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Explaining the role of character development in the evaluation of morally ambiguous characters in entertainment media

The current project aims at better understanding how narrative characteristics in stories function in the liking, moral evaluation, and enjoyment of narratives featuring morally ambiguous characters (MACs). Shafer and Raney (2012) found that viewers differently enjoyed a heroic versus MAC-centered narrative. Building on this approach, a mixed-method design was used to investigate character development in two morally ambiguous narratives. Results of both a qualitative content analysis and an experiment provide support for the claim that character development is a central mechanism to explain viewer responses to MACs in narrative content. Thus, this study provides new directions for understanding characters in media research.

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How nursing home residents respond to the interactive art installation ‘Morgendauw’

This paper reports the responses of nursing home residents who live in a psychogeriatric ward to the abstract interactive art installation ‘Morgendauw’, which was specifically designed for this study. All stakeholders were involved in designing and implementing Morgendauw. The artwork seems able to evoke responses in both the residents and their caregivers, but the amount and duration of the responses observed during the study were limited. 15 interactions over the course of 14 h were noted and almost all of them were initiated by the nursing home staff, physiotherapy students or visitors (n = 12). Interactions lasted for about 3 min on average. Although the nursing home residents initially did not seem to notice the artwork, the threshold of acknowledging and approaching the artwork was quickly overcome when staff nudged or directed the residents’ attention towards the artwork. Beyond this point, nursing home residents generally needed little explanation of the interface to interact with the artwork. The location in which Morgendauw was placed during the study or the characteristics of the installation seemed to create a threshold. Further research should focus on the importance and the effects of context when designing and implementing an interactive art installation in a nursing home environment.

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How nursing home residents respond to the interactive art installation ‘Morgendauw’

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Deconstructing the cloud

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Culture of the selfie

Culture of the Selfie is an in-depth art-historical overview of self-portraiture, using a set of theories from visual studies, narratology, media studies, psychotherapy, and political principles. Collecting information from various fields, juxtaposing them on the historical time-line of artworks, the book focuses on space in self-portraits, shared between the person self-portraying and the viewer. What is the missing information of the transparent relationship to the self and what kind of world appears behind each selfie? As the ‘world behind one’s back’ is gradually taking larger place in the visual field, the book dwells on a capacity of selfies to master reality, the inter-mediate way and, in a measure, oneself.

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We can only keep hoping

The studies in this thesis aim to increase understanding of the effects of various characteristics of scientific news about a common chronic disease, i.e., diabetes, on the cognitive responses (e.g., emotions, attitudes, intentions) of diabetes patients. The research questions presented in this thesis are guided by the Health Belief Model, a theoretical framework developed to explain and predict healthrelated behaviours based on an individual’s beliefs and attitudes. The model asserts that perceived barriers to a recommended health behavior, advantages of the behavior, self-efficacy in executing the behavior, and disease severity and personal susceptibility to the disease are important predictors of a health behavior. Communication is one of the cues to action (i.e., stimuli) that may trigger the decision-making process relating to accepting a medical or lifestyle recommendation.

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Feeling the News?

Immersive journalism (IJ) is often assumed to be inherently emotion-inducing. Through using inclusive technology, interaction possibilities and immersive narratives, the audience should ideally experience what feels like to be in a certain situation. However, for the most part we do not know to which extent and in what form IJ influences the experience of emotions. We wanted to investigate, whether, and if so, which characteristics of IJ are related to the experience of emotions, and which role the personality trait empathy tendency plays in this respect. This is important, as the evaluation of IJ often relies on the emotion-inducing assumption thereof. Four different experiments comparing one immersive journalistic characteristic (level of inclusion, interaction possibilities, immersive narratives) to the respective non-immersive counterpart were conducted. Results indicate that while the level of inclusion and interaction possibility increase the intensity of the experience, the immersive narrative influences the valence dimension of emotions. Additionally, empathy tendency is found to be a relevant moderator for these effects. Conclusions are threefold. First, the narrative form of IJ is key; second, the analysis of IJ needs to go beyond the level of inclusion; third, including emotions when assessing IJ is fundamental to understand its impact.

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De huidige verspreiding en voedselvoorkeuren van de grashommel (Bombus ruderarius) (Müller 1776) in westelijk Noord-Brabant

