bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Can Computers help Stimulate Creativity? Training Implications from a Postgraduate MBA Experience
Authors: Rickards Tudor
Published: March 2007

Computer-aided modifications were introduced to an established project in an MBA programme aimed at introducing the principles of creative problem-solving. In general, the students overcame the complexities of the new technology far more rapidly than was anticipated and it was found possible to offer a greater level of interaction, monitoring and feedback to each project group than in previous years. There is some evidence that the overall results were better in terms of teamwork and grasp of the principles of creative problem-solving, although it is not clear whether this arises from direct, or indirect changes associated with the introduction of new technology. Some vigilance was required to avoid the technology taking over and confounding the behavioural training goals of the project.
Action Learning and Academic Qualifications
Authors: Gosling Jonathan , Ashton David
Published: March 2007

This article reviews attempts to make use of managers' current work within the context of accredited courses. It examines implicit notions about knowledge, experimental methods, group dynamics and the learning company, referring to specific events of post-experience executive MBA courses. Several interpretive heuristics are offered in order to `round out' an appreciation of the social as well as the individual and corporate effects of participation in formal management education programmes.
Revitalizing Management as a Scientific Activity
Authors: McTaggart Robin
Published: March 2007

Management is a social practice which is typically informed by conflicting theories and conflicting interpretations of prior experience. Accordingly, the enhancement of management requires a distinctive approach to research which examines the resolution of these conflicts in practice. The convergence of longstanding trends in management enquiry, social theory, and participatory work practices creates a basis for recognizing more explicitly that participatory action research is a suitable approach for research by managers. Participatory action research provides theoretical, practical and organizational principles which enable managers to be more disciplined and more reflective about management practice. Further, by being more explicit about its commitment to being authentic research and to informing social theory and practice more broadly, participatory action research transcends the technicist and theoretically limited practices of quality circles, action learning, and consultant-or client-driven action research.
The Learning Organization: Learning and Empowerment for Whom?
Authors: Snell Robin , Chak Almaz Man-Kuen
Published: March 2007

In this article we develop a framework to assess organizational learning and the depth, breadth and spread of members' involvement. The framework incorporates the Morgan (1986) metaphors and the `learning company' characteristics of Pedler et al. (1991), along with the notions of single-, double-, and triple-loop learning. We draw up competing hypotheses setting Coopey's (1995a, 1995b) constitutionalist argument that a `learning organization' will enhance only the power of the `ruling court' unless democratic arrangements are explicitly laid down, against ideas of developmental leadership. Using case studies of two blue-chip companies-both cited as learning organizations, one claiming to have a democratically-oriented constitution-we illustrate how the framework may be used to assemble data for use in testing hypotheses in more empirically-grounded studies of empowerment in learning organizations. Our study compared the perspectives of top management, reflected in popular and professional publications, with grass-roots accounts from Hong Kong subsidiaries. While the data is inconclusive because it was collected opportunistically and from very few sources, it lends support to the constitutionalist position.
Communities of Practice and Social Learning Systems
Authors: Wenger Etienne
Published: March 2007

This essay argues that the success of organizations depends on their ability to design themselves as social learning systems and also to participate in broader learning systems such as an industry, a region, or a consortium. It explores the structure of these social learning systems. It proposes a social definition of learning and distinguishes between three `modes of belonging' by which we participate in social learning systems. Then it uses this framework to look at three constitutive elements of these systems: communities of practice, boundary processes among these communities, and identities as shaped by our participation in these systems.
The Long Detour: Foucault's History of Desire and Pleasure
Authors: Starkey Ken , Hatchuel Armand
Published: March 2007

It is possible to identify a number of phases in Michel Foucault's work, associated with an apparently shifting focus of concern. We argue that, beneath the differences that distinguish these phases, he demonstrates a lifelong engagement with a small number of core concerns. The main focus of this article is Foucault's later work. Here we identify a shift from a focus on discipline/domination to aesthetics and desire/pleasure. We show how this apparently new concern—what Foucault himself called `a long detour'—was in fact a new way of thinking about his core concerns and in particular the problem of aligning discipline and desire. In conclusion, we briefly examine the implications of the later Foucault for organization theory, arguing that it opens the way for a rethinking of desire and pleasure in organizations as an antidote to the Foucault who is (over-)identified with organizational constraints based upon an ubiquity of discipline and punishment. In this way we seek to engage scholars of organization with the later work of Foucault, that has tended to be neglected in favour of the earlier work focusing upon discipline and the negative aspects of management and organization.
Narration or Science? Collapsing the Division in Organization Studies
Authors: Czarniawska-Joerges Barbara
Published: March 2007

Scientific knowledge is conventionally distinguished from the everyday knowledge of lay people that is transmitted in stories-narrative knowledge. Recently, however, a call for redeeming narrative knowledge in the humanities and social sciences in general and in organization studies in particular can be heard. The present article considers whether there is enough ground for reintroducing the narrative knowledge into a research tradition, which until now has been imbued with the logoscientific knowledge.

