ESPN College Gameday Brings Fun to Lubbock

Much fun is being had in Lubbock because ESPN's College Gameday show is in Lubbock for the Texas vs. Texas Tech match up.

Cynic Wes Wise said it would never happen.

Here I am with lab crew Wes Wise, Brandon Nutting, Wendy Maxian, and Kelli Brown.

Wreck 'Em!

Tech Doctoral Student Pens Again

In our doctoral program in the college of mass communications at Texas Tech University, we have one of the most prolific authors in America today.

Bob Schaller has authored more than 40 books, and that number continues to increase dramatically. It seems as if he writes a new book each week.

Mr. Schaller's latest book, Michael Phelps: The Untold Story of a Champion, is scheduled to be released Oct. 21 from St. Martin's; however some reports have the books on some shelves now.

The Phelps book was the subject of a Publishers Weekly cover story this week (see photo). This is an honor, and it reflects positively on both Mr. Schaller and the college.

Amazon.com has the mass market paperback for just $6.99 and available for preorder, and it is my understanding that this book will have many interesting insights filtered from the official Phelps biography.

Having read some of Mr. Schaller's work, I highly recommend it. I'll be buying my copy in a little under two weeks.

Congratulations, Bob.

Tech President Appears to Be Solid Choice

Regular readers will know that Texas Tech's choice for a new president has been a topic of great concern for me.

Last week Tech announced the University of Missouri at Kansas City chancellor Guy Bailey has been named the sole finalist for the position (read news release here).

I do not know much about Bailey personally, but everything that I have read sounds very promising. He seems to have great potential as a president.

This bodes well for Tech's future and relieves a great deal of anxiety for me.

However, I still strongly oppose the process of a sole finalist. It is my conviction that multiple candidates must come to campus, and there must be dialog with the entire campus community.

In this case, the choice of a president is a bit like sausage: I like the end product, but I am not too fond of the way it is made.

Tech Board Expected to Name President Finalist

Board of Regents
Special Called Teleconference Meeting
Lubbock, Texas
July 2, 2008

Abbreviated Agenda with Approximate Times

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

2:00 p.m. Call to Order Meeting of the Board.
Location: Board Room, Second Floor, Room 201, Administration Building

2:00 p.m Executive Session
Location: Board Room, Second Floor, Room 201, Administration Building

3:30 p.m. Following Executive Session, convene into Open Session, and Meeting of the Committee of the Whole and the Board
Location: Board Room, Second Floor, Room 201, Administration Building

3:30 p.m. Adjournment



From the full agenda, which was e-mailed, but from which I cannot copy and paste because it has Acrobat security enabled, the purpose of the executive session is:

Personnel matters: Consideration and discussion of candidates for the position of President of Texas Tech University -- Section 551.074

If you do any searching of the selection of university presidents, you will find that the exclusive practice is this naming of a single finalist. Thus, it is the de facto procedure in Texas. I am of the opinion that multiple finalists should be publicly named.

From ICA, Moving into Theses Phase

From ICA in Canada to moving and summer teaching ... now to master's theses.

Three of my students are defending this month. First was Nikki Siegrist (right) on Friday.

Her thesis was titled The effects of dialect on the cognitive processing of print advertisements.

Congratulations, Nikki!

Thanks for the Memories, General

Coach Knight, you will be missed.

Wreck 'Em: Tech 34, Oklahoma 27

Thanks to Wendy Maxian for the camera phone picture.

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Taking down the No. 3 team in the nation feels good.

Thanks to Director Andy Fickman

Not much blog activity as I try to catch up from the NMSU reunion weekend and get ready for ICA conference deadline.

The highlight of the week was Hollywood director -- and Texas Tech alumnus -- Andy Fickman speaking to my class on Thursday. If I teach another 40 years, I may never have a guest speaker this good.

He was hilarious, and his success shows how far a Tech grad can go even with no previous connections in Hollywood.

Fickman directed The Game Plan, which was the number one movie in America for two consecutive weeks this month.

