a Birmingham Jail† Week 6 10/1: Working on Essay 2 in class 10/3: Discuss â€Å"No Name Woman† Week 7 10/8: Discuss â€Å"Games† 10/10: Discuss â€Å"On Morality,† Bring Thesis to Class Week 8 10/15: Rough Draft of Essay 2 Due 10/17: Exam 2 Week 9 10/22: Essay 2 Due; Introduction to Literary Analysis; Discuss â€Å"Looking for Work† available online 10/24: Discuss â€Å"Salvation† Week 10 0/29: Discuss â€Å"Shape of the Sword† available online 10/31: Discuss excerpt from Decoded available online Week 11 11/5: Bring outline and thesis to class 11/7: Rough Draft of Essay 3 Due; Exam 3 Week 12 11/12: 11/14: Essay 3 Due; Practice Presentations Week 13 11/19: Essay 3 Class Presentations 11/21: Essay 3 Class Presentations Week 14 11/26: Introduction to Final Unit; Discuss â€Å"Allegory of the Cave† 11/28: In class work and readings Week 15 12/3: In class work and readings 12/5: In class work and readings Week 16 12/10: Exam 4 12/12: Essay 4 Due; Informal presentations of Essay 4

Company Analysis of General Electric Essay

Running a company often centers on the idea of considering both positive and negative factors in order to then hand down executive decisions accordingly. To best understand the strengths and weakness of any given company, one must understand its base operations and the scope of industry in which the firm exists. In doing so, one would have a bigger picture of how the company operates and how success has been fostered in, as well as highlight in areas in which the organization could stand to see improvement. In this vein, a full analysis of General Electric was conducted, which includes an overview of the company including background and position in the manufacturing industry, as well as insight into the company’s management structure. Additionally, the company’s financials will be examined so that a recommendation can be made. Overview of Company According to the company website (2014) General Electric’s slogan is â€Å"Imagination at Work† and to this extent, the organization has been fostering in imagination for quite some time. According to the research, the company was founded in 1878 by Thomas Edison in Menlo Park. Edison is most notable for inventing the light bulb, and as such, this corporation is one of the largest companies on Earth more than a hundred years later (General Electric, 2014). After getting its start in the 1800s the company, being a leader in the industry of manufacturing and resting solely on the idea of innovation and inventions, began to manufacture different items across a wide variety of industries. According to the GE company website (2014) these inventions were primarily Edison’s own, and by the early 1900s the company, even against the Great Depression, the organization continued to make appliances for the home, delved into aviation technology, and began to further expand into new markets. As the research notes, because of this the company began to break up into several subdivisions such as GE Consumer Finance or GE energy in order to fully control its wide scope of offerings (General Electric, 2014). By the 2000s, the corporate website notes that the company further expanded into new markets, both online and for various infrastructures and industries around the world. Today, the company has  also delved into clean energy technology and pulls in an estimated $2 billion for electronics and home appliance sales alone (General Electric, 2014). Management Structure Looking to research conducted by Abetti (2011) one can see that the organization has one of the most complex management structures of all major conglomerates. In addition, as the company website (2014) points out, this structure has been in effect since the 1920s and instead of reevaluating this system; the company has only expanded upon it. According to Abetti (2011) at the top of the management structure, governing all areas is the Chairman and CEO, as well as the board of directors. Next, according to the research are two specific divisions: external and internal company functions. Internally, the company has global research, human resources, and its finance department, while externally; the company has commercial and public relations, business development, and its legal department. As noted by the company website (2014) next the company has its specific divisions or sectors, which this breakup is most notable for. These are as followed: Global Growth and Operations, Energy, Capital, home and Business Solutions, Healthcare, Aviation, and Transportation. It should be noted that each of these organizations exist as their own subdivision and entity, following the GE name. For instance, there is GE Energy, GE Home & Business Solutions, and so forth. This kind of management structure is beneficial to the company in two different ways. To start, it allows the organization to have each subdivision hand down its own division and be more or less contained within its own scope of industry, however, it also ensures that a high level of guidance will still ensure that upper-management is still well aware of what kind of decisions and operations these subdivisions will invest into. In this vein, according to research that has been conducted by Souraj (2010) each of these divisions utilize a lean manufacturing type of approach in order to ensure that all waste is eliminated and the sectors are utilizing the resources to the fullest. This ensures that the company is being cost effective in its approach and it allows the company to be innovative, without creating the potential problem of being extremely wasteful, which would then cut back on the organization’s profitability (Souraj, 2010). Moreover, each division also utilizes a six sigma approach in order to achieve near perfection. Essentially, this process rests on considering how each sector is doing in its own industry. For instance, despite the fact that GE Energy has seen slowed economic growth, this does not mean that GE Home & Business Solutions has as well. As such, utilizing a six sigma approach will allow the organization to consider the needs and goals of GE Energy before planning for solutions accordingly. Financial Overview According to research that has been drafted by Abetti (2011) by the year 2000 â€Å"General Electric was the world’s most valuable company with a market capitalization of $520 billion.† However, as the research points out, by 2008, after the U.S. recession led to a national economic downtown this figure had fallen 69% percent to $163 billion (Abetti, 2011). In addition, the global financial system has been equally a cause of concern and if one can consider the U.S. economic downturn the cause of the decrease in market capitalization, the world’s economy is the factor that has kept the company’s overall financial state lower than usual (Abetti, 2011). Although, the research points out that the organization has began to see a small increase, and thus, the company has hopes that these numbers will turn around, growth and expansion has not been seen as it had prior to 2008 (Abetti, 2011). This is largely attributed to the belief that the world’s financial system will see an upwards swing as a natural flow and with the idea that expansion can be considered a way for the company to cut back losses in some areas, while gaining them in others. According to research conducted by Abetti (2011) this line of thinking will not lead to the company to success and instead the company should â€Å"go back to GE’s traditional core competencies and divest non-core businesses.† Moreover, the company should also expand its globalization efforts, rebuild trust between employees and the company, strengthen financial and auditing function authority, and continue to invest in R & D. Although, many of these considerations are subjective, they bear a great deal of consideration when examining the company’s financials going forward. Conclusion General Electric remains one of the largest companies in the world, despite some of the misgivings mentioned previously. The company has a number of strengths including a diverse portfolio, existing in a wide range of industries, and its ability to be industry-leaders when it comes to innovation and gauging what products will be a success in the future. With this in mind, however, one recommendation that can be made to the company, based on the available research is for the organization to focus on current offerings, rather than continue to seek after non-traditional competencies. Moreover, the company must consider R & D efforts in order to continue to be the forbearers in innovation and creativity. Doing so will open the company to new markets, rather than the company attempting to slip into them and then compete with others in the market as a smaller entrant. If the company commits to these factors than there remains little doubt that General Electric will go back to being one of the world’s most valuable and innovative companies. References Abetti, P.A. (2011). General Electric at the crossroads: the end of the last US conglomerate? International Journal of Technology Management, 54(4), 345-368. General Electric. (2014). From Inspiration to Industry. Retrieved from http://www.ge.com/about-us/history/1878-1904. Souraj, S. (2010). The integration of Six Sigma and Lean Management. International Journal of Lean Six Sigma, 2040-4166.

Concretization

Concretization As with almost every aspect of â€Å"developed† or â€Å"first world† culture, a cloud of laziness accompanies any call to a challenge. Although finding an easier means of overcoming obstacles has been rooted in human existence since we came to roam the earth, it appears we have achieved a new level of indolence. Understanding abstract philosophical or religions bares no exception. To witness this one need look no further than todays pop culture. A quick Google search of â€Å"celebrity tattoos† yields upwards of 54 million results in a little over 2 tenths of a second.Riddled among the image results are countless crosses, Taijitu’s, words in Sanskrit and other philosophical or religious symbols. Riddled among these are famous rapper â€Å"lil wayne†, actress Angelina Jolie and pop celebrity Pamela Anderson. I do not necessarily condone assumptions, however, I believe it would be safe to say that these, among countless other, harbor s ymbols as an easy or careless means of professing a devotion to a specific ideology. Furthermore, an ideology that know little or nothing about.I may well be wrong and perhaps they are well educated in the ways of their respective religions/philosophies but would not wager on it if I were a betting man. Considering that Pamela is a vegan because her â€Å"†¦body is a temple† yet has had a not to distant history with pill and cocaine abuse might tilt the odds in my favor. Nevertheless, it is not just celebrities who are concretizing abstract and demanding philosophies, they are just most readily accessible.In todays first world countries, praising a concretized symbol of a philosophy or religion is an easy way of identifying ones self with the select group without difficulty of actually having to learn about it. Just as students are reading the spark notes instead of the book or parents are hiring au pairs instead of raising their children (working/single parents excluded ), so are most individuals taking a lackadaisical approach to their spiritual beliefs. This is easily done through making a symbol concrete.Consider the concept of yin-yang, a theory of balance representing male and female in unison to depict wholeness. This is often portrayed by the Taijitu symbol that most western cultures are familiar with. What is often difficult to understand about Yin-Yang is that it is ultimately a teaching of metaphysical dualism. This is to say that one is only as much itself as it is the absence of its counterpart; light is just the absence of darkness. The concept seems simple when applying it to light and dark but when it comes to questions of existence or consciousness it becomes difficult to understand.Consequently, people, either due to laziness or ignorance, attach themselves to the concrete symbol and the simplest explanation to accompany it. Thus we see that the Taijitu, in western culture, has itself adopted the name the Yin-Yang or more absurdly the â€Å"Ying- yang†. I have a friend who to this day thinks he has a tattoo Yin-Yang tattoo. It’s a pretty abstract and unlimited concept to fit in the confines of ones skin; I’m not sure if he even is aware of the word Taijitu; I don’t think I should ask. The development of concretization, however, cannot lay burden solely on the symbol.Symbols have been used to represent religions, philosophies and factions of all sorts for thousands of years. Instead, I believe ignorance, and furthermore the lack of motivation to rid oneself of ignorance, is to blame. This has become increasingly evident in the modernized world we live in today. In a time when information, entertainment and even food is mere seconds away at the fingertips of the majority of the nation, the concept of delayed gratification slowly slips through the proliferated cracks of our artificial society. I, too, am guilty of the act.When I went to military school in the 9th grade each cadet was responsible for two pairs of shoes, the dailies and the dress. The dailies were to have no scuff or tearing around the sole but would ultimately suffice with a rather dull finish. The dress shoes, on the other hand, were required to be shined to a mirror finish; a feet that requires the perpetual spit shine of rag and polish until the pores of the leather are filled. A rule of thumb is that one should be able to see the whites in their eyes when they pick up to inspect the shoe.After three hours work on one shoe alone, a blurred outline of my face was all I could make out. An older student heard me complaining to my roommate and came by to see what was the fuss. â€Å"I’ve been working on these all day,† I muttered, â€Å"this is impossible†. He smiled and turned as if to undermine my complaint. â€Å"Delayed gratification,† he replied as he walked off, â€Å"delayed gratification. † This was the first time I had heard the phrase. I looked it up an d have kept it in the back of my mind ever since. In this increasingly fast paced world we live in, instant gratification is phasing out the concept of hard work and reward.This holds true in our approach to religious/philosophical beliefs. We all want to just get it†¦ just understand†¦ just be enlightened. There are those that meditate for an hour, a day, a week and then are frustrated and perplexed as to why they are not yet enlightened†¦ Or, they go get Yin-Yang tattoo and claim they are. Unfortunately much of today’s world focuses on the simple, the easy and the instant and thus breed much of the laziness and ignorance that results in concretization of the abstract and complex.

