Media releases

• Brock expert studies public memory of Terry Fox via Instagram

  Wednesday, September 11, 2024 | By Brock University

  EXPERT ADVISORY: September 11, 2024 – R0109

  Forty-four years ago, Terry Fox captured the hearts of the nation by running across Canada on one leg to raise funds for cancer research. Although the beloved Canadian is no longer here to personally continue his Marathon of Hope, his legacy lives on through annual memorial runs and, according to Brock’s Derek Foster, through Instagram.

  Fox, who succumbed to his battle with cancer in 1981, is at the centre of Foster’s recent research involving public memory, social media and well-being.

  As part of his ongoing research into how the celebrated Canadian is remembered in popular culture, the Brock Associate Professor in the Department of Communication, Popular Culture and Film analyzed hundreds of Instagram posts created by people who visited Fox memorial sites.

  In the lead-up to this year’s Terry Fox Run, held annually in September, Foster says he wanted to see how user-generated content creates and shapes the public memory of Fox compared to the Terry Fox Foundation’s official messaging about runs and fundraising.

  “The public memory of Terry Fox is very much forward looking, in the sense that what he was pursuing in 1980 is still a collective endeavour for people motivated by finding a cure for cancer,” says Foster. “So, the memory isn’t just tied to the past through a lens of nostalgia, but rather, connected to our present and also a dream of a future.”

  Foster’s review showed about one third of his sample made clear references not only to emotional experiences, such as visitors being moved to tears, but also to what he calls “self-transcendent emotions” such as awe and gratitude.

  He also notes the posts don’t appear to be driven by a desire for engagement, as social media posts often are. In fact, only a small number of people liked or commented on the posts he reviewed. Foster says it’s significant that “the hashtag isn’t driving the discourse” because it shows a level of sincerity from the creators.

  “What we see is the vernacular memory — everyday people as they are deciding to create, produce and circulate these thoughts and experiences on their own, not organized in any way,” he says.

  Foster also says the way individuals are using social media to share their personal experiences with Fox memorials is an excellent case study on the legacies of public figures.

  “Most public memory involves looking back to build a sense of community or reinforce certain values that we can then use as we move forward,” says Foster. “That is far more explicit in the public memory around Terry Fox than other figures — the aim is not just to maintain him in memory but to continue to strive for the goal that he wasn’t able to reach.”

   

  Derek Foster, Brock Associate Professor in the Department of Communication, Popular Culture and Film, is available for media interviews on this topic.

   

  For more information or for assistance arranging interviews:

   Sarah Ackles, Communications Specialist, Brock University sackles@brocku.ca or 289-241-5483

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  Categories: Media releases

• Research aims to improve understanding of children’s procrastination

  Tuesday, September 10, 2024 | By Brock University

  MEDIA RELEASE: September 10, 2024 – R0108

  It’s not uncommon to catch preschoolers dilly-dallying when they’re supposed to be tidying or school-aged children putting off homework for more desirable tasks.

  But are these forms of procrastination? And do they influence future adult tendencies?

  These are questions Brock Professor of Psychology Caitlin Mahy is taking steps to answer. 

  “Research on procrastination in young children is an emerging field,” she says. “The same measures we use to study adult procrastination don’t necessarily apply to children at different stages of development.”

  Mahy has co-published a paper calling for procrastination definitions, theory and interventions to be informed by studies on adults and children, which have so far run parallel to one another.

  By taking this approach, researchers will more deeply understand how procrastination plays out in young children as they mature, leading to better early-life interventions, she says.

  The paper maps out children’s typical procrastination-type behaviours in various stages beginning with preschoolers (ages two to four), who put off tasks and household routines; older preschoolers (ages five and six), who delay doing homework and household chores; elementary and middle-school children (ages seven to 13), who experience an increase in academic procrastination; and high school teens (ages 14 to 18), for whom procrastination is prominent at school as competing demands on time increase.

  As time passes, children generate more simultaneous goals, while parents play a decreasing role in generating, directing and regulating goals for their children.

  Researchers probing for a greater understanding of these behaviours mostly rely on reports from parents describing what they see with their children compared to studies on adult procrastinators who fill out questionnaires on their own behaviours, says Mahy.

  The standard definition of procrastination includes five criteria: there is an intention to perform the task; the task is delayed; the delay is voluntary; the delay is unnecessary; and future negative outcomes are expected.

  “Very young children have difficulty reporting on their intentions,” says Mahy, “Even if we study their behaviour, you don’t necessarily know the child’s intentions, you can’t read their mind to see if they’ve anticipated future consequences, you’re just observing their delay in performing tasks.”

  Because young children’s abilities to be introspective and fully understand the consequences of their delays are absent, their behaviours can’t be strictly classified as being “procrastination, according to the current, prevalent definition,” says Mahy.

  “Instead, we can say these may be early pre-cursors or represent emerging procrastination behaviour.”

  In addition to reshaping the definition of procrastination to capture children’s experience, Mahy and her team describe how theory and intervention could be further improved by considering adult and child research.

  They outline several cognitive abilities, such as emotion regulation, that likely contribute to the development of procrastination. They also recommend more research on the development of children’s procrastination over time and across age ranges, as well as the creation of more objective ways of assessing children’s procrastination.

  These and other findings are included in “Mutual implications of procrastination research in adults and children for theory and intervention” — published in the September issue of Nature Reviews Psychology — in which co-authors Yuko Munakata from the University of California Davis and Akira Miyake from the University of Colorado Boulder review a broad range of research on adults’ and children’s procrastination.

  For parents wishing to help their children avoid procrastinating, Mahy offers these tips:

  • Use a “starting ritual” such as a countdown or the “Pomodoro technique,” which involves five-minute breaks after 25 minutes of doing the task.
  • Clear distractions, such as toys or screens, in the immediate environment.
  • Break down longer-term deadlines into shorter tasks and chunks of time.
  • Make tasks more fun to do and accomplish.

   

   For more information or for assistance arranging interviews:

  Sarah Ackles, Communications Specialist, Brock University sackles@brocku.ca or 289-241-5483

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  Categories: Media releases