Public Information Officers Report Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Public Information Officers Report - Essay Example CSR is not a new concept in the corporate world. The business organizations across the globe, both small and big have realized the significance of being socially responsible from the past experiences of many socially unsuccessful companies such as Enron. It has been well acknowledged by the corporate community that companies that seriously take care of CSR are more likely to sustain than those who do not. In fact, it takes into account the interest of all stakeholders. The benefits of being socially responsible are manifold. Some of the main include: Conforming to the social and ethical corporate practices results in not only corporate citizenship but it offers a numerous benefits as well. Consumers always prefer to buy products of those who are at the helm of CSR. In an article from Practical advice for Business, the relevance of being CSR conscious is illustrated as, "sales of environmentally friendly" products continue to grow - and these products often sell at a premium price. Ben & Jerry's ice cream became as famous for its approach to responsible business as for its products" (Business Link, n.d.). The benefits of CSR companies as an entity of society are manifold. They include economic, social, and ecological benefits. Besides, company's overall performance including financial performance can have a multiplier effect Corporate Financial Performance and CSR The closeness of corporate economic performance and CSR has been a topic of debate among the scholars and practitioners for years. Many studies have been conducted across the globe since the inception of the concept CSR to find whether any relationship exists between financial performance and CSR. Perhaps, all might have come out with positive results, though a very few responded in the negative. Majority of the studies argue that there is a positive correlation between corporate financial performance and CSR (Doran, 1994; Berkhout, 2005). When companies become CSR conscious, they are offered a plenty of benefits (reported above) that eventually contribute to augmented profit. Apart from this, many Studies have been done to analyze whether there is any relationship between the stock price and the economic performance. Recovery after a crisis is typically easier One of the challenges faced by a company that wants to operate under the principles of CSR is that how to balance its social and environmental responsibilities with its more clearly defined economic responsibility to earn a profit. It is important for promoters of CSR to acknowledge that at some point the cost of being socially and environmentally responsible outweighs the benefits. When this happens, most firms will cease to engage in new initiatives. In

Ideas of Adam Smith, Niccolo Machiavelli, Karl Polanyi, Jean-Jacques Essay

Ideas of Adam Smith, Niccolo Machiavelli, Karl Polanyi, Jean-Jacques Rousseau - Essay Example Machiavelli reiterates that crimes may win an empire but they can never win glory moreover he believed necessary wars were just wars and that the arms of a nation are hallowed when it lacks other resources apart from fight. In addition, concerning the markets, Machiavelli considers increase of land and things to be core (Machiavelli 13-14). Rousseau believes in a monarchy that guarantees the needs and the universal will of its people are executed. He believes the pressing interest of a ruler is his most indispensible duty is observing the laws of which the individual is the minister and on which the whole authority is founded. Moreover, he considers social actions to be reciprocal in nature thus impracticable for anyone to position himself beyond the law without relinquishing the advances of the law in a sovereign country. Rousseau believes that the government is not the master of the law but it is much of guarantor of the law and posses many means of inspiring love of it, which makes the talent of reigning. Rousseau believes that people are born amoral however, when people enter society they acquire the capacity for vice as well as the capability for virtue. Rousseau’s analysis regarding vice is comprehensible and well developed which exemplifies that vice results from competition. According to Rousseau, human beings are born free but in many political societies they are subjected to a form of dependence that amounts to slavery. Moreover, Rousseau considers two kinds of inequality that include natural and contrived inequalities but only natural inequalities are acceptable. As well, Rousseau believes justice is impossible to achieve in a world that is stark of social inequality in addition he believes that concentrations of wealth increases inequality (Rousseau 8). In wealth of nations, Smith closely ties liberation of the desire for wealth to commerce and free market, which he considered the most effective way of satisfying that desire, which is synonymous with Rousseau’s view on governance. Thus in Smith’s view, life is ceaselessly driven by desire, anxiety and fear hence life is eternally filled with disturbance and disquiet (Fitzgibbons 3). Smith considers people by nature to have a tendency for improving their circumstances through buildup of goods of affluence, status a nd power. Smith considers the accumulation of wealth as means that jeopardizes tranquility as opposed to producing it, which is also synonymous with Rousseau regarding personal interest. Therefore, both perspectives of Smith and Rousseau consider the pursuits of wealth to be deeply misleading; for instance, Smith argues on the condition of the material world (Gudz 2). Polanyi in The Great Transformation clarified precincts of self-regulating markets and currently there is no reputable, intellectual hold for the proposition that markets by themselves result in competent, let alone equitable outcomes. This view is also synonymous with Rousseau model which considered the concentration of wealth to be the cause of increase in inequality. Polanyi addresses a certain defect in self-regulating economy which involves the relationship between the economy and society in how economic systems affect the way people relate to one another. This view is also considered by Rousseau who believed accu mulation of w

Research paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words - 14