U.S. Immigration Sources Annotated Bibliography

U.S. Immigration Sources - Annotated Bibliography Example Some of the reasons cited as the negative effects of immigration include being a threat to American culture and traditions. However, overall, approximately 75% of Americans are favoring the opinion of giving the illegal immigrants an opportunity for the legal status and a path to citizenship. The overall progress that has been made by the president includes a proposal for the illegal immigrants to wait at least thirteen years before they could get the chance to apply to become citizens. This source is credible since it presents all sides of the controversial immigration issue before deducing any conclusions. The main political parties’ take has been evaluated and the potential effect that the issue may have on the outcome of those parties. The overall progress that has been made by the president is also evaluated to ensure that information from all concerned parties is available. Furthermore, the public’s view on this issue has not been ignored in the case because American’s views make a significant impact on the outcome of most issues. Personally, I would deduce that the larger portion of Americans is favoring the move to give illegal immigrants a legal status. Although this might affect the traditions as cited by some concerned Americans mostly due to intermarriages, U.S is a free country that gives individuals the freedom of choosing where they would want to belong. Additionally, if the illegal immigrants were granted the opportunity to become citizens, then issues regarding deportations on minor crimes would cease and create a better environment for the immigrants. The American health system is under crisis and the cause of the problem is being projected on to the immigrants. This is because the author indicates that both legal and illegal immigrants account for approximately one billion dollars annually in the form of unreimbursed medical expenses. Additionally, an

Criminal Justice relating to Media Research Paper - 1

Criminal Justice relating to Media - Research Paper Example Nowadays, media has been the source of violence in the society as media consumption has been continuously rising for the past decade. Media has been a part the human civilization since time immemorial. Hence, society’s dependence on media has been significantly flourished throughout the decade. One particular source of news and entertainment is largely attributed to television programs and the internet. The type of programming contained in news reports, soap operas, family sitcoms, even children’s programs have demonstrated a level of media violence that needs immediate attention especially by the parents or guardians of the kids. This is so true when it comes to children’s cartoon channels. Most of the time, their parents or guardians fail to monitor what they watch on the television. Cartoon programs were created to entertain young children, but research has shown that a significant value of media violence is attributable to cartoons. On the other hand, the int ernet has also played a substantial role in the proliferation of media violence as seen in computer games which most of the young kids are fond of. This study shall focus on the violence content that is being shown in children’s programming, while mixing it with the element of humor. â€Å"This helps create that illusion that violence is fun and largely without any negative consequences. The unpunished violence perpetrated by attractive heroes provides the best description for encouraging imitation of violent scripts and adoption of pro-violence beliefs and attitudes† (Gentile 2003). Violence has been used as a key factor to make the audience glued to the television. With the presence of humor and combined with violence, the audience’s attention will be fixed watching the program from beginning to end as a form of entertainment. â€Å"The recent studies have

Distinct Varieties of Masculinity Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Distinct Varieties of Masculinity - Essay Example The feminists believe that the discrimination curtails women rights and seek to see the situation changed. (Piper 2009) Masculinity refers to masculine which denote something related to a male who include men and boys. (Piper 2011) defines masculinity as an expression to serve and not to be served expressing a sacrifice for the woman, which requires giving direction and having a final say. While looking at the distinct values of masculinity arises from the comparison of feminist and masculinity where feminist seek for equality between men and women, but some things constitute for womanhood and others manhood. The essay below discusses the comparison of the two in regard to distinct variety of masculinity. Distinct varieties of masculinity To begin with thoughts and experiences of men, they help in understanding gender in terms of the masculine variables, as opposed to feminist. (Rotundo, p. 106) argues that women beauty lured men from their known pleasure and secure culture to follow ing women. Therefore, opining that gender gets socially construed with masculine thoughts and behaviors arising from social and cultural processes. The scholar opines that the new complex culture, give rise to the conception of self made manhood. (Rotundo, p. 80 ) Explains the boy’s culture, which prepared boys, for rough and competitive world of politics and business, also the youth culture characterized by debating clubs, where they learned new skills and how to compete in socially acceptable ways. Similarly, (Rotundo, p 86) expresses the idea of masculinity by demonstrating thinking and experiences during both boys and youth culture. Both cultures have great emotional depth involving wrestling, fisticuffs’ and rehearsals for marriage by teenage boys in preparation for adult responsibilities. The thoughts of young men inclined to taming girls while driven by desires for sex and home cooked food because they regarded women to be different from men. More so, the develo pment of culture had many think that masculinity manifested in the success of men in both business and politics. Argument and opinion Rotundo’s argument that masculinity can be traced from the thoughts and experiences of as construed in the cultural and social development has a lot of merits and some controversies. The following reasons support Rotundo’s argument: that culture develops and so the thinking and experience of a person changes as the social and cultural responsibility change; people do grow and so changes occur, so masculinity can be examined at different stages of one’s life as Rotundo considers the issue in different cultural stages; argument that a society undergoes economic and social changes (Rotundo, p. 22) requires that man change masculinity to adopt with the new roles. Therefore, this concept of distinct of masculinity is worthy agreeable with since the feminine assume its feminist like ways. Secondly, transforming masculinity can be

Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 115

Essay Example Armstrong on the other hand would no longer challenge the USADA decision finding USADA’s investigation dismissing it as a â€Å"witch hunt† that is bent on convicting him without any physical evidence. Armstrong denied that he ever took banned substances in his career (Associated Press). This decision of USADA to strip Armstrong of his titles and ban him from the sport for life is not only wrong but also excessive. It can be likened to a death penalty (Zimmerman) of which Armstrong is undeserved. It is based on onerous and unreasonable proceedings t that even the United States District Court indicated the troubling aspect of the case and indicated â€Å"the deficiency of USADA’s charging document is of serious constitutional concern† (2012 WL 3569682). It is important to state that the prosecution of USADA against Armstrong is based on â€Å"non-analytical positive† or from witness testimony and not from the presentation of concrete, scientific laboratory results. Armstrong was right when he commented that USADA convicted him without any physical evidence. To back up that comment, it has to be noted that Armstrong never tested positive to over 500 tests he was subjected to during his active career. Worst, the use of â€Å"analytical non-positive† proceeding to convict Armstrong that requires the testimony of a witness was tainted with corruption making the ground of his conviction to be doubtful if not illegal. It could be argued that there are numbers of witness who testified against Armstrong that justified the conviction. But the manner of which those testimonies were obtained or extracted automatically removes the credibility of such witnesses and making it unfit to be used as evidence in the court of law. An agency cannot break the federal bribery law just to convict anyone. Thus, the evidence used against Armstrong can be dismissed not only as hearsays but also illegal that could nullify the charges hurled

Hand Foot and Mouth Disease Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Hand Foot and Mouth Disease - Essay Example HFMD is very often confused with foot and mouth disease but foot and mouth disease is predominant in cattle and sheep. This disease is also found in swine and it is also known as hoof and mouth disease. It is very important not to confuse between these two diseases. There are various symptoms with which the HFMD starts. The most common symptom is fever and loss of appetite. Sore throat is another symptom of this disease but fever is the most common of all the symptoms. This disease is basically caused because of the entero virus genus. This is a communicable disease and spreads when an infected person comes in contact with a healthy person. The virus spreads through contact like handshake etc. HFMD is mutually exclusive to human beings and the disease does not spread either from or to animals. To the dismay of many people who are affected with this disease, it is found that there is no specific treatment for this disease. The following part of the paper will discuss the preventive me asures and the possible treatment of this disease. When a person gets fever and is feared to have this disease, it is best to reduce the fever first and this can be done by taking antibiotics. The affected people often experience pain in this disease but this can also be dealt with by taking appropriate medicines like ibuprofen, or other over-the-counter pain relievers.

Third Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Third - Assignment Example These were purely financial institutions, and they had a difficult time staying afloat due largely to poor management, bad investments, and the lack of foresight required to weather difficult economic times. Companies that begin in one industry should not consider branching into the financial sector, as GE has attempted, as to do so all too often results in less than stellar results and can,in the end, adversely affect the American economy as a whole. The financial sector of any economy is critical to the well being of the nation as a whole. It is important that such institutions are viable and that they operate with integrity in an effort to secure the confidence of an investing public. In addition, sound and prudent banking institutions are required in order to attract outside and foreign investment. Every time a bank fails, or even struggles mightily, it reflects poorly on the nation, and it weakens investor and consumer confidence. In addition, when the banking system is in peril, as it has been for the past six to seven years, credit restrictions are tightened and the economy struggles to grow due to a lack of access to financial capital throughout all sectors of the economy. Even though GE is now exiting from the financial sector, this is another indicator that many such insinuations have simply grown too big to effectively focus solely on the banking end of the business. In the end, this is a further reflection the some bu siness can diversity their portfolio so much that they fail to truly excel at any one aspect. When this occurs in the banking industry, however, the results can have ramifications that are felt around the world. In 2008, at the outset of the global financial crisis, many large financial institutions simply collapsed under the weight of bad loans and poor lending policies that created an excess of loan obligations that simply could not be repaid. Not only has this ruined the credit

Richard P Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Richard P - Essay Example 6. This book has lots of details about the remarkable people who were inducted into slavery forcibly but subsequently asserted their independence. 7. Assimilation of the ethnic minority/black race into the American Mainstream society cannot be achieved though legal provisions only. All-round efforts at every level are required. 8. African culture is the intangible heritage of humanity and suitable steps need to be taken to preserve it. 9. The intrinsic value of the traditional/holistic medical practices need to done on scientific basis. 10. The white race should give up the concept that they are the superior race. All men are created equal by god. Order#: 522517 Topic: Richard P What, if any are the lessons to be learned by students of history from Price's book? An anthropologist is a great investigator. Just as a sculptor removes piece by piece from a stone block, to chisel ultimately a perfect statue, an anthropologist scores the achieves, sieves through the records, travels extens ively, drafts questionnaires and gets the answers from the expected and unexpected quarters, and comes to his conclusions. His vision and mission is to find out the truth about the subject of his investigation. The geographical area chosen by Richard Price for his long and arduous task is Saramaka Maroons of Suriname, one of the most difficult places on Planet Earth. He has the harvest of mythologies relating to the tribes inhabiting in this place. His mentor and guide for his four decades of research is Tooy and he has covered three centuries of African exile and resettlement in America. To put the anthropological material in the narrative style is a tough asking. One has to be an anthropologist, historian and a fiction writer all molded into one. Richard Price is one such personality. Social imaginary of African American societies is unique. The common African-American citizen, men, women and children have played a historic role to build this country, without their being aware of it, and without being given any designated role or project. I have no hesitation to conclude that this is no ordinary travelogue in the company of a fellow-traveler Tooy, who is a local man. Price has a passionate commitment to the main subject of his research—Saramak Tribe. He gathers transcripts, writes field notes and presents before the reader, who feels that he is actually travelling with Richards while turning the pages of the book. One comes to know the dominant impact of ethnicity on Nationalism. This book provides great backgrounder information about the difficult process of assimilation of the tribes into the mainstream of American society. One important historical fact that I have learnt from Richard’s researched findings is the incredible role played by the rebel slaves. Though brought for slave labor against their will and with brutal force, some brave amongst them (tribal leaders?) had the guts and foresight to establish their own colony in the depths of the forests and they protected their culture, nurtured it, transmitted to the future generations and stood by their traditions. Perhaps African traditional divine powers wished to make the history of the region available to humankind which Richard tackled during the course of his adventurous research. His finding Tooy, a priest, philosopher and healer, I consider, is one such divine intervention. He must have facilitated Richard’

Reconstruction’s Failure Essay Example for Free

Reconstruction’s Failure Essay Congress Reconstruction efforts to ensure equal right to freedom failed because the enforcement acts that was giving in Document 2, Prejudice in the south giving Benjamin Boyer’s speech and from the book â€Å"Black Reconstruction in America† in document 6, another reason was the Compromise of 1877. In the exert from the New York times, it states the Ku Klux Klan purpose was to establish a nucleus around which the adherents of the late rebellion might safely rally. The whites thought that it threatened individual freedom because it allowed the government to punish the Ku Klux Klan and banned disguises. The kkk wonted to enforce the fourteenth amendment which is to â€Å"make slaves citizens† to the constitution of the U.S. They believed in the innate inferiority of blacks. The Ku Klux Klan and other terrorist groups tried to keep African Americans from making economic process They killed there livestock, attacked the African Americans who owned land and forced them to work for previous slaveholders. Many southerners were opposed to African Americans gaining equal right and voting in elections so they formed terrorist groups. They were very prejudice in the south. Benjamin Boyer’s wrote a speech that stated† It is common for the advocates of negro suffrage to assume that the color of the negro is the main obstacle to his political quality† meaning its common for people to see black as people who shouldn’t have the right to vote. He also said Negros are not equal of white Americans and are not entitled. In the book Black reconstruction in America he said the American Negro was compelled to give up his political power. What he was saying if Negros wonted to work or wonted to increase the income they couldn’t handle politics to. Another reason was the Compromise of 1877. After the southerners made great changes affecting the lives of freed African Americans, restricting the right of freed slaves. Hayes got the 20 disputed electoral votes. They were unlimitedly awarded to him after a bitter legal and political battle. The south accepts republican, Hayes becomes President and the North agrees to end reconstruction and withdraw troops. They also agreed to build a railroad from Texas to the West Coast and also agreed to appoint southerners to the cabinet. Reconstruction failed for many different reasons. Reconstruction was suppose to be the period of rebuilding after the Civil war in which all the confederate states returned to the union. Like  may things everything doesn’t always go as planned.

