bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Improved Seasonal Climate Forecasts of the South Asian Summer Monsoon Using a Suite of 13 Coupled Ocean–Atmosphere Models
Authors: Chakraborty Arindam , Krishnamurti T. N.
Published: June 2006

Several modeling studies have shown that the south Asian monsoon region has the lowest skill for seasonal forecasts compared with many other domains of the world. This paper demonstrates that a multimodel synthetic superensemble approach, when constructed with any set of coupled atmosphere–ocean models, can provide improved skill in seasonal climate prediction compared with single-member models or their ensemble mean for the south Asian summer monsoon region. However, performance of the superensemble tends to improve when a better set of input member models are used. As many as 13 state-of-the-art coupled atmosphere–ocean models were used in the synthetic superensemble algorithm. The merit of this technique lies in assigning differential weights to the member models. The rms errors, anomaly correlations, case studies of extreme events, and probabilistic skill scores are used here to assess these forecast skills. It was found that over the south Asian region the seasonal forecasts from the superensemble are, in general, superior to the forecasts of the individual member models, and their bias-removed ensemble mean at a significance level of 95% or more (based on a Student's t test) during the 13 yr of forecasts. Moreover, the skill of the superensemble was found to be better than those of the ensemble mean over smaller domains as well as during extreme events that were monitored, especially during the switch on and off of the Indian Ocean dipole, which seems to modulate the Indian monsoon rainfall. The results of this paper suggest that the superensemble provides somewhat consistent forecasts on the seasonal time scale. This methodology needs to be tested for real-time seasonal climate forecasting over the south Asian region.
Recycling and the Domestic Division of Labour:
Authors: Oates Caroline J. , McDonald Seonaidh
Published: June 2006

Domestic or household recycling has a crucial role to play in meeting EU targets for overall recycling rates. However, researchers have yet to agree on the characteristics of the domestic recycler and how recycling is actually carried out in the home. In this article, recycling is investigated within the context of domestic labour in an attempt to understand how it fits in with or overrides traditional divisions. This brings an important new perspective to the recycling debate and at the same time updates the domestic division of labour literature to include green activities. It is suggested that recycling contradicts prevailing trends towards decreasing time spent on household chores, but that, like domestic labour, it is initiated and largely sustained by women alone or together with a partner. In this sense, recycling follows a similar pattern to more established household chores.
Hybridizing Habitus and Reflexivity:
Authors: Adams Matthew
Published: June 2006

This article initially summarizes two dominant tropes in the sociology of identity in recent years, centred on the concepts of self-reflexivity and habitus, followed by an overview of extensive critical debate to which both have been subjected. It is claimed that the key criticisms of the extended reflexivity thesis gather around accusations of excessive voluntarism in accounting for contemporary identity, while critiques of Bourdieu's conceptualization of habitus deem it overly deterministic. In an attempt to move beyond the conceptual stalemate of two distinct approaches to identity, a number of hybridized accounts have emerged in social theory.The remainder of the article discusses a number of these accounts in relation to social change, and offers an initial consideration of their strengths and limitations. It is argued that the importance of post-reflexive choice must remain integral to any attempt at hybridization of these important terms, particularly in relation to the contemporary workings of social stratification.
The Sociology of Architecture and the Politics of Building:
Authors: Jones Paul R.
Published: June 2006

Because architecture provides a ‘concrete’ focus for many debates pertinent to collective identities, then the rebuilding of the Ground Zero site by architect Daniel Libeskind is hugely significant from the perspective of sociology. So-called ‘starchitects’ such as Libeskind are increasingly conscious of the complex identity discourses within which their work is situated, with competing identity claims evidenced not only in the actual form of buildings, but also in the abstract narratives architects use to situate their work in a way that avoids (symbolically) privileging one identity over another.The capacity of architects to position their buildings in this way provides the focus of this article, which argues that architects’ discourses frequently reveal many tensions between culture, politics, power, and identity.The symbolic nationalization of the architecture at the Ground Zero site has, in part, been achieved by the narrative, highly symbolic links between the buildings there and an ‘American’ collective identity.
Court Mediation in China, Past and Present
Authors: Huang Philip C. C.
Published: June 2006