Several existing and emerging traditions within organization studies are intent on achieving such a rapprochement: for instance case studies, studies of organizational stories and a variety of interpretive approaches. A collective reflection is needed to consolidate such attempts. Such reflection, which this paper initiates, might aim at interpretation which lies beyond the hermeneutic tradition of separating the material world from the symbolic, and at a conscious development of a genre which will speak to practitioners as well as to theoreticians.
The Rectifying Revolutions? Organizational Futures in the New Eastern Europe
Authors: Ray Larry
Published: March 2007

The democratic revolutions in Eastern Europe were united in what they were opposing, but contained diverse visions of organizational futures. Whilst their leaders claimed to be rejoining the path of western modernity, a view echoed in Habermas's notion of the `rectifying revolutions', past communist experience structures the shape of emergent organizational forms. The transformation encounters problems of the scale of privatization and of creating capitalism by democratic design, whilst social costs are accumulating. The state, weakly embedded in society, confronts a legacy of ambiguous property relations in which the former nomenklatura, workers' collectives and other stakeholders struggle for control of the transformation. The fate of democratization and the shape of the new organizational modernity will depend on the outcomes of these conflicts.
Living with and Building on Complexity: A Constructivist Perspective on Organizations
Authors: Bouchikhi Hamid
Published: March 2007

The paper introduces a theory of organizations built on the assumption that human behavior in organizational settings is relatively undetermined, multidirectional, and contradictory. Consistent with this assumption, the paper proposes a constructivist perspective on organizational persistence, equilibration, and structuration. The constructivist perspective represents an attempt at integrating extant, and often treated as incommensurable, theories of organizations within a complex framework.
Compliance and Post-Agreement Bargaining
Authors: JÖNSSON CHRISTER , TALLBERG JONAS
Published: March 2007

Most literature on international cooperation focuses on the phase leading up to the signing of a treaty, while neglecting the dynamics of bargaining in the aftermath of an international agreement. Reviewing existing literature, we find that bargaining theory deals almost exclusively with the pre-agreement phase and that the enforcement and management schools in the study of compliance are predominantly static in their orientation. We present a framework for analysing the dynamics of compliance bargaining — which can be understood as a process of bargaining between the signatories to an agreement already concluded, or between the signatories and the international institution governing the agreement, which pertains to the terms and obligations of this agreement — and explore compliance bargaining in the EU in light of this framework. Specifically, the EU case illustrates third-party, as opposed to self-help, enforcement and points to sources of bargaining power in compliance bargaining.
The Concept of Culture in Vygotsky's Thinking
Authors: van der Veer Rene
Published: March 2007

It is shown that Vygotsky's concept of culture was codetermined by two fundamental traditions in the human sciences. The first tradition was initiated by Humboldt and exerted a powerful influence on Vygotsky's thinking through the works of Potebnya and Shpet. Vygotsky's thinking about linguistic mediation was to a large extent determined by this tradition. The second tradition was that of Marxism and progressive thought and influenced Vygotsky's thinking about such notions as tool-use and social and cultural progress. The way in which Vygotsky combined these different perspectives in his concept of culture is described. It is suggested that this concept of culture was powerful but also limited and biased.
The Past, Intellectual Histories and Their Uses for the Future: A Response to Middleton and Crook (1996)
Authors: Rosa Alberto
Published: March 2007

This paper focuses on an examination of the uses of the past in intellectual history and in science. Borrowing the concept of symbolic market from Pierre Bourdieu, the production of new texts within a discursive formation (a la Michel Foucault) is pictured as a process of consumption-production whose outcomes are attributed a certain value by the consumers of the text. This view can be applied both to scientific and to historical products, which have their own independent-even if relatedepistemic markets with different criteria for attribution of value. Whatever the case, when events or discourses of the past appear in a current discourse it is because they are of some use as a way of providing a narrationality for current and future actions.
Psychological Concepts, Their Producers and Consumers
Authors: Hurme Helena
Published: March 2007