Media Studies Help Essay Example for Free

Media Studies Help Essay

Distinguishing Fear From Anxiety

Distinguishing Fear From Anxiety Introduction Anxiety disorders constitute the largest group of mental diseases in European countries {Andlin-Sobocki et al., 2005, Eur J Neurol, 12 Suppl 1, 1-27}. Human anxiety disorders can be categorized into generalized anxiety disorders, panic attacks, Posttraumatic stress disorders (PTSD), Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and special phobias, are amongst the most prevalent with a 28% lifetime prevalence and an incidence of 18% {Kessler et al., 2005, Arch Gen Psychiatry, 62, 617-27}. Pathological expression of both fear and anxiety are thought to represent certain aspects of anxiety disorders. Specific phobias are considered, as fear disorders, whereas generalized anxiety is viewed as an example of anxiety disorders.   PTSD patients do not only suffer from conditioned fear symptoms to discrete cues that act as a reminder of a previous trauma, but they also exhibit persistent symptoms of sustained anxiety. The regulation of fear and anxiety is the heart of many psychopathological di sorders also reflected in the extremely high comorbidity rate with other mood disorders, such as depression. Up to 90% of individuals expressing an anxiety disorder also develop depression, which could increase suicide rates (Gorman, 1997) and constitutes a significant problem for the community in general. Currently available pharmacotherapies such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) and tricyclic antidepressants (TCAs), have emerged as effective alternatives to the benzodiazepines and have been paralleled by a similar growth in effective and available psychological treatments, particularly cognitive and cognitive-behavioural therapy. A considerable portion of patients, however, requires long-term treatment throughout the whole life or does not respond at all. For coping with these limitations, focusing on a better understanding of these diseases and improved treatment is urgently needed. Distinguishing fear from anxiety Fear Vs Anxiety Fear- Behavioural manifestation associated with clearly identified imminent threat. Anxiety- Generalized fear without object, an apprehensive anticipation of future potential threats The main function of fear and anxiety is to act as a signal of danger, threat, or motivational conflict, and to trigger appropriate adaptive responses. For some authors, fear and anxiety are indistinguishable, whereas others believe that they are distinct phenomena. In particular fear is a generalized adaptive state of apprehension to an imminent threat (Michael Davis, 2010). It begins rapidly and dissipates rapidly once a threat is removed. Fear is provoked by imminent and real danger, Animals may learn to fear situations in which they have previously been exposed to pain or stress, and subsequently show avoidance behavior when they re-encounter that situation. Young animals may show an innate fear reaction to sudden noise or disturbances in the environment, but rapidly become habituated to them. When they are used to a familiar environment, then a fear of novelty may develop. Ethologists have also made the important observation that fear is often mixed up with other aspects of moti vation. Thus, conflict between fear and approach behavior may results in displacement activities (e.g., self-grooming in rats and mice). Such displacement activities may be the behavioral expression of an anxious state. In contrast anxiety is often elicited by less specific and less predicable threats (Michael Davis, 2010). Anxiety is a generalized response to an unknown threat or internal conflict, whereas fear is focused on known external danger. It has been suggested, anxiety can only be understood by taking into account some of its cognitive aspects, particularly because a basic aspect of anxiety appears to be uncertain. Originally, anxiety is associated with arousal and vigilance, as a result it can be defined as longer lasting state of apprehension that can become pathological if its become extreme.    Defense and coping strategies Fear or anxiety, result in the expression of a range of adaptive or defensive behaviors, which are aimed to escape from the source of danger or motivational conflict. These behaviors depend on the context and the repertoire of the species. Fight or flight, was coined exactly 75 years ago, in 1929, Walter Cannon originally formulated this term for the human response to threat, Fear and anxiety. The phrase fight or flight has influenced the understanding and expectations of both clinicians and patients. However, both the order and the completeness of Cannons famous phrase are suspect. Fight or flight mischaracterizes the ordered sequence of responses that mammals exhibit as a threat escalates or approaches. In recent years, ethologists working with nonhuman primates have clearly established distinct fear responses that proceed sequentially in response to increasing threat. The order of these responses may have important implications for understanding and treating acute stress in humans . The sequence, originally described by Jeffrey A. Gray, begins with what ethologists call the freeze response or freezing, terms corresponding to what clinicians typically refer to as hypervigilance (being on guard, watchful, or hyper-alert). This initial freeze response is the stop, look, and listen response associated with fear. The survival advantage of this response is obvious. Specifically, ethological research has demonstrated that prey that remains frozen during a threat are more likely to avoid detection because the visual cortex and the retina of mammalian carnivores primarily detect moving objects rather than color. Immobilization or freezing, are usually elicited when the threat is inescapable, and is characterized by autonomic inhibition (hypotension, bradycardia), and a more pronounced increase in the neuroendocrine response activation of the hypothalamopituitary-adrenal axis and increased glucocorticoid secretion. This type of passive response was originally described by Engel Schmale as a conservation-withdrawal strategy. The concept of alternative (active/passive) strategies itself owes much to the work of Henry and coworkers. Specific brain circuits appear to mediate distinct coping reactions to different types of stressors. Psychopathological fear/anxiety Although fear acts as a physiological signal of danger, threat, or motivational conflict, it can become pathological and interfere with the ability to survive. Development of specific anxiety disorders, i.e., social phobia, obsessive-compulsive and panic disorders or specific phobias are consequences of pathological fear expression. Anxiety disorders are marked by excessive future fear, often in response to specific objects or situations and in the absence of a true danger. Anxiety disorders are extremely common in the general population. According to a recent epidemiological study, the lifetime prevalence of any anxiety disorder is 28.8% (Kessler et al, 2005). Increased anxiety in animal models, as a trait, can be attributed to at least two sets of factors: (i) a genetic predisposition, essentially linked to the expression of genes that are involved in the various neurochemical mechanisms underlying fear and anxiety; and (ii) the influence of environmental factors. These environmental factors can interact with the expression of the relevant genes during early development and determine the functional properties of the neural and biochemical systems involved in coping with stressful events. They can also modulate the learning processes that occur at a later stage, when the individual is confronted with various life events, and determine the capacity to cope successfully with aversive or threatening situations in adulthood. These predisposing factors, either innate or acquired, determine individual affective styles or coping strategies, which are thought to play an important role in vulnerability to psychopathology. Brain structures and functional circuitry involved in fear/anxiety Limbic System: Emotional brain Limbic areas include the hippocampus (HPC), amygdala, cortex, thalamus, hypothalamus and the bed nucleus of striaterminalis (BNST). Hippocampus and amygdala are considered as a main area involves in emotion, but I will mainly focus on the amygdala. Hippocampus The hippocampus is a part of the forebrain, located in the medial temporal lobe. The hippocampus consists of the dentate gyrus, the Cornu Ammonis fields (CA1-CA3), and the subiculum. The main information input to the hippocampus is via the entorhinal cortex and the main information output from the hippocampus is via the subiculum. Between entorhinal cortex and subiculum, three major pathways of the hippocampus are described. The perforant pathway from entorhinal cortex forms excitatory connections with the granule cells of the dentate gyrus (Bliss and Lomo, 1973). The mossy fiber pathway, formed by the axons of the granule cells of the dentate gyrus, connects the granule cells with the pyramidal cells in the area CA3 of the hippocampus (Lu et al., 1997). The Schaffer collateral pathway connects the pyramidal cells of the CA3 region with the pyramidal cells in the CA1 region of the hippocampus (Collingridge et al., 1983). Amygdala The amygdala is a limbic system structure and is a key target area implicated in emotional processing. It is composed of several interconnected nuclei located in the medial temporal lobes in mammals and is reciprocally linked to sensory cortices, thalamus, and autonomic control centers (Sah et al., 2003). Its internal and external connections permit the amygdala to evaluate environmental stimuli, attach salience to them, then generate appropriate autonomic, endocrine, and behavioral responses (Adolphs, 1999; Rogan LeDoux, 1996; Walker Davis, 2002). In addition, the amygdala is involved in detecting and evaluating emotional expression (Adolphs, 1999). The lateral nucleus of the amygdala (LA) has been implicated as the critical area where sensory stimuli achieve emotional salience. Consequently, the amygdala is needed for proper emotional processing, as in fear and anxiety, memory, and attention (Davis, 1997; Keele, Hughes, Blakeley, Herman, 2008; LeDoux, Cicchetti, Xagoraris, Roma nski, 1990). Plasticity in neurotransmission is important in maintaining the emotional significance of stimuli we encounter (Ehrlich, 2009). However, if those synapses and circuits become super-sensitized, what was once adaptive emotional behaviors can become psychopathologies, such as anxiety disorders and depression (Keele, 2005; Rosen Shulkin, 1998). Amygdala structure The amygdaloid complex is comprised of 13 nuclei, which are further divided into 3 groups: the basolateral complex, the cortical nuclei, and the centromedial nuclei. The basolateral complex is composed primarily of the basolateral (BLA) and lateral (LA) amygdala nuclei (Keele et al., 2008; Sah et al., 2003). Neuroanatomical studies reveal that there are extensive internuclear and reciprocal intranuclear connections (Pitkanen, Savander, LeDoux, 1997). Physiological studies further suggest that the amygdala nuclei are primarily individual functional units with the flow of information through the amygdala being highly organized, as seen in fear conditioning studies (LeDoux, 2000). Sensory afferents (context + tone) terminate in the LA (Romanski, Clugent, Bordi, LeDoux, 1993). The information proceeds in a predominantly unidirectional flow from the lateral to medial at which point the LA sends glutamatergic projections to the central nucleus of the amygdala (CeA), as well the BLA and o ther nuclei (Sah et al., 2003; Pitkanen et al., 1997; Smith Par eacute;, 1994). The CeA, where much of the amygdala nuclei projections converge and insubstantial intra-amygdaloid fibers exit, constitutes the output of the amygdala (Sah et al., 2003; Pitkanen et al., 1997). Two main cell types have been described morphologically and physiologically in the BLA (Rainnie, Asprodini, Shinnick-Gallagher, 1993; Sah et al., 2003). The first type is glutamatergic projection neurons that give off collaterals within the nucleus. They account for 70% of the neuronal population (McDonald, 1982). Their secondary and tertiary dendrites appear spiny, distinguishing them from the other neuronal type (Sah et al., 2003). In the LA, pyramidal neurons account for about 95% of the population. Pyramidal neurons show broad action potentials and spike frequency accommodation of varying degrees, and express N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA), a-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic acid (AMPA), and k ainate receptors. Main input to these neurons is cortical and thalamic, but they are highly modulated by interneurons and monoaminergic afferents from brain stem nuclei (Marowsky, Yanagawa, Obata, Vogt., 2005; Rainnie, 1999; Sah et al., 2003; Sullivan, Coplan, Kent, Gorman, 1999). The second type of neurons is interneurons, also called stellate cells (Sah et al., 2003). They account for 5-10% of the neurons in the BLA and are local circuit gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) releasing cells with short duration action potentials and no spike frequency accommodation. AMPA receptors are expressed but NMDA receptors are reportedly absent (Sah et al., 2003). Like the projection neurons, input is cortical and thalamic with modulatory input from brainstem nuclei (Lang and Par eacute;, 1998). Afferent and Efferent Connectivity Amygdala innervation consists of sensory input from the thalamus and cerebral cortex and autonomic input from the hypothalamus and brain stem (Keele et al., 2008; Sah et al., 2003). All sensory modalities glutamatergically project to the amygdala via the thalamus, sensory cortices, association cortices, and other polymodal cortical areas (McDonald, 1998; Romanski LeDoux, 1993; Sah et al., 2003). Brain stem projections provide monoaminergic modulation of the amygdala. There is extensive serotonergic innervation from the dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN), dopaminergic innervation from the ventral tegmental area, and noradrenergic innervation from the locus coeruleus (Clayton Williams, 2000;Marowsky et al., 2005; McIntyre, Power, Roozendaal, McGaugh, 2003; Rainnie, 1999). Main output of the amygdala is projected from the CeA. Lesion and stimulation studies have shown cortical, hypothalamic, and brain stem regions to be target areas, directly and indirectly through projections to the bed nuc leus of the stria terminalis (Iwata, Chida, LeDoux, 1987; LeDoux, Iwata, Cicchetti, Reis, 1988; LeDoux, 2000; Sah et al., 2003; Turner, Mishkin, Knapp, 1980; Walker Davis, 2002). CeA efferents modulate specific behavioral and autonomic responses to fear, anxiety, and stress (Davis, 1997; Rosen Schulken, 1998; Sah et al., 2003). The CeAs connection to the hypothalamus allows activation of the sympathetic nervous system, such as an increase in heartbeat, galvanic skin response, and pupil dilation in response to fear. For inducing behavioral responses to fear, there are projections from the CeA to brainstem nuclei. For instance, connections with the periaqueductal gray induce freezing behavior and with the nucleus reticularis pontis caudalis (PnC) increase acoustic startle response (Davis, 1992). The brainstem innervation is so extensive that the amygdala contacts almost every brainstem region involved in autonomic functioning (Keele et al., 2008; LeDoux, 1992; Price, 2003). Behavioral Function The amygdalas contribution to emotion has long been documented. Initially, monkey bilateral temporal lobectomy studies performed by Klà ¼ver and Bucy (1937 1939), resulted in agnosia, hyperorality, hypersexuality, social withdrawl, difficulty recognizing emotionality of objects, and placidity. This became known as Klà ¼ver-Bucy syndrome. In following amygdalectomy studies a loss of fear, aggression, and normal social interactions with an increase in exploration was found (Goddard, 1964; Aggleton Young, 2000). Rodent lesion studies further demonstrated decreased active fear avoidance (Poremba Gabriel, 1999) and decreased passive conditioned fear response (Roozendaal, Koolhaas, Bohus, 1993), for instance, amygdala lesioned rats fail to show freezing behavior in the presence of danger, such as a cat (Blanchard Blanchard, 972). Specific lesioning of the lateral nucleus of the amygdala blocked conditioned fear (LeDoux et al., 1990). Amygdalectomized humans also show impairments in fear conditioning (LaBar, LeDoux, Spencer, Phelps, 1995). Additionally, human subjects do not recognize fear from facial expressions, voices, (Adolphs, Tranel, Damasio, Damasio, 1995), or music (Gosselin et al., 2005), and judge deceitful looking individuals as trustworthy (Adolphs, Tranel, Damasio, 1998). Stimulation and activation studies further corroborate amygdala lesion evidence. Human amygdala stimulation often produces observable fear responses as well as subjective feelings of fear (for review see Davis, 1992). Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) further shows activation of the amygdala during viewing of fearful faces (Rosen Donley, 2006) and following fear conditioning when the conditioned stimulus is presented (LaBar, Gatenby, Gore, LeDoux, Phelps, 1998). In animals, amygdala stimulation shows an increase in behaviors, such as, vigilance, attention, and arousal (Rosen Schulkin, 1998) and an increase in autonomic responding; such as, respiration, heart rate, and blood pressure (for review see Davis, 1992). Additional emotions reported in humans have been anger and rage (Joseph, 2000). One female subject displayed enraged facial expressions, lips retracted and grimacing, then progressed to aggressive behavior and attack (Mark, Ervin, Sweet, 1972). These are emotional behavior autonomic responses that are often a component of the fear response. Fear Conditioning and Long-Term Potentiation One commonly used technique for studying amygdala function in both animals and humans is conditioned fear learning (Bà ¼chel, Morris, Dolan, Friston, 1998; Walker Davis 2002). To accomplish this type of learning a neutral sensory stimulus (conditioned stimulus or CS, often a light or tone) is paired with a noxious stimulus (unconditioned stimulus or US) such as a mild electric shock. Upon repeated US-CS pairing the learned association between the two stimuli elicits a behavioral response (conditioned response or CR) that can last indefinitely with o nly a few pairings (Maren, 2005). The convergence of the cortical sensory input and thalamic relays from the spinothalamic tract in the amygdala as well as the abolishment of learned fear response after amygdala lesions implicate it as the site for conditioned fear learning (LeDoux et al., 1990; Ledoux, 2000). The learned association as well as the fear behavioral response is seen across many species and has been extensively studied in rats, cats, primates, and humans. The neural mechanisms have also been conserved across these animal species and probably humans as well (LeDoux, 1996; Price, 2003). Long-term potentiation (LTP) functions as a mechanism for increasing synaptic strength between two neurons. Experimentally it can be induced by tetanic stimulation of afferent fibers; however, naturally occurring similar mechanisms are induced in the LA during conditioned fear learning (McKernan Shinnick-Gallagher, 1997; Rogan LeDoux, 1996; LeDoux, 2000). Support comes from the observat ion that before conditioning, neurons in the LA respond to CS and US input. After conditioning, the postsynaptic neurons response to the CS is greatly enhanced. This suggests that fear conditioning provides a suitable means for examining amygdala synaptic plasticity and fear circuitry. The proposed LTP molecular mechanism initiating fear conditioning is that the CS induces a release of glutamate, which activates the glutamatergic receptors on postsynaptic LA neurons. The US further depolarizes the neurons causing the release of the Mg2+ block in the NMDA receptors (NMDARs) allowing an influx of Ca2+. The additional Ca2+ initiates second messenger cascades that are responsible for the increased neuronal response to the CS. Blocking NMDARs with the antagonist DL-2-amino-5- phosphonovalerate (APV) prevents the acquisition of fear conditioning. If APV is delivered after training it does not affect the consolidation of the fear memory further supporting the necessary involvement of NMDAR s in the LTP mechanism. Ca2+ influx due to L-type voltage-gated calcium channels (L-VGCCs) is also required for the association to occur. The L-VGCCs may be opening in response to the strong depolarization from the US, especially when postsynaptic spiking and back-propagating action potentials occur. How learned fear memories are acquired and the mechanisms involved is essential to understanding normal amygdala functioning. Fear conditioning provides a means for studying dysfunction of fear circuitry and the resulting abnormal fear behaviors. Fear circuitry receives intense inhibitory modulation. When the inhibition is removed the fear conditioning mechanisms, such as LTP, are unmodulated and the circuitry enters a hyperexcited state. This could potentially lead to abnormally enhanced fear associations resulting in heightened fear responses. Manipulating the fear circuitry by altering inhibitory modulators and then assessing the fear behavior responses could elucidate the mechanisms leading to fear and anxiety disorders. Neuropeptide Y (NPY) system: Involvement in fear and anxiety NPY: Overview Neuropeptide Y(NPY) was isolated from porcine brain more than two decades ago (Tatemoto et al., 1982). This 36-amino-acid residue is one of the most abundant peptides found in the central nervous system (CNS) of all mammals, including humans {Chan-Palay et al., 1985; Chan-Palay et al., 1986}. It is one of the most conserved peptides in evolution (Larhammar, 1996; Larhamar and Salaneck, 2004), suggesting an important role in the regulation of basic physiological functions (Larhammar et al., 1993). At present, five NPY receptor subtypes have been cloned and designated-Y1, Y2, Y4, Y5, and y6 (Dumont et al., 1993; Gehlert, 1994; Michel et al., 1998)-all of which couple to Gi/o proteins and inhibit the production of cyclic AMP (Palmiter et al., 1998). NPY has important modulatory functions in the immune and cardiovascular systems (Song et al., 1996; Michalkiewicz et al., 2001), circadian rhythms (Antonijevic et al., 2000; Yannielli and Harrington, 2001), food intake (Jolicoeur et al., 199 5), and seizure (Husum et al., 1998; Colmers and El Bahh, 2003) and the response to pain (Munglani et al., 1996). NPY is involved in anxiety related behaviors (Thorsell and Heilig, 2002), and there is increasing support for the role of NPY in mood disorders such as depression (Redrobe et al., 2002a). It is constantly reported that NPY producing anxiolytic-like effect and can be observed different battery of behavioral tests like elevated plus maze, light dark, open field, and stressed induced hyperthermia. Consistent findings across different rodent modes have been proving the true anxiolytic effect of NPY. The presence of different NPY receptors and the plethora of NPY-induced behavioral effect raise the question as to whether NPY and its receptors have an effect on fear, and extinction of conditioned fear. The NPY Y1 receptors can be found in number of brain regions but prominent in cerebral cortex, amygdala, and hippocampus (Kask et al., 2002). The majority of studies have been proved the involvement of NPY Y1 receptor in the regulation of anxiety. In the present study I am focusing on fear reducing properties of NPY following the hypothesis that anxiolytic-like effect of NPY mediated my Y1 receptors.