What is called “mediation” in China today includes a wide variety of actions, ranging from the purely facilitative to the substantially adjudicative and yet still mediatory (those that are mainly adjudicatory and imposed regardless of the will of the litigants should be excluded). They show that contemporary Chinese court mediation as it has been practiced is very different both from Qing court practices and from current alternative dispute resolution (ADR) in the West. Qing courts generally did not mediate, despite the Confucian ideal of resolving disputes through (societal) mediation and despite the official ritualistic requirement that court actions always be voluntarily accepted by litigants. Contemporary Chinese courts, however, routinely mediate, a legacy not from the Qing but from the Maoist period. If mediation fails, arbitration or adjudication—under the same judge—will almost always follow. That makes the process very different also from current ADR in the West, where mediation is generally separate and distinct from court trials and mediators do not operate with nearly as much discretionary power as Chinese judges. For better or for worse, the contemporary Chinese approach to court mediation is predicated on an implicit epistemological method that contrasts sharply with the formalist ideal (which characterizes modern Western Continental law): instead of starting from universal premises about rights and then applying those by legal (deductive) logic to all fact situations, Chinese judges start instead from the nature of the fact situation and then decide to mediate or arbitrate or else adjudicate, as appropriate. In placing the concrete and the practical ahead of the abstract, they still share a good deal in legal reasoning with judges of the Qing.
Voices from a Room of One's Own
Authors: Wong Lisa Lai-ming
Published: June 2006

Contemporary critics who study women's literature often focus on the very act of speaking, or the possession of a voice. The speaker in a poem seems to lend the women of her time a voice to express their feelings and in so doing offers a female perspective on social and cultural aspects of life. Adopting ideas from Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own as well as Hélène Cixous's notion of “writing the body, ” this article explores how women poets find a private space in their own rooms for examining “liberated” selves. A new conception of body and space is presented in these lyric voices. In contrast, in the voices of many critics, we hear a glaring double standard that exposes the persistence of patriarchal inhibition of women's freedom of expression. This dialogic tension between the voices reveals women's predicaments and their strong protests against the status quo in contemporary China.
The Gendered Politics of Woman-work
Authors: Manning Kimberley Ens
Published: June 2006

This article explores discursive tensions in Party organizations prior to and after the founding of the People's Republic of China. Specifically, it explains radicalism among grassroots women leaders during the Great Leap Forward. The author argues that some of these leaders neglected the health of women and children and even sought to dismantle grassroots women's organizations because of how they were recruited and trained in grassroots Party organizations. Whereas the Chinese Communist Party and the All China Women's Federation (ACWF) leadership sought to implement a Marxist maternalist conception of sexual equality that stressed physiological difference, grass-roots Party organizations operated on the basis of a revolutionary Maoist ethic according to which all were expected to struggle equally. Trained by local Party organizations, a number of rural women leaders identified with interpretations of sexual equality put forth by the local Party, not by the Party and ACWF leadership, and consequently transformed important aspects of woman-work during the late 1950s.
Knowledge reuse in action: the case of CALL
Authors: Chua Alton Y. K. , Lam Wing , Majid Shaheen
Published: June 2006

This paper reviews how the Center for Army Lessons Learned (CALL), an intelligence unit within the US Army, has entrenched a unique knowledge reuse process into its modus operandi. It highlights several issues related to knowledge reuse, including the collection, distillation and dissemination of knowledge, the role of subject experts in the knowledge reuse process and how technology facilitates knowledge reuse. For practitioners, this paper offers an inspiring exemplar of knowledge reuse success. For researchers, existing theoretical grounds for knowledge reuse have been opened for further debate.
How influential is Brooks’ Law? A longitudinal citation context analysis of Frederick Brooks’ The Mythical Man-Month
Authors: McCain Katherine W. , Salvucci Laura J.
Published: June 2006

Citation context analysis is used to demonstrate the diversity of concept symbols that a book-length publication can represent and the diffusion of influence of these concepts over time and across scholarly disciplines. A content analysis of 574 citation contexts from 497 journal articles citing an edition of Frederick P. Brooks, Jr’s The Mythical Man-Month (MMM) over the period 1975-1999 showed that MMM represents a variety of different concepts and is cited in a wide range of subject areas. Over time, a high level of interest in MMM spread from software engineering and computer science to management and information systems, with different areas showing different patterns of focus on concepts within the work. ‘Brooks’ Law’ (the ‘mythical man-month’ or ‘adding more people to a late project makes it later’), accounted for less than 30% of the classified citation contexts. The findings contribute to our understanding of the diffusion of ideas in scholarly communication, and the diversity that can underlie the creation of a reference in a scholarly publication.
Searching for a Weapon of Mass Production in Nepal
Authors: Bhandari Ravi
Published: June 2006