Research Paper Example The real GDP growth of china again reduced to 7.8% and GDP hits approximately 8.23 million US dollars in 2012. According to International Monetary Fund China’s PPP in 2012 was 12,382.559 billion US dollar. According to World Bank’s report China’s PPP in 2011 was 11,290 billion US dollar. The country’s PPP in 2010 was 10085.71 billion US dollars. According to the IMF report it was estimated that Greece would achieve a GDP of 254,978 billion US dollar but finally had achieved a growth of -5.70%. According to the report of UN Greece had achieved a GDP of 299,001 billion US dollar at a growth rate of -6.7%. In 2010 the GDP of Greece was 271.112 billion at a growth rate of -3.5%. Since last few years Greece is going through several economical problems. On the other hand China is becoming one of the strongest leading economies globally. China is the second largest and strongest economy in the world (Deshpande & Nurse, 2012). The higher GDP growth rate, increasing GNP and increasing PPP is the evidence of China’s economical development. On the other hand, decreasing GDP growth rate, decrease in per capita income of people which has identified in this study clearly states the Greece is undergoing several economical problems. Greek government debt-crisis and European Sovereign-debt crisis is the key reason behind the economical problems of Greece. The Greek government debt crisis is a part of European sovereign-debt crisis. It is a structural weakness of the economy of Greece that coupled with banking and tax unification of the monetary union of Europe. Due to these kinds of problems Greece is going through several challenges. In terms of China, the Nation is experiencing a higher average growth rate of 10% over the last 30 years. Higher GDP growth, increasing per capita income, high disposable income of people and Higher GNP states that the country is becoming one of the strongest economies. According to reports of

Advanced Persistent Threats Against RSA Tokens Case Study

Advanced Persistent Threats Against RSA Tokens - Case Study Example Likewise, in the entire hoax, there was a requirement of evaluating homeland security that also pertains to Information technology infrastructure. The Information technology infrastructure was not the only consideration, as these attacks affect vulnerabilities pertaining to federal information systems and any organization that acquires information systems. However, there were several laws that were passed in the congress after September 11 terrorist attacks. In the process, a series of homeland security presidential directives were issued for sustaining domestic security. However, on the other hand, despite an economic turmoil from September 11 attacks, the aviation industry continues to grow at a rapid pace and is considered as a fundamental transformation. Moreover, there is also a significant change for managing air traffic via net-centric approach. The acquisition of this change will replace the traditional approach for controlling air traffic that is constructed on Information t echnology solutions. By focusing on security, there is a significant increase in utilizing computerized systems onboard of an air carrier. Likewise, these systems facilitate high airborne and internally located system connectivity, operational and maintenance requirements. Moreover, the net-centric ATM connectivity raises concerns for cyber security threats and vulnerabilities. Propagation threats are critical because it is capable of rapidly broadcasting traffic on the Internet along with bypassing intrusion detection systems. Likewise, for augmenting the primary phase of work propagation, it uses a ‘hit list’ comprising of overflowed users i.e. users consuming heavy bandwidth. By identifying users, worm spreads itself at a rapid pace when compared to traditional spreading worms. Moreover, this type of attack saves a considerable amount of scanning time by only attacking a visible target. In the context of any cyber threat to an airport, the airport cannot be the prima ry target, as the Spanair flight JK5022 crash was successful by one of the contributions from a Malware. Vulnerabilities Existed in the System / Attack Methods Computer network intrusions are becoming very sophisticated and advanced and they have enforced a challenge for modern computer network based organizations. Likewise, a new class of challengers called now as ‘Advanced Persistent Threats’ (APT) demonstrates a well-planned and sponsored, highly skilled hackers targeting highly classified data for gaining competitive edge specifically in corporate businesses, law firms, military networks, national or international politics (Cole, 2012). Likewise, these highly skilled cyber criminals utilize sophisticated tools and methods that are constructed to disrupt computer network defense semantics without being detected. As per Mr. Mike Cloppert, is a Co-Chair of the cyber threat intelligent summit says that the cyber threat intelligence can facilitate organizations to mainta in an information classification and protection mechanism based on the priorities of these cyber criminals. As a result, the likelihood of success for these hackers will become low. Moreover, organizations can than plan accordingly for the targeted information and can counter these complex advanced persistent threats. Information security management team requires authentic and on time information for constantly monitoring new and potential threats and techniques. Likewise, exploiting the received information will improve a resilient defense posture of an organization. The number of RSA tokens implemented up till now exceeds 40 million and another 250 million are mobile software, as that leads the market for enabling

Retail atmospherics are quite well studied but are poorly explained Essay

Retail atmospherics are quite well studied but are poorly explained - Essay Example Before examining the claim that retail atmospherics are thoroughly studied but not stated well, we need to define what is meant by retail atmospherics. According to Kotler (1974), it is the effort to design buying environments to produce specific emotional effects in the buyer that enhances his purchase probability. A renewed interest was created in retail atmospherics through the caricature reporting by the Wall Street Journal showing a bank manager asking a customer’s opinion on the background music, which the manager has boasted of selecting himself. Such complex decisions as presenting background music are made irrationally in retail ambience. It gives the impression that no serious thought is given on creating retail atmospherics to provide a memorable experience to customers in the retail industry. Such decisions if taken rationally and thoughtfully can create a positive impact on customer perceptions of service quality, purchase, and consumption behaviour (Chebat & Dube , 2000). Developing of a customer experience has become very crucial with the importance given to the purchase of commodities. Expectations from retail managers have increased to create an environment of understanding in creating the atmospheric resources for providing the desired customer experience. Challenges in the retail atmospheric research lie in understanding the psychology of consumer reactions on the one hand and the functional requirements and planning at the firm level to provide that experience to the customers on the other hand (Chebat & Dube, 2000). Babin and Attaway (2000) have specifically worked on developing a reliable mechanism tool to innovatively measure the customers’ behavioural outcomes. Customer spending is directly impressed by a store’s capacity to create value that benefits the customer. It was found that environmentally inspired emotions affect relative spending by the customer. Their research indicates that customer behaviour can be induc ed by developing the right retail atmosphere. The value of shopping through the relationship of the customer behaviour with the retail environment provided by the retailer is justified. Research