Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

A Study On The Productivity And Efficiency Effects Of Enterprise Reforms In China, Song Gao

Dissertations

This dissertation studies the progress and impacts of State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) reforms in China. The primary interests center on impacts of non-ownershipchange reforms and privatization on Chinese SOEs’ productivity and efficiency. The research comprises of three major sections.

Section one briefly reviews the history of SOEs’ reform in China and examines the changes in some selected performance indicators with help of a comprehensive dataset on 863 Chinese firms from 1995 to 2001. In addition, causes of Chinese SOEs’ privatization and determinants of firms’ inefficiency are also studied.

Section two examines the effects of privatization and non-ownership-change reforms on firms’ productivity …

Mainstreaming Evaluation: Four Case Studies Of Systematic Evaluation Integrated Into Organizational Culture And Practices, Amy M. Gullickson

Dissertations

Following a literature review, a researcher generated a descriptive theory of evaluation mainstreaming, the integration of systematic evaluation into the culture, systems, and job responsibilities of organizations. She then explored the validity and generalizability of the theory in the National Science Foundation’s grant-funded Advanced Technological Education Program using mixed methods research. Four centers were chosen based on quantitative survey responses which suggested that the organizations were likely to be mainstreaming evaluation. For each center, the researcher conducted a site visit, interviews, and document review to understand (i) the processes by and extent to which evaluation became part of everyday operations; …

Economic And Risk Factors Associated With Sexual And Reproductive Health, Julio Cesar Hernandez-Correa

Dissertations

This dissertation is intended to evaluate the effects of economic and risk factors on three aspects of sexual and reproductive health: maternal mortality, prenatal care demand, and contraceptive use. The first study of this dissertation discusses the effects of risk factors and socioeconomic determinants on maternal mortality. This research uses a unique, nationwide panel of counties to analyze maternal mortality in Madagascar. Factors like health environment and access to health services were controlled for. The results indicate that female literacy and wages decrease maternal mortality. Other factors related to health infrastructure, and diseases can represent a burden to women's health. …

The Interface Of Breastfeeding And Work: A Phenomenological Exploration Of The Experiences Of White Low-Income Women, Jessica A. Kerby

Dissertations

Vocational psychologists have been called to expand the traditional discourses related to work and career to address the actual work experiences of individuals, especially those of the working class. Breastfeeding rates are on the rise among employed women and mothers of low-income, but little is known about women of low income who seek to concurrently work and breastfeed. Work-family interface theories suggest employed mothers of low-income may experience conflict and/or enhancement through multiple roles. The purpose of this research was to answer the call to vocational psychologists, give voice to the narratives around breastfeeding and work among lowincome mothers, and …

Predictors And Outcomes Of Occupational Commitment Profiles Among Nurses, Lindsay Sears

All Dissertations

Occupational turnover is a costly problem afflicting much of the nursing industry, and occupational commitment is a strong predictor of withdrawal from one's profession. Traditional organizational research examines most commitment-behavior relationships from a variable-centered perspective, focusing on the relationships between constructs. The present study adopts a configural, or person-centered approach aimed at identifying and describing clusters of individuals who share a similar set of occupational commitment mindsets. The present study extends current literature by a) investigating the existence of several occupational commitment profiles and describing their characteristics; b) examining situational and demographic predictors of profile membership; and c) testing differences …

The Political Economy Of Currency Re-Denomination By Countries., Peter Nwaoba

Bullion

In the view of the Bank, redenomination policy for Nigeria was not to translate to revaluation, as market forces were to continue to determine the prices, including interest rates and exchange rates, with the expectation that inflation will be low while exchange rate will appreciate. The objective of this paper is to articulate the reasons and conditions under which countries embark on currency redenomination exercises, and how successful these exercises had been over the years. The paper is descriptive with presentation based on literature reviews. Under the redenomination programme, banknotes were to be issued in denominations of new 50k (old …