The World Bank recently published a comprehensive statement on land reform policy, the first in 30 years, that self-proclaims market-assisted land reform as a key policy to achieve not only efficiency, but even more importantly, equity. At the core of this ‘neo-populist neoclassical’ orthodoxy is: 1) the long-term pursuit of individual property and associated rights; 2) an idealized notion of the egalitarian and efficient small farmer based on the well-known inverse relation between farm size and productivity; and 3) a static view of rural markets blinding one to the negative and unforeseen consequences by landlords in the face of reform. This article critically examines the validity of these core assumptions in light of current calls for market-assisted land reform in Nepal. A major conclusion is that given the evidence, the presumed benefits of such reforms are ideologically driven, and therefore, will unlikely provide a much needed escape from poverty for millions of Nepali citizens.
Financial Market Governance in Developing Countries
Authors: Zhang Xiaoke
Published: June 2006

This article presents a critique of the prevailing IMF/World Bank paradigm for financial market governance in developing countries that converges on the restrained role for the state, the neoliberal emphasis on self-governance, and the pursuit of market efficiency. It argues that the largely positive terms in which the governance discourse is couched have obfuscated the political dimensions that underlie the limitations of current efforts to improve the functioning of national financial systems in developing countries. It seeks to explore the political underpinnings of market governance that manifest themselves in the primary role of the state in market destruction and creation, the politically sustainable balance of power between private interests and public authorities, and the distributive justice of institutional reforms. Drawing upon recent national experiences with financial reforms and crises in developing countries, the article highlights these three dimensions as the essential normative constructs of effective financial policy management and market governance in developing countries.
China and Globalization
Authors: Liang Bin , Lauderdale Pat
Published: June 2006

This article focuses on the process of China’s increasing connections with other nations within the global system and analyzes the impact of these global connections on China’s economic development and domestic legal and economic systems. We suggest that China’s reaction to globalization can be analyzed by reference to a mixture of modernization theory and the world system perspective. We further examine the forces behind China’s decision to join the World Trade Organization and discuss crucial ways in which the Chinese government and legal system have been pressured or have elected to adopt international standards in order for the country to become a key player in the global marketplace.
Transparency in Communication
Authors: Soley Lawrence , Feldner Sarah Bonewits
Published: June 2006

Increased corporate-sponsored university research and professorial consulting has caused medical, psychological, and other scientific journals to adopt conflicts-of-interest disclosure policies. This study examines editorial policies concerning conflicts of interest at communication journals in the context of Habermas's theory of communicative action. The results show that communication journals do not have the same mandatory disclosure requirements that journals of other disciplines have. In this regard, communication research journals are similar to the mass media. Consequently, the article suggests that disclosure policies are needed if communication research journals are to function as part of a larger dialogic process. Moreover, communication researchers are not in a position to criticize the mass media for failing to disclose conflicts of interest when their own journals do not require disclosure.
Analyzing Resistance Narratives at the North American Anarchist Gathering
Authors: Atkinson Joshua
Published: June 2006

In this study, a methodological framework is established for the examination of resistance narratives in alternative media texts. Using the concepts of narrative paradigm, narrative fragmentation, constitutive elements of narrative, and hegemonic and/or emancipatory resistance, the author analyzed the manner of resistance within narrative fragments in alternative media circulated at the 2002 North American Anarchist Gathering. Qualitative content analysis identified the constitutive elements of cultural values and identity that showed an overarching narrative of resistance in the alternative media texts at the Gathering. The author then assessed the narrative based on Mumby's notions of hegemonic and emancipatory resistance. The analysis demonstrated an overarching narrative about egalitarianism, while hindering capitalists' ability to manipulate workers, which could be both hegemonic and emancipatory.
News Coverage of Genetic Cloning
Authors: Hyde Jon
Published: June 2006

This case study examines news coverage of genetic cloning in three major print newspapers and three major online news sources from 1996 to 1999. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to systematically assess issues of balance, sourcing, news focus, and language use in news articles about cloning. Four trends emerge from this study: a tendency to portray cloning as a technique and/or technology, a reliance on sources from research institutes and biotechnology companies, a use of language that depicts cloning in a positive light, and an overwhelming emphasis placed on the possible future benefits that may be associated with cloning. The author argues that these findings suggest a shift from conventional notions about what journalists do— report on events that have occurred. Instead, news reports about cloning involve speculative conjectures about potential benefits and possible futures. Such a shift may mean that a re-evaluation of journalistic practices is needed.
The Group in the Unconscious
Authors: Knauss Werner
Published: June 2006

In this article, the author proceeds from the individual to the group by elaborating the group matrix in each individual’s unique unconscious. The article ends with a brief outlook from a group-analytic perspective on to the global village.
Group Therapy as Self-Management Training
Authors: Moxnes Paul
Published: June 2006