has been done on the relation between shopping behaviour and environmental factors via transformations in emotional feelings. Shoppers’ behaviour was examined through fixed time and changing time during a simulated shopping test. It included listening experience of different but familiar music provided to the shoppers. Later on shoppers’ outlook on shopping time, their mental state and product appraisal were recorded, which indicated that shoppers spent long hours while listening to favourite music, which was their perception but actually they spent long hours shopping when listening to not-popular music. Limited actual shopping times in the known music scenario were associated with increased awareness. Longer assumed shopping hours by the shoppers in popular music listening ex perience were associated to unmeasured cognitive factors. Mental states of the shoppers played a part in taking a purchase decision on a product but these impressions were not directly associated to the playing of music (Yalch and Spangenberg, 2000). Research by Turley and Milliman (2000)) also shows that impact of music is not positive and good always. Their review shows weakness of the theoretical base. Majority of customer emotion measures depend on store type. Functional and job-oriented environments are related with lower levels of pleasure and arousal-related emotions, which provides an alternative to Mehrabian and Russel (1974)) model on environmental psychology. By changing the store design and settings, emotional shopping results can be

Operationalize Sustainability Essay Example for Free

Operationalize Sustainability Essay â€Å"We must strive to become systems thinkers if we are to benefit from the interrelationships of the triple bottom line of sustainability: mission, environment, and community† (sustainability. army. mil). Welcome to the Army strategy for the environment. As one of the largest organizations in America, the Army has joined the movement towards sustainability. With 4 available resources, 5 functional areas and 7 programs and implementation tools, the Army is surging forward with applying sustainability practices. The purpose of this work is to divulge into the Army’s P2, or Pollution Prevention program, as well as giving alternate suggestions on preventing waste. Pollution Prevention (P2) is defined as the systematic effort to minimize, or eliminate altogether, process waste and other pollutants before that are generated (army. mil). P2 is a program that is just one tool to help achieve sustainability. This program can be applied to almost every aspect from field training, housing, family life, installation operations and munitions productions. To operationalize the P2 program, the Army has applied the basic principles of pollution prevention as well as developed the P2 hierarchy: reduce, reuse, recycle and dispose in an environmentally safe manner. The first priority in the hierarchy is reduction. The Pollution Prevention Act (PPA) defines this as â€Å"Any practice which 1) reduces the amount of any hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant entering any waste stream or otherwise released into the environment (including fugitive emissions) prior to recycling, treatment, or disposal; and 2) reduces the hazards to public ealth and the environment associated with the release of such substances, pollutants, or contaminants. The term includes equipment or technology modifications, process or procedure modifications, reformulation or redesign of products, substitution of raw materials, and improvements in housekeeping, maintenance, training, or inventory control† (army. mil) In the P2 program, this definition is applied to the broad goal of reducing or eliminating the environmental impacts of consuming resources and the waste that is generated from it. This waste can come from Army vehicle maintenance such as oil changes or leaving computers and lights on at the end of the work day. Reuse and recycle in hierarchy are meant for pollution that cannot be prevented. In this case, pollution should be treated in an environmentally safe manner whenever feasible. â€Å"The resources of a nation must be constantly managed: expanded then gathered, gathered then distributed each person or group sometimes gaining, sometimes losing, but always treated fairly and with respect. (O’Toole, 1993, p. 108) For example, Fort Bragg Army base in North Carolina has built an entire village out of materials recycled or diverted from the Fort Bragg landfill. This recycled â€Å"trash† village is used in training and preparing troops for deployment. If the first three actions cannot be taken, the last step in the P2 hierarchy is to disposal, removal and discharge of pollution into the environment should be employed only as a last resort and should be conducted in an environmentally safe manner. We will look at how these problems have arisen, and how they are all symptoms of a way of living that we have taken for granted, which has produced great progress but also growing side effects† (Senge, 2008, p. 10) While this program and many others are giving the Army advances in the right direction toward sustainability, there are other efforts that can be made to help prevent waste. In sustainability, waste is not reserved to trash alone. Waste can be the unnecessary use of, or degradation, of resources. For the Army, a suggestion for prevention can be monitoring the use of electronics. Each office in the military has several computers since the military communicates largely with emails, share drives and electronic training and personnel records. These computers are continuously on throughout the day, even after personnel go home. â€Å"U. S. organizations squander $2. 8 billion a year to power unused machines, emitting about 20 million tons of carbon dioxide†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Swartz, 2009) In some cases, such as hospitals with shift workers, there may be a need for active computers. In other cases, the Army can implement a timer, programmed for the end of a shift, to turn off all computers. The exception may be to leave one on for additional use of people working late, but the others would automatically shut off, saving the energy use instead of having computers in sleep mode throughout the night. â€Å"Simply shutting down PCs at night can save a company with 10,000 PCs over $260,000 a year and 1,871 tons of carbon dioxide emissions, the report says. (Swartz, 2009) The same goes for radios, printers, faxes, unnecessary machinery and all other excessive electronics. Another suggestion would be to create self-sustaining gyms. Exercise and the military go hand in hand. Exercise is directed and required to have a successful military career. Many people go to the gym, not just active duty but also dependent spouses, veterans, civil service workers and civilians with base access. The treadmill, elliptical, bikes and stair climbers are the most used equipment in the gym due to the diversity of patrons. Eco-friendly gyms have been popping up worldwide. † (Huey, 2008) This can be used to the Army’s advantage by using the energy output from the machines in use to generate the electricity for the lighting in the gym and operation of TVs. Instead