Steven Spielberg Essay Example for Free

Steven Spielberg Essay It is hard to imagine a person who has not heard of Steven Spielberg. He is one of the most renown, if not the most renown, American filmmakers of the century. His films have captivated and helped develop imaginations of contemporary society and remain among the most successful films ever made. Spielberg was born in Cincinnati on December 18th, 1946. His father was an electrical engineer, and his mother a concert pianist. Steven seemed to get the best elements from both of them. Spielberg had an early fascination with cinema and began making amateur films at a very young age. At 13, he won a local contest for his 40-minute film, Escape to Nowhere. Ironically, Steven was unable to get into a film school, so he settled for majoring in English Literature at California State University. After graduation, he set out to Hollywood, where he was determined to be successful. In 1974, he received his first break for The Sugarland Express. The film went on to win a Cannes Film Festival Award for best screenplay. The following year saw JAWS explode. This very successful horror film, depicting a man-eating shark, captured the attention of the world and has become part of contemporary pop culture. The movie was nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars and won several Oscars for technical categories and for its very distinctive score. JAWS was not the only film of his to make the 100 best films of the century list by the American Film Institute. Many of Steven Spielbergs works have been placed on that list, and many are so timeless, they will live in the hearts of generations to come. Such films as Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E. T. , Indiana Jones, and Jurassic Park have become legendary. In Spielbergs down time, he stringed together a personal little film about a suburban boy who befriends an earthbound alien, also known as E. T. for Extra-Terrestrial. It hit theaters in 1982 and became an instant classic and is still the defining film of his landmark-filled career. This magical and exceedingly sentimental film surpassed even George Lucas Star Wars to become one of the biggest domestic moneymakers of all time. He has the unparalleled talent of capturing peoples imagination and dreams, but at the same time tapping into humanities darkest nightmares. In 1993, Spielberg made Schindlers List, a haunting epic that showed the Holocaust in its ugly truth. The film would eventually win him a Best Picture Oscar. It has now become part of the regular curriculum in many schools and is considered by many to be the most significant film of this generation. In 1998, Spielberg came out with Saving Private Ryan, which captured war in gory and shocking detail as his soldiers stormed the beaches of Normandy. This again shows his willingness to deal with larger, more serious issues. Further profiting as a producer of other directors its like Poltergeist, Back to the Future and Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Spielberg became one of the richest and most powerful players in Hollywood. In 1984, he founded Amblin Entertainment and used the E. T. logo as its trademark. While this was doing well, Spielberg wanted more control over his projects and did not want any other studios interfering with his work. In 1994, along with several other industry hotshots, they created the first new movie studio in Hollywood in over 75 years- Dreamworks. The company covers all its bases and produces live action and animated movies, music, computer games, arcades, television productions, and distribution. Spielberg owns approximately 22% of Dreamworks and he is worth around 1 billions dollars. His average salary is $238 million a year! A defining characteristic of a Steven Spielberg movie is the elaborate costs of making movies, huge box office returns, and many award nominations. For example, Jurassic Park was a special effects-laden adaptation of Michael Crichton dinosaur disaster novel of the same game that cost $70 million to make. But, it grossed $100 million in nine days on its way to completely shattering his own record in E. T. Schindlers List finally earned Spielberg his long-awaited Oscars for Best Director and Best Picture. Most people know that Steven Spielberg is a director, but not all know that he is an amazing producer and writer with endless movies and shows under his belt. Some examples of movies he directed are: JAWS (1975), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), E. T. (1982), Twilight Zone: The movie (1983), Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), Hook (1991), Jurassic Park (1993), The Lost World (1997), Amistad (1997), and Saving Private Ryan (1998). There are too many shows and movies to state in this paper that Spielberg has either produced or written. Some of these movies are: Poltergeist (1982), Gremlins (1984), Back to the Future (1985), Goonies (1985), Cape Fear (1991), Twister (1996), Men in Black (1997), Deep Impact (1998), and soon to be released in the Summer of 2001, Jurassic Park 3. Steven Spielberg has also written and produced many cartoon shows like Animaniacs that are still entertaining children five years later. Many of his movies have been cartoons such as: An American Tail (1986), The Land Before Time (1988), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), and Fievel Goes West (1991). No matter if a person is 5 or 50, every generation can find a Steven Spielberg movie that is to their liking. If a person watches a Spielberg film carefully, one can see many defining characteristics that are basically present in every movie. The storylines never cease to be interesting and deep. He will usually choose characters that the general public can relate to and issues that large groups of people have dealt with. For example, my grandfather fought in World War II and received a Purple Heart for being a POW. He is an avid fan