In this paper, the author develops a personal interpretation of some in-depth issues encountered while participating in a three-year programme in group analysis, focusing on the interface between group analysis and leadership training. Among the issues delineated are member-leader conflicts, role-suction, the creation of covert roles (deep roles), parricide, and parental fantasies relevant to leadership in action. The paper ends with a description of the author’s surging self-conflict during the last year of the training programme, maintaining that his participation in the programme led to strategic decisions that led to significant on-the-job changes.
Fragmented careers?
Authors: Fenton Steve , Dermott Esther
Published: June 2006

It has been argued that people's engagement with work is becoming more like a series of encounters than an enduring relationship. In this article we address the question of whether this fragmentation is characteristic of people in the early stages of their working lives by drawing on a study of young adults in Bristol. We conclude that there is a core of young adults who are employed in a relatively stable pattern, along with a sizable minority, mostly of low paid workers, whose working lives can be described as discontinuous and fragmented. The study suggests that employment fragmentation is concentrated among young adults with less education, and in lower status, lower paid occupations and does not support a generalized picture of uncertainty and discontinuity.These employment patterns among younger people tend to highlight the continuing significance of long-standing social divisions of socio-economic advantage and gender-related disadvantage.
A very precarious profession:
Authors: Roderick Martin
Published: June 2006

Based on semi-structured interviews with 47 present and former professional footballers, this article explores the uncertainty that is a central feature of the professional footballer's workplace experiences, contributing to sociological understanding of insecurities stemming from the social relations of this type of work.The professional football industry has always been marked by a competitive labour market, and players quickly grasp the limited tenure of contracts, the constant surplus of talented labour, and their vulnerability to injury and ageing.To deal with the feelings of insecurity that arise from these working conditions, players develop networks of a) friends to whom they can turn if they perceive their status to be under threat, and b) dramaturgical selves(Collinson, 2003) in order to maintain stable, masculine workplace identities. Addressing feelings of uncertainty is an everpresent dimension of their working lives.
Just ‘non-academics’?
Authors: Collinson Jacquelyn Allen
Published: June 2006

Surprisingly perhaps, knowledge about occupational groups within academia is relatively scant, with an almost exclusive concentration upon teaching staff. The research upon which this article is based aims to fill this gap by focusing upon one specific group, which, to date, has been under-researched: research administrators. Utilizing primarily symbolic interactionist analyses, and based upon qualitative interviews, the project sought to investigate the occupational life-worlds of research administrators.The wide range of roles and divergent responsibilities covered by the title of ‘research administrator’ emerged as salient features, together with the boundary-crossing, ambiguous nature of much research administrative work.The article examines in particular the ‘identity work’ (Prus, 1996) undertaken by research administrators as they seek to resist categorization as ‘mere nonacademics’, and to counteract social invisibility. Administrative–academic relations were also found to constitute a core element within administrators' occupational life-worlds, and the article considers how the putative administrative/academic boundary is often problematized by research administrators.
Pay, promotion and parenthood amongst women solicitors
Authors: Wass Victoria , McNabb Robert
Published: June 2006

The article examines the workplace sources of sex-based and gendered pay differentials in professional labour markets. Solicitors are among the highest paying professionals, yet women solicitors receive on average only 58 percent of the earnings received by men solicitors, well below an 82 percent average for all British employees in 1999. From survey data we find that women solicitors have fewer prospects of promotion, and receive lower rewards than men for both promotion and experience. From interview data we find that sex-differences in access to reputation-building activities generate qualitative differences in participation (specifically, in carrying out legal work not chargeable to a client) which are consistent with differential outcomes found in the survey data.
Women, lifelong learning and transitions into employment
Authors: Jenkins Andrew
Published: June 2006

Policy makers place increasing emphasis on the importance of lifelong learning in enabling more people, not just the registered unemployed, who are out of the labour force to move back into employment, or even into employment for the first time. However, there is very little reliable evidence on the economic effects of formal learning undertaken by adults. This article reports research on a cohort of British women in their 30s who initially were not in employment, using event history analysis to examine the factors which influenced transitions into employment between 1991 and 2000.The key finding is that, in the presence of a full range of controls, lifelong learning, defined in terms of obtaining qualifications as an adult, substantially increases the likelihood that labour-market inactive women will make a transition to paid employment.
Kinnock: where Clarke was right
Authors: Hagerty Bill
Published: June 2006