of having TVs on and available at all times, have TVs operational only on the machine while it is in use, being powered by the operator. â€Å"A unique and key feature of green gyms is that they can actually use the energy generated from people exercising and use that to power their facilities. (Huey, 2008) Obviously this may not sustain an entire gym, considering air conditioning, heating and the size of the gym to include playing courts, but this can help to drastically lower energy usage. The Army also wastes equipment, which can produce pollution upon disposal. This equipment is the boots, jackets, uniforms, camel packs, Gerber tools, etc. that is issued to troops. When a troop completes basic training, or boot camp, the required initial equipment items are issued. When a troop deploys to an overseas location, new equipment is issued, even if the troop recently completed boot camp. This results in a double issue of equipment to the same troops, with no requirement to turn in unused or unneeded equipment. â€Å"While Soldiers have embraced the RFI process, they recently identified one noteworthy problem area in the RFI process: Their clothing records having duplicate items that were previously issued. † (Maj. Wright, 2009) Military members are also issued a clothing allowance every year for new uniforms. This results in money lost and equipment waste and abuse. Troops can throw away unused equipment without properly recycling the materials. To help put a check on equipment, the Army can implement a â€Å"turn in, tag out† system. This means troops will have to turn in old, worn out equipment, such as boots, to be issued new pairs. A â€Å"tag out† on issued items will be kept electronically in a database to ensure individuals are not being issued double items. Supply personnel can look up by name and determine if the troop has already received an item. With old equipment being turned into supply, the right people can properly and environmentally safely dispose or recycle used equipment. Also, by documenting equipment that is issued out and what equipment is being turned in, supply personnel will be better equipped in ordering new items efficiently rather than ordering excessive products and wasting money. Although the Army has taken many positive steps toward operationalizing sustainability, there are many more that can be taken. The Army may never be fully sustainable due to numerous training missions that use fuel, energy and natural resources, but every effort counts toward reducing, recycling and disposing of pollution properly. These advances can be applied toward other military branches as well. For instance, the Navy dumps thousands of gallons of fuel into our atmosphere to make the planes lighter and able to land on carriers at sea. While this maneuver is done for safety, the amount of gas put into the plane initially is known to be too much upon landing. This is an obvious area to improve on. Sustainability can be operationalized by every business, organization and company in the world. â€Å"What weve discovered on our journey is that implementing sustainability is a lot like implementing any other corporate change initiative. (Hitchcock, 2006, p. 167) The military is always changing and always adapting. In conclusion, the Army has many programs and tools that are operationalizing sustainability practices. The P2 program is a great start to handling systems that produce waste and pollution. The hierarchy of reduce, reuse, recycle and dispose of in an environmentally safe manner is the right mindset for sustainability. The Army also has areas that can be improved upon, as with any company. The Army is making progress towards sustainability, which is progress in the right direction for a better future. Bibliography http://www.greeniacs.com/GreeniacsArticles/Gyms-Get-Sustainable.html www.gdrc.org/sustdev/concepts/19-n-step.html http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/environment/2009-03-25-pc-power-company-costs_N.htm http://www.ikea.com/ms/en_US/about_ikea/pdf/sustainability_Report_2009.pdf

Understanding Emotions through Parent-Child Talk

Understanding Emotions through Parent-Child Talk Introduction Although there is a large body of literature focused on childrens understanding of emotions and another body focused on parent-child conversation about emotions, little research has examined parent-child talk about complex emotions. The majority of research is dedicated to simple emotions and their functions in childrens life. However, the studies which are dedicated to simple emotions admit the sufficient importance of parent-child interaction for better emotional understanding. The emerging of complex emotions become a disputable process, moreover these emotions are functionally more complicated than simple. The following research has argued the importance of parent-child conversation in terms of understanding complex emotions by children. To account for this gap in the literature, the present study focuses on parent child talk about complex emotions. To understand this topic, a review of the literature on complex emotions is needed. Much past research has looked at ambivalent emotions. However, researchers use different names such as ambivalent emotions (Donaldson Westerman, 1986), mixed emotions (Harris, 1989a, 1989b; Harter Buddin, 1987; Kestenbaum Gelman, 1995), conflicting emotions (Bennet Hiscock, 1993) and multiple emotions (Meerum Terworgt, Koops, Oosterhoff, Olthof, 1986; Wintre Vallance, 1994). There are many definitions that these authors use, but in spite of this fact, these authors express the similar idea about this kind of emotion: when an individual has two contradictory feelings at the same time. For instance, we may be happy to receive a present, but disappointed at the same time, as a present is not what we have expected to receive. Childrens understanding of emotions is a gradual process that develops from simple types of emotions to more complex ones (Tenenbaum, Visscher, Pons, Harris, 2004). According to Pons, Harris, de Rosnay. (2004) and Tenenbaum et al. (2004) the understanding of emotions has three broad categories which develop gradually: external, mentalistic, and reflective. The external component consists of recognizing faces, the ability to realise emotions when they are affected by different external circumstances and understanding the fact that past emotions might affect present ones. Recognizing faces means that children start identifying emotions according to a facial expression. Then, they understand how external cases can cause different feelings and the last component is when they realize that some subjects from the past might cause emotions in the present. This type of emotion understanding usually develops among children between the ages three to five. The second component, mentalistic emot ions, contains of realizing beliefs and desires, also identifying the difference between real and apparent emotions. Children start assuming the idea that people may have different emotional reactions due to the fact that they have dissimilar desires. The same situation occurs with beliefs, as children start understanding that peoples beliefs will influence their emotions to a situation. The last