of old war movies and can usually watch them with no problem because he says, they are not realistic enough. I went with my grandfather to see Saving Private Ryan in the theater and after 20 minutes, he starting shaking and crying and said he couldnt bear to watch because it was bringing back far too horrible memories. Many of his other war buddies had a similar reaction and stated that Saving Private Ryan was the most accurate depiction of the invasion of Normandy they had ever seen. Spielberg has a talent of recreating an event perfectly, right down to the exact set and even perfect gun replicas. The sets from Jurassic Park, Saving Private Ryan, Indiana Jones, and Schindlers List are extremely elaborate and enormous and cost millions of dollars. Archaeologists and prehistoric experts were brought in to oversee the miniature models of the dinosaurs and even the plants to ensure that they were as close to the truth as possible. Spielberg also uses a variety of camera angles to invoke moods and feelings in his viewers. He is famous for his head shots during an emotional scene and also letting you see through the eyes of various characters in his films. This makes the audience feel more involved in the movie and can keep the audience on the edge of their feet when something unexpected happens. Personally, I cant imagine what movies and television would be like if Steven Spielberg hadnt burst onto the scene some three decades ago. My first movie that I ever saw in the theater was E. T. when I was barely two years old. I can not begin to remember how many times I watched such classics like JAWS, Goonies, Gremlins, The Land Before Time, and An American Tail while growing up. Some of my fondest memories as a child was sitting with my two-year-old brother on my lap and watching little Petrie and Sarah in The Land Before Time. I would explain to him that Sharptooth wasnt really real and that he didnt have to hide under the covers at night. I used to ice skate when I was younger and chose theme songs from Spielberg films like Somewhere Out There from American Tail and the main song from Indiana Jones. In conclusion, Steven Spielberg is arguably the most famous and most recognized producer/writer/director in the world. His list of films is endless, as well as the awards he as been nominated for or won. My generation has grown up with his films and no matter what age a person may be, there is a Steven Spielberg movie out there for them to watch and love. Bibliography References Taylor, P. (1992). Steven Spielberg: The man, his movies, and their meaning. Continuuminternational. Powers, T. (1996). Steven Spielberg: Master Storyteller. Lerner Publishing Company. Brode, D. (1994). The Films of Steven Spielberg. Carol Publishing Group. Crawley, T. (1990). The Steven Spielberg Story. Morrow, William ; Company. McBride, J. (1997). Steven Spielberg. Simon and Schuster Trade. Knight, B. (1998). Steven Spielberg: Master of Movie Magic. Silver Burdett Press

Effect Of Caffeine On Breathing And Pulse Rate Biology Essay

Effect Of Caffeine On Breathing And Pulse Rate Biology Essay Caffeine is a natural chemical substance known to have stimulant properties within the body (Addicott MA Laurienti PJ, 2009). Prior research focused on caffeines ability to affect ventilation, blood pressure, mood, and mental stress (Kennedy MD et al. 2008; Addicott MA Laurienti PJ, 2009). Their findings concluded that caffeine actually spiked blood pressure, ventilation and heart rate (Kennedy MD et al., 2008); while others claimed that it had no effect on heart rate or breathing (Ratliff-Crain J et al., 1989). Some gaps in these studies were that very few actually measured the rate of breathing, but rather focused on the volume of breathing and the percent oxygen saturation/diffusion (Chapman R Stager JM, 2008), as well as blood pressure, rather than heart rate (Ratliff-Crain J et al., 1989). This experiment aimed at finding a clear relationship between ingesting caffeine, and its effect, if any, on breathing and heart rate, after the subjects performed incremental stepping exercises. The significance of this study is vital in sport, particularly caffeines role in the Olympics (Spriet LL, 1995), and its potential as a prophylactic in treating asthma (Welsh EJ et al., 2010). Methods: See School of Biological Sciences (2010). Refer to Appendix (1) for the hypotheses. Results: Using the t-test it was found that the mean (+/- range) change in pulse rate was not significantly different between non-caffeine (Group A) and caffeine (Group B) treated subjects (t=0.4, df=161, P=0.7 ie P>0.05). (Refer to Appendices 2a, 2b,3a, and 3b for the data and t-test) Figure 1: The mean of changes in the pulse rate of non-caffeinated (control) and caffeinated (treatment) participants after performing a stepping exercise. Error bars are the range. N=140 and n= 75 for the non-caffeinated and caffeinated groups respectively. Using a paired two sample for mean t-test it was found that the mean (+/- range) change in respiration rate was not significantly different between non-caffeine (Group A) and caffeine (Group B) treated subjects (t=-0.7, df=132, P=0.5 ie P>0.05). (Refer to Appendices 2a, 2b,3a, and 3b for the data and t-test) Figure 2: The mean of changes in the breathing rate of non-caffeinated (control) and caffeinated (treatment) participants after doing a stepping exercise. Error bars are the range. N=140 and n= 75 for the non caffeinated and caffeinated groups respectively. Discussion: The results of the investigation revealed that the difference in mean pulse rate change between the two groups was 1.1 BPM and the mean breathing rate was 1 BRPM. This indicated that there were no significant difference between mean change in pulse rate and breathing rate between the group that was taking the caffeinated drink (treatment), and the group that ingested the non -caffeinated beverage (control). Therefore, since (P>0.05) the null