In a revealing interview with BJR editor Bill Hagerty, the former leader of the Labour Party describes the press as "unaccountable", "pernicious", "dangerous", "insidious" and "invidious". And Kinnock has ideas how the Press Complaints Commission could be reconstituted to help create more trust in the press. Many of his journalist friends are concerned about falling quality, he says, "so somehow a way must be found of trying to establish their standards of integrity as the norm. I actually think [we need] a non-statutory body drawn substantially from experience within the industry with the watchword being the setting of good journalistic standards of integrity and all the other requirements of fairness."
Unequal war of the web
Authors: Jezierski Francis
Published: June 2006

Jezierski believes the BBC's internet dominance is, in the end, incompatible with rival commercial existence, and writes: "The BBC's website is, and should be seen to be, an affront to all those working in the media or those who wish to. Its very existence is, paradoxically, a disservice to the public because it deprives it of the central benefit the internet offers over other media: the potential for wide diversity. The BBC operation, which is in effect a state website, constitutes a diminution of freedom because it discourages the dissemination of different perspectives."
Fast stalker
Authors: Bown Jane
Published: June 2006

In a fascinating interview The Observer's legendary award-winning photographer explains why she told the Queen, "I'm just a newspaper hack" and tells the stories behind some of the favourite pictures along her work. Now 80, Ms Bown still hates being idle: "I'm not taking many pictures now and I'm sorry that I've been lifted above my station. I used to like it when they'd say, 'Can you do a picture for a byline' or something, because I like taking pictures and I'd put as much effort into a byline picture as I would anything else. But that's all gone - I'm sort of fading away from it. Now sometimes I think, "Oh, no" when I'm asked to photograph someone, because I'm not doing enough and it comes as such a shock. What I admire about the Queen is that she just goes on. She does the same thing, but differently every day. Well, I used to be a photographer like that."
Use of the deficit model in a shared culture of argumentation: the case of foot and mouth science
Authors: Wright Nick , Nerlich Brigitte
Published: June 2006

The “deficit model” as an explanation of the public understanding of science has attracted sustained criticism. While acknowledging the limitations of the deficit model, we argue that researchers should not abandon all interest in exploring it. Our results suggest that the deficit model is an important part of a culture of argumentation shared by both scientists and members of the public, and drawn upon as explanations of the public understanding of science. We carried out discourse analysis of a focus group conducted at the height of the UK's Foot and Mouth Disease crisis. The focus of our analysis was a debate about the science behind the spread and control of the virus. The results point to the importance of the deficit model in the public understanding ofthe public understanding of science. The challenge is to look to other ways of describing the relation between science and society, while recognizing that the deficit model serves scientists, the public and others alike as a resource for political discourse.
Surveillance Strategies and Populations at Risk: Biopolitical Governance in Canada’s National Security Policy
Authors: Bell Colleen
Published: June 2006

This article examines how Canada’s new national security policy operates through language and practices that take elusive risks to the health and safety of the population as an opportunity for action, and is made possible through an expansion of surveillance. The biopolitical character of security has greatly reduced the traditional distinction between the state as a military apparatus and the state as a service provider and manager of the citizenry. The article argues that the biopolitical governance strategies of Canada’s national security policy treat the problems for political freedom, equality and democratic accountability posed by encroaching security measures as largely negligible in the face of indeterminable danger. Using a Foucauldian analysis, the article establishes the connection between biopolitics and security. It subsequently examines how the Canadian policy deploys truth claims about the immanence of ‘threat’ and how claims about Canadian values produce an internal ‘other’ that represents the proliferation of threats. The article then focuses on two principle techniques of governance: first, guarding the freedom, health and safety of the population, and, second, expanding surveillance to give national security a totalizing reach. The article concludes by theorizing the implications of security governance for legitimating racial profiling and the ‘war on terror’.
From Distant Neighbors to Partners? Changing Syrian-Turkish Relations
Authors: Altunışık Meliha Benli , Tür Özlem
Published: June 2006

The growth of cooperative relations between Syria and Turkey, after the two countries came to the brink of war in 1998, has been a major development in the Middle East. This article examines both the reasons behind increasing ties between the two countries and the new challenges this rapprochement is facing due to the rapidly shifting international context. It argues that although systemic factors have been crucial in setting up the parameters of the bilateral relationship, these factors gain meaning through the complexities of domestic settings. The US policy of regime change and the Iraq War of 2003 and its aftermath are taken as the main regional and international factors influencing relations between the two countries since 1998. Domestic factors like the process of regime consolidation in Syria under Bashar and rising nationalism, the Kurdish issue, and the coming to power of the Justice and Development Party in Turkey constitute the main lenses through which these systemic factors are evaluated and policy outcomes projected.
Gender, Resistance and Human Security
Authors: Hoogensen Gunhild , Stuvøy Kirsti
Published: June 2006