Prudence Macintosh :: essays research papers

Prudence Mackintosh, a writer of both novels and magazines articles, was born and raised in Texarkana and now lives in Dallas where she raised her family. Mackintosh went to college at the University of Texas in the sixties. She wrote and still is writing about Texas womanhood and what it is like to be a mother in Texas. Prudence Mackintosh has influenced the world's perception of Texas and the rest of the West through her humorous writing about everyday life in Texas. Prudence Mackintosh has three sons who are grown up now that she raised in Highland Park. All three boys are different. Her oldest son is very well organized and willing do anything she asks him to do, her middle son is very disorganized, and the youngest son is very adventurous. Mackintosh supported them in their decisions and always helped them know how to chose right from wrong. Mrs. Mackintosh wrote a story about when her oldest son he didn't want to play football anymore, and how all the other boys made fun of him. To help him, she wrote a story telling how not all boys had to play football to be tough. Prudence Mackintosh's mother and father were the main influences as she was growing up. She was born into a family of writers, who both worked for the newspaper, her mother wrote articles and her father did editing. Her parents took her to their office where she observed the hectic yet exciting environment of the writers using adult language that children shouldn't hear. So she grew up to think that writing was the job for her. Besides her parents, Maya Angelou was another huge influence on Mrs. Mackintosh. Angelou and Mrs. Mackintosh grew up only twenty five miles apart, but there lives were extremely different. Maya Angelou is sixteen years older so she started her writing career when Prudence Mackintosh was a child. Mackintosh says, "Maya Angelou's first book, "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", was an especially strong stuff for me. Maya Angelous' black childhood experiences in Stamp, Arkansas, occurred only twenty-five miles and sixteen years from her very different white childhood in Texarkana, Texas. Angelou's writings influenced her views on racism in her small town. An old friend of hers from college became editor of Texas Monthly Magazine. He remembered how fabulous a writer Mackintosh was from their college years. Their first meeting was in a poetry class when he laughed at her name.

Free Essays on A Dolls House: Marital Lessons :: Dolls House essays

Marital Lessons from A Doll's House    Divorce has become widely accepted throughout the world. In today's world, the violent shredding of a family is shrugged off like the daily weather.   The Norwegian play A Doll's House, by Henrik Ibsen, is a prime example of a marriage that didn't work. The marriage of Torvald and Nora Helmer had many problems because the husband and wife couldn't discover the secrets of marital bliss. To keep a marriage alive and growing it must hold true to four qualities: love, communication, trust and loyalty, and perseverance. With the incorporation of these qualities any marriage would work.    Without love a relationship would probably not even begin. Two people meet, a friendship forms, and soon a romance blossoms. Though the basis for Nora and Torvald's relationship appeared to be centered around love, the needed balance was not obtained. Torvald didn't really love Nora; to him she was just another child to mind. He said, 'And I wouldn't want you to be any different from what you are-just my sweet little song bird. But now I come to think of it, you look rather-rather-how shall I put it? -rather as if you've been up to mischief today' ( 151). Calling his wife names such as 'skylark,' 'squirrel,' and 'spendthrift,' Torvald does not love his wife with the respect and sensitivity a man should. The main area where Torvald showed his lack of love for Nora was in the way he managed his house. Torvald was the owner of what he believed to be a perfect doll house. This doll house was first controlled by Nora's domineering father, and once Nora entered marriage, the titles and dee ds to this doll house were handed over to Torvald. Torvald manipulated Nora, and then the children through her according to his wants, sure that he could never lose control over his precious doll house. This lack of love and imperious attitude would eventually ruin their marriage. Nora was the only one of the two partners who showed love for the other in this play. Going against all the odds a woman faced in the late nineteenth century, Nora went behind her husband's back, borrowed a large sum of money, forged her father's signature, and went on to pay it off with hopes of Torvald never hearing of it. She refused to be a doll, and would alternate personalities between 'Torvald's little skylark,' and 'Nora the intelligent and strong woman.

Free Essay: Analysis of Sonnet 12 :: Sonnet essays

Analysis of Sonnet 12 When I do count the clock that tells the time, And see the brave day sunk in hideous night: When I behold the violet past prime, And sable curls o'er-silver'd all with white; When lofty trees I see barren of leaves, Which erst from heat did canopy the herd, And summer's green all girded up in sheaves Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard: Then of thy beauty do I question make That thou among the wastes of time must go, since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake, And die as fast as they see others grow; And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence save breed to brave him when he takes thee hence. This is an enjoyable sonnet that uses nature imagery, found extensively in Petrarca, that Shakespeare uses to get his point across. Not much explication is needed, aside the sustained images of nature, to fully understand its intent, but I would like to point out a peculiar allusion. When reading line 3, "the violet past prime" has made me think of Venus and Adonis. In the end, Adonis melts into the earth and a violet sprouts where his body was, which Venus then places in her heart, signifying the love she has for him. Reading this into the poem makes the few following lines more significant. Having Adonis portrayed as the handsome youth, Shakespeare is alluding to the death of youth (in general and to the young man) through the sonnet. In the next line, it is not certain if "sable" is an adjective or a noun and if "curls" is a noun, referring to hair (which is plausible) or a verb modifying "sable." Invoking the allusion to Adonis here, Shakespeare portends that if Adonis did live l onger, he too would have greying hair; thus, Shakespeare sees ["behold"] an Adonis figure, the young man, past his youth.