The process of production and consumption of goods is presented as a metaphor which is applicable to the construction of psychological concepts. Researchers are equated with industrial workers and artisans, and research institutions with the owners of a company. Together they are the 'producers' of both immaterial (e.g. concepts) and material (e.g. books) forms of knowledge. Laypersons and implementing authorities are the 'consumers' of these products. Besides these two groups, decision-makers who fund research make up 'the market'. Thus, concepts are not produced only by researchers, but are socially and culturally constructed. There are several ways in which the producers and consumers of knowledge are shown to be interdependent. In knowledge production, much the same processes are found as in industrial production: competition, advertising, monopolies, and so on. Developmental psychology is used as an example to show that 'demand', that is, public interest, also directs the production of psychological concepts.
The Influence of Romanian Campaign Finance Laws on Party System Development and Corruption
Authors: Roper Steven D.
Published: March 2007

While East European party systems have received considerable attention, little research has been conducted on the influence of campaign finance laws on party system development. It is surprising that this issue receives such little attention given the widespread use of these laws in East Europe and that the requirements and especially the enforcement mechanisms of these laws have an influence on corruption. This article examines the logic behind public campaign financing and its implementation in Romania. The first section of the article explores the rationale behind party campaign finance, notes some of the criticisms of state campaign subsidies and addresses how party campaign finance generally influences the party system. The second section examines the Romanian campaign finance system and addresses how party campaign finance has influenced the development of parties, the party system and corruption.
Public Interest `Blackballing' in South Korea's Elections
Authors: Horowitz Shale , Kim Sunwoong
Published: March 2007

South Korea's April 2000 congressional elections saw large numbers of incumbent candidates defeated. The South Korean mass media attributed considerable importance to the activities of a public interest umbrella organization, the Citizens' Alliance (CA) for the 2000 General Elections. CA `blackballed' 86 candidates of all parties as corrupt, unqualified or otherwise unsuited for office, and 59 of these candidates lost. After controlling for a variety of other factors - characteristics of districts, candidates and parties, and campaign spending - we find that CA did indeed exert a remarkably strong influence on electoral outcomes. Being blackballed was most damaging to independent candidates. Blackballing had the greatest impact on the probability of winning in districts with weaker party loyalties, and, somewhat ironically, for candidates of the ruling Millennium Democratic Party - the party most closely identified with the issue of clean government.
Why Clinton Won and Dukakis Lost
Authors: Wattenberg Martin P.
Published: March 2007

This article examines the change in the presidential fortunes of the US Democratic Party from 1988 to 1992. It focuses on the role of presidential candidates as the key dynamic aspect of American party politics. The analysis recognizes that candidates can influence the vote in several ways, including their personal attributes, ideological positions and policy and performance issues that are associated with them. For many American voters, the presidential candidates are the party. Contrary to the fears of many, candidate-centered politics have not led to presidential elections being determined by the personalities of the nominees. Nor has the decline of party politics led to ideological volatility, with the deciding factor being how closely candidates position themselves to the median voter. The major reason why Clinton won and Dukakis lost was that domestic issues favored Vice President Bush in 1988 but worked against President Bush in 1992.
The Place of `Party' in Post-Communist Europe
Authors: Wyman Matthew , White Stephen , Miller Bill , Heywood Paul
Published: March 2007

Using data from a survey of almost 6000 voters in five post-communist countries (Russia, Ukraine, Slovakia, Hungary and the Czech Republic) designed by the authors and carried out in November and December 1993, the authors review evidence about citizens' formal commitment to parties compared with other forms of civic activity; about depth of trust in political parties; the effectiveness of action through political parties; desirable forms of party competition; and the depth of party identification in post-communist Europe. They conclude that while the degree of hostility to political parties remains significant, and identification remains low in comparative perspective, in none of the countries is there a desire among mass publics to see an end to party competition, and the place of party is in any event secured by elite consensus.
Economic Theories of Organization and the Politics of Institutional Design in Political Parties
Authors: Koelble Thomas A.
Published: March 2007

The following article applies the principal-agent model to the politics of institutional design, that is, the relationship between representatives and their intra-party constituencies, in three social democratic parties. It examines whether the principal-agent thesis provides a useful methodological tool for the analysis of intra-party struggles over organizational distributions of power. The study concludes that the model is indeed applicable to the study of internal decision-making processes and conflict, but that a more rigorous test and application is necessary to fully ascertain its methodological and theoretical value for the study of political parties in general.
Re-Entering Electoral Politics
Authors: Hamann Kerstin , Sgouraki-Kinsey Barbara
Published: March 2007

This article examines change in the Greek and Spanish party systems between their pre- and post-authoritarian periods. While the Greek party system displayed substantial continuity, the Spanish system showed considerable change. We connect continuity in party structure with length of interruption of competitive electoral politics. Our argument relies on the idea of reputation to explain why Spanish party leaders were far less constrained in moving their parties along the policy space than their Greek counterparts. Political parties in Spain had less reputation for established policy positions than Greek parties. Our argument and its implications are formally derived from a model developed by Bowler. We evaluate some alternative explanations and conclude that reputation is a factor accounting for variation in party system change in these two cases. At the time of the transition party leaders were presented with different opportunities to redefine their respective parties' policy positions.
Gender Issues in Health-related Exercise
Authors: Penney Dawn , Harris Jo
Published: March 2007

