Describes a study in New Zealand that examined the information behavior of people in daily life contexts. Results showed how users' expectations of the usefulness of information sources varied by gender and source characteristics, including accessibility, trustworthiness, and reliability. Suggests ways to encourage use of formal information…

Purpose: This paper describes one program that has developed a screening procedure for assessing elder mistreatment, with a special focus on elder neglect. The aim is to understand how expert neglect assessment teams process and diagnose complex geriatric cases referred for suspected elder neglect. What are the key themes that must be understood…

Widely viewed today by many taxpayers, business leaders, and elected officials as inefficient, ineffective, bureaucratic, public education is losing its once-noble brand position as the cornerstone of American democracy. According to Laura Ries, a marketing guru, the first problem is the name, it is called public education. It is because the…

Research has produced mixed results in evaluating whether people are influenced more by computer output than by other information. The present study examined how teachers' perceptions of psychological reports differ when the reports are identified as being produced by a computer program or by a school psychologist. Subjects were 40 experienced…

The Advertising section of the proceedings contains the following 16 papers: "Ethics of Advertising Practitioners: An Explanation Based on a Classical Theoretical Framework" (Cornelius B. Pratt and E. Lincoln James); "Sex Roles in Frightening Film Newspaper Advertisements: An Overview of the Past 50 Years" (Melissa M. Spirek);…

More than one-third of U.S. newspapers use various kinds of systematic survey research other than that provided by Gallup or Harris, and broadcast networks have polling units that are part of their news divisions. However, as most of the media employ them, opinion polls provide a genuine basis for "broad, sweeping generalizations." News…

A study investigated the perceived source credibility of organizations that produce health messages. Manipulated versions of a health advertisement were generated to represent three types of organizational sources: a nonprofit source, a for-profit source, and a combination of for-profit and nonprofit sources. The advertisements were then produced…

A key characteristic of multinational companies is a worldwide perspective and orientation in managerial decision making. In its quest for international opportunities, a multinational company confronts many problems and uncertainties in evaluating and dealing with political, legal, economic, social, cultural, and governmental policy variables and…

Working on the assumption that listeners would be more convinced and persuaded by a speaker with whom they could identify, a study asked black and white college students to evaluate a speaker with a black or white dialect, introducing them to an innovation in mathematics. Half of the black subjects were randomly assigned to listen to a black…

In order to test whether constant eye contact, formal posture, and varied vocal inflection increase source credibility and listener comprehension, 144 college students in an introductory speech communication course were placed in groups of equal size that listened to the same informative speech. The speaker presented to each group a different…

Several important ethical issues need to be addressed both by the consultant and the organization in the field of academic substance abuse consultation. Various problems face the university-based academician who consults with agencies and organizations, such as consultant abuse, i.e., when a consultant is hired on the basis of title and academic…

A study was designed to examine an underlying assumption regarding the use of the semantic differential in measuring the credibility and homophily of a communicator, namely, that responses to an ideal source position themselves at one extreme end of the scale, reflecting the monotonic function of the instrument such that the highest response…

Rating scales were developed and applied to evaluate deferential/nondeferential language users. Participants were 1,262 college students in small discussion groups containing two experimenter's confederates who used either deferential or nondeferential language. The characteristics of deferential language users were questioning/tentative behavior,…

The purpose of this study was to examine the socializing effect the viewing of adult-oriented commercials has on young children of differing socioeconomic backgrounds. The subjects, 227 children in the first, second, and third grades, included 109 lower-socioeconomic-level black children and 118 white children representing upper-middle-income…

This paper describes the author's perceptions of the reasons for the tarnished image of advisors and academic advisement. Specific problems are discussed under seven headings. These are: (1) Advisor Credibility, (2) Becoming Aware of Advisee Constructs, (3) Reducing Advisee Defensiveness concerning Related constructs, (4) Advisee Challenge of…