Web Based System

IntroductionYoung Entrepreneur Society (YES) is the organization of SACLI. They have different activities like Acceptance Party, Upcoming Seminar, Upcoming Business Exhibit, Christmas Party, and Booth for Foundation Day, Community Service, and monthly due registration fee for certificate and membership. They have also the rules and regulations for the members. The Young Entrepreneur Society (YES) organized the activity through manual. It will take a lot of time to do. The members are going to school to know the schedule and where the event will be held. They compute through manual the monthly due registration fee. The head have to update the upcoming activities to the group or the leaders.The researcher proposed a system which allows the officials and membersso tomake it easy to organize for theYoung Entrepreneur Society (YES) to have an efficient and convenient way of communication and transaction through WEB-BASED SYSTEM OF THE SACLI YES. The system contains 6 main landing pages: H OME features the history of Young Entrepreneur Society. LOG-IN/LOG-OUTfor the administrator. VIDEO features the video of all activities. EVENTS below this it have the below this it have content of Acceptance Party, Upcoming Seminar, Upcoming Business Exhibit, Christmas Party, Community Service and Booth for Foundation Day. MEMBER’sprevious advisers/ members, YES achiever, and present members. And to recognize the advisers and members it has profile and category.And last ABOUT.WEB BASED SYSTEM OF THE SACLI YESneed only be installed on the server placing minimal requirements on the end user workstation. This makes maintaining and updating the system much simpler and it can all be done on the server. Any client updates can be deployed via the web server with relative ease. Typically in larger more complex systems data is stored and moved around separate systems and data sources. In web based systems these systems and processes can often be consolidated reducing the need to move data around. It also provides an added layer of security by removing the need for the user to have access to the data and back end servers. It can  dramatically lower costs due to reduced support and maintenance, lower requirements on the end user system and simplified architecture.Chapter IIA. Historical BackgroundIndustry and trade become dynamic, creating an impact fordeveloping business society in the field of education thus promoting entrepreneurial ability for students who are inclined to do business and be part of world class manager’s entrepreneurs. Inspired by the modern trends and global attraction and opportunities in business locally and internationally, by the Entrepreneurs Society came into existence. The year 2003 was memorable for business administration student of St. Anne College Lucena Inc. because it was the year the society started and was then recognized by the college, aside from other student organizations, thereby Constitution and By-laws was promul gated and took effects as the law required.Embodied in the Constitution and By-laws are its objectives: A. Uphold the ideals geared towards ensuring a well-rounded intellectual, social, cultural, and physical development of every member. B. Provide the members an effective training in leadership and socio-civic awareness within and without the college campus. C. Promote all aspects of growth and development of its members. D. Cultivate among members the spirit of camaraderie and cordiality with other students, faculty members, staff and the administration of the college.MembershipAll students enrolled in the College of Business (Business Administration and Entrepreneurship) may upon enrollment become member of the society.AdvisersDuring the term of Prof. Carmelita A. Maranan as Dean of the college, she appointed Mr. Cyril Gonzales as the adviser of YES. For five years the society was able to hold several projects and out campus learning (benchmarking) such as Calmeray (Laguna), GSIS Museum, Philippine Stock Exchange, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, and World Trade. We also attended several seminars and workshop thereby the members were as happy as they  learned from these activities. We also held livelihood project such as candle making. Dish washing liquid making, powder soap making and perfume making and many more.After Mr. Cyril Gonzales term as adviser for three years, it was Prof. Maranan who took the position, thereby she enunciated more projects, field trips and livelihood programs.The past officers were: Year 2003 – 2004.B. Organizational ChartChapter IIIA. Main problemCould be caused by any number of things: a poorly designed architecture, an underpowered CPU, limited network bandwidth, or a combination of several factors. For example, a higher than expected load can easily overwhelm a system's resources. However, a higher volume is not always required to uncover performance problems. Poorly designed software that does not handle resource alloca tion and contention properly can easily cause deadlocks that eventually lead to nefarious performance problems even at a normal load.B. Sub-problemPoorly designed software that does not handle resource allocation and contention properly can easily cause deadlocks that eventually lead to nefarious performance problems even at a normal load.

Personal Philosophy Essay

Educational philosophy is sometimes referred to as the immediate objectives of education. Immediate objectives on the other hand are purposes which a subject at a given time must aim to achieve through the courses of study or the curriculum. Its aims constitute a very important aspect of the total education. They are more specific and they can be accomplished in a shorter period of time, maybe a day or a week. These, too, are considered goals of specialization. This study aims to develop an educational philosophy and relate its important to one’s classroom teaching. Role of the teacher. The life of the teacher everywhere is full of responsibility. The teacher should recognize that the welfare and interest of the child is the principal objective of his profession. The school is for the children and the teacher’s first thought should be for them. At least during the time the pupils are in the school the teacher stands for the parents. The teacher should guard the health, moral, and well-being of the pupils with intelligent care. He should also be alert to discover physical defects of his pupils, and prompt to inform and interest the parents so that relief may be offered. Curriculum. Through the years, schools have taken on many new subjects without dropping old subjects. Schools must relinquish subjects that can be learned readily outside the school system and should be child-friendly and child-centered school. It should provide a variety of programs to meet the special interests and talents of the students. The Child. The child is the center of the matter. The teacher must know the nature of the child to be motivated, directed, guided, and evaluated. To understand the child, the teacher must know him as a biological organism with needs, abilities, and goals. He must know the social and psychological environment of the child and the cultural forces of which the child is a part. The behavior of the child at any given moment is the result of biological environment factors operating simultaneously. The child behaves as he does because he is a human being with needs and motives, and because he is surrounded by environmental and cultural forces which determine his behavior, these needs and motives shall be met. Methods of Education. The literature on the subject of teaching generally makes no distinction between method of teaching and technique of teaching. Writing on educational theory and practice has presented different classroom procedures as methods of teaching/education or techniques of teaching. These two terms have different meanings and values, but both are integrated in any teaching and learning situation. The method of education covers the psychological processes involved in learning, and the technique of teaching covers the use of devices and the application of principles in teaching in order to effect the proper development of the individual student. In addition, method relates to the learning performance rather than to the teaching performances, and method of education involves steps to guide the mental processes (Demiashkevich 43-48). Aims of Education. The philosophical aims of education require all public and private schools in this country to pursue, in the development of every child, regardless of color, creed, or social status. All educational institutions shall aim to inculcate love of country, teach the duties of citizenship, and develop moral character, personal discipline, and scientific, technological, and vocational efficiency. The study of the Constitution shall be part of the curricula in all schools (Peterson, pp. 64-69). The State shall provide citizenship and vocational training to adult citizens and out-of-school youth, and create and maintain scholarship for poor and deserving students. Moreover, philosophy of education is one of the major ground bases of education as field of profession; hence, focused study of such condition is essential. The case study involves the subjects of philosophical perspective of education linked with the condition of determining the future trends of the system. Utilizing five aspects of contributing factors, such as standards of teaching, bilingual education, cultural diversities, special education and the public policies, we shall determine the possible implications of such factors in professional philosophy of education. As a conclusion, as for the philosophy of education, and the continuity of learning and the aspects of continuous teaching without regards to any exceptions as incurred by the society, divine law, and human rights. Every minority with no considerations to race, gender, and possibly realistic health conditions should be deprived with education. The philosophy of education involves the general principle of conducting education as a means of providing universal treatment for the development implicated in a universal perspective. Furthermore, the philosophy of education, on the perspective of professionalism, involves that the educator must also be under the said umbrella of development and continuous learning despite of the governed tasks of teaching. Reference: Demiashkevich, Michael (2003). An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education. Pp. 43- 48American Book. New York. Peterson, Michael L. (2000). Philosophy of Education: Issues and Options. Pp. 64-69, InterVarsity Press. Downers Grove, IL.