hypothesis (HO) was accepted, and the alternative hypothesis (HA) was rejected. Prior research revealed that caffeine had no significant effect on the ventilator responsiveness or exercise ventilation on exercise -induced subjects following the administration of a moderate dose of caffeine (8mg per kilogram of body weight). Any modest increase in breathing rate was attributed to caffeines secondary effect on the Central Nervous System, rather than a direct effect on the respiratory system (Chapman R Stager JM, Caffeine stimulates ventilation in athletes with exercise-induced hypoxemia, 2008). However, other studies have suggested that caffeine acted in the manner of a ventilator stimulant and increased the breathing rate of individuals (Chapman R Mickleborough TD, 2009). Similar studies found that caffeine increased the mean change in pulse rate by 6 beats/min an hour after ingesting caffeinated coffee (350mL, 140mg of Caffeine). This revealed that while caffeine may affect the heart rate, its relative impact had no significant effect (Kennedy MD et al., 2008). Further research concluded that regular consumption of coffee could not increase the heart rate and blood pressure; unless consumed chronically and excessively (Ratliff-Crain J et al., 1989). The experimental data revealed that naturally there were a large range of values, beginning from as low as {3 BPM, 1 BRPM} and peaking to {110 BPM, and to 62 BRPM} respectively. The issue with having such a large range was that it masked any significance to the mean. The extreme data points would distort the mean value, even if caffeine had proven to have a significant effect. Thus, its effect would not be reflected in the results. Whilst increasing the sample size and repeating the experiment a number of times would improve the reliability of the experiment, it would do little to increase the precision of results. This is due to the presence of natural variation. Different people have differing athletic ability, sensitivity to caffeine, or gender differences, which the sample sizes (n=140 and n=75), did not account for. The failure to take account for the nature of the sample sizes greatly reduced the power of the experiment. Research suggests that males and females may actually hav e distinct responses (Kennedy MD et al., 2008), and so must be accounted for separately. This could be improved by separating the caffeinated and non- caffeinated groups into gender types, and perhaps only observing its effect on athletes (Chapman R Stager JM, Caffeine stimulates ventilation in athletes with exercise-induced hypoxemia, 2008). The amount of coffee may have been too small experimentally to produce a noticeable effect. Switching the dose to a full cup of coffee could enhance the effects of caffeine (Kennedy MD et al., 2008), or perhaps the length of time between ingestion and exercise was too short. Increasing the period from 1 hour to 2 hours could give caffeine more time to produce its effects (Kennedy MD et al., 2008). The accuracy of the results could have been improved by using more sophisticated counting methods to measure heart rate like using a digital pulse readout (i.e. an ECG), or percentage arterial oxyhemoglobin saturation to measure ventilation, which would produce more accurate results (Chapman R Stager JM, Caffeine stimulates ventilation in athletes with exercise-induced hypoxemia, 2008). The implication of this study is particularly important in the issue of caffeine bans from the International Olympic Committee, and whether or not it provides legal ergogenic advantage to athletes in short distance running or other aerobic activities. The rules governing caffeine ingestion prior to exercise may be revised if caffeine is proven to have substantially enhanced the athletes pulmonary capabilities (Spriet LL, 1995). Other future studies of caffeine include developing prophylactics for asthma (from its anti-inflammatory and bronchodilator properties). Randomised clinical trials have already confirmed improvements in lung function after using caffeine. This could produce new front line drugs to treat asthma (Welsh EJ, 2010). In conclusion, the caffeinated and non caffeinated groups showed a slight mean difference of 1.1 BPM and 1 BRPM, but statistically, there were no significant change in the mean heart rate or the mean breathing rate, which means the null hypothesis was accepted (P>0.05), and the effects of caffeine was not proven conclusive on either. References: Addicott MA, Laurienti PJ. (2009). A comparison of the effects of caffeine following abstinence and normal caffeine use. Psychopharmacology , 207 (3), 423-31. Chapman R, Mickleborough TD. (2009). The effects of caffeine on ventilation and pulmonary function during exercise: an often-overlooked response. Phys Sportsmed. , 37 (4), 97-103. Chapman RF, Stager JM. (2008). Caffeine stimulates ventilation in athletes with exercise-induced hypoxemia. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise , 40 (6), 1080-6. Graham TE, Hibbert P, Sathasivam P. (1998). Metabolic and exercise endurance effects of coffee and caffeine ingestion. Journal of Applied Physiology , 85 (3), 883-9. Kennedy MD, Galloway AV, Dickau LJ, Hudson MK. (2008). The cumulative effect of coffee and a mental stress task on heart rate, blood pressure, and mental alertness is similar in caffeine-naÃÆ'Â ¯ve and caffeine-habituated females. Nutrition Research. , 28 (9), 609-614. Ratliff-Crain J, OKeeffe MK, Baum A. (1989). Cardiovascular reactivity, mood, and task performance in deprived and nondeprived coffee drinkers. Health Psychol. 1989 , 8 (4), 427-427. School of Biological Sciences, The University of Sydney. (2010). Human Biology: Unit of Study Manual for Students. Spriet LL. (1995). Caffeine and Performance. International Journal of Sport Nutrition. , S84-99. Welsh EJ, Bara A, Barley E, Cates CJ.(2010). Caffeine for asthma. Cochrane Database Systematic Reviews. 1(1): CD001112.

