• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.231-238
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• 2010

The anthropomorphism of brands, defined as seeing human beings in brands (Puzakova, Kwak, and Rosereto, 2008) is the focus of this study. Specifically, the research objective is to understand the ways in which brands are rendered humanlike. By analyzing consumer readings of stories found on food product packages we intend to show how marketers and consumers humanize a spectrum of brands and create meanings. Our research question considers the possibility that a single brand may host multiple or single meanings, associations, and personalities for different consumers. We start by highlighting the theoretical and practical significance of our research, explain why we turn our attention to packages as vehicles of brand meaning transfer, then describe our qualitative methodology, discuss findings, and conclude with a discussion of managerial implications and directions for future studies. The study was designed to directly expose consumers to potential vehicles of brand meaning transfer and then engage these consumers in free verbal reflections on their perceived meanings. Specifically, we asked participants to read non-nutritional stories on selected branded food packages, in order to elicit data about received meanings. Packaging has yet to receive due attention in consumer research (Hine, 1995). Until now, attention has focused solely on its utilitarian function and has generated a body of research that has explored the impact of nutritional information and claims on consumer perceptions of products (e.g., Loureiro, McCluskey and Mittelhammer, 2002; Mazis and Raymond, 1997; Nayga, Lipinski and Savur, 1998; Wansik, 2003). An exception is a recent study that turns its attention to non-nutritional packaging narratives and treats them as cultural productions and vehicles for mythologizing the brand (Kniazeva and Belk, 2007). The next step in this stream of research is to explore how such mythologizing activity affects brand personality perception and how these perceptions relate to consumers. These are the questions that our study aimed to address. We used in-depth interviews to help overcome the limitations of quantitative studies. Our convenience sample was formed with the objective of providing demographic and psychographic diversity in order to elicit variations in consumer reflections to food packaging stories. Our informants represent middle-class residents of the US and do not exhibit extreme alternative lifestyles described by Thompson as "cultural creatives" (2004). Nine people were individually interviewed on their food consumption preferences and behavior. Participants were asked to have a look at the twelve displayed food product packages and read all the textual information on the package, after which we continued with questions that focused on the consumer interpretations of the reading material (Scott and Batra, 2003). On average, each participant reflected on 4-5 packages. Our in-depth interviews lasted one to one and a half hours each. The interviews were tape recorded and transcribed, providing 140 pages of text. The products came from local grocery stores on the West Coast of the US and represented a basic range of food product categories, including snacks, canned foods, cereals, baby foods, and tea. The data were analyzed using procedures for developing grounded theory delineated by Strauss and Corbin (1998). As a result, our study does not support the notion of one brand/one personality as assumed by prior work. Thus, we reveal multiple brand personalities peacefully cohabiting in the same brand as seen by different consumers, despite marketer attempts to create more singular brand personalities. We extend Fournier's (1998) proposition, that one's life projects shape the intensity and nature of brand relationships. We find that these life projects also affect perceived brand personifications and meanings. While Fournier provides a conceptual framework that links together consumers’ life themes (Mick and Buhl, 1992) and relational roles assigned to anthropomorphized brands, we find that consumer life projects mold both the ways in which brands are rendered humanlike and the ways in which brands connect to consumers' existential concerns. We find two modes through which brands are anthropomorphized by our participants. First, brand personalities are created by seeing them through perceived demographic, psychographic, and social characteristics that are to some degree shared by consumers. Second, brands in our study further relate to consumers' existential concerns by either being blended with consumer personalities in order to connect to them (the brand as a friend, a family member, a next door neighbor) or by distancing themselves from the brand personalities and estranging them (the brand as a used car salesman, a "bunch of executives.") By focusing on food product packages, we illuminate a very specific, widely-used, but little-researched vehicle of marketing communication: brand storytelling. Recent work that has approached packages as mythmakers, finds it increasingly challenging for marketers to produce textual stories that link the personalities of products to the personalities of those consuming them, and suggests that "a multiplicity of building material for creating desired consumer myths is what a postmodern consumer arguably needs" (Kniazeva and Belk, 2007). Used as vehicles for storytelling, food packages can exploit both rational and emotional approaches, offering consumers either a "lecture" or "drama" (Randazzo, 2006), myths (Kniazeva and Belk, 2007; Holt, 2004; Thompson, 2004), or meanings (McCracken, 2005) as necessary building blocks for anthropomorphizing their brands. The craft of giving birth to brand personalities is in the hands of writers/marketers and in the minds of readers/consumers who individually and sometimes idiosyncratically put a meaningful human face on a brand.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Food Science and Nutrition
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• v.42 no.11
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• pp.1848-1856
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• 2013