Resume Marketing Management, 14th Edition – Kotler & Keller

KOTLER RESUME Marketing Management Philip Kotler – Kevin Lane Keller SUMMARY PART 1 Understanding Marketing Management4 Defining Marketing for the 21st Century4 Developing Marketing Strategies and Plans5 PART 2 Capturing Marketing Insights13 Collecting Information and Forecasting Demand13 Conducting Marketing Research16 PART 3 Connecting with Customers18 Creating Long-term Loyalty Relationships18 Analyzing Consumer Markets21 Analyzing Business Markets25 Identifying Market Segments and targets28 PART 4 Building Strong Brands31 Creating Brand Equity31 Crafting the Brand Positioning34Competitive Dynamics36 PART 5 Shaping the Market Offerings39 Setting Product Strategy39 Designing and Managing Services41 Developing Pricing Strategies and Programs46 PART 6 Delivering Value53 Designing and Managing Integrated Marketing Channels53 Managing Retailing, Wholesaling, and Logistics58 PART 7 Communicating Value60 Designing and Managing Integrated Marketing Communications60 Managing Mass Co mmunications : Advertising, Sales Promotions, Events and Experiences, and Public Relations63 Managing Personal Communications : Direct and interactive Marketing, Word of Mouth, and Personal Selling68PART 8 Creating Successful Long-term Growth72 Introducing New Market Offerings72 Tapping into Global Offerings86 Managing a Holistic Marketing Organization for the Long Run93 PART1: UNDERSTANTING MARKETING AND MANAGEMENT CHAPTER 1: DEFINITNG MARKETING FOR THE 21st CENTURY THE IMPORTANCE OF MARKETING Marketing is a significant dimension of any business in today’s highly competitive environment and financial success is often dependent on marketing ability. Marketing is crucial for business success. THE SCOPE OF MARKETING Marketing is about identifying and meeting human and social needs.One of the shortest definitions of marketing is the process of meeting needs profitably. Marketing management is the art and the science of choosing target markets and getting, keeping and increasing customers though creating, managing, communicating and delivering superior customer value. UNDERSTANDING MARKETS Marketing can be used for: Services, products, services and products, events, experiences, people, places ideas Marketing managers seek to influence the level, timing, and composition of demand to meet the organization’s objectives. Eight states of market demand are possible: Full demand: consumers buy all services or products brought to market. – Overfull demand: there are more consumers demanding the service or product than can be satisfied. – Irregular demand: consumer purchases vary on a seasonal, monthly, weekly†¦ – Declining demand: consumers begin to buy services or products less frequently or not all. – Negative demand: consumers dislike the service or product and may even pay a price to avoid it. – Nonexistent demand: consumers may be unaware of or uninterested in the product or service. – Latent demand: consu mers may share a strong need that cannot be satisfied by an existing product or service. Unwholesome demand: consumers may be attracted to services or products that have undesirable social consequences. In each case, marketers must identify the underlying causes of the demand state then determine a plan of action to shift the demand to a more desirable state. HOW IS MARKETING PRACTICED? Marketing practice can be viewed in many perspectives. The traditional view is the KOTLERIAN marketing management view of managing the marketing mix after selecting target market and positioning. TRANSACTIONAL, RELATION AND SERVICE MARKETINGTransaction marketing is defined as attracting and satisfying potential buyers by managing the elements in the marketing mix. Interaction marketing: implies face to face interaction between individuals. Network marketing is with the consumers but occurs across and among organization. The concept was developed by the Nordic school from northern Europe and developme nts from the USA. Relationship marketing in its simplest form is a progression from the dominant and often criticized the 4 P focus. The relational is focus on building long-term relationships with consumers CHAPTER 2 : DEVELOPING MARKETING, STRATEGIES AND PLANMarketing is about satisfying consumers' needs and wants. The task of any business is to deliver customer value at a profit. I. The value Delivery Process The traditional view of marketing is that the firm makes something and then sells it. Companies that subscribe to this view have the best chance of succeeding in economies marked by goods shortages where consumers are not fussy about quality, features, or style-for example, basic staple goods in developing markets. There, the â€Å"mass market† is actually splintering into numerous micro markets, each with its own wants, perceptions, preferences, and buying criteria.The smart competitor must design and deliver offerings for well-defined target markets. II. The value C hain Michael Porter of Harvard has proposed the value chain as a tool for identifying ways to create more customer value. According to this model, every firm is a synthesis of activities performed to design, produce, and market, deliver, and support its product. The value chain identifies nine strategically relevant activities-five primary and four support activities-that create value and cost in a specific business. He firm's infrastructure covers the costs of general management, planning, finance, accounting, legal, and government affairs.The firm's task is to examine its costs and performance in each value-creating activity and to look for ways to improve it. Managers should estimate their competitors' costs and performances as benchmarks against which to compare their own costs and performance. The firm's success depends not only on how well each department performs its work, but also on how well the company coordinates departmental activities to conduct core business processes. †¢ The market-sensing process. †¢ The new-offering realization process. †¢ The customer acquisition process. †¢ The customer relationship management process. The fulfilment management process. To be successful, a firm also needs to look for competitive advantages beyond its own operations, into the value chains of suppliers, distributors, and customers. III. Core competencies Many companies today outsource less-critical resources if they can obtain better quality or lower cost. The key, is to own and nurture the resources and competencies that make up the essence of the business. A core competency has three characteristics: 1. It is a source of competitive advantage in that it makes a significant contribution to perceived customer benefits. 2.It has applications in a wide variety of markets. 3. It is difficult for competitors to imitate. Business realignment may be necessary to maximize core competencies. It has three steps: 1. Defining the business concept or à ¢â‚¬Å"big idea† 2. Shaping the business scope 3. Positioning the company's brand identity. IV. A holistic marketing Orientation and Customer Value A holistic marketing orientation can also help capture customer value. The holistic marketing framework is designed to address three key management questions: 1. Value exploration- How can a company identify new value opportunities? 2.Value creation- How can a company efficiently create more promising new value offerings? 3. Value delivery—–How can a company use its capabilities and infrastructure to deliver the new value offerings more efficiently? A. Value exploration Understanding the relationships among three spaces: – The customer's cognitive space – The company's competence space – The collaborator's resource space. B. Value Creation To create new customer benefits, marketers must understand what the customer thinks about, wants, does, and worries about and observe whom customers admire and i nteract with, and who influences them.C. Value Delivery The company must become proficient at customer relationship management, internal resource management, and business partnership management. Customer relationship management allows the company to discover whom its customers are, how they behave, and what they need or want. V. The central role of the strategic planning Successful marketing thus requires companies to have capabilities such as understanding customer value, creating customer value, delivering customer value, capturing customer value, and sustaining customer value.To ensure that they select and execute the right activities, marketers must give priority to strategic planning in three key areas: managing a company's businesses as an investment portfolio, assessing each business's strength by considering the market's growth rate and the company's position and fit in that market, and establishing a strategy. For each business, the company must develop a game plan for achi eving its long-run objectives. The marketing plan is the central instrument for directing and coordinating the marketing effort. The marketing plan operates at two levels: strategic and tactical.All corporate headquarters undertake four planning activities 1. Defining the corporate mission 2. Establishing strategic business units 3. Assigning resources to each SBD 4. Assessing growth opportunities I. Defining the corporate mission To define its mission, a company should address Peter Drucker's classic questions:What is our business? Who is the customer? What is of value to the customer? What will our business be? What should our business be? These simple-sounding questions are among the most difficult a company will ever have to answer.The good mission statements have five major characteristics. First, they focus on a limited number of goals. †¢ Industry. Some companies will operate in only one industry; some only in a set of related industries; some only in industrial goods, c onsumer goods, or services; and some in any industry. †¢ Products and applications. Firms define the range of products and applications they will supply. †¢ Competence. The firm identifies the range of technological and other core competencies it will master and leverage. †¢ Market segment. The type of market or customers a company will serve is the market segment. Vertical. The vertical sphere is the number of channel levels, from raw material to final product and distribution, in which a company will participate. †¢ Geographical. The range of regions, countries, or country groups in which a company will operate defines its geographical sphere. II. Establishing Strategic Business Units Large companies normally manage quite different businesses, each requiring its own strategy. General Electric has classified its businesses into 49 strategic business units, SBlls. An SBU has three characteristics: 1.It is a single business, or a collection of related businesses, that can be planned separately from the rest of the company. 2. It has its own set of competitors. 3. It has a manager responsible for strategic planning and profit performance, who controls most of the factors affecting profit. III. Assigning Resources to Each SBU Once it has defined SBUs, management must decide how to allocate corporate resources to each. Management would want to grow, â€Å"harvest† or draw cash from, or hold on to the business. IV. Assessing growth Opportunities A. Intensive GrowthCorporate management's first course of action should be are view of opportunities for improving existing businesses. B. Integrative Growth A business can increase sales and profits through backward, for- ward, or horizontal integration within its industry. Media companies have long reaped the benefits of integrative growth. C. Diversification Growth Diversification growth makes sense when good opportunities exist outside the present businesses-the industry is highly attractive a nd the company has the right mix of business strengths to be successful. D. Downsizing and Divesting Older BusinessesWeak businesses require a disproportionate amount of managerial attention. Companies must carefully prune, harvest, or divest tired old businesses in order to release needed resources to other uses and reduce costs. VI. Organization and Organizational Culture Five key strategies for managing change in an organization: 1. Avoid the innovation title-Pick 2. Use the buddy system-Find 3. Set the metrics in advance- 4. Aim for quick hits first- 5. Get data to back up your gut-Use testing to get feedback and improve an idea The Business Unit Strategic Planning I. The Business MissionEach business unit needs to define its specific mission within the broader company mission. Therefore, a television-studio-lighting-equipment company might define its mission as, â€Å"To target major television studios and become their vendor of choice for lighting technologies that represent the most advanced and reliable studio lighting arrangements. † II. SWOT ANALYSIS The overall evaluation of a company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats is called SWOT analysis. It's a way of monitoring the external and internal marketing environment. A. External Environment (opportunity and threat) AnalysisThe business unit should set up a marketing intelligence system to track trends and important developments and any related opportunities and threats. Good marketing is the art of finding, developing, and profiting from these opportunities. A marketing opportunity is an area of buyer need and interest that a company has a high probability of profitably satisfying. Opportunities can take many forms, and marketers need to be good at spotting them. To evaluate opportunities, companies can use market opportunity analysis (MOA) to determine their attractiveness and probability of success by asking questions like: To articulate the benefits convincingly to a define d target market(s)? – To locate the target market(s) and reach them with cost-effective media and trade channels? – To possess or have access to the critical capabilities and resources we need to deliver the customer benefits? – To deliver the benefits better than any actual or potential competitors? 5. To rate of return meet or exceed our required threshold for investment? B. Internal Environment (strengths and weaknesses) It's one thing to find attractive opportunities, and another to be able to take advantage of them.Each business needs to evaluate its internal strengths and weaknesses. C. Goal Formulation This stage of the process is called goal formulation. Goals are objectives that are specific with respect to magnitude and time. The unit's objectives must meet four criteria: 1. They must be arranged hierarchically, from the most to the least important. 2. Objectives should be quantitative whenever possible. 3. Goals should be realistic. Goals should arise from an analysis of the business unit's opportunities and strengths, not from wishful thinking. 4. Objectives must be consistent.It's not possible to maximize sales and profits simultaneously. III. Strategic Formulation A. Porter Generic Strategies – Overall cost leadership. Firms pursuing this strategy work hard to achieve the lowest production and distribution costs so they can price lower than their competitors and win a large market share. – Differentiation. The business concentrates on uniquely achieving superior performance in an important customer benefit area valued by a large part of the market. – Focus. The business focuses on one or more narrow market segments. B. Strategic Alliances Product or service alliances-One company licenses another to produce its product, or two companies jointly market their complementary products or a new product. – Promotional alliances One company agrees to carry a promotion for another company's product or servic e. – Logistics alliances One company offers logistical services for another company's product. – Pricing collaborations One or more companies join in a special pricing collaboration. Hotel and rental car companies often offer mutual price discounts. D. Program Formulation and ImplantationThe unit has decided to attain technological leadership, it must plan programs to strengthen its R department, gather technological intelligence, develop leading-edge products, train the technical sales force, and develop ads to communicate its technological leadership. Businesses are also increasingly recognizing that unless they nurture other stake- holders-customers, employees, suppliers, distributors-they may never earn sufficient profits for the stockholders. E. Feedback and Control The company has to point out that it is more important to â€Å"do the right thing†-to be effective-than â€Å"to do things right†-to be efficient.The most successful companies excel at b oth. Product Planning: The Nature and Contents of a Marketing Plan What, does a marketing plan look like? What does it contain? – Executive summary and table of contents. The marketing plan should open with a brief of the main goals and recommendations. A table of con- tents outlines the rest of the plan and all the supporting rationale and operational detail. – Situation analysis. This section presents relevant background data on sales, costs, the market, competitors, and the various forces in the macro environment.How do we define the market, how big is it, and how fast is it growing? What are the relevant trends? What is the product offering and what critical issues do we face? Firms will use all this information to carry out a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis. – Marketing strategy . Here the product manager defines the mission, marketing and financial objectives, and groups and needs that the market offerings are intended to sati sfy. The manager then establishes the product line's competitive positioning, which will inform the â€Å"game plan† to accomplish the plan's objectives.All this requires inputs from other areas, such as purchasing, manufacturing, sales, finance, and human resources. – Financial projections. Financial projections include a sales forecast, an expense fore- cast, and a break-even analysis. On the revenue side, the projections show the forecasted sales volume by month and product category. On the expense side, they show the expected costs of marketing, broken down into finer categories. The break-even analysis shows how many units the firm must sell monthly to offset its monthly fixed costs and average per-unit variable costs. – Implementation controls.The last section of the marketing plan outlines the controls for monitoring and adjusting implementation of the plan. Typically, it spells out the goals and budget for each month or qU31ter, so management can review each period's results and take corrective action as needed. PART 3 : CAPTURING MARKETING INSIGHTS CHAPTER 3 : COLLECTING INFORMATION AND FORECASTING DEMAND Three developments make the need for marketing information greater now than at any time in the past: – Rise of global marketing – New emphasis on buyers’ wants, preferences and behaviour – Trend toward non price competitionTo carry out their analysis, planning, implementation, and control responsibilities, marketing managers need a Marketing Information System (MIS). The MIS’s role is to assess the managers’ information needs, develop the needed information, and distribute that information in a timely manner. It is really easiest and effective with this method to collect information of various countries as it gives: – Quick information – Competitive advantage – Guides the marketing decision It relies on internal company records, marketing intelligence activities & res earch. INTERNAL RECORDS & MARKETING INTELLIGENCESpot important opportunities & problems THE ORDER-TO-PAYMENT CYCLE = the heart of the internal records system Favored firms are those which can promise timely delivery so they have to improve: o Speed o Accuracy o Efficiency This will save costs as well and it is the MIS role! SALES INFORMATION SYSTEMS Reports on current sales are indispensable for marketing managers. Inventory data warehouse is a great tool to capture all important data This will help to be aware of every kind of situation and manage it! Cookies are also a useful tool to provide information to companies.Technological gadgets are revolutionizing sales information systems but sales dta must be carefully interpret. DATABASES, DATA WAREHOUSING, AND DATA MINING Databases are essential to companies to organize their information. This is used in several areas for different information: customer, product, sales person†¦ Advantages: Save mailing expenses Help and make eas y access to decision makers Can be used for statistical methods for usefukl information Managers can yield still deeper insights using its own in-house technology THE MARKETING INTELLIGENCE SYSTEMIt is a set of procedures and sources used by managers to obtain everyday information about pertinent developments in the marketing environment. It can also be called HAPPENINGS DATA. Several steps can be taken by companies to improve the quality of its marketing intelligence: – Train & motivate the sales force to spot and report new development – Motivate distributors, retailers, and other intermediaries to pass along important intelligence – Network externally: giving an immediate competitive advantage – Set up customer advisory panel – Take advantage of government data resources Purchase information from outside suppliers: lower costs – Use online customer feedback systems to collect competitive intelligence Competitive intelligence function work s bests when intelligence operations collaborate closely with key users in the decision-making process! Needs and Trends A trend is a direction or sequence of events that have some momentum and durability. We can draw distinctions among fads, trends, and megatrends. Trends are more predictable and durable. A trend reveals the shape of the future. Trends and megatrends merit marketers’ close attention.Identifying the Major Force In the economical arena, companies and consumers are increasingly affected by global forces. Substantial speedup of international transportation, communication, and financial transactions, leading to the rapid growth trade and investment, especially tripolar trade. – The rising economic power of several Asian countries in world markets. – The rise of trade blocs such as the European Union and the NAFTA signatories. – The severe debt problems of a numbers of countries, along with the increasing fragility of the international financi al system.Successful companies realize that the marketing environment presents a neverending series of opportunities and threats. The major responsibility for identifying significant changes in the macroenvironment falls to a company’s marketers. More than any other group in the company, marketing managers must be the trend trackers and opportunity seekers. 