element is when children can understand the link between memory and emotions, for example, the strength of emotions might reduce with time. The authors claim that this process usually occurs between the ages five to seven. Finally, the third component consists of reflective emotions which include moral, regulated and ambivalent emotions. Children start experiencing several moral emotions such as guilt, shame or embarrassment when their actions did not correlate with generally accepted rules. They also start realizing the way they can control their emotions, using either behavioural or psych ological strategies. The last stage is an understanding that people might have two different emotions at the same time. Overall, the third component usually emerges at ages seven to nine. That classification is widely used in terms of defining emotions. Consequently, ambivalent emotions, which are one of the primary aims of the following work, are situated at the third level and presented to be one of the most complicated emotional categories to understand. Some authors (Donaldson Westerman, 1986; Harter Buddin, 1987) created a model of ambivalent emotions which consists of four different stages. This model was invented after clinical observations of play therapy. Children used to experience problems in understanding two emotions at the same time. Consequently, a question about developing of understanding of mixed emotions arouses. The following model consists of four stages including such factors as valence (positive or negative emotions) and a target (one or several targets). The stages are presented gradually from the least to the most advanced. The first level, which usually arises at seven years old, is presented the same valence and target, where two positive or two negative emotions are expressed towards one object (e.g., A boy was happy and excited because of his birthday). The second level, which might emerge around eight years old, is represented as same valence, but different targets (e.g., A girl was happy about her birthd ay and excited that so many guests had came). The third combination, usually develops at ten years old, is shown as different valence and targets (e.g., A boy was sad he could not go for a walk, but happy because he could watch TV). Finally, the fourth combination, arises approximately at 11 years old and consists of different valence and same target, a child has different feelings towards one object or situation (e.g., A girl was happy to go for holiday with parents, but sad to leave her friends). Though, authors give an explanation that understanding and experience may not be contemporary, as it is possible that a child might experience two emotions at the same time, but not be able to realize it yet. Though, there is a contradictory view about the levels of emotional development. Wintre and Vallance (1994) present their theory where alongside with multiple emotions and valence, they also depicted the intensity of emotions. Based on several previous studies, they offered the theory of development of understanding mixed emotions, which include such components as intensity and valence and multiplicity. For example, at level A that emerges usually at 4 years, there might be observed only intensity directed to one situation, though valence and multiplicity have not arouse yet. At level B which develop around 5 years old, children may recognize several mixed emotion of the same valence, but they do not use different intensity. Next level C, usually arise at 6 years old, where intensity is combined with mixed emotions, but there is only the same valence involved yet. At the last level D, which might emerge at 8, where children show the ability to use all three components together. Besid es they differentiate not only stages and the main components of emotional understanding of ambivalent emotions, but the age of emerging as well. Thus, for Harter and Budden (1987) the last stage might be reached children approximately by ages 10 and 11, whereas for Wintre and Vallence (1994) the period for the last component is age 8. However, there is another arguable point is the age period at which complex emotions arise. For example, several studies (Donaldson Westerman, 1986; Meerum Terwogt et al., 1986; Harter Buddin, 1987; Harris, 1989a, 1989b; Pons et al., 2004; Tenenbaum, 2008) pointed to the approximate period of developing complex emotions from seven to eight years old until eleven to twelve. To illustrate this point, there are several examples based on the studies. According to Harter Buddin (as cited in Donaldson Westerman, 1986) understanding of ambivalent emotions is quite a late cognitive process. She found that children were not able to distinguish emotions that occur simultaneously toward the same person until ten and a half years old. Taking into consideration her study, Donaldson and Westerman (1986) replicated the findings, showing that though few characteristics of understanding ambivalence appeared at seven to eight years old, only older children of ten to eleven showed this ability enti rely. A study conducted by Harter and Buddin (1987) supported the fact of gradual development of understanding ambivalent emotions. Thus, children four to five ages cannot believe that two feelings could be together, six to eight years old placed feelings in temporal order as when a child did not see the object which had caused his emotions, he simply forgot about it. However, children from eight to twelve usually can describe the appearance of two emotions at the same time. Meerum Terwogt (1986) argued that ten year old child understood the fact of having both emotions equally strong, but younger children had always chosen one to be stronger than another. They present an example of two groups of children: six and ten years old. Undoubtedly, ten years old children understand ambivalent emotions more often than six years old children, especially if the situation consists of opposite valence emotions. To sum up these studies, the most widespread period of time when mixed emotions deve lop is from seven to twelve years old. Though, there are some authors (Gnepp and Klayman, 1992; Wintre and Vallance, 1994) whose studies admit the arising of understanding two simultaneous emotions at the age of 8. They gave some explanations for this, where not only cognitive factor plays a crucial role, but social experience also becomes an important factor. Consequently, these authors did not share either late or early emerging of mixed emotions. However in spite of all these findings, there are other studies, which contradict the idea of such a late arising of ambivalent emotions. For instance, Kestenbaum and Gelman (1995) pointed that the development of mixed emotions appeared between ages four and six. Children of four and five years old can recognize ambivalent emotions when they are presented in a facial expression, even if they were on the same face (sad eyes and happy mouth), as well as on a picture with two-headed alien who expressed different emotions. Moreover, the results confirm that five year old children might understand mixed emotions within a simple story. Furthermore, it was offered two levels of understanding emotions at the preschool