Picture This! Objectification Versus Empowerment in Women\u27s Photos on Social Media

The purpose of this study is to examine women’s motivations for posting sexualized photos of themselves on social media sites. In Western society, women are objectified through many forms of media, such as magazines and television. As a result, women have learned to view themselves as objects, through a process known as self-objectification (Fredrickson & Roberts, 1997). Women experience a number of negative consequences from self-objectification, such as depression, anxiety, and eating disorders (Moradi & Huang, 2008). Despite all of the research indicating the negative effects of the objectification of women, other research has shown that some women enjoy feeling sexualized (Liss, Erchull, & Ramsey, 2011) because it gives them a sense of empowerment and self-worth, although some researchers believe this may simply represent another form of social control over women and their sexuality (Gill, 2008). The overarching hypothesis is that women who post self-sexualizing photos (especially if they receive many “likes” on those photos) will have a greater sense of sexual empowerment rather than self-objectification. Undergraduate women (N=45) completed a number of surveys that related to objectification and empowerment and downloaded 10 photos of themselves from their social media sites. After coding the photographs, our results showed that none of the empowerment or objectification measures correlated with the degree of sexualization in the photos. The sexualized photos did correlate with the motivation statements of obtaining attention and more friends/followers

The SED of the TeV BLLac 1ES 1426+428 after correction for the TeV--IR absorption

The recent HEGRA detection and spectrum of 1ES 1426+428 at TeV energies, once corrected for absorption using present estimates of the diffuse extragalactic IR background, suggest that the high energy peak of the Spectral Energy Distribution (SED) could be much higher than the synchrotron one ($L_c/L_s>10$), and lie at energies above 8-10 TeV. To see if such an SED could be accounted for, we have applied a "finite injection time" SSC model, and present here some preliminary results. Within this model, we found the need of an external ("ambient") contribution to the energy density of seed photons, in order to account for both the high Compton dominance and the hard spectrum.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures, to appear in the proceedings of the conference "Relativistic jets in the Chandra and XMM era", Bologna, 23-27/9/02 (New Astr. Rev.

The effect of a seven-week exercise program on golf swing performance and musculoskeletal measures

As most golf exercise studies have shown improved golf performance as a result of two or three sessions per week, the present study investigated the effects of a supervised exercise session performed once a week for seven weeks on golf swing variables and musculoskeletal screening measures. Professional Golfers Association of Australia International Golf Institute student golfers (n ¼ 43) with a mean standard deviation handicap of 8.6 8.3 participated in the study. Each golfer performed 10 musculoskeletal tests and a standardised 60-shot golf performance test (TrackMan, Vedbaek, Denmark) on separate days before and after the seven-week program. Significant improvements in a number of musculoskeletal tests (i.e. left leg bridging (6.6%), thoracic extension (62.5%), right thoracic rotation (23.3%), and right (20.8%) and left single leg squat (29.1%)) were observed (all p 0.024); however, no significant differences were observed for any golf swing variables. Future research investigating different training protocols may help to determine whether the type or frequency of training has the greatest influence on golf swing performance

Absolute rigidity spectrum of protons and helium nuclei above 10 GV/c

Proton and helium nuclei differential spectra were gathered with a balloon borne magnet spectrometer. The data were fitted to the assumption that the differential flux can be represented by a power law in rigidity. In the rigidity range 10 to 25 GV/c the spectral indices were found to be -(2.74 plus or minus 0.04) for protons and -(2.71 plus or minus 0.05) for helium nuclei. A brief discussion is given by systematic errors

Coulomb gauge Gribov copies and the confining potential

We study the approach, initiated by Marinari et al., to the static inter-quark potential based on Polyakov lines of finite temporal extent, evaluated in Coulomb gauge. We show that, at small spatial separations, the potential can be understood as being between two separately gauge invariant colour charges. At larger separations Gribov copies obstruct the non-perturbative identification of individually gauge invariant colour states. We demonstrate, for the first time, how gauge invariance can be maintained quite generally by averaging over Gribov copies. This allows us to extend the analysis of the Polyakov lines and the corresponding, gauge invariant quark-antiquark state to all distance scales. Using large scale lattice simulations, we show that this interpolating state possesses a good overlap with the ground state in the quark-antiquark sector and yields the full static inter-quark potential at all distances. A visual representation of the Gribov copies on the lattice is also presented.Comment: 22 pages, 9 figures, v2: minor changes, references adde

Observation of cosmic ray positrons from 5 to 25 GeV

The positron data gathered in conjunction with electron data published elsewhere is reported. The basic recognition scheme was to look for low mass positive particles that cause a cascade in a 7 radiation length shower counter. The mass criteria is imposed by selecting particles that were accompanied by Cherenkov light but whose rigidity was below the proton Cherenkov threshold. Thus the proton Cherenkov threshold represents an upper limit to the range of the experiment

Multiwavelength study of TeV Blazar Mrk421 during giant flare

Context: The nearby (z=0.031) TeV blazar Mrk421 was reported to be in a high state of flux activity since November, 2009. Aims: To investigate possible changes in the physical parameters of Mrk421 during its high state of activity using multiwavelength data. Methods: We have observed this source in bright state using High Altitude GAmma Ray (HAGAR) telescope array at energies above 250 GeV during February 13 - 19, 2010. Optical, X-ray and gamma-ray archival data are also used to obtain the SEDs and light curves. Results: Mrk421 was found to undergo one of its brightest flaring episodes on February 17, 2010 by various observations in X-rays and gamma-rays. HAGAR observations during February 13 - 19, 2010 at the energies above 250 GeV show an enhancement in the flux level, with a maximum flux of ~ 7 Crab units being detected on February 17, 2010. We present the spectral energy distributions during this flaring episode and investigate the correlation of the variability in X-ray and gamma-ray bands. Conclusions: Our multiwavelength study suggests that the flare detected during February 16 and 17, 2010 could arise due to a passing shock in the jet.Comment: 9 pages, 10 figures, Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics (A & A

Gauge-invariant Green's functions for the bosonic sector of the standard model

There are many applications in gauge theories where the usually employed framework involving gauge-dependent Green's functions leads to considerable problems. In order to overcome the difficulties invariably tied to gauge dependence, we present a manifestly gauge-invariant approach. We propose a generating functional of appropriately chosen gauge-invariant Green's functions for the bosonic sector of the standard model. Since the corresponding external sources emit one-particle states, these functions yield the same S-matrix elements as those obtained in the usual framework. We evaluate the generating functional for the bosonic sector of the standard model up to the one-loop level and carry out its renormalization in the on-shell scheme. Explicit results for some two-point functions are given. Gauge invariance is manifest at any step of our calculation.Comment: 29 pages, Revtex. v2: Discussions improved, conclusions unchanged. Some references added. v3: Published versio