This morning our college honored Fickman as one of five 2007 college of mass communications outstanding alumni. The honor is well deserved.

Images from the College of Mass Comm

Tech Admissions Offers Cool Blog Opportunity

The Office of Admissions is looking for student bloggers to chronicle their
experiences in 2007 - 2008 for our Web site; a blog is a Web site for journal
entries.

This year is the launch of our blog site, which is meant to give prospective
students an authentic feel for life as a Texas Tech student. Colleges and
universities with blog sites have received significant attention from students
for the unique nature of blogs—¬namely that blogs are unedited and feature
multi-media postings.

Read more here.

Smoking Conquered; Obesity Is Next

In this screen capture from a Family Guy episode, a young "Death" wears a T-shirt that reads "Smoke Cigarettes." From many popular culture references such as this, it is evident that most people realize the health dangers from smoking. A recent Gallup poll suggests that Americans are now realizing the dangers of obesity.

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Regular readers know that I have spent the better part of the past two months indirectly fighting diabetes. Not for me, but for rural Hispanics in West Texas.

We are currently testing public service announcements (PSAs) that we created over the past few weeks.

In the current experiment, we are showing the anti-diabetes PSAs along with some filler PSAs about smoking, AIDS, marijuana, and cocaine.

During an experiment the other day, master's student Wes Wise remarked that the battle on smoking was pretty much won. Now, he predicted, more efforts could be targeted toward obesity and related health problems.

Turns out that many Americans are at least acknowledging the danger of obesity. A recent Gallup Poll shows that Americans acknowledge that being significantly overweight is just as harmful to your health as smoking.

Of those polled, 83% said being obese was "very harmful" to your health, whereas 79% of Americans said smoking was "very harmful" to your health.

When we surveyed rural West Texas Hispanics earlier this year, we found that about half were overweight according to the Body Mass Index, and another quarter were overweight. That's more than two-thirds of those polled.

Echoing the diabetes problem, many of our experimental participants are self reporting family members with serious diabetes-related health problems. Many of the participants report having lost a loved one to diabetes.

According to the Gallup poll, 28% of Americans report that obesity has been a cause of serious health problems within their family. I would venture to guess that this number is higher among our populations of rural West Texans (of both Hispanic and non-Hispanic descent).

Although we will learn something from the current endeavor, PSAs will not be enough. Our focus group data has shown that there are two major causes of the current eating concerns: economy of time, and economy of money (thanks again to Wes Wise for coining these terms).

It's faster and cheaper to eat at the dollar menu. You can walk out of McDonald's absolutely stuffed for about $3.21 in Texas. Just order two double cheeseburgers and a 99-cent order French fries.

It's a lot of food. It's also a lot of grease. I just looked up the nutrition facts online. Each 99-cent double cheeseburger has 440 calories, 23 grams of fat, and 11 grams of saturated fat. Those 11 grams of saturated fat represent 54% of the recommended daily allowance for a 2,000 calorie a day diet. The medium fries add another 380 calories, 20 grams of fat, and 4 grams of saturated fat.

So your $3.21 bought you 1,260 calories, 66 grams of total fat, and 26 grams of saturated fat. With that one meal you have 128% of the saturated fat you were supposed to eat for the day.

It is almost impossible to get that much sustenance for that little money in any other fashion. And when you're broke with a lot of mouths to feed -- and I've been there -- it's difficult to look at the single bunch of broccoli that the $3.21 will buy.

Add to the fact that for most people, those fat and carbohydrate grams taste really good. There's a reason they taste so good: you get the most energy (i.e., calories) per gram with those molecules. When you're just trying to survive, fat and carbs keep you alive.

When I was a little kid, our house backed up against the old Missouri River bluffs, and much of that land was a park. Since the bluffs made a cliff, it was basically our private park since no one climbed the cliff to get there.

My father used to like to photograph the wildlife, so one day he put out a dog food bowl full of bacon grease. The animals went crazy. I believe raccoons would just lay by the bowl lapping up that congealed bacon grease as if it were pure heaven. Scavenging from trash cans had never tasted so good! [If dad will send a picture, I will post it here].