1. Within the rapidly changing global picture, marketers must monitor six major environmental forces: demographic, economic, natural, technological, political-legal, and social-cultural. 2.In the demographic environment, marketers must be aware of worldwide population growth; changing mixes of age, ethnic composition, and educational levels; the rise of non traditional families; large geographic shifts in population; and the move to micromarketing and away from mass marketing. 3. In the economic arena, marketers need to focus on income distribution and levels of savings, debt, and credit availability. 4. In the social-cult ural arena, marketers must understand people’s views of themselves, others, organizations, society, nature, and the universe.They must market products that correspond to society’s core and secondary values, and address the needs of different subcultures within a society. 5. In the natural environment, marketers need to be aware of raw-materials shortages, increased energy costs and pollution levels, and the changing role of governments in environmental protection. 6. In the technological arena, marketers should take account of the accelerating pace of technological change, opportunities for innovation, varying R&D budgets, and the increased governmental regulation brought about by technological change. . In the political-legal environment, marketers must work within the many laws regulating business practices and with various special-interest groups. CHAPTER 4 : CONDUCTING MARKETING RESEARCH The components of a modern marketing information system A marketing informatio n system (MIS): consists of people, equipment, and procedures to gather, short, analyze, evaluate and distribute needed, timely, and accurate information to marketing decision makers. Internal Records System It is the most basic information system used by marketing managers. (Sales, prices, inventory levels†¦)The order-to-payment cycle Sales reporting system MARKETING INTELLIGENCE SYSTEM Is a set of procedures and sources used by managers to obtain their everyday information about pertinent developments in the marketing environment? MARKETING RESEARCH SYSTEM Are the systematic design, collection, analysis, and reporting of data and findings relevant to a specific marketing situation facing the company? SUPPLIERS OF MARKETING RESEARCH Many ways: engaging students or professors to design and carry out marketing research projects; using online information services; checking out rivals.THE MARKETING RESEARCH PROCESS Step 1 : Define the problem and research objectives Step 2 : devel oping the research plan. Decisions on the data sources, research approaches, research instruments, sampling plan, and contact methods Step 3 : Collect the information. The data collection phase of marketing research is the most expensive and the most prone to error. Step 4 : Analyze the information. Extract pertinent findings from the collected data. Step 5 : Present the findings. Major findings are pertinent to the major marketing decisions facing management.MARKETING DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM Is a coordinated collection of data, systems, tools and techniques with supporting software and hardware by which an organization gathers and interprets relevant information from business and environment and turns it into a basis for marketing action? FORECASTING AND DEMAND MEASUREMENT †¢ A VOCABULARY FOR DEMAND MEASUREMENT Market demand Market demand for a product is the total volume that would be bought by a defined customer group in a defined geographical area in a defined time period i n a defined marketing environment under a defined marketing program.Market potential Is the limit approached by market demand as industry marketing expenditures approach infinity, for a given environment? Company demand Is the company’s estimated share of market demand at alternative levels of company marketing effort? Forecast Is the expected level of company sales based on a chosen marketing plan and an assumed marketing environment? A sales quota Is the sales goal set for a product line, company division, or sales representative? It is primarily a managerial device for defining and stimulating sales effort. A sales budgetIs a conservative estimate of the expected volume of sales and is used primarily for making current purchasing, production, and cash-flow decisions. Company sales potential ESTIMATING CURRENT DEMAND Total market potential Area market potential †¢Market-build-up method †¢Multiple-factor index method 3. Industry sales and market shares Estimating i ndustry sales and market shares (Identifying competitors and estimating their sales ESTIMATING FUTURE DEMAND Survey of buyers’ intentions Composite of sales force opinions Expert opinion Market test method PART 3 : CONNECTING WITH CUSTOMERS CHAP 5 CREATING LONG TERM LOYALTY RELATIONSHIPSBuilding customer value, satisfaction and loyalty Customer-perceived value (CPV) is the difference between the entire perceived customer’s evaluation of all the benefits and all the costs of an offering and the perceived alternatives. Applying value concepts The customer value analysis reveals the company’s strengths and weaknesses relative to those of various competitors. Delivering high customer value Loyalty is a deeply held commitment to rebuy a preferred product and service in the future despite situational influences and marketing efforts having the potential to cause switching behavior.The value proposition consists of the whole cluster of benefits the company promises to deliver. The value delivery system includes all the experiences the customer will have on the way to obtaining and using the offering. Total customer satisfaction Satisfaction is the difference between expectations and the product’s perceived performance. Product and service quality Quality is the totality of features and characteristics of a product or service which satisfy explicit or implicit needs. Maximizing customer lifetime value Customer profitabilityA profitable customer is a person, household or company that revenues are higher than the company’s costs for attracting, selling and servicing that customer. But it is a very difficult task, even for banks. Customer profitability analysis is an accounting study which estimates all revenue coming from a customer less all costs (distribution, phone calls, traveling to meet the client, gifts). Measuring customer life time value Customer lifetime value estimates future profits over customer’s lifetime purchases . You can find it p. 172. Cultivating customer relationshipsCustomer relationship management (CMR) Customer relationship management is the process of carefully managing detailed information about individual customers and all customer â€Å"touch points†to maximize customer loyalty. A touch point is any occasion on which a customer meets a brand and a product. One-to-one marketing Identify your prospects and customers, don’t go after everyone. 1. Differentiate customers in terms of (1) their needs and (2) their value to your company. Spend more efforts on the most valuable customers. Do the customer profitability analysis. 2.Interact with individual customers to improve your knowledge about their needs and build a stronger relationship. 3. Customize products, services, and messages to each customer. Increasing value of the customer base †¢ Reducing the rate of customer defection. †¢ Increasing the longevity of the customer relationship. †¢ Increase sells with new offerings and opportunities, like accessories for motorcycles if you sell Harley-Davidson. †¢ Making low-profit customers more profitable or terminating them. Like low-cost flying companies which charge customers for drinks or food. †¢ Focusing disproportionate efforts on high-value customers.Building loyalty Developing loyalty programs Frequency programs are design to provide rewards to customers who buy frequently and in substantial amounts. Many companies have created club membership programs. Customer databases and database marketing A customer database is an organized collection of comprehensive information about individual customers and prospects that is current, accessible and actionable for marketing purposes (sells, maintain relationships). Database marketing is the process of building, maintain and using customer databases to contact, transact and build customer relationships. Customer databasesCustomer database contains customers past purchases, demogra phics (age, birthday, and family members), psychographics (activities, interests), media graphics (preferred media) and other useful information. A business database contains past purchases, volumes, prices, profits, buyer team member names, assessment of competitors their strengths and weaknesses. Data warehouse and dataminig Companies use databases to: 1. Identify prospects 2. Decide which customer should receive a particular offer 3. To deepen customer loyalty 4. To reactivate customer purchases 5. To avoid serious customer mistakes CHAP 6 ANALYZING CONSUMER MARKETSWhat influences consumer behavior? Consumer behavior is the study of how individuals, groups and organizations select, use, and dispose of goods, services, ideas, or experiences to satisfy their needs and wants. Cultural factors Culture is the fundamental determinant of a person’s wants and behavior because of values. Subcultures provide more specific identification and socialization for their members. Subcultur es include nationalities, religion, racial groups†¦ Social classes are relatively homogeneous and enduring divisions in a society, hierarchically ordered and with members who share similar values, interests, and behaviors.Reference groups A person’s reference groups are all the groups that have a direct or indirect influence on their attitudes or behavior. Membership groups have a direct influence. Primary groups are in constant contact with the person (family, friends, neighbors, coworkers). Secondary groups are religious, professional, trade-union groups. Aspiration groups are those a person hopes to join. Dissociative groups are based on individual reject. Opinion leader is the person who offers informal advice or information about a specific productor product category. FamilyFrom family a person acquires an orientation toward religion, politics, and economics and a sense of personal ambition, self-worth, and love. It is a more direct influence on everyday buying beha vior. Role and status A role consists of the activities a person is expected to perform. Each role carriers a status Personal factors Personality is a set of distinguishing human psychological traits that lead to relatively consistent and enduring responses to environmental stimuli (including buying behavior). Brand personality is defined as the specific mix of human traits that we can attribute to a particular brand.Lifestyle is person’s pattern of living in the world as expressed in activities, interests, and opinions. Key psychological processes Motivation  : Freud, Maslow, Herzberg A need becomes a motive when its intensity drives us to act. Perception Perception is the process by which we select, organize, and interpret information inputs to create a meaningful picture of the world. Selective attention is the screening of stimuli and marketers must work hard to attract consumers’ notice. People are more likely to notice stimuli that relate to a current need Peop le are more likely to notice stimuli they anticipateSelective distortion is the tendency to interpret information in a way that fits our preconceptions. Because of the selective retention, we are pore likely to remember good points of a product we like and forget good points about competing products. Learning Learning comes from experiences and makes us changing our behavior. A drive is a strong internal stimulus impelling action. Cues are minor stimuli that determine when, where, and how a person responds. Discrimination means that we have learned to recognize differences in sets of similar stimuli and can adjust our responses accordingly.The hedonic bias says people are more likely to attribute failure to external causes and success to themselves. Memory Associative network memory model explains that information are stored and linked with a different level of strength. Brand associations consist of all brand-related thoughts, feelings, perceptions, images, experiences, beliefs, at titudes, and so on that become linked to the brand information stored. Memory encoding describes how and where information gets into memory. Memory retrieval is the way of the information gets out of the memory.The buying decision process Marketers must identify who makes the buying decision: people can be initiators, influencers, deciders, buyers, or users. Problem recognition Information search Personal: family, friends, neighbors. Commercial: advertising, web sites, salespersons, packaging, displays. Public: mass media. Experiential: handling, examining, is using the product. Market partitioning is the process of identifying the hierarchy of attributes that guide consumer decision making for the marketer to understand different competitive forces and how this various sets get formed.Evaluation of alternatives Belief is a descriptive thought that a person holds about something. Attitudes are a person’s favorable or unfavorable evaluations, emotional feelings, and action ten dencies towards some object or idea. Expectancy-value model of attitude formation shows that consumers evaluate products and services by combining their brand beliefs according to importance. Purchase decision Heuristics are rules of mental shortcuts in the decision process. With the conjunctive heuristic the customer looks for every attribute and chooses the irst alternative that meets the minimum standard for all attributes. With the lexicographic heuristic the customer chooses the best brand on the basis of its perceived most important attribute. With the elimination-by-aspects heuristic the customer compares brands and eliminates those which don’t correspond to the minimum acceptable cutoffs. The perceived risks can modify, postpone or avoid a purchase decision. Functional risk: the product does not perform up to expectations. Physical risk: the product could threat health or well-being of the user or others.Financial risk: the product is not worth the price paid. Social risk: the product results in embarrassment from others. Psychological risk: the product affects the mental well-being of the user. Postpurchase behavior Other theories of consumer decision making Level of consumer involvement Consumer involvement is the level of engagement and active processing responding to a marketing stimulus. Decision heuristics and biases The availability heuristic means that for example a customer who had troubles with a product would be more likely to purchase a future product with warranty.The representativeness heuristic means that the customer buy a product to be seen as representative of a whole category. The anchoring and adjustment heuristic means that the first impression determines the interpretation of the further information. That is why it is very important to make a first good impression for a salesperson, for instance. Mental accounting Mental accounting refers to the way consumers code, categorize, and evaluate financial outcomes of choices. Pro spect theory maintains that the consumers frame their decision alternatives in terms of gains and losses according to a value function.CHAPTER 7 ANALYSING CONSUMER MARKETS A The study of consumer behavior Consumer behavior is the study of when, why, how and where people do or do not buy products. It tries to understand the buyer wants and decision making process both individually and in groups. It also attempts to evaluate influences on the consumer from groups such as family, friends, reference groups, and society in general. Its can be divided into three interdependent dimensions: – The study of culture – The study of social group – The study of the individual CultureCulture is the essential determinant of a person’s wants and behavior. Every culture can be divided in subcultures that include nationalities, religions, geographic region etc and offer more precise identification for their members. Multicultural marketing appear to satisfy the different su bcultures. We can also observe different social classes with people who have the same values, interests and behavior. Each social class show diverse product and brand preferences on different level. Social groups a. Reference group A reference group is a group that influences people attitudes and behavior.There are different categories of groups: – Membership groups: have a direct influence on people (family, friends, colleagues†¦) – Aspirational groups: are thosea person wish to join – Dissociative groups: are thosea person, does not belong b. Family Family is the most influential primary reference group. There are two families: – Family of orientation: parents and sibling – Family of procreation: wife /husband children The individual consumer A consumer’s decisions are influenced by personal characteristics such as the age and stage in the life cycle, the occupation and economic, the life style and values and the buyer’s person ality.So to study and understand consumer behavior it’s really important to start with the consumer herself or himself. Explore into all these factors can provide clues to attain and serve consumers more effectively. B Key psychological process Motivation: Freud, Maslow, Herzberg a. Freud’s theory For Freud people ‘s behavior are unconscious. People not only react to their affirmed aptitudes, but also to other. b. Maslow’s theory c. Herzberg’s theory For Herzberg there are two different factors: – Dissatisfiers: factors that cause dissatisfaction – Satisfiers: factors that cause satisfactionThe sellers should try to keep away dissatisfiers’ factors and identify the principal satisfiers or motivator of purchase in the market and then provide them. I. Perception Perception is the processes by which we select organize and interpret information. People have different perception of the same object because of three perceptual processe s: – Selective attention – Selective distortion: tendency to interpret information in a way that fits our preconception – Selective retention: only