Thesis (M.A.I.S.)--Oregon State University, 2009. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 85-94). Also available on the World Wide Web.

The aim of this qualitative study was to explore product attachment among men and women in conjugal associations and to design a series of household objects to encourage product attachment. A preliminary study based on the interview responses of 16 married individuals was used to identify themes and to develop the instrument employed in the main study. The main study sample consisted of eight married couples and the qualitative methodology involved the thematic content analysis of their responses to a questionnaire and in-depth interviews. The findings supported product attachment theory, and masculinity and femininity was reflected by the objects that the participants perceived to be the most valuable. Men tended to prefer objects with a functional value serving a consumer experience, particularly those that they could interact with and/or express the masculine desire to be independent and take an active role. Women were more variable in their preferences, but most became attached to objects with shared, affective and/or affiliative value. The values which made an object special were found, in general, not to be common to both husband and wife; however, those objects with a shared value, reflecting episodic memories concerning their marriage, were highlighted. These findings led to the construction of a tentative explanatory model to expand product attachment theory in the context of married couples. Underpinned by this model, action is recommended to promote the design and segmented marketing of products in order to create an emotional bond for one or both conjugal partners. Designs are proposed for a series of household objects to encourage the progressive development of episodic memories among married couples. Some prospective designs of products specifically targeted to promote shared value among the married couple segment of the market, including furniture and decorative items for the home are described. Further research is recommended to expand product attachment theory to take into consideration the design of objects for the married couples market.

Introduced Diploma thesis aims to analyze the schemes of online self-presented femininity on a social network site using depth analysis of chosen Profiles. The aim was to discover the concepts of online self-presentation using gender perspective. Facebook as a huge user based medium, which allows all its users to produce content, constitutes a potential to change stereotyped schemes in presenting femininity in media. In theroretical part I summarize the principles of Facebook functions, I engage in Goffman's (and his followers') dramaturgical metafor and I link it to the theories of Gender Advertisements, The Beauty myth and Male gaze. All of these theories I use in analytical part of the thesis.

A picture says more than thousand words - an analysis of GQ Magazine´s cover images and ninth grade student´s views of them is an essay in media and communication studies covering 15 hp. This essay examines how men and women are depicted on the cover of GQ Magazine and how ninth grade students perceive these images. Our research questions are: How is gender presented in cover images? How do the students interpret these images? What possible differencies or similarities are there? Our theoretical framework is based on gender theory. Methods used are a survey conducted at Tegs Central school and a semiotic analysis of the cover images. We have to keep in mind that the cover images already have a stereotypical representation of the women and men, and that will automaticly affect the students answers. The essay shows that the semiotic studie describes profound thaughts on connotation terms. The survey studie shows that the students have the ability to analyse GQ Magazine´s cover images in a denotation level. Since the social problem is about what images says and what possible affect they have on the viewer. It is therefore important to have a critical mind when it comes to analyse images and be aware of these general representations of gender.

This thesis deals with the jealousy in the context of masculinity and femininity. The work focuses on jealousy in relationships, which is viewed from a gender and psychological point of view. Main aim of the thesis is to explore the way of constructing jealousy in the context of gender and to find any differences and similarities in such constructs. I am going to fulfill the aim through content analysis of selected lifestyle journals, while some of them are gender-focused on their readers and some are not. The work is divided into two parts, the first, theoretical part deals with the particular definitions and theoretical approaches to jealousy, their description and explanation of the origin of differences in jealousy between men and women. In my own research I use a combination of quantitative and qualitative content analysis of the most widely read magazines in the Czech Republic and therefore I can provide a more comprehensive insight into the topic and gain more comprehensive information about the link between jealousy and gender. I believe that the work will bring better insight into the question of designing jealousy in the context of gender. Key words: gender, masculinity, femininity, psychology, jealousy in romantic relationships

Dans la lignée des « romans de l’actrice » de la fin du XIXe siècle, plusieurs romanciers français et américains prolongent la fortune littéraire de cette figure au lendemain de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, dans un siècle marqué par l’essor du cinéma et plus largement de la culture populaire. Il s’agit d’analyser comment la littérature perçoit et raconte ces changements à travers la figure de l’actrice, que celle-ci soit inventée ou inspirée de personnes réelles. Les romans de l’actrice du second XXe siècle se caractérisent par une forte homogénéité des enjeux narratifs et empruntent à d’autres genres, tels que le roman de l’artiste et le conte de fées. La sémiologie du personnage central est marquée par un métier qui sème le trouble dans son identité, entre le moi, les rôles et la persona et par l’importance d’un corps portant les marques hyperboliques du genre et de la beauté. Les actrices romanesques illustrent la domination masculine et bien rares sont celles qui trouvent une capacité d’agir et se font « actrices » de leur devenir. L’écriture romanesque opère ainsi une « défiguration » de la figure qui expose la déchéance derrière les images splendides, ou exacerbe ces images pour faire de la merveille un monstre. L’enjeu de ces textes est également intermédial : il s’agit, pour le roman, de se mesurer au cinéma qui l’a remplacé dans son statut de récit populaire, en imitant ses procédés mais aussi en racontant ses modes de réception dans une vision parfois iconoclaste. S’opère ainsi une réflexion sur la littérature et la culture à travers la figure de l’actrice, artiste sans œuvre propre, parfois double de l’auteur dans des jeux entre référence et fiction. / Following in the footsteps of late-19th-century “actress novels”, a number of French and American novelists prolonged the literary fortunes of the actress-protagonist in the years immediately following the Second World War, in the broader context of a century heavily influenced by the rise of the cinema and, more largely, of popular culture. This dissertation analyzes how literature perceives and recounts these changes through the character of the actress, be she fictional or based on a real-life person. Actress novels of the second half of the 20th century are characterized by their predominantly homogenous narrative aims and borrow from other genres, such as the artist novel and the fairytale. The semiology of the main character is marked by a profession that confuses her identity between her own ego, her characters and her persona, and by the importance placed on her body that bears the hyperbolic markers of gender and beauty. Novelistic actresses illustrate male domination and few of them are capable of autonomous action, of becoming independent “actors” of their own destinies. Novelistic writing thereby causes a “disfiguration” of the very figure that exposes the degradation behind the splendid images, or exacerbates those images in order to transform the marvel into a monster. The goal of these texts is also intermedial: the novel is intended to be compared to cinema, which recently supplanted it in its status of popular tale, by imitating its techniques but also by recounting its modes of reception through a sometimes-iconoclastic lens. This leads to a reflection on literature and on culture via the figure of the actress, an artist without her own work, sometimes a clone of the author in a game between referentiality and fiction.