In the debate on human security, the leading question for many is ‘where do we go from here?’ Through this article, the authors contribute to the discussion by exploring both the extent to which gender approaches have been relevant to the human security debate thus far and how they can offer some directions forward. They argue that gender approaches deliver more credence and substance to a wider security concept, but also enable a theoretical conceptualization more reflective of security concerns that emanate from the ‘bottom up’. The authors therefore incorporate gender theory to develop human security as an epistemological perspective to security studies. Gender theory claims that security must be linked to empowerment of the individual, as well as to the capabilities to create positive environments of security. They employ the tool of resistance as one crucial example of human agency in security. Practices of resistance, in the latter’s various empirical forms, are present in all social contexts. Such a perspective on security directs attention to the practices of agents and provides a basis for exploring contextually dependent insecurities and securities.
Tobacco Control Policy Advocacy Attitudes and Self-Efficacy Among Ethnically Diverse High School Students
Authors: Ramirez Amelie G. , Velez Luis F. , Chalela Patricia , Grussendorf Jeannie , McAlister Alfred L.
Published: June 2006

This study applied self-efficacy theory to assess empowerment to advocate on behalf of tobacco control policies. The Youth Tobacco Survey with added policy advocacy self-efficacy, attitudes, and outcome expectations scales was given to 9,177 high school students in Texas. Asians showed the lowest prevalence of experimentation and current smoking, followed by African Americans. Anglo-Europeans had higher rates of current smoking. Latino male students had the highest experimentation and current smoking rates. Policy advocacy self-efficacy was higher among African Americans. Latinos scored lowest. Asians had the highest level of approval for tobacco control policies. African Americans had the highest scores in policy advocacy outcome expectations, followed by Asians and Latinos. Anglo-Europeans scored lowest. Students who had never tried smoking had the highest scores in all three scales, with a decreasing trend as the frequency of smoking increased. Associations with smoking status remained significant when controlling by gender and ethnicity
Bridging Domains in Efforts to Reduce Disparities in Health and Health Care
Authors: Kumanyika Shiriki K. , Morssink Christiaan B.
Published: June 2006

The concept of health disparities is a familiar one, but we must continually challenge our thinking on how disparities issues are framed. The 1985 Report of the Secretary’s Task Force on Black and Minority Health established a disease-oriented focus on “excess deaths” as the primary targets of disparities initiatives. However, progress in reducing disparities has been limited. The disease focus, which emphasizes the individual-level and health care services, may be too narrow. A “population health” perspective can foster a more comprehensive and integrated approach. Both disease-oriented and population health perspectives have advantages and disadvantages, for both policy and practical purposes. The challenge is to effectively leverage both approaches to improve the health of ethnic minority and other disadvantaged populations. We need bridge builders who can articulate and hear diverse perspectives, work with systems, and maintain a long-term vision for affecting the social dynamics of society
Eliminating Health Disparities in the African American Population: The Interface of Culture, Gender, and Power
Authors: Airhihenbuwa Collins O. , Liburd Leandris
Published: June 2006

Since the release of former Secretary Margaret Heckler’s Secretary’s Task Force Report on Black and Minority Health more than two decades ago, excess death from chronic diseases and other conditions between African Americans and Whites have increased. The conclusion of that report emphasized excess death and thus clinical care, paying little attention to the sociocultural environment and its effects on risk of disease. The authors of this article contend that eliminating health disparities between the African American and White populations in the United States requires a focus on improving the social environment of African Americans. They examine the interface of culture, gender, and power and how those are central to analysis of the root causes of health disparities. The REACH 2010 project of the Centers for Disease Control offers examples on how a coalition of community and research organizations can infuse community interventions with informed considerations of culture, gender, and power to eliminate health disparities
Applying Transdisciplinary Research Strategies to Understanding and Eliminating Health Disparities
Authors: Abrams David B.
Published: June 2006

This overview for the special issue of Health Education & Behavior on “Health Disparities and Social Inequities” briefly outlines the transdisciplinary (TD) approach to research and examines the scope of TD science. The need to embrace basic science as well as several domains of applied research is discussed along the TD “pipeline” from discovery to development to delivery to policy. The overview concludes with selected examples of the emerging TD science of disparities. One central challenge for a TD approach is the need to strengthen what is being called “the science of dissemination” along with improving the “dissemination of evidence-based science.”
Ethnic and Racial Health Disparities Research: Issues and Problems
Authors: Sue Stanley , Dhindsa Meenu K.
Published: June 2006