The Performance Of Nigerian Stock Exchange Sectoral Indices: January 2009 December 2010, Alvan E. Ikoku, George Okorie

Bullion

The paper reviews the performance of the sectoral indices during the first twenty-four months of their existence, i.e., between their inception in January 2009 and December 2010. The authors seek to examine not only the raw performance of the indices but also their risk-adjusted performance. The results of the analysis will facilitate the allocation of capital by institutional as well as individual investors in the Nigerian equity market. The rest of the paper is organized as follows. Section 2 discusses the transformation of the indices and their correlation. In section 3, we examine the nominal performance of the sectoral indices …

New Census Data Show Portland’S High-Poverty Pockets, Michael Burnham

Publications, Reports and Presentations

Brief article that reports on poverty within the Portland, Oregon, metropolitan area, based on information gleaned from the American Community Survey and census data.

Cultivating The Commons An Assessment Of The Potential For Urban Agriculture On Oakland’S Public Land, Nathan Mcclintock, Jenny Cooper

Urban Studies and Planning Faculty Publications and Presentations

This is an inventory of open space with potential for agricultural production on land both owned by public agencies and within the city limits of Oakland, California. The inventory was conducted between the summer of 2008 and spring of 2009 and is part of an ongoing movement to develop a more resilient, sustainable, and just food system in Oakland. This project aims to locate Oakland’s "commons"—land that is owned by public agencies and therefore a public resource—and assess the potential for urban agriculture (UA) on this land. We hope that this assessment can be used 1) to inform policy decisions …

Wording Effects In Moral Judgments, Ross E. O'Hara, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, Nicholas A. Sinnott-Armstrong

Dartmouth Scholarship

As the study of moral judgments grows, it becomes imperative to compare results across studies in order to create unified theories within the field. These efforts are potentially undermined, however, by variations in wording used by different researchers. The current study sought to determine whether, when, and how variations in wording influence moral judgments. Online participants responded to 15 different moral vignettes (e.g., the trolley problem) using 1 of 4 adjectives: “wrong”, “inappropriate”, “forbidden”, or “blameworthy”. For half of the sample, these adjectives were preceded by the adverb “morally”. Results indicated that people were more apt to judge an act …

Time Perspective And Psychological Problems Among Adolescents Affected By Violent Conflict In Indonesia, Sherly Saragih Turnip

Makara Human Behavior Studies in Asia

Conflicts and wars in several areas in Indonesia have caused a large number of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). IDPs adolescents are a vulnerable group for developing psychological problems. There was a concern about the form of time perspective that these adolescents have and its relationship with the occurrence of psychological problems in the future. However, there is a lack of studies of internally displaced persons that assess the relationship between psychological distress and time perspective in low income countries. The study aim was to assess psychological status and time perspective of adolescents who were affected by violent conflict in Indonesia. …

Kearifan Tradisional Suku Maybrat Dalam Perburuan Satwa Sebagai Penunjang Pelestarian Satwa, Freddy Pattiselanno, George Mentansan

Makara Human Behavior Studies in Asia

Widlife management as food resources in the tropical areas is very rarely done. Traditional wisdom as an aspect that plays an important role in wildlife sustainability still put into practice by certain tribals. Study on traditional wisdom of Maybrat ethnic group was done to observe the practice of traditional wisdom create important impact to the effort of wildlife sustainability in Sorong Selatan Regency. The results indicate that traditional wisdom practice such as the use of hunting tools, places for hunting and wildlife hunted that indirectly give positive impact in order to support wildlife sustainability in Sorong Selatan.