The indoctrination of the Concept of Racial Hygiene: The Begining of t :: essays research papers fc

The Indoctrination of the Concept of Racial Hygiene: The Beginning of the End   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The idea of biological degeneration had been studied by doctors, psychiatrists, and scientists many decades before the 1930’s and the Nazi regime were ever in power. The idea that the integrity of populations was being undermined by behaviors of alcoholism, criminality, or mental deficiency was a topic for researchers before anyone even knew who Adolf Hitler was. In this essay I will discuss the evolution of a concept that would become known as racial hygiene. In my examination of this idea I will explore the educational tools, the propaganda machine, and the eventual mobilization of a nation towards this ideological organization of a supreme race in Nazi Germany.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The aforementioned idea that nations were being undermined by increasing cohorts of unfit individuals has some scientific and political significance. Cell biologist August Weissman coined the term defective ‘germ plasm’ and contended that it was this defective plasm that was to blame for these unfit individuals’ behaviors. In the early 1900’s there were a rising number of eugenic pioneers that would try and continue the study of the ideas of Weissman. There was a ‘gene race,’ much like the more contemporary space race, that occurred between various countries around the turn of the century.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  As these studies became better known, their political implications became magnified. In 1909 the world’s first professorial chair in eugenics was established. Now as international scientists begin to explore the possibility of a defective germ plasm existing political divides begin to form. As the studies became more and more intense the idea that a nation could be improved by selective breeding became the focus. This would eventually become the premise for eugenics theorists.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The debate over the validity of the theory of eugenics was the question posed by â€Å"ethically aware and responsible† scientists to prove eugenics without using pseudo-scientific assumptions.2 Although the challenges to eugenics were strong the post World War I depression would bring the rise to more intense challenges against the conservation of people who were burdensome both biologically and economically to a nation. A number of nations that were suffering mass depression would look to eugenics as one of the reasons for their pain and suffering.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  As the debate over eugenics continued to keep scientists on both sides of the argument hard at work, discussions of euthanasia would begin to surface. One of the main arguments that arose was that there could be an opportunity to reduce costs.

El Niño, A Non-technical Description :: essays research papers

El Nià ±o, A Non-technical Description An El Nià ±o is a temporary change in the climate of the Pacific ocean, in the region around the equator. You can see its effects in both the ocean and atmosphere, generally in Northern Hemisphere winter. Typically, the ocean surface warms up by a few degrees celsius. At the same time, the place where hefty thunderstorms occur on the equator moves eastward. Although those might seem like small differences, it nevertheless can have big effects on the world's climate. o  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  What causes it? o  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  What makes it stop growing? o  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  What effects does it have? o  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  How long does it last? o  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  How often do we get them? o  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  How well can we predict El Nià ±o? o  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  A more technical explanation What causes it? Usually, the wind blows strongly from east to west along the equator in the Pacific. This actually piles up water (about half a meter's worth) in the western part of the Pacific. In the eastern part, deeper water (which is colder than the sun-warmed surface water) gets pulled up from below to replace the water pushed west. So, the normal situation is warm water (about 30 C) in the west, cold (about 22 C) in the east. In an El Nià ±o, the winds pushing that water around get weaker. As a result, some of the warm water piled up in the west slumps back down to the east, and not as much cold water gets pulled up from below. Both these tend to make the water in the eastern Pacific warmer, which is one of the hallmarks of an El Nià ±o. But it doesn't stop there. The warmer ocean then affects the winds--it makes the winds weaker! So if the winds get weaker, then the ocean gets warmer, which makes the winds get weaker, which makes the ocean get warmer ... this is called a positive feedback, and is what makes an El Nià ±o grow. Back to top So what makes it stop growing? The ocean is full of waves, but you might not know how many kinds of waves there are. There's one called a Rossby wave that is quite unlike the waves you see when you visit the beach. It's more like a distant cousin to a tidal wave. The difference is that a tidal wave goes very quickly, with all the water moving pretty much in the same direction. In a Rossby wave, the upper part of the ocean, say the top 100 meters or so, will be lesirely sliding one way, while the lower part, starting at 100 meters and going on down, will be slowly moving the other way.

New York City A Diverse Area :: essays research papers

New York City is a diverse area. It contains hundreds of different tracts with one different from the other. I am going to be comparing Hunter's tract, which is 120 with my tract, which is 721. After comparing these two tracts, I am going to compare them both to the entire city of New York. The pace where I live in is Forest Hills, Queens. NYC contains Demographic Characteristics such as total population. In all of New York, to be exact, there are 8,008,278 people in all. Hunter's tract contains 3,965 people. In my tract there are 5,243 people. By looking at this data, it shows that there is a larger population in my tract. Sex and Age in my tract is similar to Hunter's tract and NYC. In all three there are more females than males. Tract 721 has 46% males and 54% females. Hunter's tract has 43.6% males and 56.4% females. NYC as a whole has 47.3% males and 52.7% females. The difference in all three is the median age. Hunter's tract is the oldest one with 51.1 years. The second oldest one is my tract with a median age is 41.9 years. NYC has a median age of 34.2 years. I believe it is so young because, a lot of babies are being born. Educational Attainment and Income are very important. It matters how much education you have in order to have a good job and a higher income. Hunter's tract is more educated then the tract where I live in. There is an enormous difference between the two. In Hunter's tract, people with no high school diploma are only 3.4%. My tract's calculation for no high school diploma is 17.9%. That's almost 6 times as much. With bachelors degree or higher in my tract, there is 38.7%. In Hunter's tract it is 74.8%. That's almost double. This shows that there are greater amounts of educated people in Hunter's tract then my tract. NYC as a whole has almost the same percentage with no high school diploma as to people with bachelor's degree or higher. No high school diploma is 24.7% and bachelors degree or higher is 27.4%. This shows that there are less educated people in New York. Income is the same as educational attainment. There is a much greater income in Hunter's tract than in my tract. The median household income in tract 721 is $33,402.