This article focuses on gender issues arising in research that explored physical education (PE) teachers’ attitudes and approaches relating to the teaching of healthrelated exercise(HRE) within the National Curriculum for Physical Education (NCPE) in England. Data are reported that reveal notable differences between female and male PE heads of departments in their development of HRE in the NCPE, and variations in the HRE programmes provided for girls and boys. The article addresses the implications of the research findings for physical education teachers and teacher educators and makes recommendations with respect to changes that are required if physical educators are to develop more equitable educational practices and environments. The article also draws attention to the insights that the research provides into the complexities of policy, curriculum and pedagogical change and, specifically, factors underpinning variations in implementation of policy, and stabilities in the practices of physical education over time.
Influence of the Motivational Climate in Physical Education on Sixth Grade Pupilsí Goal Orientations
Authors: Todorovich John R. , Curtner-Smith Matthew D.
Published: March 2007

The primary purpose of the study was to ascertain whether manipulating the motivational climate of physical education units would influence sixth grade pupils’ goal orientations. A secondary purpose was to assess the influence of the motivational climate on the goal orientations of boys and girls. Twenty-seven girls and 45 boys were randomly assigned to a control group or one of two experimental groups. Experimental groups were taught modified field hockey within an ego- or task-involving climate. Pupils’ goal orientations were measured before and after instruction with the Task and Ego Orientation in Sport Questionnaire. Group gender test analysis of variance tests indicated that the two experimental treatments had the expected influence on pupils’ goal orientations but that there were no differential effects on male and female pupils.
The Theory behind Practical Evaluation
Authors: Scriven Michael
Published: March 2007

Two claims are put forward in this article : (I) practical evaluation, especially practical program evaluation, depends on theoretical assumptions that put its procedures and conclusions at risk; and (2) practical evaluation is unnecessarily and seriously limited because of its failure to use theory as a way to recognize and develop solutions to problems not yet solved in practice. Both claims raise the question of the relation of theory to practice in our discipline, and most of the article concerns this question. The focus of the discussion is the recent Handbook of Practical Program Evaluation. At the end, one possible low-level theory about evaluation-essentially, a conception of evaluation as a discipline-is proposed.
Playing With/In Plurality
Authors: Abma Tineke A.
Published: March 2007

We are living in a postmodern society characterized by a permanent and irreducible plurality. This has serious implications for the practices of social planning and evaluation. This has not always been fully recognized. The dominant discourse in evaluation is modernist in its ambition to rationalize society by the instrumental use of objective, scientific knowledge. This coincides well with centralized, top-down social planning based on analysis and instruction by experts. Although dominant approaches have been criticized for their technocratic orientation, proposed alternatives are incompatible with a decentralized, bottom-up and interactive planning that takes a diversity of perspectives into account. The case of social revitalization in Rotterdam illustrates that a responsive evaluation approach can succesfully support attempts of entrepreneurial, local governments that invite and involve public, private and voluntary stakeholders to revitalize their realities and relationships.
Me and My Shadows: On the Accumulation of Body-Images in Western Society Part One - The Image and the Image of the Body in Pre-Modern Society
Authors: FERGUSON HARVIE
Published: March 2007

Granting that the `soul' was only an attractive and mysterious thought, from which philosophers rightly, but reluctantly, separated themselves - that which they have since learnt to put in its place is perhaps even more attractive and even more mysterious. The human body, in which the whole of the most distant and most recent past of all organic life once more becomes living and corporal, seems to flow through this past and right over it like a huge and inaudible torrent: the body is a more wonderful thought than the old `soul'. (Nietzsche, 1973: 132-3)

Man is but breath and a shadow. (Sophocles)
Muscle, `Hard Men' and `Iron' Mike Tyson: Reflections on Desire, Anxiety and the Embodiment of Masculinity
Authors: JEFFERSON TONY
Published: March 2007

If, as Anthony Elliot argues, `the [symbolic] law of the father triumphs over the loss of the maternal body' in the making of men, how is the masculine body possible? The answer would appear to be, on condition that it becomes implacably hard, disciplined, an object of work. On the other hand, excessive interest in the body, as in the case of bodybuilding, would appear also to betoken narcissism and femininity. Drawing on the notions of the `hard man', the significance of muscle, bodybuilding and the case of `Iron' Mike Tyson, this article attempts to come to grips with the complex and contradictory relations among desire, anxiety and the embodiment of masculinity. Specifically, this entails focusing on the deconstruction of discourses relating to muscle and `hardness', and on how identifications with such discourses are made and sustained.
Performing the Technoscientific Body: RealVideo Surgery and the Anatomy Theater
Authors: THACKER EUGENE
Published: March 2007

