InternetReputation.com, the premier site for online reputation management, is proud to announce the launch of a new program that is exclusively designed to help franchisors monitor and manage their Internet reputations, along with the reputations of their franchisees. The services that are bundled into this new comprehensive program include online monitoring, review monitoring, management of negative comments and reviews, and much more. For InternetReputation.com, creating this program was a logical next step. The award winning tech firm is known throughout the United ...

While the U.S. Olympians have grabbed the headlines this summer, Health Journeys has quietly added a new member to its superstar roster of contributing health and mind-body health practitioners. They are proud to introduce Traci Stein, PhD, MPH, a practicing psychotherapist and Columbia-trained clinical psychologist, ASCH-certified in clinical hypnotherapy - specializing in general health and pain management psychotherapy. Stein is the former Director of Integrative Medicine in the Department of Surgery at Columbia University, and has combined integrative therapies, ...

Going through your back-to-school check list? Pencils and paper . . . check. Spiffy new outfits . . . check. How about your tires? Whether you're hauling the kids to school in the SUV or helping your child pack her car for college, the engineers at GT Radial suggest you check the tires. Air Pressure "First off, check your tires' air pressure because under- or over-inflated tires do not perform as designed," says William Estupinan, vice president of technical service for GITI Tire in the Americas (GITI Tire is the worldwide manufacturer of GT Radial tires). ...

From school trousers to shoes and jumpers to jackets, go back to school in style with this brilliant range of girls' and boys' schoolwear from Next. This collection includes everything you need to kit out your children for the new term all with great next day delivery* and free delivery to your local store.* The new term is looming and what better way to kick start the year than with this fantastic range of school clothing online. Next is one stop shop for all kid's school essentials, providing great quality at affordable prices. Dresses start from as little as GBP8 ...

With UK 'A' Level Students finding out their results this week and the focus being firmly on education, thanks to Foresters UK 150 students will have a contribution to the financial costs of their further studies via the Foresters Scholarship Programme. Foresters, the international financial services organisation, is committed to the support of the community, and has given students renewable scholarships awarding them for their outstanding educational achievements and the undertaking of volunteering projects in their community. "The Scholarship Programme is ...

The Offshore Group recently spoke with Jim Clarke, vice president of new business development, with Taylor, Michigan-headquartered FOCUS Business Solutions. FOCUS has assisted companies involved in international trade to move their products into and out of the U.S. for the past twenty-five years, and has developed a particular expertise in servicing manufacturers located in Mexico, as well in the rest of the NAFTA region. During the session, Clarke talks about five challenging issues that confront companies navigating Customs that confront companies navigating Customs ...

Design blogs such as Apartment Therapy or lifestyle brands such as Martha Stewart help consumers exercise taste in their everyday life as they learn how to generate meaning through objects, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research. "Participating in a taste regime allows consumers to assemble coherent sets of objects, associate meanings with those objects, and then create routines that serve to maintain the physical order of objects and their associated meanings," write authors Zeynep Arsel (Concordia University) and Jonathan Bean (Parsons The New ...

When charity recipients seem to belong to a cohesive group, donors will make stronger judgments about the victims, which leads to greater concern and increased donations if these judgments are positive, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research. "One of the most puzzling aspects of charitable giving is the relative meagerness of donations to large numbers of 'statistical' victims in contrast to the generosity shown to a single identified victim," write authors Robert W. Smith (University of Michigan), David Faro (London Business School), and Katherine ...

The price a consumer will pay for a product is often significantly less than the price they will accept to sell it. According to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research, this occurs because ownership of a product enhances its value by creating an association between the product and consumer identity. "Our studies support the idea that ownership enhances the attractiveness of a product because ownership creates an association between the item and the self," write authors Sara Loughran Dommer (Georgia Institute of Technology) and Vanitha Swaminathan (University ...

Consumers enjoy products more in the long run if they don't overuse them when first purchased, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research. "Consumers are naturally prone to consume products they enjoy too rapidly for their own good, growing tired of them more quickly than they would if they slowed down," write authors Jeff Galak (Carnegie Mellon University), Justin Kruger (New York University), and George Loewenstein (Carnegie Mellon University). We often face decisions about how rapidly to consume products we enjoy: how quickly to eat a favorite dessert; ...

Growing communities can overcome conflict and fragmentation, and increase diversity, without losing their sense of collective belonging, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research. "Consumption communities are groups of people united by a shared passion. A persistent challenge to community is continued engagement, and collective enterprises can be destabilized by differences as they grow. Our research shows how community members leverage social and economic resources to overcome differences," write authors Tandy Chalmers Thomas (Queen's University), ...

Confident consumers pay more attention to advertisements and product information that focus on high-level features of a product, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research. Less confident consumers, however, focus on the basics. "When we feel confident, we think that abstract information is more relevant to us. But when we feel doubtful, we think that concrete information is more relevant. The more relevant we perceive information to be, the more we will focus on it," write authors Echo Wen Wan (University of Hong Kong) and Derek D. Rucker (Kellogg School ...

Sticky plaques of proteins called amyloids mark several different, though related degenerative brain diseases including Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and Creutzfeld-Jacobs. The symptoms of these disorders overlap and methods to diagnose and monitor them are not very advanced. To solve this problem, scientists at the University of California, San Diego, have devised several new fluorescent probes that change color depending on what type of amyloid they encounter. Because amyloids accumulate in the eye as well as the brain, their discovery offers hope that one day neurodegenerative ...