Application of Forensic Psychology within a trial: R vs. Golds

Introduction Before delving into the applications and relevant theories in Forensic Psychology in this case, it is first necessary to summarise the particulars of this case. This will allow for the evidence to be objectively assessed, and then broken down as the empirical evidence provided by the field of Forensic Psychology pertains to specific points. This will allow for the value of various aspects of the evidence on both sides to be assessed, which may result in a re-evaluation of the overall verdict. The psychological evidence will then be evaluated within the relevant theoretical framework, and these theories will in turn be critically analysed so that the degree to which the relevant findings and theories of forensic psychology can be used to interpret the meaning and weight of evidence in this case can be evaluated. The defendant was convicted of murdering his wife, but appealed against conviction on the grounds that he was suffering from a mental illness and therefore was impaired substa ntially enough to meet the criteria for manslaughter, not murder. The appeal was dismissed. Although the defendant admitted killing his wife he did not give evidence at the trial, stating that he was not in a fit mental state. A voir dire by a medical expert, B, attested to the fact that the defendant ought not to give evidence due to his mental state, and when recounting this to the jury the judge ruled that no adverse inference should be drawn from this. The judge did however not allow evidence from B to be given at the trial. The evidence in support of the defence was given by three expert medical witnesses all attesting to the deteriorating mental state of the defence and that the criteria for diminished responsibility were satisfied. No medical testimony disputed this. Evidence admitted by the judge against the defence came from the defendant’s daughter, S, who recounted a conversation in which the defendant admitted assaulting the victim on a prior occasion. This was ta ken as evidence of the defendant’s bad character. During the trial there was some discussion of the definition of the term ‘substantially impaired’; the defence counsel defined the term as anything ‘more than trivial[ly impaired]’ but the judge refused this definition and declined to give the jury any further guidance as to the legal definition of this term. A verdict of manslaughter would suggest that the defendant was not able to fully understand the nature of what he was doing, make a rational decision and exercise self-control (Morse, 2003). Of course the legal definition of ‘substantially impaired’ is also relevant; as it is defined by the English Homicide Act (1957) substantial impairment is constituted either by a ‘common sense’ standard or by any degree of impairment which is more than trivial but less than total (Prevezer, 1957). Whether the defendant reaches the threshold for these definitions of substantially impa ired will decide whether he is convicted of manslaughter or murder. One issue raised by the defendant in the appeal was that although the judge did explicitly state that the jury was not to draw any condemning inference from the defendant’s lack of testimony, he failed to remind the jury that S’s evidence should be considered with caution, because the defendant was not able to give any account of the alleged conversation. According to the literature in forensic psychology there could be valid grounds to this claim, however the claim itself could also be redundant entirely. This is because jurors do indeed evidently find it difficult to evaluate the weight of evidence and draw inferences appropriately (Thomas and Hogue, 1976). Thomas and Hogue (1976) developed a decision-making model for jurors, showing broadly that the weight jurors will ascribe to evidence varies across the population according to a variety of factors relevant to the characteristics of the jury. In th is model the decision threshold which defines whether the jury votes for the plaintiff or defendant varies little across the population but may vary between cases and be affected by factors such as instructions to jurors. This latter point is very important because it addresses the effect that instructions to the jury can have, even a small effect could have made a substantial difference to the way the jury regarded evidence. Evidence suggests that this is particularly the case with emotionally-charged evidence which is pertinent to this case, Cush and Delahunty (2006) found that mock jurors who received no pre-evidence instructions to consider emotionally evocative evidence (gruesome photographs) dispassionately or with caution gave more verdicts in favour of the victim and scored higher on measures of victim compassion and crime negativity than did jurors who did receive such instruction. Embedded within cognitive theory this evidence supports the defendant’s position on th is point; without all of the pertinent evidence with the appropriate weights the juror as a sense-making machine would not be able to reach an informed decision (Pennington and Hastie, 1991). The heuristics and biases approach (Griffin, Gonzalez and Varey, 2001) views decision-making, thought and perception as vulnerable to various cognitive biases and distortions from mental archetypes. One such source of bias has been dubbed ‘WYSIATI’, or ‘what you see is all there is’. This notion is important in a forensic context because the jury will naturally find it difficult to take into account evidence that is not readily presented to them (Neal and Grisso, 2014) especially when presented with material evidence which contradicts it. Another point to consider is the value of S’s evidence; factors which may be important to consider are the age of the witness (Ceci, Ross and Toglia, 1987), the power of hindsight and the nature of reconstructive memory (Leippe , 1980). According to a retrieval theory of memory, recognition and recall styles of memory are possible through a resonance-style spreading-activation pattern of retrieval attempts (Ratcliff, 1978). When a search of memory in this way is performed, certain archetypes or contextual information and assumptions about the objects in memory may fill in gaps or add meaning; depending on the age of the witness this may be even more important, because young children are more susceptible to such biases (Ceci, Ross and Toglia, 1987; Leippe, 1980). There may have been subtleties in the alleged conversation with the defendant which would reinterpret the meaning, especially in light of the defendant’s alleged mental illness which S could have missed in her memory of the conversation. Even if the judge had instructed the jury to treat S’s evidence with caution though, the question is what effect would this have had on the verdict. The