This article is an investigation into the ways in which anatomico-medical bodies are produced through means of public mediation and spectacle technologies. The examples of `RealVideo surgery' (surgical operations broadcast live over the Web) and the early modern anatomy theaters, provide two instances where `the body' enframed by science is mediated via technology. Referencing the genealogical work of Michel Foucault, and through an analysis of the anatomy theaters and RealVideo surgery, this article attempts to show how such institutionally framed and legitimizing science practices do not simply produce `the body', but are rather involved in multiply articulating different types of technoscientific bodies. At issue in such instances are the ways in which practices and habits of reading, decoding and recognizing bodies are being reconfigured in the utilization of such technologies as the Internet and Web, and the possible modes of critical analysis which may develop from within such instances.
The Relationship to Help: Interacting Beliefs about the Treatment Process
Authors: Reder Peter , Fredman Glenda
Published: March 2007

Clients and professionals bring to their relationship with each other beliefs about the helping process which can significantly influence the outcome of referral and treatment. This article describes the development of the authors' ideas about this relationship to help and some of the beliefs that contribute to it. In clinical practice, issues around the relationship to help may need to be addressed at the referral, engagement or therapy phases.
Trauma-Organized Systems in Practice: Implications for Work with Abused and Abusing Children and Young People
Authors: Bentovim Arnon
Published: March 2007

This paper examines the notion of trauma-organized systems, which sees the perpetrator of abuse organizing reality by blaming the child for triggering his response. Meanwhile children attribute actions of the perpetrator to themselves, and are also perceived as cause by parents who should be protective. This theme is explored through research on children who have been sexually abused, and who sexually abuse other children. The mental health of the abused child depends in part on the extensiveness of abuse, and in part on whether the child is believed, and supported following diagnosis. Sexual abuse is a factor in triggering abusive action in abused children, but early experience of physical violence, and a mother who has herself grown up in a climate of violence are the factors which lead to an abusive orientation towards younger children. The implications for therapeutic work is examined in these studies with the necessity emerging for good protective work, re-parenting of seriously abused and abusing children, specific trauma and offence orientated therapy, and a general approach which reverses the effects of living in a trauma organized system.
Critical Approaches to Health Psychology
Authors: Rogers Wendy Stainton
Published: March 2007

Health psychology generally prioritizes scientific method as its means of enquiry, and positivism as its theoretical foundation. In the broader domain of social psychology, however, we are now seeing the emergence of a new paradigm, 'critical social psychology', which draws extensively upon postmodern theorizing, and, in particular, discursive methods of analysis and inquiry. In this article, I describe what is meant by critical social psychology, how it differs from the mainstream, and examine some of its implications for health psychology. My aim is to open up debate between mainstream and critical approaches. In adopting an explicit challenge to the way health psychology is currently conceived, it invites dialogue over the methods, theorization and practical applications of our discipline.
Effective Decision-making
Authors: Ratzan Scott C.
Published: March 2007

This article examines the critical role of communication and interpersonal negotiation in provider/consumer relations. Only through the use of strategic and competent communication can providers and consumers work cooperatively to make effective health-care decisions. A conflict resolution/shared negotiation model is presented to illustrate how communication can facilitate cooperative decision- making in health care. The model emphasizes cooperation, trust and mutual adaptation between providers and consumers. A case study is then presented to illustrate further the model and cooperative health-care decision-making processes.
Using the Counselling Interview To Collect Research Data on Sensitive Topics
Authors: Coyle Adrian , Wright Clare
Published: March 2007

In interview-based research on sensitive health-related topics, the interview may restimulate painful memories among respondents who may become distressed. It is ethically questionable for researchers to address sensitive issues without being equipped to deal with resultant distress. An effective way of addressing this problem is for interviewers to foster counselling attributes and use counselling skills within research interviews. This fulfils various therapeutic and supportive functions for the interviewees, such as helping them to understand their experiences and engage in cathartic disclosure. It also serves research functions in that it can foster good rapport, encourage interviewees to elaborate their experiences and help establish potential lines of association and causation in the research data. The use of the counselling interview as a data collection tool is illustrated with examples drawn from a study of AIDS-related bereavement among gay men.
The Effects of a Multimedia System in Supermarkets To Alter Shoppers' Food Purchases
Authors: Anderson Eileen S. , Winett Richard A. , Bickley Patricia G. , Walberg-Rankin Janet , Moore John F. , Leahy Michael , Harris Carl E. , Gerkin Robert E.
Published: March 2007