Racial and ethnic disparities in health and health care are pervasive. A number of research and policy issues have been raised in the examination of disparities. This article analyzes some methodological, conceptual, and political issues that underlie disparities research. Specifically examined are the research challenges posed by the different ways of defining disparities, heterogeneity within racial or ethnic groups, measurement issues, conceptual levels of analyses, and financial/political factors. It is suggested that research funding for disparities research be substantially supported and encouraged and that researchers more adequately address methodological and conceptual difficulties that are associated with disparities research
Introduction: Eliminating Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities: A Call for Innovative Research
Authors: Quinn Sandra Crouse , Green B. Lee
Published: June 2006

Eliminating racial and ethnic disparities in health is not a new challenge for health education. This commentary highlights the contributions of articles emerging from the Society for Public Health Education (SOPHE) summit on health disparities and calls for new partners with which SOPHE can collaborate to move forward a transdisciplinary approach to research
Commentary to Special Issue on Health Discrepancies: Expanding the Frame of Understanding Health Disparities: From a Focus on Health Systems to Social and Economic Systems
Authors: Smedley Brian D.
Published: June 2006

Policy makers are increasingly attending to the problem of racial and ethnic health disparities, but much of this focus has been on evidence of inequality in health care systems. This attention is important and laudable, but eliminating inequality in the health care system would be insufficient to eliminate racial and ethnic disparities and improve the health of all Americans. Social and economic factors, such as disadvantaged socioeconomic status, racism, discrimination, and geographic inequality shape virtually all risks for poor health. Interventions that focus solely on improving access to health care, or on reducing individual behavioral and psychosocial risks, therefore have limited potential to reduce racial and ethnic health disparities. The elimination of health disparities requires comprehensive, intensive strategies that address inequality in many sectors, including housing, education, employment, and health systems. These interventions must be targeted at many levels, including individuals and families, workplaces, schools, and communities
The Seductive Danger of Visual Metaphors: It’s About Time
Authors: Thorngate Warren
Published: June 2006

Two articles in this journal (Rudolph, 2006; Yamada & Kato, 2006) courageously attempt to consider new ways to conceive of time in relation to human development, presenting several visual metaphors to make their case. I explore some of the confounds of these metaphors, and suggest why practical research techniques and examples derived from the metaphors are needed as demonstrations of their utility
Times of Life and Timing in Developmental Psychology
Authors: Hood Kathryn E.
Published: June 2006

For the many aspects of psychological time, there are many approaches to understanding, including cultural theories, psychological studies, philosophical analyses and mathematical models. A useful approach is to assume that there are many kinds of psychological time in coexistence, and to distinguish their different cultural and meaning-based contexts, as do Yamada and Kato (2006). From a different perspective, Rudolph (2006) presents rigorous mathematical models of psychological time, in the hope that psychologists will apply them as ways to gain insights into experience and change. This discussion enjoins some qualities of time, attention and ambivalence (Rudolph’s themes) to properties of dialectical structures (Hood, 1995), with fluctuation as a source of individuality within the spiraling cycles of reversible time proposed by Yamada and Kato. Fluctuations at a border, especially a fractal border, may show the way in which a present experience contains traces of the past and constructions of the future. Applications of mathematical models in cultural contexts serve here to more fully elaborate the qualities of psychological time, rather than to reduce them as statistical products. This approach suggests a reconsideration of the distinctive roles of different kinds of time in the study of life cycles.
Mathematics, Models and Metaphors
Authors: Rudolph Lee
Published: June 2006

‘Full time’, sketched in my target article (Rudolph, 2006a), was intended to be a mathematical model of psychological time based on the mathematical structures known as ‘simplicial complexes’. Here I give a somewhat more detailed—but still sketchy—outline of how mathematical models based on finite simplicial complexes might be used to study other psychological phenomena
Tourists to Amboseli National Park: A factor-cluster segmentation analysis
Authors: Kibicho Wanjohi
Published: June 2006

This study, although exploratory by nature, uses benefit segmentation in order to understand how tourists differ in what they look for in Amboseli National Park, Kenya. The survey reveals that the sample studied can be grouped into three clusters according to their needs. These clusters can further be divided into two broad segments based on their attitudes to the environment: ecocentric and anthropocentric. The results show that these segments have differing profiles in terms of preferences and their behavioural characteristics. Thus, the analyses provide information beneficial to the appropriate allocation of limited resources by protected area's managers because the use of simple averages or majority opinions would conceal the heterogeneity of tourists' preferences.
Fanatics, fans or just good fun? Travel behaviours and motivations of the fanatic
Authors: Mackellar Joanne
Published: June 2006