answer would seem to be that even though it may have changed the jury’s perception of the evidence (Cush and Delahunty, 2006), this would not have substantially affected the verdict because the evidence of S was of limited significance in the first place because of the strength of other evidence that the defendant had abused the victim. A cognitive decision-makin framework would see people evaluating this evidence overall in favour of the victim (Pennington and Hastie, 1991). In addition to this it was made clear to the jury that the case of the defendant was that he had not abused the victim. This makes it a somewhat trivial point in the overall case. Cognitive theory is useful in the context of forensic psychology because it provides a framework for the decision-making process to be understood, and an opportunity for the value of evidence to be quantified. The theory does view human beings as rational agents who are able to objectively consider evidence, simply adding additional weight to emotional evidence. This could be seen as reductionist as it ignores a wealth of human experience and much of the cultural meaning inherent in cases such as this one. The spreading-activation theory of memory also has its opponents. Some memory researchers prefer to view memory errors as arising from consolidation or encoding errors (Squire and Alvarez, 1995). Both are useful in a forensic psychology context but it is important to remember that the evidence is interpreted theoretically, and there must still be a weight assigned to evidence based on theory. It must therefore be acknowledged that the interpretation of evidence is at least somewhat arbitrary based on these theories. A second point in the appeal was that the judge was supposedly wrong to not allow the evidence of B to go before the jury. The value of expert witnesses is debateable in the literature, assuming that their professional opinions within their fields are valid and reliable, the problem arises with the effect their testimony has on the jury. Expert testimony usually affects the credence that the jury gives to the testimony or stance of the individuals being evaluated, and in this case the evidence of B may well have contributed to the judge’s decision to instruct the jury to draw no condemning inference from the defendant’s lack of testimony. Due to certain cognitive biases, the message an expert tries to convey may not be received by the jury as intended, which may vindicate the judge’s decision to not allow B’s testimony. Jury members will often ascribe disproportionate impact to expert testimony (Krafka, Dunn, Johnson, Cecil et al., 2002), meaning the intended message is exaggerated or otherwise distorted resulting in jurors who may believe something contrary to what the literature on mental illness suggests. B had stated that the defendant was not in a fit state to give testimony, and attested to the reality of his mental illness and deteriorating mental state despite the usage of antips ychotic medication. This last point may be of particular importance because members of the general public may not have a full understanding of the research into the effects of antipsychotics (Jorm, Korten, Rodgers, Pollitt et al., 1997) which B presumably did have. If the jury believed that antipsychotics could cure the defendant’s mental illness then this could lead to them drawing a condemning inference. The weight that B’s evidence would have had is in question though because of the already substantial amount of evidence in support of the existence and chronic worsening of the defendant’s mental illness. This is an issue because if the jury was already convinced that the defendant was indeed mentally ill at the time of the killing and still voted to convict the defendant of murder then the impact B’s evidence may have had is a moot point. The only remaining question is whether B’s testimony would have added anything to the testimony of the other experts due to the voir dire examination. It does seem unlikely that the testimony of B would have differed significantly from the other experts, and due to the evidence suggesting that the individual persuasive ability of experts has more of an impact on jurors than the content of their message (Bank and Poythress, 1982) the judge was probably right to not allow the additional expert testimony. A criticism of most of this research is that it mostly uses mock jurors, and also the mock cases obviously involved different experts and circumstances to the one in question. This means that the effect may be more or less pronounced in this scenario, but the evidence is from a very relevant context and is extremely likely to still be useful. The only potential problem lies in the participants not taking the mock case as seriously as they would a real case. The general population may not have a good understanding of mental illness or mental capacity as these terms are defined in legal disco urse (Jorm, 2000) which did necessitate at least some expert testimony. Another point is that the judge did not give any contrasting definition for the term ‘substantially impaired’ when the defence counsel offered the definition of ‘anything impairment more than trivial’. Although this was submitted as grounds for appeal, the evidence suggests that if anything this point would have resulted in the jurors adopting a standard of impairment that was too liberal by legal standards. This is because jurors and indeed people in general are not as able to disregard presented information as readily as most people believe (Lieberman and Arndt, 2000). According to theories in social psychology, hindsight bias and belief perseverance can lead to jurors actually relying on inadmissible evidence more than other evidence (Lieberman and Arndt, 2000). This is very useful research in this context because it highlights the importance of presented information; the definition offered by the defence counsel will be given inappropriate attention. Since the verdict was still to convict, this suggests strongly that the court was right to dismiss the appeal. In light of the strength of the evidence and theory reviewed and the applications in this case, it is clear that the second and third points submitted by the defendant in the appeal were properly rebuffed by the judge, in fact the evidence suggests that these issues would have worked in the defendant’s favour if the judge had responded differently. As for the first point, it appears from the research that any effect on jury perception would be negligible, although there is some conflict in the literature as to the effect of instructions of limitation from the judge. References Morse, S. J. (2003). Diminished rationality, diminished responsibility. Ohio St. J. Crim. L., 1, 289. Prevezer, S. (1957). The English Homicide Act: A New Attempt to Revise the Law of Murder. Columbia Law Review, 624-652. Thomas, E. A., & Hogue, A. (1976). Apparent weight of evidence, decision criteria, and confidence ratings in juror decision making. Psychological Review,83(6), 442. Cush, R. K., & Delahunty, J. G. (2006). The influence of limiting instructions on processing and judgments of emotionally evocative evidence. Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, 13(1), 110-123. Griffin, D., Gonzalez, R., & Varey, C. (2001). The heuristics and biases approach to judgment under uncertainty. Blackwell handbook of social psychology: Intraindividual processes, 1, 207-235. Neal, T., & Grisso, T. (2014). The cognitive underpinnings of bias in forensic mental health evaluations. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 20(2), 200. Pennington, N., & Hastie, R. (1991). Cognitive theory of juror decision ma king: The story model, A. Cardozo L. Rev., 13, 519. Ceci, S. J., Ross, D. F., & Toglia, M. P. (1987). Suggestibility of children’s memory: Psycholegal implications. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 116(1), 38. Leippe, M. R. (1980). Effects of integrative memorial and cognitive processes on the correspondence of eyewitness accuracy and confidence. Law and Human behavior, 4(4), 261. Ratcliff, R. (1978). A theory of memory retrieval. Psychological review, 85(2), 59. Alba, J. W., & Hasher, L. (1983). Is memory schematic?. Psychological Bulletin, 93(2), 203. Bank, S. C., & Poythress Jr, N. G. (1982). Elements of Persuasion in Expert Testimony, The. J. Psychiatry & L., 10, 173. Jorm, A. F. (2000). Mental health literacy Public knowledge and beliefs about mental disorders. The British Journal of Psychiatry, 177(5), 396-401. Lieberman, J. D., & Arndt, J. (2000). Understanding the limits of limiting instructions: Social psychological explanations for the failures of instru ctions to disregard pretrial publicity and other inadmissible evidence. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 6(3), 677. Squire, L. R., & Alvarez, P. (1995). Retrograde amnesia and memory consolidation: a neurobiological perspective. Current opinion in neurobiology,5(2), 169-177. Jorm, A. F., Korten, A. E., Rodgers, B., Pollitt, P., Jacomb, P. A., Christensen, H., & Jiao, Z. (1997). Belief systems of the general public concerning the appropriate treatments for mental disorders. Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology, 32(8), 468-473.

A Review and Analysis of Ryanair and Flextronics Operations

It will discuss the four stages In the Hayes and Wheelwright's model of operations contribution. This will take Flatirons as an example. Ryan Ryan is one of Rupee's largest low cost airlines, which operates more than 1,400 flights per day from 44 bases across 27 countries with a fleet of 272 Boeing 737 aircrafts. They operate with a team of 8,000 personnel and have carried around 73. 5 million passengers during 2011 with the average fare of 39 Euros. (Ryan official website) The below chart, figure A, from Ryan official website shows the passenger growth in millions from 1995 to 2007.Operations Strategy In every organization, operation strategy provides a framework to determine how the organization should pretzel and utilize Its resources to achieve Its performance objectives and gain advantage to Its competitors In the pre-defined market place. In another word, once a company defines it's role in business and identifies its performance objectives then it needs a set of framework and guiding principles for decision makers, to ensure that all the objectives are met. These frameworks and guidelines are the principles of what is known as operations strategy.In today's easiness world, operations managers are faced with various challenges regarding development of effective strategies in line with organization's -mission and vision- and to properly implement those strategies. Ryan Operations Strategy As a low cost airline, Ryan overall framework is to provide air travelers the option of flying to vast number of destinations with the minimum fee possible. To attain that In the costly business environment Like the allure business, Ryan needs to carefully adopt operations strategy to malignant It's basic services while lowering the costs as much as possible in different operation areas.It is important to understand Market qualifiers, in order to survive in the market. The terms Order-winning and qualifying objectives will be discussed later. Hence in general the efficien cy of the Ryan operations should support it's market positioning, as a low-cost airline, and the following are some key elements on how RA manages the processes and implements the operational factors to deliver its results. * Keeping turnaround time at minimum.This has been achieved partly due to improved employee productivity, which could be the result of intense staff training and development, and partly because there are no meals and sees luggage to be loaded on to the plane. * Aircraft equipment cost. Using identical aircrafts (Boeing 737) in large quantities helps Ryan to reduce significant cost in repair, services and storage of aircraft parts. It also gives the company the advantage to negotiate the price of purchasing aircrafts and parts coming all from single supplier.Apart from those, using identical aircrafts offer reduction in staff training cost as well as flexibility in the scheduling of crew and equipment. * Airport access cost. Airport landing and services fees are m uch lower in secondary airports and could save the airline a lot of none by diverting flights to these airports. Also diverting passenger traffic to these airports gives Ryan the advantage to negotiate costs with airports by providing high passenger flow. * Customer services costs.Ryan has developed its own Internet booking service facility, which sells tickets directly to the costumers, offering lower prices by cutting travel agency commissions. Using electronic services will give an advantage to management to access a range of data for future planning and service enhancement. Apart from that, Ryan has entered into agreements with third party contractors at certain airports for assenter and aircraft handling, ticketing and other services that can be provided in a more cost efficient way by third parties. Personnel productivity Ryan endeavors to control its labor costs by continually improving the productivity of its already highly productive work force. Compensation for employees e mphasizes productivity-based pay incentives, including commissions for on-board sales of products for flight attendants and payments based on the number of hours flown by pilots and cabin crew personnel, within limits set by industry standards will stem to higher personnel engagement and productivity.Apart from the mentioned bullet points Ryan air's management, reviews the day-to-day