preserve information that support our manners and beliefs II. Learning People learn from their experiences and change their behaviour.Marketers should build demand for a product by associating it with strong drives (internal stimulus pushing action), cues (minor stimuli) and providing positive support. III. Memory Memory is distinguished between to type of memory short-term memory and long-term memory. Marketing is a good way to be sure that consumers have the right type of products and services experiences to build the good brand knowledge and keep it in memory. Four main psychological processes affect consumer behavior r motivation, perception, learning, and memory. C Perspectives on consumer behaviorNumerous perspectives on consumer behavior can be considered: – The behaviorist perspective: focus on the imp act of external influences on consumer behavior – The information processing perspective: appeared in the 60’s and 70’s thinks about how consumers mentally process, store, retrieve and use marketing information in the decision process – The emotional perspective: consumers affections should be included in the explanation of consumer decision making – The cultural perspective: culture show consumers view – A multiperspective approach: consumers do not have unlimited mental resources D The buying decision process the five stage modelTo understand how consumer make buying decisions, marketers should identify who makes and has contribute into buying decision. People can be initiators, influencers, deciders, buyers or users. The classical buying process consists of the following succession of events: 1. Problem recognition (the buyer recognizes a problem) 2. Information search 3. Evaluation of alternatives 4. Purchase decision 5. Post purchase be havior (post purchase satisfaction, action, use and disposal) Marketers’ have to understand the consumer behavior at each stage. It’s not always easy because many different factors influence the diverse behavior.CHAPTER 8 : IDENTIFYING MARKET SEGMENTS AND TARGETS I. The business market versus the consumer market Business marketers have numerous characteristics that contrast with those of consumer markets: – Fewer larger buyers: deal with much bigger buyer than the consumer market – Close supplier customer relationship: suppliers adapt their offering to individual business customer needs – Professional purchasing: goods are bought by trained purchasing agents – Multiple buying influence: more people typically influence business buying decisions – Multiple sales calls Derived demand: the demand for business goods resulting from the demand for consumer goods – Inelastic demand: the demand for goods won’t change even if pric es change – Fluctuating demand: the demand for business goods and services tend to be more unstable than the demand for consumer goods and services – Direct purchasing: business buyers buy directly for manufactures II. Buying situations The business buyer faces many decisions in making a purchase. The number depends on the buying situation: complexity of the problem being solved, newness of the buying requirement, number of people involved and time requirement.There are three types of buying situations: – Straight Rebuy: The purchasing department reorders supplies and chooses from suppliers on an approved list. The suppliers’ effort to maintain service and product quality. Their goal is to get a small order and then enlarge their purchase share over time. – Modify rebuy: the buyer wants to change products specifications – New task: the buyer buys the product for the first time III. Systems Buying and Selling Originally,  «Ã‚  system buying   Ã‚ » is a practice about government purchases of major weapons and communications systems.Thus, many business buyers prefer to buy a total solution to a problem from one seller. A system selling is a key industrial marketing strategy in bidding to build large-scale industrial projects, such as dams, steel factory, irrigation systems, sanitation systems, pipelines, utilities and even new towns. B. Participants in the business buying process I. The buying centre The buying center consists of all those individuals and groups who contribute in the purchasing decision making process. Its include all members of the organization who take part in any roles in the purchase decision process. Initiators: request something be purchased – Users: use the product, initiate the buying proposal – Influencers: people who influence the buying decision – Deciders: decide on product requirements or on suppliers – Approvers: authorize the proposed actions – Buyers: have formal authority to select the supplier and arrange the purchase terms – Gatekeepers: have the power to prevent sellers or information from reaching member II. Buying centre influences Buying center typically include several participants with diverse interest.If the business marketers want to influence these participants they should try to be attentive to many factors such as environment, organization, individual, motivations and interpersonal influences. III. Buying centre targeting Business marketers should answer at some questions to target their efforts appropriately. Who are the major decision participants? What decisions do they influence? What is their level of influence? The small sellers focus on reaching the key buying influencers and larger sellers the multilevel in depth selling to attain many participants. C. The Purchasing/Procurement Process a. Purchasing Department PerceptionsRecent competitive pressures have led many companies to upgrade their purchasing departments and elevate administrators to vice presidential rank. These new, more strategically oriented purchasing departments have a mission to seek the best value from fewer and better suppliers. b. Purchasing Organization and Administration Some companies have started to centralize purchasing. Headquarters identifies materials purchased by several divisions and buys them centrally, gaining more purchasing clout. At the same time, companies are decentralizing some purchasing operations by empowering employees to purchase small-ticket items.D. Stages in the buying process The buying process consists of: 1. Problem recognition: the company recognizes a need that can be fixed by purchasing a good or service. 2. General need description and product specification:general characteristics and required quantity 3. Supplier search: identify the most appropriate suppliers 4. Proposal solicitation: invite the qualified suppliers to suggest proposals 5. Supplier selection: the buying center usually use a supplier evaluation to identify the most attractive suppliers 6. Order-routine specification: negotiations 7. Performance review: review of the chosen supplierE. Managing business to business relationship Business marketers must form strong bonds and relationships with their customers and provide them added value. Some customers, however, may prefer more of a transactional relationship. a. The Benefits of Vertical Coordination Much research had advocated greater vertical coordination between buying partners and sellers, so they can transcend merely transacting and instead engage activities that create more value for both parties. Building trust is one prerequisite to healthy long-term relationships. b. Business Relationships: Risks and OpportunismResearchers have noted that establishing a customer-supplier relationship creates tension between safeguarding and adaptation. Vertical coordination can facilitate stronger customer-seller ties but at the same time may increa se the risk to the customer’s and suppliers specific investments. Specific investments, however, also entail considerable risk to both customer and supplier. Transaction theory from economics maintains that because these investments are partially sunk, they lock the firms that make them into a particular relationship. I. Transactions cost economics F. Institutional and government marketsPART 4 : BUILDING STRONG BRANDS CHAPTER 9 CREATING BRAND EQUITY I. What is a brand equity A. Role of brand Permit to consumers evaluate products (of specific brands), in order to find their needs. Brand signal a certain level of quality. Brand offer security for customers and firms B. The scope (ampleur) of branding A brand resides in the minds of consumer as an identity One of the first branding strategy is: consumers must be convinced their meaningful differences among brands in products or services C. Defining brand equity -is the added value endowed on product and service customer based br and equity: the customer brand knowledge is + when he reacts more favorably to a product and –when reacts less favorably 3 keys for favorably react: different responses about consumer needs associated the brand of something (image†¦), and ensuring consumer has great experiences with products. D. Brand equity as a bridge -brand knowledge (decide by customer) dictates future direction of the brand – Brand promise: is what the brand is and must do for consumers So, money spend for marketing is an investment for consumers’ brand knowledge E. brand equity model 4 models of B. equity models brand asset valuator (p 283) 5 categories: differenciation,energy, revelance, estum, knowledge -brandz: (p 284) relationship with brand (pyramid) -AAKER model: typically elements (value, uses, meaning, origin country, personality, symbols) -brand resonance model (p 285): development, building objectives II. Building brand equity This is the creating to have the right brand kno wledge of consumers F. Choosing brand elements -It’s that identify and differentiate the brand -6 criteria: memorable, meaningful, likable, adaptable, transferable (for a new product, geography), protectable (not become generic as Kleenex, scotch).G. Designing holistic marketing activities Brand contact with the consumer, there are 3 phase: Personalization: -stop mass market, throwback to personalizing marketing. – Each customer is unique: one to one marketing -build a strong consumer’s relationship Integration: -traditional mix marketing isn’t adequately, now we need variet of marketing to reinforce the brand. (Sponsoring, communication, promotion, events†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. ) Internalization: -companies must adopt an international perspective Choose the right moment, link internal and external marketing and bring the brand alive for employees H.Leveraging (influence) secondary association Linking the brand with others information (p290), a brand can build equity by linking with others entities. III. Measuring brand equity 2 basic approaches: -Brand audit: uncover sources of brand equity, suggest way to improve its equity. Brand audit is use to prepare marketing plan -brand tracking studies: understanding thank to quantitative data from consumers, to facilitate day to day decision marketing. IV. Managing brand equity Brand management requires a long term view of marketing actions I. Brand reinforcement -Brand need to be carefully managed to surviveImprove product, service, and marketing Needs innovations/relevance throughout marketing program (p295) -marketing need some change to be competitive -brands need activities to awareness (new products, creatively design, ad campaign†¦) J. Brand revitalization New competitors can affect a brand, so brand have to be refresh Solution: -understanding the source of brand equity -bad association loosing the brand -create new positioning -change marketing program -come back to basic ima ge V. Devising (concevoir) a brand Strategy -Brand extension: establish brand with introduce a new one sub brand: new brand combine with existing brand -brand line: all product -License product: brand name has been licensed to make the product K. Branding decision Develop a brand name for a product: 4 strategies Individual name:(old el Paso) advantage, if the product is low quality brand is not hurt Blanket family name: development cost is lower because we don’t need research/add, to create recognition Separate family name for all products: ex: craftsman for tools Corporate name combined with individual product name: Kellogg: kellogg’scorn flakes L. Brand extension Advantages: -customers know parent brand don’t need to create awareness for marketing, communication Feed back effect: knowledge Disadvantages: -confusion with new product -harm, hurt parent brand with bad a product (Success characteristic f 9. 8 p301) M. Brand portfolio Marketers need multiple brands to pursue these segments. Aim goal of brand portfolio is maximize brand coverage. -low end entry: attract customers to brand franchise -high end prestige: prestige of brand with adds CHAPTER 10 CRAFTING THE BRAND POSITIONING SEGMENT MARKETING A market segment consists of a group of customers who share a similar needs and wants.Rather than creating the segments, the marketer’s task is to identify them and to decide which one to target. Market segments can be characterized in different ways, one approach is to: Identify preference segment categorized them by: Homogeneous preferences: if the customers have the same preferences Diffused preferences: the customer preference vary greatly in their requirement Clustered preferences: when natural market segment emerge from groups of customers with shared preferences NICHE MARKETING A niche is marketing is narrowly defined customers group seeking a distinctive mix of benefits or values.Marketers usually identify niches by dividing a m arket into subsegments. Niche markets are generally fairly small is term of volume but constitute a sufficientetly attractive size, profit and growth potential. Also they are less likely to attract many other powerful competitors †¢ Focusing their resources to gain economies though specialization LOCAL MARKETING Customizes merchandise to match the perceived demand of local areas The risk associated with localized marketing includes: †¢ A tendency to drive up the manufacturing costs and to reduce economies of scale Grassroots marketingINDIVIDUAL MARKETING Marketing one to one The researches seek to define segment by looking at descriptive characteristics: geographic, demographic and psychographic. GEOGRAPHIC SEGMENTATION Divide the market into different geographical units such as nations, states, regions†¦ DEMOGRAPHIC SEGMENTATION The market is divided into groups on the basic of variable such as ages, family size, occupation, race†¦ PSYCHOGRAPHIC SEGMENTATION Psy chographic profiles are typically developed with reference to three variables know as the AIO factors that describe individual lifestyle: 1. Activities 2. Interests . opinions BEHAVIOURAL SEGMENTATION Marketers place buyers into groups on the basic of their knowledge of, attitude towards, use of or response to a product. To compete more effectively many companies are now adopting target marketing. Instead of scattering their marketing efforts they are focusing on customers they have the greatest chance of satisfying. Target marketing includes three activities: market segmentation, market targeting and market positioning. STEPS IN SEGMENTATION PROCESS 1. Needs-based segmentation Group customers into segments based on similar needs 2. Segment identificationSegment by behavior, psychographic, individual, demographic and geographic 3. Segment attractiveness: Determine the attractiveness of each segment 4. Segment profitability: Determine segment profitability 5. Segment positioning: for each segment create a value proposition and product-price positioning strategy based on that segment’s unique customer need and characteristics 6. Segment â€Å"acid test†: create segment storyboard to test the attractiveness of each segment’s positioning strategy 7. Marketing mix strategy: Expand segment positioning strategy to include all aspects of the marketing mix: the 4PEFFECTIVE SEGMENTATION CRITERIA An effective segmentation must be: 1. Measurable: size, purchasing power†¦ 2. Substantial: the segment are large and profitable enough toserve 3. Accessible: the segment can be effectively reached and seved. 4. Differentiable: the segment are distinguishable 5. Actionable: effective programs can be formulates for attracting and serving the segments Positioning is the act of designing the company offering and image to occupy a distinctive place in the minds of the target market. The goal is to establish the brand in the mind of the consumers.The result o f positioning is the successful creation of a consumer- focused value proposition CHAPTER 11 : COMPETITVE DYNAMICS Without customers, you don’t have business Creating loyal customers is at the heart of every business, the only value your company will ever create is the value that comes from the customers. Managers who believe that costumer is the company’s only true â€Å"profit center† consider the traditional organization chart (first figure), successful marketing companies invert the chart (second figure) At the top the customer, the front line is the people who meet, serve and satisfy customersMany companies recognize the importance of satisfying theirs consumer in order to develop brand reputations that can deliver a sustainable competitive advantage The concept of costumer-perceived value enables marketers to discover what consumers want though the medium market research CUSTOMER-PERCEIVED VALUE (CPV) The CPVis the difference between the prospective custom er’s evaluation of all benefits and all the costs of an offering and the perceived alternatives. Total costumer benefit is the perceived monetary value of the bundle of economic, functional and psychological benefits consumers expect from given market offering.Total costumer cost is the perceived bundle of costs costumers expect to incur in evaluating, obtaining, using and disposing of the given market offering BUILDING CUSTOMER SATISFACTION Customers want loyalty, not perfection Customer can sense when a companies are consistently more loyal to investors, employees and regulators than to people who buy their products and services, customers are not being disloyal; they are being discriminating. The question is not how can we radically increase customer loyalty, but how can we radically increase our own loyalty to customers.To increase our sellers, we need to develop consumer’s loyalty Total customer satisfaction Whether the buyer is satisfied after purchase depends on the offer’s performance; if the performance falls short of expectations, the customer is dissatisfied, if the performance match the expectations, the customer is satisfied, if the performance exceeds expectations, the customer is highly satisfied or delighted. Customer assessments of product performance depend on many factors, especially the type of loyalty relationship the customer has with the brand.Although the customer-centre firm seeks to create a high customer satisfaction, that is not only his ultimate goal. Company might be able to increase its profitability by means other than increased satisfaction. Monitoring satisfaction Many companies are systematically measuring how well they treat their customers, identifying the factors shaping satisfaction and making changes in their operations and marketing as a result Customer satisfaction Companies should measure customer satisfaction regularly, because an important key to customer retention is customer satisfaction.A hig h customer satisfaction brings high profits, the customer stay longer; the customers are less sensitive to the price and pay less attention to the competing brand. Measurement techniques A number of methods exist to measure customer satisfaction for example periodic surveys, customer loss rate. Influence of customer satisfaction For customer-centre companies, customer satisfaction is both a goal and a marketing tool. Companies need to be especially concerned today with their customer satisfaction level.MAXIMIZING CUSTOMER LIFETIME VALUE Customer profitability A profitable customer is a person, household, or company that over time yields a revenue stream that exceeds by an acceptable amount the company’s cost stream for attracting, selling and servicing that customer. CULTIVATING CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS Maximizing customer-perceived value means cultivating long-term customer relationship. Companies are now moving away from wasteful mass marketing to precision marketing designed to build strong customer relationships.Customer relationship management Customer relationship management (CRM) is the process of carefully managing detailed information about individual customers and all customer â€Å"touch point† to maximize