Their bowl of bacon grease is our dollar menu and all-you-can-eat buffet. You cannot get much more appetitive than that. And unlike illegal drugs where you can get arrested right now, the danger from overeating is distant. Your heart does not stop today. You do not have a stroke today. You do not lose your foot to diabetes today.

So you eat from the dollar menu today. You'll eat right tomorrow. Sadly, for too many Americans that healthy eating tomorrow never comes.

I'm not picking on McDonald's. They claim to be committed to Hispanics, and I am sure that they mean it. But combining the dollar menu with any economically disadvantaged population does not and cannot encourage healthy eating.

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Our research project is funded by the West Texas Rural EXPORT Center, however, opinions shared here are solely my own.

Lab Is Moving Soon ... To the Basement

It was about this time last year that the Communication and Cognition lab moved to Texas Tech.

Shouldn't it be time to move again?

Yes ... but. We are moving within the next 10 days. But we're staying at Tech. We're moving to a much better -- and quieter -- space in the basement of the mass communications building.

I'm excited about the new space. But not about the move. I toured the new space today, and it will be most excellent.

It'll be a busy year. We have three master's theses to run in addition to whatever studies we run to follow up out glut of data.

Branded: Love and Hate in West Texas

We continue our work into the cognitive processing of brands in the communication and cognition lab. We're just beginning to analyze the data, but in the interim, I thought that I would bring you the most and least loved brands on the South Plains.

Most Loved Brands
1. Disney
2. Google
3. Starbucks
4. Dr Pepper
5. Target (go figure)

Least Loved Brands
28. McDonald's
29. Citibank
30. Abercrombie & Fitch
31. Camel (cigarettes)
32. Marlboro

Most Arousing (Exciting) Brands
1. 20th Century Fox
2. BMW
3. Bacardi
4. Smirnoff
5. Nike

Least Arousing (Exciting) Brands
28. Dell
29. Microsoft
30. Gap
31. Citibank
32. Maxwell House

Time to Work: ICA Adventure Complete

While at the International Communication Association in San Francisco, we made an outing to a Giants game at AT&T Park. Barry Bonds was 0-for-4.

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Time to start anew after a refreshing conference in San Francisco.

The Texas Tech contingent represented our new college of mass communications well in my estimation.

More importantly, interactions with colleagues recharged my batteries to write the many papers that need written.

I am excited about research and my lab, and that makes the nightmare flight worth it.

It was especially fun to mix my Indiana past with my current lab members.

Red Raiders on the Golden Gate

SAN FRANCISCO -- The Texas Tech contingent freezes atop the Golden Gate Bridge. Wendy Maxian, me, and Wes Wise.

Seeing the Obvious in Science and Radio

Philosophy of science is a pet passion of mine. I owe this to my doctoral advisor, Annie Lang.

I wish that I had more time to read more in this area. One of the tenets to which I cling is that you cannot see the world exactly as it is. Instead you see the world through a filter that is your experience. You cannot be blind to your own biases. If I we both had the time, I could spin a neural network based tale about why this might be.

At any rate, I am fascinated by our own perceptual limitations.

Today my parents are in town. At Texas Tech, we currently house Gordon McClendon's personal record collection. McClendon was instrumental in the growth of the Top 40 radio format, and my father, too, played a role in the early days of Top 40 radio.

Because of this link, my dad was eager to see the collection. Today we finally made it down to room 030, where the LPs are housed.

Sitting there, dad told some of the stories about the birth of Top 40 radio. If you are reading this, chances are that you know nothing but format radio. But five-plus decades ago, things were different. The major radio networks syndicated programs much like ABC and NBC do today.

That was just the way things were done. So local programming followed much the same idea.

Many times I have heard my dad say, "We invite you to join us for an interlude of transcribed music." And that was usually followed by 30 minutes of polka, which might be followed by 30 minutes of Hawaiian music. On the same station.

That's just the way things were done.

And it's damned hard to see past what you were taught.