experience of the company regularly to modify and refine their strategic decisions in order to abide to the company's policy on customer services. SOOT Analysis Strength Ryan has been known as Rupee's first low cost airline, which is the company's strongest selling point. Adopting low cost strategy helped Ryan to rapidly increase of customers and expansion of their operations. Addressing to the marketing trends by adopting Internet services like booking and ticketing has changed the customer behavior and has provided wide range of clients for them.Last but not least, rapid expansion of flight routes and aircrafts, has provided more frequent flights and destinations to air travelers. Weaknesses weaknesses too. Restricted customer service, deceiving advertisement and low quality services are among those weaknesses, which has lead to bad publicity for the company. Opportunities Ryan, according to its strength, has opportunities to still dominate the European airline industry in term of providing more quality service standards and maintain its positioning as a low cost airline.By determining the latest trends in airline industry and meeting the up to dated demands of customers they are capable of gaining more customers to be the number one airline company in the whole region. Threats Given the competitive nature of airline business, Ryan is faced with the inevitable threat of competition. To tackle that, Ryan needs to constantly provide highly effective and efficient new products with higher quality services comparing to competitors. Strengths: Rupee's first low-cost airline IT Servic es Rapid Expansion Strengths: Weakness: Restricted customer servicesLow quality service Also to maintain the advantage, Ryan needs to increase its destinations to cover more customers by flying to new regions and at the same time increase its customer service to ensure passenger's satisfaction. Opportunities: Providing quality service standards Defining new IT service standards Expansion to more destinations Opportunities: Competition Reduction of passengers in airline market Threats: Figure B: Ryan operations Strategy SOOT Analysis ‘Market qualifiers' and ‘order winners' Qualifying and order-wining factors are ways to distinguish a company from its imitators within the market.Order winning factors are mainly those aspects, which contribute to promote the service or product to the highest level of costumer satisfaction and help the business to stand ahead of other competitors in the market. On the other hand, qualifying factors are those aspects of the service provider, which should be met to attain the consideration from costumers for business. Costumers needs and wants along with competitors market standards define weather a factor is a qualifier or a winner.Market qualifiers and order winners that would apply to a owe-cost airline market are as follow: Qualifying Objectives I Order winning objectives I Low cost fares I Free minimum luggage services I Covering wide destinations I Variety on-board service (food, beverage, pillow, blanket) I Reasonable quality ; comfort I Priority boarding I Safety ; emergency protocols I Free on-board entertainment I Direct booking ; ticketing services I Pre-assigned seats for passengers I High-frequency flights I Ground services on departure (bus services to airport) I In-flight food ; beverage availability with charge I Ground services on arrival (car hire, I Luggage services with charge I More comfortable seating I transportation) I Internet and communication services on board I Flatirons Flatirons is an electr onics manufacturing services provider, which specializes in supply chain services such as packaging and transportation, as well as design, engineering and after sales services within several markets including automotive, computing, consumer, industrial, infrastructure, medical and mobile.Based in Singapore, Flatirons is behind well-known brands like -but not limited to- HP, RIM, Motorola, Microsoft, Dell, Cisco, Sony Ericson and IBM. (Flatirons official Website) Flatirons Operations Strategy As one of the global leaders in design, manufacturing and distribution and after sales market services, Flatirons operations strategy must be designed in a way to address the needs for low-costs, responsive and flexible product and services. To achieve this Flatirons has adopted the following strategies: * Extensive network of design, manufacturing and logistics facilities. These extensive networks are placed in the world's major electronic markets helping Flatirons to address each customer's th at simplify global product development and supply processes.Through his, Flatirons is able to go through the life cycle of the products from its initial design to volume production, test cycles, distribution and post sales services in a more efficient manner. * Integrated industrial parks. These industrial parks are positioned in low cost regions close to the Flatirons costumers and world markets, giving them the advantage of delivering the products and services in a very large scale and as cheap as possible. Also Flatirons encourage its own suppliers to position in these industrial parks for easier access. Through this strategy Flatirons reduce major cost of shipping, handling and storing products.Hayes and Wheelwright's four stage of operation contribution Professor Hayes and Wheelwright developed a four-stage model to evaluate the role and contribution of operations function. These stages are as follow: 1. Internal Neutrality: Lowest level of contribution by operations function. It does not react upon competitive success and the aim is to avoid mistakes. 2. External Neutrality: At one level higher, in this stage the company begins to look outside and compare itself with its competition. The objective may not be to be the best but at least to implement the best practice with regards to other market players. . Internally Supportive: Operations at this stage are among the bests in their market. Developing appropriate operations resources to support company's strategic goals is at the most priority. 4.Externally Supportive: At this stage the operations functions are designed to provide a foundation for competitive success. Adopting a long-term view, considering the future changes in the market and consumer behavior helps the company to be one step ahead of the market. The four-stage model of operation contribution Looking at Flatirons and considering the four stages of operations contribution, it is Lear that the operations function of Flatirons is a very good example of stage 4 â€Å"externally supportive† Operations. As mentioned earlier, through an extensive network of design, manufacturing and after-sale services, Flatirons can deliver its services at the most appropriate locations, which shows in depth knowledge of costumer behavior understanding.