A randomized-control test of a multimedia nutrition intervention—the Nutrition for a Lifetime System (NLS©)— utilized supermarket receipts to examine effects of NLS treatment on the daily per person nutritional content of participants' supermarket purchases. In regression analyses controlling for background variables, baseline purchases and trends toward increased purchasing, NLS treatment contributed to lower levels of total fat and to higher levels of total fiber and servings of fruits and vegetables at post-test. Redemption of NLS coupons contributed to greater decreases in fat and increases in servings of fruits and vegetables in users' purchases. Implications for future interventions promoting healthier food choices include tailoring program content and addressing broader lifestyle issues such as caloric intake and expenditure.
Understanding How Inequality in the Distribution of Income Affects Health
Authors: Lynch John W. , Kaplan George A.
Published: March 2007

Research on the determinants of health has almost exclusively focused on the individual but it seems clear we cannot understand or improve patterns of population health without engaging structural determinants at the societal level. This article traces the development of research on income distribution and health to the most recent epidemiologic studies from the USA that show how income inequality is related to age- adjusted mortality within the 50 States. ( r = -0.62, p = 0.0001) even after accounting for absolute levels of income. We discuss potential material, psychological, social and behavioral pathways through which income distribution might be linked to health status. Distributional aspects of the economy are important determinants of health and may well provide one of the most pertinent indicators of overall social well-being.
Individuality in Vulnerability
Authors: Horner Karen L.
Published: March 2007

The relation between personality traits, environmental stressors and their impact, coping behaviors, and health status was examined, as were pathways through which health is influenced by these individual difference variables. It was hypothesized that personality predicts susceptibility to stressors and coping mechanisms that modify the cognitive and affective reactions that influence health status. Two hundred and eighty- four university students completed self-report questionnaires. Ego resilience, low neuroticism, hardiness, internal locus of control, and extraversion loaded on a factor moderately related, indirectly, to health status. A path analysis testing sexes separately revealed that men with a vital personality (i.e. emotionally calm but flexible, self-reliant, and hardy) reported perceiving fewer environmental threats, using more efficacious coping behaviors, and experiencing lower levels of negative affect and better health status than did less self-possessed persons. Similar results emerged for women except that stressors predicted health status independently of personality influences. Moreover, the use of wishful thinking predicted health status directly for men but not for women. Personality appears to be related to poor health, through ineffective coping and consequent negative affect.
When Technical Rationality Fails
Authors: Still Arthur , Todd Chris
Published: March 2007

The theory that thinking is modelled on the social activity of argument is investigated through the views of general practitioners about terminally ill patients. The social activity of general practice centres on the consultation, which the doctor manages by 'technical rationality'. But this is difficult when the patient is terminally ill. In that case technical rationality is seen to fail and rhetorical skills are invoked. GPs' thinking about such consultations can be described using an agonistic model based on a hierarchy of objectives, strategies and tactics. The objective of keeping patients comfortable and dignified is aimed at through three strategies, and a variety of rhetorical tactics is drawn on in thinking about these strategies.
Stress and Coping Styles in Guangzhou Families with Hepatitis B Virus Children
Authors: Cheng Lai Alice , Salili Farideh
Published: March 2007

This study was conducted in Guangzhou, China. The study compared the stress coping styles of three groups of parents: (1) parents of children who are carriers of the hepatitis B virus (HBV) who attend a special health kindergarten; (2) parents of children with HBV who stay at home; and (3) parents of healthy children attending ordinary kindergarten. Parents of HBV children who stayed at home reported greater problems due to stress. The groups did not differ in reports of stress arising from life events other than their child's illness and the fact that their HBV-carrying children were prohibited from the kindergarten. Content analyses of the mothers' reported styles revealed five patterns of coping styles, which are explained with reference to the Chinese cultural context.
Long Houses, Long Mounds and Neolithic Enclosures
Authors: Bradley Richard
Published: March 2007

This paper discusses the relationship between Neolithic long houses, the burial mounds that adopt a similar ground-plan and the first earthwork en closures in Europe. It considers recent discussions of these monuments by Hodder and Sherratt and proposes a new interpretation of the relationship between these different features. It suggests that the long houses of the Linear Pottery Culture were often abandoned whilst they were structurally sound and that they were then left to decay. This may have happened when one of the occupants died. The distintegration of such houses might have provided the frame of reference for the eventual development of long mounds. On some sites ditched enclosures may have marked the positions of abandoned houses or even those of whole settlements. Like the burial mounds, such earthworks were still being built long after their prototypes had gone out of use.
Museum Topology and the Will To Connect
Authors: Hetherington Kevin
Published: March 2007