This study is designed to examine the change in physical properties of extruded brown rice-vegetable mix at different temperatures and $CO_2$ gas injections. Moisture content and screw speed were fixed to 27% and 100 rpm respectively. Die temperatures and $CO_2$ gas injections were adjusted to 60, 80, $100^{\circ}C$ and 0, 150 mL/min, respectively. The ratio of ${\alpha}$-brown rice, brown rice and sugars (oligosaccharides and palatinose) was fixed to 25, 50 and 16%, respectively. Green tea, tomato and pumpkin powder were blended individually at 9%. Specific mechanical energy (SME) input decreased as die temperature for each vegetable addition increased. All extrudates decreased in density and breaking strength, but increased in specific length and water soluble index as $CO_2$ gas injection increased. Elastic modulus decreased as the die temperature and $CO_2$ gas injection increased. Extruded green tea mix with $CO_2$ gas injection at 150 mL/min was larger pore size and higher amount of pore than the tomato and pumpkin extrudates with $CO_2$ gas injection. Cold extrusion with $CO_2$ gas injection at $60^{\circ}C$ die temperature could be applicable for making Saengsik (uncooked food).

• Journal of the Korean Society of Food Science and Nutrition
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• v.43 no.3
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• pp.333-340
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• 2014

The purpose of this study was to develop functional lotus root bugak with plasma lipid reduction capacity by controlling the color of batter used for bugak preparation. Lotus root, nearly colorless, was selected to observe color effects. Gardeniae fructus (GF), Opuntia ficus-indica var. saboten (OF), and green tea (GT), which are colored yellow, red, and green, respectively, were used as coloring agents. Fermented glutinous rice was prepared naturally during winter season by placing glutinous rice and water (1:2, w/w) together in a crock pot for 7 days. Coloring materials (10%, w/w) were blended with glue made from fermented glutinous rice flour to prepare the batter. Cooked lotus root was then mixed with a 1.1-fold amount of batter (w/w) and dried at room temperature. Lotus root bugak (LRB) is pan-fried with un-roasted sesame oil, which is traditionally used as frying oil in Korea. Low-density lipoprotein receptor knockout ($LDLr^{-/-}$) mice (n=36) were fed an atherogenic diet (AD) containing various types of LRB (10 g%) for 10 weeks. Plasma triglyceride, total cholesterol, and LDL-C concentrations decreased significantly in mice fed LRB prepared with OF batter (OFB) and GT batter (GTB) (P<0.05). Protein expression levels of fatty acid synthase (FAS) and 3-hydroxyl-3-methylglutaryl coenzyme A reductase (HMGCR) in the OFB and GTB groups were suppressed compared with the LRB group (P<0.05). In accordance with the results on FAS and HMGCR expression, sterol regulatory element binding protein-I and II (SREBP-I and II), which are responsible for the regulation of FAS and HMGCR gene expression, respectively, were down-regulated compared to the LRB group (P<0.05). In conclusion, the plasma lipid reduction activities of OFB and GTB could be mediated through down-regulation of FAS and HMGCR mRNA expression via suppression of regulatory molecules, SREBP-I and II, in $LDLr^{-/-}$ mice.

• The Korean Journal of Food And Nutrition
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.666-675
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• 2015

This study was carried out to develop rose sparkling wine with reed root. To make the base wine with reed root extracts, we first blended wild grape wine with reed root extracts (1:9 v/v) and fermented the mixture for 14 days at $20^{\circ}C$. The pH of the control and the rose base wine with reed root extract (RWE) decreased with increasing fermentation time, but acidity showed the opposite behavior. The control and RWE had $7.33^{\circ}Brix$, and $6.90^{\circ}Brix$, respectively at 14 days, with higher sugar content in the control than in RWE. The alcohol content increased as the fermentation progressed and was higher in RWE than in the control at 14.20% and, 13.83%, respectively. Regarding the color, the lightness decreased as the fermentation progressed. The total polyphenol contents of the control and RWE were 29.19 mg/100 mL and, 34.97 mg/100 mL. The flavonoids decreased as the fermentation progressed. The ABTS radical scavenging activity of the control and RWE were 44.26% and, 64.37% while the DPPH radical scavenging activity showed similar results in the control and RWE. In the second test, we added RWE to base wine, because yeast rearing was inhibited at 14% alcohol content. We made sparkling rose wine with 4 strains and fermented the wine for 8 days at $20^{\circ}C$. The pH of the samples decreased with increasing fermentation time, but the acidity showed the opposite behavior. The $^{\circ}Brix$ decreased and the alcohol content increased with increasing fermentation time. The pressure in sample A was $4.30kgf/cm^2$ at 8 days which was the highest in the samples. In the sensory evaluation, the color, flavor, softness and overall acceptability of the control was higher than the other samples. In conclusion, Saccharomyces cerevisiae Vitilevure Quartz was overall the most suitable rose sparkling wine.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.31 no.7
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• pp.505-514
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• 2009