ages. The first one is recognition of ambivalent emotions showing on the face. The second level is an ability to match a face that expressed mixed emotions with a situation. All in all authors claim that this is a gradual process which starts early and increases with age. Their findings contradict the other researches which admit that a development of mixed emotions is a process starting much later. Likewise, Brown Dunn (1996) mentioned that even six years old children might show an understanding of mixed emotions when they are given a slight prompt about feelings of characters in stories. Similarly, Harris, P. L., Johnson, C. N., Hutton, D., Andrews, G., Cooke, T. (1989 a) consider the fact that even young children may predict about different emotions in a more advanced way. Even children between the ages of three to seven are very sensitive to other peoples desires, emotions and beliefs. Moreover, they do not merely take into account a situation by itself, but modify their reaction due to different situational changes. That in case might show childrens advanced ability to understand second mentalistic component: beliefs and desires. Considering this fact, they suggest that understanding of the second level arouse at three, but set up only between the ages five to six years. Consequently, the next level to develop will be the third, which contains moral, ambivalent and regulated emotions. The possible explanation of this phenomena could be found in Harriss (1989 b) study, he pointed that even in a behaviour of one-year-olds might be seen the ambivalence, whereas conscious realization does not arise before seven or eight years old. He stressed that children start expressing ambivalence quite earlier, but understanding it emerges only from eight to ten, young children can merely express ambivalence without understanding of this fact. To sum up all the previous research made according to this topic, it can be clearly seen that these studies implied a large range of age when complex emotions appear in the childhood. Though, it might be criticised the period of appearance of mixed emotions. As if to consider all researchers, described earlier, there are some who consider the emergence of ambivalent emotions as a very early process (between ages 4 to 6 years old). Some consider it to be the late process (between 9 to 12 years old). Besides, there are some who support the idea of appearance of multiple emotions at age 8. However, the researchers who offered the late period of appearance ambivalent emotions might be criticised for a big age gap between groups. For example, in the research of Meerum Terwogt et al. (1986), they conducted their study with two groups of children by ages 6 and 10. What may be considered not exactly relevant, as during these 4 years undoubtedly children will have a great step forward in term s of understanding ambivalent emotions. In present study the age group of seven, eight and nine were chosen in order to observe the difference between the age group according to rather contradictory fact of arising the understanding of mixed emotions. However, there are some findings that admit the fact of emerging mixed emotions quite early (Harris et al., 1989a; Kestenbaum Gelman, 1995; Brown Dunn, 1996), the excessive amount of research claim the period from seven to twelve years old. Taking into consideration both contradicting findings together, it was decided to concentrate the research on the following groups of children due to some reasons. For instance, such ages as seven, eight and nine present an ideal age group where ambivalent emotions might just have started and developed at the late stage. Besides, it appeared to be not enough amounts of studies to support the idea of early development of mixed emotions, hence, children of younger ages were not considered. Moreover, according to Harriss (1989 b) study, whe re his notable remark cannot be ignored, children might notice the ambivalence, but not understand it. As the major aim of this work is to find out when mixed emotions are understood by children, these period of ages were chosen. Parent-child conversation One way in which children understand emotions may be through the family via interaction with parents (Dunn et al., 1991; Harris, 2004; Racine et al., 2007). Different researchers have examined different types of conversations that may support childrens understanding. For example, Engel (as cited in Fivush Fromhoff, 1988) described two maternal styles, which are called: conversation-eliciting and directive. The first one is characterized by asking many questions, rare interruption of children, and a regular tendency to integrate a childs answer what in turn leads to more equal and productive conversation. The second type is characterized by different types of commands, frequent interaction in childs actions, as well as the high parental control during the conversation. Another classification was offered by Reese Fivush (1993) and Reese, E., Haden, C.A. Fivush, R (1993) and it claimed that childrens understanding emotions correlates with the parental conversational style. They offered two parental styles: high – elaborative and low- elaborative. For instance parents with high-elaborative style, which consists of a lot of details, explanations, always try to arouse childrens interest. On the contrary there is other kind of style called low-elaborative where parents ask simple questions during their interaction with children and give them little new information and quite often change topics of conversation. Similar types of maternal styles were offered by Fivush and Fromhoff (1988) where the styles are called: elaborative and repetitive. Elaborative mothers are likely to provide a lot of details during the discussion and tend to ask many open-ended and complex questions during the interaction. On the contrary, mothers who have repetitive conv ersational style tend to ask yes/no questions; do not provide so much detailed information during the discussion. Besides, the authors depict that elaborative style is significantly better for children to remember past events during the conversation. Overall, all previous research concerning maternal style of conversation was summarized (Reese et al., 1993) The mothers who are more engaged in a conversation with their children – elaborative, high-elaborative, reminiscing or topic-extending and mothers who are less involved in a communication process – repetitive, low elaborative, practical remembers or topic-switching (p. 404). There are many studies that support the link between parent-child conversation and childrens emotional understanding (Dunn, Bretherton Munn, 1987; Fivush Fromhoff, 1988; Dunn, J., Brown, J., Slomkowski, C., Tesla, C., Youngblade, L., 1991; Dunn Brown, 1994; Brown Dunn, 1996; Steele et al., 1999; Pons et al., 2003; Laible Song, 2006). Some of the authors connect emotional understanding with maternal attachment (Brown Dunn, 1996; Steele et al., 1999; Pons et al., 2003), the other with the quality of maternal speech (Dunn et. al., 1987; Dunn Brown, 1994). To begin with, there is as well a link between quality of parent-child attachment and the quality of family talk about emotions with childrens emotional