This paper is concerned with the relationship between material culture and spatiality. Through the example of the ceramics collection in the City Museum and Art Gallery in Stoke-on-Trent, England, an analysis is made of the topological character of space that is folded around certain objects on display. Ozzy the Owl, a 17th-century slipware owl jug, who was discovered on BBC TV's Antiques Roadshow in 1990 and subsequently bought by the museum, is seen as an agent that is constituted by the folding together of preface and afterword in the museum display, unsettling its (Euclidian) geometry, (Kantian) aesthetic and discourse of improvement (organized around Wedgwood). Ozzy brings complexity and connection; his contingent location within the museum's heterogeneous material network reveals the functional blankness of objects and the effect this can have in performing new topological arrangements in a space, revealing the friability and partial connectedness of its narrativity.
Claiming Citizenship? Sexuality, Citizenship and Lesbian/Feminist Theory
Authors: Richardson Diane
Published: March 2007

In this article I seek to examine some of the key issues arising from a relatively new and rapidly expanding literature on sexuality and citizenship, looking primarily at how lesbian and gay theorists have engaged with the concept of sexual citizenship in general and lesbian citizenship in particular. I shall explore the question of whether sexual citizenship is being used as a sexual/gender-neutral or a sexual/gender-differentiated concept. In addition, and in so far as citizenship is defined in terms of rights and duties, the question of sexual rights and obligations will be discussed. Overall, an attempt is made to critically assess the complex interrelationships between this new body of work and lesbian/feminist perspectives. I hope to demonstrate how within such theoretical frameworks the expansion of a concept of sexual citizenship is far from unproblematic. These theoretical developments in understanding sexual citizenship are located against a backdrop of changing notions of `sexual politics', more especially the increasingly dominant `equal rights' approach to claiming citizenship.
`Tarred with the Same Brush': `Homophobia' and the Role of the Unconscious in School-based Cultures of Masculinity
Authors: Redman Peter
Published: March 2007

This article interrogates the concept of `homophobia' via a set of `open' interviews with 16- to 18-year-old boys. It explores a broadly sociological critique of the concept; one that understands boys' anti-lesbian and gay talk and behaviour in terms of the local and dialogic performance of heterosexual masculinities. However, while acknowledging the relevance of this critique, the article suggests that the existence of homophobia highlights the need for an understanding of the position of the unconscious in gender and sexual performance. The article explores an expanded account of the unconscious dimensions of `homophobia', arguing for forms of analysis capable of addressing the unconscious and the social as intersecting and mutually constitutive dynamics.
Between the Image and the Act: Interactive Sex Entertainment on the Internet
Authors: Kibby Marjorie , Costello Brigid
Published: March 2007

An analysis of participation in adult video-conferencing on the internet reveals a subversion of traditional relations between the image and the act in pornography, providing an `interactive' sex entertainment which is both representation (or image) and presentation (or act). CU-SeeMe offers an experience that is at the same time both image and act, creating a space that accommodates multiple and fluid roles, allowing the positions of spectator and spectacle to be freely exchanged, and rewriting active/passive gender relations. In proposing that interactive CU-SeeMe sex entertainment blurs the boundaries between image and act, this article suggests that online interactive sex entertainment allows for the possibility of rewriting codes of sexuality.
Fe/male Trouble: The Unsettling Place of Lesbians in the Self-images of Brazilian Travesti Prostitutes
Authors: Kulick Don
Published: March 2007

Transgendered prostitutes ( travestis) in the Brazilian city of Salvador have strong opinions about lesbians. Although individual travestis maintain cordial relationships with individual lesbians, whenever they discuss lesbians among themselves, travestis are always dismissive and condemnatory. This paper discusses three reasons for that attitude: the contention among travestis that `God made woman for man and man for woman'; the conviction that lesbians actively pursue travestis as objects of desire; and the idea that lesbians share a (very different kind of) transgendered project with travestis. This paper investigates what might be gained by examining the ways in which one group of transgendered individuals thinks about other individuals whom it also sees as transgendered. The argument is that this kind of enquiry allows a more nuanced understanding of some of the underlying configurations of gender and sexuality that travestis draw on and reproduce in their own practices and subjectivities.
Occupational Mass Psychogenic Illness: A Transcultural Perspective
Authors: Bartholomew Robert E. , Sirois Fran«ois
Published: March 2007