Star Trekkers, hot-rodders, Elvis impersonators and NASCAR nuts all travel in order to indulge their interests, but who are these people and how far will they go to fulfil their fanatical dreams? This study attempts to discover more about this little understood tourist market, their needs and behaviours. The article draws together the disparate literature on fanaticism to present a model from which further analysis can occur. Accordingly, the examination begins with a psycho/social perspective of fanatics that identifies their behaviours generally, and further as consumers. The analysis is followed by melding tourism and recreation literature to establish an enhanced understanding of the leisure fanatic. The examination illuminates the concept of travel as being a function of the fanatic's make-up and, as such, the study points to the types of touristic activities they will undertake. Similarly, the role of special events is discussed as being of high importance to the needs and desires of the fanatic in providing the right environment to pursue their passions. In a final aspect to the study, negative aspects of fanatics are highlighted which may affect their travel behaviours in certain situations. The article examines the implications for those in the fields of tourism and leisure management, where special interest tourism, or niche tourism, is of increasing interest.
Tomorrow's tourist and the information society
Authors: Yeoman Ian , McMahon-Beattie Una
Published: June 2006

With the internet expected to account for the vast majority of all holiday purchases by 2015 and with other technologies such as 3G and a digital society changing purchasing behaviour, we have seen as much change in technologies in the last 10 years as we have in the previous 150 years. All of this exponential change impacts upon information and Scottish tourism, but does this mean a cashless society/a paperless office/big brother or androids? Two scenarios have been constructed called The Free Information Society and The Real Information Society in order to discuss how information and consumer trends fold out in the future. These scenarios are not an answer to the future, but a means to discuss the future implications of an information society. The Free Information Society highlights that information is freely available and that we do not buy information any more, whereas the Real Information Society is about how technology supports personal information rather than replacing it. The paper identifies 16 trends that will shape the future of an information society including citizen brands, gaming cultures and technology convergence. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications for Scotland's tourism industry.
‘Body Image is for Girls’
Authors: Hargreaves Duane A. , Tiggemann Marika
Published: June 2006

Although a considerable and informative literature on boys' body image is beginning to emerge, this literature has been guided strongly by theorizing about female body image. The present study aimed to gain access to boys' own ideas and terminology regarding their body image. The participants (aged 14 to 16 years) said that they are satisfied with their appearance, but some conceded their physical appearance to be more important than they like to admit. Boys do not believe that the mass media influences their body image and said they do not talk about body image because it is a feminine or gay issue.
The Construction of the Adolescent Male Body through Sport
Authors: Ricciardelli Lina A. , McCabe Marita P. , Ridge Damien
Published: June 2006

The present study examined the role played by sport in understanding adolescent males' views about their body. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 40 adolescent boys aged between 15 and 17 years. An inductive thematic analysis of boys' narratives showed that sport provided adolescent males with a context for discussing their body image. Attributes which males liked about their body were synonymous with those associated with being successful at sport. In addition, sport was used as a forum for competing with other males both through playing sport and by using sport performance to make favourable social comparisons about their body size.
Evaluation of a Prevention Program to Address Body Focus and Negative Affect among Children
Authors: Mccabe Marita P. , Ricciardelli Lina A. , Salmon Jo
Published: June 2006

The current study evaluated a program to improve the body image and positive and negative affect of children. Participants were 368 children aged 8–12 years. The results demonstrated that boys placed more importance on and were less satisfied with their muscles; girls were less satisfied with their weight and the importance of weight increased with increasing age. Children with a large BMI were less satisfied with their weight. Boys in the intervention group showed reduced levels of negative affect over time. Further research is required to develop prevention and intervention programs to lower the effects of body dissatisfaction and negative affect among children.
Characteristics and benefits of professional work
Authors: Western John , Haynes Michele , Durrington Denise A. , Dwan Kathryn
Published: June 2006

The Professions in Australia Study is the first longitudinal investigation of the professions in Australia; it spans 33 years. Self-administered questionnaires were distributed on at least eight occasions between 1965 and 1998 to cohorts of students and later practitioners from the professions of engineering, law and medicine. The longitudinal design of this study has allowed for an investigation of individual change over time of three archetypal characteristics of the professions, service, knowledge and autonomy and two of the benefits of professional work, financial rewards and prestige. A cumulative logit random effects model was used to statistically assess changes in the ordinal response scores for measuring importance of the characteristics and benefits through stages of the career path. Individuals were also classified by average trends in response scores over time and hence professions are described through their members’ tendency to follow a particular path in attitudes either of change or constancy, in relation to the importance of the five elements (characteristics and benefits). Comparisons in trends are also made between the three professions