Aqueous potassium salt of serine was proposed as an alternative $CO_2$ absorbent to monoethanolamine (MEA) and its $CO_2$ absorption characteristics were studied. The experiment has been conducted using screening test equipment with NDIR type gas analyzer and vapor-liquid equilibrium apparatus. $CO_2$ absorption/desorption rate and net amount of $CO_2$ absorbed in cyclic process are the criteria to assess the $CO_2$ absorption characteristics in this study. Effective $CO_2$ loading of potassium salt of serine and MEA are 0.425 and 0.230 respectively. Cyclic capacities are 0.354 and 0.298 for potassium salt of serine and MEA. The absorption rate of the potassium serinate decreased sharply at $CO_2$ loading is 0.1 and were maintained approximately at half of MEA. To enhance the absorption rate of aqueous potassium salt of serine, small quantities of rate promoters, namely piperazine and tetraethylenepentamine were blended, so that rich $CO_2$ loading were increased by 13.7% and 18.7% respectively. The rich $CO_2$ loading of potassium salt of serine was 29.2% and 35.0% higher than those of aqueous sodium and lithium salt of serine, respectively. The absorption rate of potassium salt of valine and isoleucine which have similar molecular structures to serine were lower than that of serine because of the presence of bulky side group. Precipitation phenomena during $CO_2$ absorption were discussed by the aid of literatures.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.177-189
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• 2013

In Smart Education, the roles of digital textbook is very important as face-to-face media to learners. The standardization of digital textbook will promote the industrialization of digital textbook for contents providers and distributers as well as learner and instructors. In this study, the following three objectives-oriented digital textbooks are looking for ways to standardize. (1) digital textbooks should undertake the role of the media for blended learning which supports on-off classes, should be operating on common EPUB viewer without special dedicated viewer, should utilize the existing framework of the e-learning learning contents and learning management. The reason to consider the EPUB as the standard for digital textbooks is that digital textbooks don't need to specify antoher standard for the form of books, and can take advantage od industrial base with EPUB standards-rich content and distribution structure (2) digital textbooks should provide a low-cost open market service that are currently available as the standard open software (3) To provide appropriate learning feedback information to students, digital textbooks should provide a foundation which accumulates and manages all the learning activity information according to standard infrastructure for educational Big Data processing. In this study, the digital textbook in a smart education environment was referred to open digital textbook. The components of open digital textbooks service framework are (1) digital textbook terminals such as smart pad, smart TVs, smart phones, PC, etc., (2) digital textbooks platform to show and perform digital contents on digital textbook terminals, (3) learning contents repository, which exist on the cloud, maintains accredited learning, (4) App Store providing and distributing secondary learning contents and learning tools by learning contents developing companies, and (5) LMS as a learning support/management tool which on-site class teacher use for creating classroom instruction materials. In addition, locating all of the hardware and software implement a smart education service within the cloud must have take advantage of the cloud computing for efficient management and reducing expense. The open digital textbooks of smart education is consdered as providing e-book style interface of LMS to learners. In open digital textbooks, the representation of text, image, audio, video, equations, etc. is basic function. But painting, writing, problem solving, etc are beyond the capabilities of a simple e-book. The Communication of teacher-to-student, learner-to-learnert, tems-to-team is required by using the open digital textbook. To represent student demographics, portfolio information, and class information, the standard used in e-learning is desirable. To process learner tracking information about the activities of the learner for LMS(Learning Management System), open digital textbook must have the recording function and the commnincating function with LMS. DRM is a function for protecting various copyright. Currently DRMs of e-boook are controlled by the corresponding book viewer. If open digital textbook admitt DRM that is used in a variety of different DRM standards of various e-book viewer, the implementation of redundant features can be avoided. Security/privacy functions are required to protect information about the study or instruction from a third party UDL (Universal Design for Learning) is learning support function for those with disabilities have difficulty in learning courses. The open digital textbook, which is based on E-book standard EPUB 3.0, must (1) record the learning activity log information, and (2) communicate with the server to support the learning activity. While the recording function and the communication function, which is not determined on current standards, is implemented as a JavaScript and is utilized in the current EPUB 3.0 viewer, ths strategy of proposing such recording and communication functions as the next generation of e-book standard, or special standard (EPUB 3.0 for education) is needed. Future research in this study will implement open source program with the proposed open digital textbook standard and present a new educational services including Big Data analysis.