Исследовалась взаимосвязь выбора копинг-стратегий в ситуации стресса и гендерных особенностей у мужчин-военнослужащих (маскулинность, фемининность, андрогинность) с целью уточнения критериев профотбора для группы опасных профессий. Обсуждаются результаты данные, полученные по четырем методикам на выборке из 149 человек. / We investigated the relationship between choice of coping strategies in a situation of stress and gender men-soldiers (masculinity, femininity, androgyny) with a view to clarifying the criteria for selection of groups of hazardous occupations. Results the data obtained for the four methods on a sample of 149 people.

A schooling system that claims to offer its students the opportunities to develop their talents and help towards self-determination in their adult lives might be expected to have a career structure itself that demonstrated these virtues, one in which there was equality of the genders in positions of influence and leadership, and no gender stereotyping of roles. Apart from the fairness and consistency of that expectation, it is also reasonable to expect the neutral template of teacher employment and textbook selection in schools. Many children may grow up with few books in their homes but lots of those in their schools. Many of the textbooks used in elementary schools, according to recent studies, contain gender stereotypes. In these, females are rarely found as central characters and when they appear at all, they are often passive figures dependent on male characters. Women are frequently shown in domestic roles / in most textbooks it is assumed that only males &#039 / go out to work&#039 / whereas daughters are the best helpers of their mothers whose sons are allowed to do what they wish. In the light of those allegations, this research is designed as a case study which addresses itself to the aim of looking into stereotyped gender role presentations existing in elementary school textbooks used by the students studying at 1st-5th grades in 2001/2002 academic year of an elementary school placed in Burdur and to see whether these students are affected by the exposure of those stereotyped gender role presentations. For this purpose, the textbooks being studied are analyzed according to pre-set categories to deduce how they include stereotyped gender role presentations and the evaluation of the effects of that exposure on students are made by asking 1st-3rd grade students to draw and 4th-5th grade students to write compositions on a given topic. This study also attempts to find out both whether Turkish elementary school teachers teaching at 1st-5th grades are aware of stereotyped gender role presentations in those textbooks that they use and their own points of view about stereotyped gender role presentations via interviews carried out with them. In conclusion, stereotyped gender role presentations are encountered in those analyzed school textbooks studied at 1st- 5th grades in 2001/2002 academic year of the elementary school placed in Burdur and the perceptions of those presentations are also obtained in the drawn and written productions of the students studied at the same school. Through the teachers&#039 / interviews, various kinds of perceptions towards gender role concept and its stereotyped presentations that take place in those textbooks are observed in their sayings

The diploma thesis deals with representations of femininity and masculinity in Sluníčko magazine. These representations are examined through analysis of men, women, boys, girls and animal characters. The theoretical part defines gender order of contemporary society and its main characteristic. Then usual gender stereotypes in physical appearance, gender roles, interests and characteristics are defined. The diploma thesis then focuses attention to the gender socialization and concept of representations, which are defined as an instrument of power that helps to maintain androcentric order of society. Also the media are considered as significant and important tool of normalization and socialization. Another dimension of the thesis is mapping the "progress" of representations or comparing the two editions - edition n. 8 (published in 174/75) and edition n. 48 (published in 2015). In research the qualitative media analysis is used. It is focused on texts and picture illustrations of femininity and masculinity, therefore on characters. These characters are analysed through four categories - Physical appearance, Gender roles, Activities and interests, Characteristics, while the central categories are "Vacant" femininity and Counterfactuality, which are present throughout the content of both editions. Key...

This thesis focuses on the presentation of the so-called migration and refugee crisis of 2015- 2016 in the news coverage published by the main Czech daily newspapers. The thesis is a gender analysis of media messages during that period. In the framework of this thesis, I have analysed through qualitative content analysis written media reports as well as photographs of newly arrived migrants and other visual materials published in the media in order to illustrate migrants in Czech daily newspapers Blesk, Lidove noviny, Mlada fronta Dnes, and Pravo during the month of January 2016. The thesis focuses on how masculinity/femininity is constructed in media messages. Furthermore, the thesis looks into the construction and representation of otherness through media messages dedicated to so-called migration crisis. The aim of the thesis is to critically assess how newly arrived migrants are depicted by the main four Czech dailies, and to analyse and explain the mechanisms through which certain characteristics associated with newly arrived migrants are emphasised or suppressed. Key words: Media - gender - masculinity - femininity - migration - migration crisis - refugee crisis - religion - ethnicity - otherness