From July 28, 1949, to April 1953, my dad worked at KCHS-AM radio in Truth or Consequences, N.M. (named Hot Springs when he arrived). During that time, he hosted an afternoon call-in request show named It's All Yours.

People called in and requested current hits. The same songs. It was not unlike TRL on MTV. And it was popular. And when it was over, they went back to programs segmented into 15, 30, or 60 minute blocks.

It was obvious, really. Just play the hits all of the time. If you had realized this in 1951 and had any cash to invest, you'd be a rich person today.

Todd Storz got the idea and implemented it at KOWH-AM in Omaha, Neb. He followed with WHB-AM in Kansas City, my hometown (and one-time employer of my mother).

Storz made a lot of money. He saw what others could not. It's hard to see what is so plainly in front of your face when it does not fit your picture of the world. It happens in science every day. It happened in radio for a long time. It is happening today. But we cannot see it. If you have that rare vision, you might very well soon be rich.

Texas promoter Gordon McLendon took that idea and ran with it. He, too, made a lot of money.

When Charles Darwin finally published his theory of natural selection, his friend and colleague Thomas Henry Huxley said “How extremely stupid of me not to have thought of that!”

Exactly.

See Wikipedia's history of Top 40.

Hands for Hope 2007: A Walk for Autism

Today the Burkhart Center for Autism Education and Research played host to the 2007 Hands for Hope walk.

My amazing wife, Emily, works at the center and was co-director of the walk. The entire center did an amazing job, and it was a great event.

We spent two hours in the wonderful West Texas sun, and I think that they raised a lot of money to help fund autism research.

Here two of my kids pose with Raider Red of Texas Tech University.

NCAA Tourney Provides Highs, Lows

Media dependency is in full force here, as I spent the evening glued to the television watching the NCAA and NIT selection shows.

Last night I was celebrating that my New Mexico State Aggies (B.A., 1997) won the Western Athletic Conference tournament and an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.

Tonight I am mourning that my Kansas State Wildcats (M.S., 2001) are snubbed and headed to the NIT. The Cats are the first team in the history of the 64-team field from a power conference that won 20 games, won 10 conference games, and finished in the top 4 of the conference and not make it to the Big Dance.

The Indiana Hoosiers (Ph.D., 2005) have a difficult draw, playing Gonzaga in Sacramento.

The Texas Tech Red Raiders (current employer) are also in, and Bob Knight will have his hands full with Boston College.

Let's hope coach Bill Self and the Kansas Jayhawks (childhood favorite) will finally win in the first round. Since the name of their opponent does not begin with the letter "B," odds are good.

Finally, the Ohio State Buckeyes (former employer) receive the almost automatic bid to the round of 32, as no No. 1 seed has ever lost to a No. 16 seed.

Let the games begin.

Political Orientation Affects Perceptions for All

Recently, my lab has been investigating the cognitive processes underlying the cultivation effect.

In a nutshell, this effect shows that people who watch a lot of television give higher estimates of crime prevalence (among other things).

In our data, political orientation is turning out to have a much greater effect. This perhaps is not surprising due to the conservative nature of Texas Tech Students.

One of the qualifiers of the cultivation effect is so-called mainstreaming.

That is, the television portrayal of the social world tends to most strongly affect social perceptions of those with views far from the mainstream. In this line, heavy TV viewing has been shown to bring them into the mainstream.

In this figure that I presented at our brown bag luncheon yesterday, we see little evidence of mainstreaming on crime perceptions. Instead, after statistically controlling for age, sex, income, GPA, and need for cognition, we see little effect of TV across the three political orientations. Nonetheless, the strong main effect of political orientation persists.

University Day Brings Fresh Faces

Today was University Day at Texas Tech University. I wanted to help recruit new students to Tech, so I headed over to the United Spirit Arena this morning to help work the college of mass communications "booth."

It was fun meeting the high school students and their parents. It's an exciting time in life, and their optimism was energizing.

I spoke with a number of students who were interested in the advertising major, and I hope that they will choose to come to Lubbock in the fall or even fall 2008 (there were a lot of motivated juniors there).