Bijen zijn de belangrijkste bestuivers voor wilde planten en voor meer dan 90% van de globale gewassen. De hoeveelheid bijen neemt echter sterk af in Nederland door de versnippering, aantasting en verlies van habitat. Eén van de sterk afgenomen soorten in Nederland is de grashommel (Bombus ruderarius). De grashommel is een zeldzame soort die op het moment alleen nog maar in grote aantallen voorkomt in Zeeland en Friesland. Om de groei van deze soort te bevorderen is er onderzoek gedaan naar de verspreiding van de grashommel in westelijk Noord-Brabant. Hiervoor worden vijf verschillende gebieden geïnventariseerd: ‘Het Laag’, ‘Stellebos’, ‘Noordpolder van Ossendrecht’, ‘Brabantse Wal’ en ‘Fort de Roovere en Groote Melanen’. In de laatste twee gebieden is de grashommel hiervoor nog nooit waargenomen. Hiernaast is de stuifmeelvoorkeur van de grashommel werksters in juni in Noord-Brabant, Zeeland en Friesland bepaald door middel van een microscopisch stuifmeelonderzoek. In vier van de vijf gebieden in Noord-Brabant is de grashommel koningin in dit onderzoek waargenomen in de maanden april en mei. In één van de vijf gebieden zijn grashommel werksters waargenomen in de maand juni. De stuifmeelvoorkeur van de grashommel werksters in juni ligt grotendeels bij de Gewone smeerwortel (Symphytum officinale), Rode klaver (Trifolium pratense) en Witte klaver (Trifolium repens), gevolgd door Eénstijlige meidoorn (Crataegus monogyna), Gewone rolklaver (Lotus corniculatus) en Vogelwikke (Vicia cracca). Daarnaast is de grashommel koningin in het voorjaar waargenomen op de Witte dovenetel (Lamium album), Gewone smeerwortel en Gewone paardenbloem (Taraxacum officinale). Er aanbevolen om in de ‘Brabantse Wal’ en ‘Friesland’ het huidige maaibeleid aan te passen, zodat het voedselaanbod voor de grashommel niet onderbroken wordt. Voor de gebieden ‘Het Laag’, ‘Stellebos’, ‘Noordpolder van Ossendrecht’ en ‘Fort de Roovere en Groote Melanen’ is aanbevolen om meer stuifmeelvoorkeurs planten van de grashommel in te zaaien in het gebied. Er is sterk aanbevolen aan het EIS Kenniscentrum om de grashommel in de Noord-Brabantse gebieden te blijven monitoren, waarmee kan worden gekeken naar de effecten van de ingevoerde maatregelen op de grashommel populaties in de gebieden.

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De huidige verspreiding en voedselvoorkeuren van de grashommel (Bombus ruderarius) (Müller 1776) in westelijk Noord-Brabant

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Wat werkt? Een verkenning van de praktische en wetenschappelijke kennis over informatievisualisaties.

Voordat een visualisatie tot stand komt, is daar een complex proces aan vooraf gegaan. Doel en doelgroepen worden vastgesteld (‘hoe bereiken we welk effect bij wie?’) terwijl daarnaast de relatie tussen de data en de uiteindelijke visualisatie gedefinieerd moet worden (‘hoe laten we wat zien?’). De productie en de receptie van een visualisatie zijn twee te onderscheiden processen. Bij het maakproces spelen vakkennis, design, technische mogelijkheden, brongegevens, doelgroep, mediakeuze en doelstelling een belangrijke rol. Bij receptie gaat het erom of en hoe de doelgroep de boodschap ontvangt: wordt die waargenomen en begrepen? En wat zijn de gevolgen bij de gebruiker? Hoewel receptie in de tijd volgt op het productieproces, spelen verwachtingen over receptie een belangrijke rol bij het maken van informatievisualisaties. De kennis over publieksreacties op visuele boodschappen is echter op verschillende manieren vastgelegd. Bij designers en anderen die betrokken zijn bij het maakproces van informatievisualisaties is er sprake van een verzameling van working theories (McQuail, 2010, pp. 13-14) die vooral op ervaring is gebaseerd. Bij empirisch onderzoek daarentegen worden responses op visuele cues daadwerkelijk gemeten. Zie Deel II van dit onderzoek. Doelstelling van dit onderzoek is deze twee vormen van kennis met elkaar te vergelijken. De vraag is welke veronderstellingen en verwachtingen er bij de beroepspraktijk bestaan en in hoeverre deze gestaafd, aangevuld of weersproken worden door empirisch, wetenschappelijk gefundeerd, onderzoek.

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Wat werkt? Een verkenning van de praktische en wetenschappelijke kennis over informatievisualisaties.

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Making Waves

This is not a catalogue of finished work. This is also not a report of our collaboration on climate imaginaries. Instead, this zine offers a peek into an ongoing collaboration between artists, designers and researchers who have jointly turned their attention to the rising ocean. In riso-printed* collages, designers Carlo De Gaetano, Andy Dockett and Mariana Fernández Mora formulate their visual responses to the questions, insights and experiments we encounter on our journey. Previous research has shown that before people can accept, let alone create, the change necessary for the climate crisis, they need to first be able to imagine life in a changing climate. How can one facilitate imagination between generations and across species, geographies and materialities? Or liberate the imagination from recurring tropes that suggest climate change is of the future, elsewhere, affecting others, when so many people worldwide already live its devastating impact? These questions lie at the heart of our programme Climate Imaginaries at Sea. With the generous support of the NWA-arts route, CoECI and ARIAS, we will continue our work through artistic research studios that address global South, material and interspecies perspectives on climate change*, striving to make waves.

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Explaining the role of character development in the evaluation of morally ambiguous characters in entertainment media