For the first time, engineers at the University of New South Wales have demonstrated that hydrogen can be released and reabsorbed from a promising storage material, overcoming a major hurdle to its use as an alternative fuel source. Researchers from the Materials Energy Research Laboratory in nanoscale (MERLin) at UNSW have synthesised nanoparticles of a commonly overlooked chemical compound called sodium borohydride (NaBH4) and encased these inside nickel shells. Their unique nanostructure has demonstrated remarkable hydrogen storage properties. "No one has ever ...

The Pipe Nebula is a prime example of a dark nebula. Originally, astronomers believed these were areas in space where there were no stars. But it was later discovered that dark nebulae actually consist of clouds of interstellar dust so thick it can block out the light from the stars beyond. The Pipe Nebula appears silhouetted against the rich star clouds close to the centre of the Milky Way in the constellation of Ophiuchus (The Serpent Bearer). Barnard 59 forms the mouthpiece of the Pipe Nebula [1] and is the subject of this new image from the Wide Field Imager on the ...

An international team of researchers has found that certain bioactive components found in human milk are associated with a reduced risk of HIV transmission from an HIV infected mother to her breast-fed infant. Their study will be published in the August 15 online edition of American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. "In developing countries, HIV-infected mothers are faced with the decision of whether or not to breastfeed their babies," said Lars Bode, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine. ...

DURHAM, N.C. – Researchers at Duke University Medical Center may finally have discovered why people with sickle cell disease get milder cases of malaria than individuals who have normal red blood cells. In a finding that has eluded scientists for years, Duke researchers discovered that genetic material in red blood cells may help alter parasite activity via a novel mechanism that alters parasite gene regulation. "One of the most interesting findings in our study is that the human microRNA (very small units of genetic material) found in sickle red cells directly participate ...

Melting over the Greenland ice sheet shattered the seasonal record on August 8 – a full four weeks before the close of the melting season, reports Marco Tedesco, assistant professor of Earth and atmospheric sciences at The City College of New York. The melting season in Greenland usually lasts from June – when the first puddles of meltwater appear – to early-September, when temperatures cool. This year, cumulative melting in the first week in August had already exceeded the record of 2010, taken over a full season, according to Professor Tedesco's ongoing analysis. ...

In our zest for cleanliness, have we permanently muddied our nation's waters? A science team from Arizona State University, in collaboration with federal partners, has completed the first statewide analysis of freshwater bodies in Minnesota, finding widespread evidence of the presence of active ingredients of personal care products in Minnesota lakes, streams and rivers. These products are a billion dollar industry and can be found in antimicrobial soaps, disinfectants, and sanitizers to scrub our hands and clean countertops. Hundreds of antimicrobial products are ...

New research from New Zealand's University of Otago is casting doubt on a landmark US study that suggested infants as young as six months old possess an innate moral compass that allows them to evaluate individuals as 'good' or 'bad'. The 2007 study by Yale University researchers provided the first evidence that 6- and 10-month-old infants could assess individuals based on their behaviour towards others, showing a preference for those who helped rather than hindered another individual. Based on a series of experiments, researchers in the Department of Psychology at ...

LOS ANGELES (Aug. 14, 2012) – An experimental immune-based therapy more than doubled median survival of patients diagnosed with the most aggressive malignant brain tumor, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center researchers reported in Cancer Immunology, Immunotherapy, published online Aug. 3. Median survival in a Phase I clinical trial at Cedars-Sinai's Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr. Brain Tumor Center was 38.4 months, significantly longer than the typical 14.6-month survival of patients with newly diagnosed glioblastoma receiving standard therapy alone, which includes radiation and chemotherapy. Median ...

Long-term methadone treatment can cause changes in the brain, according to recent studies from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. The results show that treatment may affect the nerve cells in the brain. The studies follow on from previous studies where methadone was seen to affect cognitive functioning, such as learning and memory. Since it is difficult to perform controlled studies of methadone patients and unethical to attempt in healthy volunteers, rats were used in the studies. Previous research has shown that methadone can affect cognitive functioning in ...

A sense of fairness is an important part of human behaviour, yet a research team involving Queen Mary, University of London (UK) found it did not evolve from our closest living relatives. The study, published in the journal Biology Letters today (15 August) tested whether our great ape relatives, the chimpanzees and bonobos, have a sense of fairness like humans. The scientists, involving Professor Keith Jensen, from Queen Mary's School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, put the apes through a series of ultimatum games. One against the other, they had to choose ...

Philadelphia, PA, August 15, 2012 – Depression takes a substantial toll on brain health. Brain imaging and post-mortem studies provide evidence that the wealth of connections in the brain are reduced in individuals with depression, with the result of impaired functional connections between key brain centers involved in mood regulation. Glial cells are one of the cell types that appear to be particularly reduced when analyzing post-mortem brain tissue from people who had depression. Glial cells support the growth and function of nerve cells and their connections. Over ...

Web shops, Cloud Computing, Online CRM systems: Each day many IT systems require the user to identify himself. Single Sign-On (SSO) systems were introduced to circumvent this problem, and to establish structured Identity Management (IDM) systems in industry: Here the user only has to identify once, all subsequent authentications are done automatically. However, SSO systems based on the industry standard SAML have huge vulnerabilities: Roughly 80 percent of these systems could be broken by the researchers from Ruhr-Universität Bochum. Protection through digital signatures ...