understanding (Pons et al., 2003). Brown and Dunn (1996) also consider a possibility that childrens development of ambivalent emotions can depend upon the family where a child grows. Moreover the findings, presented by Steele et al. (1999) suggested that the development of secure mother-child attachment at one year helps to shape a good understanding of mixed emotions later at six years. Much past work has argues that when mothers talk a lot about emotions, children consequently start using more emotional words in conversation (Dunn et. al., 1987). However, , children in families in which the use of negative emotions is greater than positive emotions may have some difficulties expressing and recognizing emotions (Dunn Brown, 1994). Studies conducted by Dunn et al. (1991) showed a significant link between the parent-child conversation and childrens emotional understanding. Thus children whose parents spoke with them a lot about emotions at the age of 3 demonstrated better understanding about the emotions of unfamiliar adults at the age of 6 in comparison with the children who did not experience feeling- state talk so frequently. Laible (2004) and Thompson et al. (as cited in Laible and Song, 2006) argue that style is more influential than content. Parent- child conversation helps children realise different situations of everyday life, especially if these situations are not so obvious to see. That usually includes emotions, motives and intentions. Besides, when mothers involved with children into conversation about past experience, they not only give their children an emotional understanding of the past, but also bring extra knowledge for future experience. The other findings of Laible Song (2006) indicated that parent-child discourse was a crucial predictor of the childs socio-emotional development. For example, during the given task if mother used more elaborative style rather than repetitive, children had higher scores on emotional understanding. The similar results were presented by Steele et al. (1999) where children and parents language abilities did not affect childrens understanding of ambivalent emotions, what in turn depicted the fact about the major influence of socio-emotional rather than cognitive elements. Considering all previous research conducted on this topic, it is without doubt the effect that parent-child conversation plays in terms of childrens emotional understanding. However, some studies use different core point to correlate this connection, the influence is still might be observed. Particularly, the more elaborative and positive discourse parents and children have, better emotional understanding children express in comparison with children whose parents use low-elaborative style, and consequently these results show the great impact of parental conversation with children on childrens emotional understanding. The same situation is presented with an attachment, the more secure attachment is observed between mother and child, and the better emotional understanding will be expressed by a child later. Hence, the parent-child conversation was chosen in order to correlate it with childrens understanding of mixed emotions. Parent child discourse may however vary with child gender. That is the importance of gender difference in terms of parent-child interaction, which cannot be denied, although the studies are rather controversial, thus some researches refute it (Racine et al., 2007; Dunn et al., 1991) and some support (Dunn et al., 1987; Fivush, 1991;Kuebli Fivush, 1992; Reese Fivush, 1993; Cervantes Callanan, 1998). To begin with, there are examples of several studies which support the gender difference in parent-child interaction. The findings of Dunn et al. (1987) claimed that mothers had more communication with girls rather than boys and later girls referred to emotional states more often than boys. Moreover, mothers expressed more emotional words to daughters rather than to sons. Consequently, girls used more feelings words during the discourse in comparison with boys. Though authors pointed one of the limitations to be a small sample of children who took part in the research, the studies made afterwards can support these results. Namely, Reese Fivush (1993) argued that parents of daughters expressed more elaborative style than parents of boys and the authors believed that due to more prolonged conversation with daughters, they can grow up to produce more elaborative narrative style in comparison with sons. The authors admit that in the majority of cases parent-daughter pairs involved in more detailed conversation and as well as this style required more involvement of childrens memory, daughters may develop more elaborative style in comparison with sons. Similar results are presented by Kuebli Fivush (1992) where they admit parents of daughters use quite more emotional words in comparison with parents of sons. Their study shows that parents speak more about sadness with girls rather than with boys. Besides, the study conducted by Cervantes Callanan (1998) also showed the gender difference for children at the age of 2 but not at the age 3 and 4 in terms of childrens tal k, there were also gender-related differences in mothers talk for using more explanations for boys and more labels for girls. In the light of this evidence, it is obvious that if there is a gender difference during parent-child conversation, parents usually pay more attention to interaction with girls rather than with boys, that is why the aspect of gender difference seemed to be quite significant in the present study. One good point might summarize the gender difference idea. Though, mothers tend to socialize with a child in different ways according to the gender. Besides, it may be that boys and girls are experiencing and discussing emotions in different ways and consequently, their mothers simply respond to this difference (Fivush, 1991). All things considered, in the following study, there is an aim to find out whether parent-child discourse about mixed emotions plays a significant role in childrens understanding of these emotions. Based on a substantial literature (ref), the first hypothesis predicted that the more parents explain complex emotions, the better children will understand emotions. A second related hypothesis is that the more emotion words parents use, the better the childs emotional understanding will be. The third hypothesis is that parents will use more emotion words with girls than boys and consequently, girls will use more emotion words in comparison to boys. Method Participants. The participants were 16 parent–child pairs. Children were dived for three groups according to their age: the younger group was 7 years (M = 7.5, ranging from 7 years, 4 months to 7 years, 10 months), 8 years (M = 8.48, ranging from 8 years, 1 month to 8 years, 9 months) and 9 years (M = 9.42, ranging from 9 years, 1 month to 9 years, 8 months). There were both 5 children at the group of 7 and 9 years old and 6 children at the age group 8 years old. Overall there were nine boys and seven girls. Participants and their parents were recruited from one primary school in Dunstable. All participants were white British. It is notable that all parents that took part in