Reports of occupational mass psychogenic illness (OMPI) in the scientific literature were examined to describe underlying presentation patterns and explain their sporadic appearance in the literature. Three distinct patterns were identified: (i) mass anxiety hysteria is precipitated by the sudden appearance of an anxiety-generating stimulus following the redefinition of an innocuous or imaginary odour or agent that is perceived as an immediate threat; (ii) mass motor hysteria is characterized by internalized conflict which fosters dissociation, histrionics and psychomotor agitation. Episodes are typified by an atmosphere of pre-existing tension and employee dissatisfaction with restrictive management practices coupled with inhibited negotiation channels; (iii) a third presentation pattern involves the relabelling of endemic symptoms and the occasional appearance of conversion reactions, which are reinforced by a hypervigilant medical community and exacerbating factors. Social factors may explain the irregular appearance of reports.
Psychological Characteristics of Children Who Speak of a Previous Life: A Further Field Study in Sri Lanka
Authors: Haraldsson Erlendur , Fowler Patrick C. , Periyannanpillai Vimala
Published: March 2007

Personality and mental ability measures were administered to 27 pairs of children in Sri Lanka who did, or did not, claim memories of a previous life. Questionnaires about their behavior, development, and family environment were administered to their parents. Children claiming previous-life memories performed better in school than did their peers and they were not more suggestible. The Child Behavior Checklist revealed that they exhibited more behavioral problems, including oppositional traits, and obsessional and perfectionistic characteristics. The Child Dissociation Checklist showed them to have dissociative tendencies (e.g. rapid changes in personality and frequent daydreaming). The structure of their family environment did not differ measurably from that of comparison children.
The Lay Concept of ‘Mental Disorder’: A Cross-Cultural Study
Authors: Giosan Cezar , Glovsky Viviane , Haslam Nick
Published: March 2007

Lay concepts of ‘mental disorder’ were investigated in three countries (U.S.A., Romania and Brazil). Participants judged whether a sample of conditions – some falling inside and some outside the borders defined by DSM-IV – were mental disorders, and rated them on features invoked in professional understandings of ‘mental disorder.’ The concept of mental disorder was considerably more inclusive and convergent with the DSM-IV in the American sample than in the Brazilian sample, and disorder judgments showed only moderate agreement across cultures. Several features of the concept were culturally distinctive, amounting to a more ‘internalist’ or intrapsychic understanding in the American sample.
Cultural Psychiatry in a Creolizing World: Questions for a New Research Agenda
Authors: Bibeau Gilles
Published: March 2007

The recent interest of anthropologists in textuality, narrativity and phenomenology has shifted the concerns of cultural psychiatrists toward the consideration of the inner subjective life of persons and their discourses. Most versions of semiologically and phenomenologically oriented cultural psychiatry are weakened by three limitations: (i) the tendency to reify and homogenize cultural systems; (ii) the lack of integration of social and cultural orders; and (iii) the disconnection between local worlds and the global scene. This essay invites researchers to break with out-dated anthropological approaches and explore new territory around such concepts as cultural complexity, creolization, pluralism and boundaries. The emblem of this new era is the immigrant who is confronted with fragmented referential models. We must embark upon a new research agenda that incorporates five main features of our times: (i) people build their experience with reference to creolized rather than monolithic cultures; (ii) representational systems of meaning are embedded in specific social organizational patterns from which culture cannot be divorced; (iii) societies are increasingly dominated by experts, managers and a new economy of knowledge based on functional literacy; (iv) an increasing number of excluded or marginalized persons are claiming the power to narrate their own lives; and (v) the right to speak about the painful experiences of others, particularly when they are mentally disabled or socially excluded, must be reassessed in the face of the policy of political correctness. These elements can contribute to the reconceptualization of a socio-cultural psychiatry that is more attuned to the contemporary world.
Explanatory Model Interview Catalogue (EMIC): Framework for Comparative Study of Illness
Authors: Weiss Mitchell
Published: March 2007

The Explanatory Model Interview Catalogue (EMIC) refers to a collection of locally adapted explanatory model interviews rooted in a common framework. Efforts to develop the EMIC were motivated by research experience in cultural psychiatry and tropical medicine that demonstrated a need to integrate epidemiological and anthropological research methods more effectively. Various adaptations of the EMIC framework have produced semi-structured interviews based on an operational formulation of an illness explanatory model that systematically clarifies the experience of illness from the point of view of the people who are directly affected. Patterns of distress, perceived causes, preferences for help seeking and treatment, and general illness beliefs constitute a framework for the operational formulation of the illness explanatory model. Data sets generated from these EMIC interviews typically include quantitative variables and qualitative prose, which are cross-referenced for analysis to clarify key features and answer important questions about illness experience and its practical implications. This review discusses the development and structure of the EMIC, the adaptation of particular explanatory model interviews, the analysis of data obtained from these interviews, the scope of research they have addressed, and next steps in the development of the EMIC.