Official: men are terrible shoppers
Nicola Smith and John Harlow
For
Neil Fiore, it was the perfect Christmas gift for the lady who loved
scented candles: a bright red fire extinguisher, wrapped in a white
bow.
Perhaps, as a psychologist at Berkeley University in California, he should have been prepared for the muted wail of outrage. ''But I wanted her to know I was practical and looking out for her safety. Sadly, the relationship did not survive long after that,'' he confessed last week. For Fiore, and millions like him, what should be the joy of giving has become a stressful maze of missed hints, guessing games and panic attacks that end in Christmas morning disappointment.
Now social scientists believe they can explain why men are such unsuccessful Christmas shoppers and what they can do about it.
Researchers at Tilburg University in Holland and the Katholieke University in Belgium quizzed 35 couples and found that most were better at buying presents for strangers than for their partners. Luk Warlop, one of the report’s authors, said: ''When you know someone, then you think you know it all.''
The solution, according to the report published in the University of Chicago’s Journal of Consumer Research, is for women to depend less on hints and for men to ask more questions and to avoid overspending to compensate.
For men, the array of opportunities on the internet merely means more ways of getting it horribly wrong. Affluence has not helped: women can often buy everything obvious that they want for themselves.
Some desperate men employ £200-a-day ''personal shoppers'' who ask them to filch their wives’ or girlfriends’ clothing so they can get the correct sizes.
To reduce its annual mountain of returned underwear, Marks & Spencer recently trained 200 men in 50 stores to help male customers to choose Christmas lingerie.
Misguided gifts can crystallize underlying tensions. ''I once bought a girlfriend a T-shirt with a picture of me on it and the words My Boyfriend,'' said David Parker, 33, a project manager from Windsor. ''She washed her car with it.''
Denise Knowles, a counselor with Relate, said modern lifestyles were partly to blame: ''We make assumptions about what our partner wants based on conversations we have had very early in the relationship. Buying the wrong present for your partner can be about complacency but it can also be because the couple don’t have the time to sit together and talk about what they like and enjoy.''
The Sunday Times
December 17, 2006
Features
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Feature articles are less time-sensitive than news articles, and may describe people, places, or events of general interest to the public. They also tend to be longer than news articles. Feature articles often begin with a "hook" that is meant to catch the reader's attention, and go on to describe interesting aspects of the topic under consideration without necessarily following the "inverted pyramid" structure. As in news articles, you should quote sources knowledgeable about the topic, and most of your research will involve personal interviews.
Unlike the news article, the feature story allows for a great deal of creativity on the part of the writer. It contains many elements often found in other kinds of story writing: narrative, character, dialogue, action, setting and even symbolism. A feature story emphasizes the people involved in an event rather than the facts of the news.
News Feature: A news feature is based on a current news story. It often provides related background information. For example, suppose a new story announces the schedule of events for the Annual Fun Night. A news feature might highlight the difficulties the committee had in deciding which games and activities to offer.
Informative Feature: An informative feature presents an interesting and appealing story not necessarily related to a timely news story. It is based on a news writer's interviews, observations, and reading. For example, suppose you were interested in architecture. You might research school architecture and develop an informative feature which proposes the ideal layout for a middle school or high school.
Historical Feature: A historical feature is often the result of a timely news story. For example, suppose a news story reports on the track team's first conference championship in 25 years. A historical feature might review that championship track team of 25 years ago.
Personality Story: A personality story presents a story about an individual who would be interesting or appealing to readers. For example, a day-in-the-life story of a local high-school freshman would be interesting to middle-school readers.
Firsthand Account: A firsthand account develops from the writer's personal experiences. For example, a writer might re-create his or her experience in an accident or special event.
6. Culture Features: Movie stars and pop singers are the role models of today that inspire the youth. Acting, gossip, mega success stories, flops, characters, comedy, tragedy etc. could be raw material for Feature writing.
7. Hi Tech Features: With the demand of Technical writing in the field of Computers, a lot challenge awaits for the Feature writers online as well as in the IT magazines. The leap of technology has left everyone breathless and feature possibilities are enormous. Scopes to enhance technical writing is an endless learning and getting updated in the field of Technology.
8. Life Style Features: Changing fashion trends and life-styles makes an interesting reading. A passion for fashion and acquaintance with fashion moguls and a fondness for showmanship make a good fashion Feature writer. This is not a job of any Tom, Dick and Harry! All leading business magazines carry life style features which are more or less showpieces of a changing society and so, the competition is hand to hand for an exposure in writing with a flair as a Life style feature writer.
9. Travel Features: The Travel themes are a class apart for the adventure they hold in the writing themes. The Travel feature unfolds the romance inducing the wander lust and creating a spell on readers making them fly on the seventh heaven. People and places are always exciting but the places recommended must be worth spending money, time and trouble. Travel features demand exceptional descriptive and narrative skills.
10. Hobby Features: People have pursued for various hobbies and a very few exceptional genre have the taste of interest in various hobbies. Stamp collecting, gardening, reading, music, photography are the common hobbies but some uncommon hobbies like cloud watching, bird watching, lizard eating, bees collecting etc. present exotic feature avenues. A hobby feature writing interests the readers that has to say about exceptional hobbies.
11. Concerned Features: These have the power to exposure the burning issues like the Education, poverty, corruption, drug addiction, women issues, hapless victims, etc The concerned writing calls for a debate to show the magnitude of the problem through cases, anecdotes and quotable quotes and a lot of writing stuff challenging the perspective.
12. Career Features: These features focus on Career guidance scaling to career peaks or career blues. Choosing the right career, getting started, aptitude and such feature writing are good breeding grounds for beginners. Stories that give insight to careers, role models, career planning, mid career crisis lead to interesting and informative feature writing especially for the people who have to decide the fate to earn their bread and butter.
13. Business Features: In a market driven world with day to day crisis boom, Business feature writing provides a platform to give a glimpse of the insight of the business world. Exploring ideas, opportunities, market trends, dizzy world of CEOs, Corporate ladder, alliances, mergers and various other feature writing on Business is a challenge and par excellence to rise faster than reporters and correspondents. Business feature writing requires special eye to vision the business – the expression of the art of minting money!
Regardless of the approach taken, Webster's New World Student Writing Handbook (212) points out that a strong feature
evokes an emotional reaction: joy, sympathy, anger, frustration, contentment, or some other emotion
gives depth and meaning to complicated issues or news items, thus clarifying and interpreting events
follows the techniques of good creative writing [message or angle, dialogue, character, setting, showing rather than telling, imaginative language and imagery]
begins with a strong lead
avoids the pyramid structure of the news story
follows an organization appropriate for the subject
uses an introduction (lead) that attracts the readers
uses a tone and style appropriate to its subject
achieves success by being researched and brightly written