STRANGE YET STYLISH HEADGEAR VR consumption and the construction of gender

This article examines how gender is inscribed and reproduced in the consumption of Virtual Reality (VR) technologies. The focus is on how virtual reality systems become embedded in 'everyday life' through leisure and consumption, and how the spectacles and disciplines associated with consumption sites produce gendered virtual subjects. Studies of new communications technologies have tended to polarize between 'cyberpunk'/'cyberfeminist' visions of bodily transcendence in 'cyberspaces', and the critique of such visions from social theorists who focus on the reproduction of social and cultural inequalities through technical systems. These approaches tend to neglect the specific sites in which the social relations of VR are played out. A 'multi-sited' ethnographic study of immersive virtual reality systems is the basis for discussion of how virtual reality technologies produce gender in specific sites. Virtual systems are positioned and used differently in various locales such as arcades and art galleries, bars and theme parks and cafes. The article discusses the practices of consumption which (re)produce and maintain conventional bodily and subjective boundaries. What relationships are becoming institutionalized? Are new conventions of gender created in these consumption relationships? The construction of spectacle and space, and the specific bodily disciplines required for participation in virtual realities in locations of consumption is particularly important in the formation of gender dynamics. Multiple subject positions are offered through competing technical, economic and cultural practices in diverse sites. These positions can establish new conventions of virtual identities and experiences, but also remain shot through with familiar operational categories of gendered identities and bodily practices. This article argues that immersive virtual reality technologies cannot be understood without some consideration of the locales in which they are embedded, and the social identities they make possible or constrain. A local, reflexive and feminist orientation assists in understanding the gendered dynamics associated with 'becoming virtual'.     

Informality,emotion and gendered career paths: The hidden toll of maternity leave on female academics and researchers

While the negative impact of child‐raising and caring on women's career progression in academia is well‐established, less is known about the role of academic women's lived experiences of maternity leave as an institutional practice. This article presents the findings of a qualitative study of the lived experiences of female academics and researchers in an Irish university. The analysis intrinsically links organizational structures and problems with the lived and felt dimensions of work. The findings point to the need for better structural accommodations for maternity leave which address the relationship between caring and career disadvantage within academia. The article adds to existing literature on the intersection of motherhood and academia by unpicking the specific role of maternity leave as both a lived experience and an institutional practice that can reinforce gender inequalities in academia.     

Behavioural Addictions in Adolescents and Young Adults: Results from a Prevalence Study

Our study aims to assess the prevalence of behavioural addictions in an adolescent population, evaluating the effects of gender and age, and to assess the correlations among different behavioural addictions. 2853 high school students were assessed in order to evaluate the prevalence of behavioural addictions such as Pathological Gambling (PG), Compulsive Buying (CB), Exercise Addiction (EA), Internet Addiction (IA), and Work Addiction (WA), in a population of Italian adolescents. The South Oaks Gambling Screen-Revised Adolescent (SOGS-RA), the Compulsive Buying Scale (CBS), the Exercise Addiction Inventory (EAI), the Internet Addiction Test (IAT), and the Work Addiction Risk Test (WART), were compiled anonymously by the students. Overall prevalence was 7.0% for PG, 11.3% for CB, 1.2% for IA, 7.6% for WA, 8.5% for EA. PG and EA were more common among boys, while gender had no effect on the other conditions. CB was more common among younger (<18 years old) students. The scores of all of these scales were significantly correlated. The strong correlation among different addictive behaviours is in line with the hypothesis of a common psychopathological dimension underlying these phenomena. Further studies are needed to assess personality traits and other clinical disorders associated with these problems behaviours.     

Physical activity is inversely related to drug consumption in elderly patients with cardiovascular events

Elderly patients with cardiovascular events are characterized by high drug consumptions. Whether high drug consumptions are related to physical activity is not known. In order to examine whether physical activity is related to drug consumption in the elderly, patients older than 65 years (n?=?250) with a recent cardiovascular event were studied. Physical activity was analyzed according to the Physical Activity Scale for the Elderly (PASE) score and related to drug consumption. PASE score was 72.4?±?45.0 and drug consumption was 8.3?±?2.2. Elderly patients with greater comorbidity took more drugs (8.7?±?2.1) and are less active (PASE?=?64.4?±?50.6) than patients with Cumulative Illness Rating Scale severity score higher than 1.8 than those with a score lower than 1.8 (76.3?±?41.4, p?<?0.05, and 8.0?±?2.0, p?=?0.006, respectively). Multivariate analysis correlation confirmed that PASE score is negatively associated with drug consumption (β?=??0.149, p?=?0.031), independently of several variables including comorbidity. Thus, physical activity is inversely related to drug consumption in elderly patients with cardiovascular events. This inverse relationship may be attributable to the high degree of comorbidity observed in elderly patients in whom poor level of physical activity and high drug consumption are predominant.     

Not without them: realising the sustainable development goals for women migrant workers

ABSTRACT

Drawing on multiple data sources, including key informant interviews, participant observation and archival study, this paper provides an analysis of the civil society’s role in foregrounding the agenda of women migrants in migration and development (M&D) fora, and reflects on its role in realising the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Yet, the dominant narrative within the state-led Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) tends to be a gender-blind migration for development approach, which emphasises national-level economic growth at the centre of migration processes, while negating the subjectivities of women migrants and neglecting their contributions to the global economy; this approach diverts attention to a narrow focus on macro-economic development through forms of financial remittances. Based on an examination of the GFMD as a site for gender mainstreaming M&D, we reflect on lessons learned as we look forward to achieving the SDGs. We argue that while the SDGs include some significant provisions for women in migration, only critical civil society advocacy and activism networked within grassroots organisations can address the structural changes necessary (such as a re-articulation of the care economy to value economic contributions of women’s reproductive work) to transform and improve the lived realities of women in migration and realise the SDGs in a manner that fosters their empowerment.     

The Formation and Development of New Zealand English: Interaction of Gender-Related Variation and Linguistic Change

This research assesses the relative roles played by men and women in the development of New Zealand English. Real-time evidence on the development of NZ English over the past fifty years is provided by comparison of speakers recorded in 1948 and their present day descendants recorded recently. Elements of two vowel shifts are studied, and particular attention is paid to the vowel variables in words such as MOUTH, TRAP and DRESS. Results indicate that women lead in changes which are new and dynamic, but lag behind men in the use of variables representing older changes. While these results mirror patterns of gender-related variation observed in other contexts, explanations in terms of prestige which are often assumed to account for this pattern of variation are found to be inadequate in the New Zealand case. Rather, a hypothesis in terms of dialect contact, and specifically women's preferred discourse strategies in contact situations, is used to explain the process and progress of linguistic change in NZ English.     

Studying the relationship between anxiety and school achievement: evidence from PISA data

Statistical Methods & Applications - Using the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2015 data for Italy, this paper offers a complete overview of the relationship between test...