this study were mothers; no fathers participated in the research. The majority of mothers (12 people) were employed, 1 mother was employed, but worked at home and 3 mothers were homemakers. All mothers have educational background ranging from primary school to university. Materials The session with each pair will be held only once. To begin with, it is notable to mention that the books were chosen for this research as a discussion in general seems to be a quite crucial for children in order to reach better emotional understanding. Therefore, in the joint activity, such as reconstruction of events, adults give an idea for children what emotions are appropriate and inappropriate for different situations (Fivush, 1991). A created story book which contains 6 vignettes about 3 complex, 2 regulated and 1 moral emotions. The book was created by the researcher and was particularly organised for boys and girls separately. The story was about two children: a boy – Peter and a girl – Anna, who took part in several activities, such as: passing an exam, having a birthday, going to amusement park, home interaction, his/her friend leaving. There was one question concerning emotions for every situation to which a child was involved in. The second book is called F rog goes to dinner by Mercer Mayer (1974). This book contains several vignettes, presenting a story about a boy who has a frog. Accidentally, a frog goes to dinner with a boy and his parents without being noticed by anybody. A frog spoiled the dinner and the parents were very angry with a boy. The important fact is that this book is wordless; obviously the task was to create a story together. This particular method was chosen because Kestenbaum and Gelman (1995) pointed the importance of presenting information to children during the research not only verbally, but giving photographs or drawings as stimuli. To justify their point, there were two reasons presented in their study. The first reason is that a facial expression helps children understand emotions significantly better. The second reason is that the absence of pictures might cause some difficulties as children might not know how two different emotions can be expressed at the same time. After reading two books with the parent s, children were tested by the Test of Emotional Comprehension which was created by Pons, Harris and de Rosnay (2004). The TEC presents vignettes in which a gender-matched protagonist encounters simple to complex situations that elicit different emotional responses. After each vignette, the child is asked how the protagonist is feeling, by choosing from four illustrations of faces representing different emotional states (Tenenbaum et al., 2004). The TEC consists of nine sections which included several pictures and a question about emotional condition of protagonist. Though, the first section requires naming emotions that the faces show. The second includes the situation where a book character expresses the influence from external factors. The third one consists of desires that a protagonist expresses. The fourth factor involves understanding of false beliefs and the way they influence on emotions. The fifth section expresses the situation with reminders that might influence on childrens present condition. The sixth one asks children to control their emotions. The seventh section includes hidden emotions that a child should define. The eighth factor presents the situations with mixed emotions, particularly on what this study focuses. The last component involves understanding of moral emotions. Parents were offered to fill in a Parent Questionnaire which contains several questions about background information and social economic status. Procedure. Parents with children read two books: one is created by the researcher and another is Frog goes to dinner by Mercer Mayer. The first book was created by the researcher and concluded six situations including such emotions as mixed, moral and regulated. A task required to read the stories and a child should have answered an offered question. It was not specially defined who suppose to read a book. Consequently, mothers could read it as well as children, or they could do it in an order. The vignettes, which were presented in a book, concerned several situations at school, at home, at an amusement park, on holidays. For example, a situation for girls that involved mixed emotions: Annas birthday is during summer holiday, so she can do everything shed like to do- ride a bicycle, play with friends and eat ice-cream! Her parents decided to arrange a birthday party for Anna. She likes parties very much and a lot of guests will bring gifts to her. But her best friend, Lola, is unwell and now s he cant go to Annas birthday party. Anna wants Lola to come so much. How does Anna feel now? After reading a created book together, they were offered to make up a story together. A book Frog goes to dinner by Mercer Mayer (1974) was used as a good example of wordless story. These two tasks were chosen in order to give parents and children enough time to interact with each other. Moreover, they both contain different emotional situations describing which should promote an excessive usage of emotions. After making up a story a child was tested with the Test of Emotional Comprehension, which was created by Pons, Harris and de Rosnay (2004) in order to measure the period of time when children start understanding different emotions. The model of Pons, Harris and de Rosnay (2004) was accepted as the main one in a theoretical description of emotional understanding of complex emotions. Besides, the test consists of pictures, and the questions are always asked by a researcher. It is also very convenient for children to conduct this test due to the absence of necessity to read. Consequently, their test was assumed to be relevant to use during the research. Besides, it is worth mentioning that the researcher was trained before to conduct this test, as the requirements were to conduct it with neutral voice, do not give any prompts to children which emotions a protagonist might express. During conducting the TEC with children, parents were offered to fill in the Parent Questionnaire which contains of such sections as child and parents names, childs age, date of birth and birth order, also social economical situation of parents (ethnicity, occupation, level of education, marital status). Besides, parents signed a consent form which stated that they and their children agreed to take part in the present research and they did not object to be video taped. Moreover, this form included all information about research, it was also mention that parents were free to withdraw at any time they want from the study and contact details of researchers were provided. Children were asked oral permission if they agreed to help a researcher to conduct the study and neither parents nor children refused. Parents were given a choice to stay or leave during a conducting the TEC with children, but it is worth mentioning that all parents were present during childrens testing. Coding A created book that was basically consisted of 6 vignettes was scoring in the following way. It is notable that in terms of this book the amount of using em