• Horticultural Science & Technology
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.499-506
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• 2014

This research was conducted to develop root media containing ground and aged pine bark (GAPB) and ground and raw pine bark (GRPB). After analysis of physico chemical properties, the pine barks were blended with peat moss (PM) or coir dust (CD) in various ratios to formulate 12 root media. Then, two out of 12 root media were chosen based on the physical properties for further experiments. The pre-planting nutrient charge fertilizers (PNCF) were incorporated into two root media and chemical properties were analysed again. The total porosity (TP), container capacity (CC), and air-filled porosity (AFP) of GAPB were 78.7%. 39.4%, and 38.3%, respectively, while those of GRPB were 74.7%, 41.2%, and 33.4%, respectively. The percentage of easily available water (EAW, from CC to 4.90 kPa tension) and buffering water (BW, 4.91-9.81 kPa tension) in GAPB were 12.7% and 8.5%, respectively, which were a little lower than the 13.5% and 8.8% in GRPB. The pH and EC were not different significantly, but cation exchange capacity was different between the two pine barks (GAPB: pH 5.26, EC $0.61dS{\cdot}m^{-1}$, CEC $15.7meq{\cdot}100g^{-1}$; GRPB: pH 5.19, EC $0.32dS{\cdot}m^{-1}$, CEC $9.32meq{\cdot}100g^{-1}$). The concentrations of exchangeable cations in GAPB were Ca 0.32, K 0.05, Mg 0.27 and $0.12cmol+{\cdot}kg^{-1}$, whereas those in GRPB were Ca 0.28, K 0.08, Mg 0.25 and $0.09cmol+{\cdot}kg^{-1}$. The concentrations of $PO_4$-P, $NH_4$-N and $NO_3$-N were 485.8, 0.62 and $0.91mg{\cdot}L^{-1}$ in GAPB and 578, 1.00 and $0.82mg{\cdot}L^{-1}$ in GRPB, respectively, when those were analyzed in the solution of the saturated paste. The TP, CC and AFP in the two selected media were 89.3 and 76.3, and 13.0% in PM+GAPB (8:2, v/v) and 88.2, 68.2 and 20.0% in CD+GRPB (8:2), respectively. The pHs and ECs were 3.8 and $0.24dS{\cdot}m^{-1}$ in PM+GAPB which were a little lower than 5.8 and $0.65dS{\cdot}m^{-1}$ in CD+GRPB. However, the pHs analysed before and after incorporation of PNCF in the two root media did not show large differences. This is because the solubility of dolomitic lime is very low, and the pH it is expected to rise gradually when crops are cultivated int he root media. The information obtained in this study should facilitate effective formulation of root media containing pine bark.

• Horticultural Science & Technology
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.886-897
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• 2016

The physical properties of rooting media for the establishment of plugs in a greenhouse are modified according to variations in the greenhouse environment throughout the season. In this study, we established a standard for rooting media for the production of plug seedlings for each growing season (summer, winter and spring fall). Eight types of peatmoss (PM) and 4 types of perlite (PL) commonly used in Korea were collected and blended with the ratio of 7 parts PM to 3 parts PL (v/v) to make 32 different rooting media blends. We determined the total porosity (TP), container capacity (CC), air-filled porosity (AFP), pH, and electrical conductivity (EC) of the 32 media blends, and 6 media blends were selected for seasonal use. We also conducted additional analyses for plant easily available water (EAW), buffering water (BW), cation exchange capacity (CEC), and nutrient contents in the 6 media blends. The TP, CC, and AFP of the 32 media blends ranged from 64.7 to 96.0%, 42.9 to 90.1%, and 1.3 to 27.8%, respectively, indicating that the physical properties were strongly influenced by the type of PM and PL. The pH and EC of the PMs ranged from 2.96 to 3.81 and 0.08 to $0.47dS{\cdot}m^{-1}$, respectively. However, after blending the PM with the PL the pH was raised and the EC was lowered The media blends selected for the summer growing season were Blonde Golden peatmoss (BG) + No. 1 perlite size < 1 mm (PE1) and Latagro 0-10 mm (L1) + No. 2 perlite size 1-2 mm (PE2). These two media blends had 89.8-90.9% of TP, 80.8-81.3% of CC, and 9.0-9.7% of AFP. The media blends selected for the winter growing season were Sfagnumi Turvas (ST) + PE2 and Latagro 20-40 mm (L3) + PE2. These media blends had 79.9-86.7% of TP, 60.4-74.9% of CC, and 11.8-19.6% of AFP. The TP, CC, and AFP of two media blends, BG + No.3 perlite 2-5 mm (PE3) and Orange peatmoss (O) + PE3, selected for the spring and fall growing seasons, respectively, were 85.2-87.3%, 77.9%, and 7.4-9.4%, respectively. The percentage of EAW of the media blends selected for the spring, summer, and winter growing seasons ranged from 24.2-24.9%, 22.0-28.6%, and 18.0-21.8%, respectively, but the percentages of BW were not significantly different among the selected root media blends. The pH, EC, and CEC of the 6 selected media blends ranged from 3.11-3.97, $0.06-0.26dS{\cdot}m^{-1}$, and $97-119meq{\cdot}100g^{-1}$, respectively.