Metode Pembelajaran Tutor Teman Sebaya Meningkatkan Hasil Belajar Berdasar Regulasi-Diri, Ruseno Arjanggi, Titin Suprihatin

Makara Human Behavior Studies in Asia

The purpose of this study is to empirically examine the effectiveness of peer tutoring method on self-regulated learning. In self-regulated processes such as planning, self monitoring, and control of disturbances, the model of interaction between personal environment and behavior is a reciprocal interaction. Peer tutoring is expected to raise the potential behavior through an independent learning materials organization. Those behaviours include assistance-seeking behavior and assistance-giving during a more intensive learning process resulted from nearer psychological distance between the tutor and tutee. The subject of this research was 63 students of the Faculty of Psychology Unissula Semarang, which was divided into …

Perkembangan Motif, Makna, Dan Fungsi Tato Di Kalangan Narapidana Dan Tahanan Di Yogyakarta, Cons. Tri Handoko

Makara Human Behavior Studies in Asia

This article describes about the developments of the motifs, meaning, and functions of the tattoo among the convicts and detainees in Yogyakarta since 1950s. The research respondents were the convicts and detainees in the Socialization Institution of Class IIA Yogyakarta, ex-convicts, and tattoo artists who understood about the developments of tattooing in Yogyakarta. The Motifs of tattoo among the convicts and detainees were flora, fauna, people portraits, horror, tribal tattoo, heart iconics, typography, biohazard and biomechanical, also still life. There were two appearances of the motif, standed alone and mix motifs. Each motif had particular meaning. The tattoing technique used …

Pengukuran Servant Leadership Sebagai Alternatif Kepemimpinan Di Institusi Pendidikan Tinggi Pada Masa Perubahan Organisasi, Seger Handoyo

Makara Human Behavior Studies in Asia

Leadership is a critical factor for organizational effectiveness and also has great influence to almost all human life. Higher education has a distinctive characteristics, so it needs a particular leadership. Recently, higher education in Indonesia is actively making organizational change, so higher education’s leaders continually make efforts to accomplish successful and significant change. The purposes of research are to examine how important is virtues of servant leadership and to examine multidimensionality of servant leadership. Result shows that servant leadership is an alternative of leadership to accomplish successful organizational change in higher education. Result also finds that servant leadership is a …

Um Peixe Olhou Para Mim: O Povo Yudjá E A Perspectiva, Peter Gow

Tipití: Journal of the Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America

No abstract provided.

Semantic Enrichment Of Text Representation With Wikipedia For Text Classification, Hiroki Yamakawa, Jing Peng, Anna Feldman

Department of Computer Science Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Text classification is a widely studied topic in the area of machine learning. A number of techniques have been developed to represent and classify text documents. Most of the techniques try to achieve good classification performance while taking a document only by its words (e.g. statistical analysis on word frequency and distribution patterns). One of the recent trends in text classification research is to incorporate more semantic interpretation in text classification, especially by using Wikipedia. This paper introduces a technique for incorporating the vast amount of human knowledge accumulated in Wikipedia into text representation and classification. The aim is to …

A Community In Bloom: An Affordable Housing Needs Assessment Of West Bloomington, Margaret L. Anderson, Lloyd Banwart, David F. Becker, Dana Bulba, Jared Dellinger, Mimi Duong, Julie Ornee, Katie Mitchell, Andrew Piotrowski, Hillary Smith, Dustin Stoltz, Mandy Swartzendruber, Niko Valaris, Katie Weber

Community Project Design and Management Reports - Sociology

Purpose of Report

This report was written in response to a request from Habitat for Humanity of McLean County. The report expands upon and updates an affordable homeownership needs assessment for the Bloomington-Normal community – with an emphasis on West Bloomington – that was created in 2004. Because the housing market and economic conditions of the area have changed drastically in the last 6 years, an updated report is necessary.

Data Sources and Methodology

This report uses a combination of primary and, mainly, secondary data sources. Interviews were conducted with representatives of, among others, Bloomington Housing Authority, the Economic Development …

Agreement Between Clinician And Patient Ratings Of Adaptive Functioning And Developmental History, Jared A. Defife, Rebecca Drill, Ora Nakash, Drew Westen

School for Social Work: Faculty Publications

Objective: Psychiatric researchers rely heavily on patient report data for clinical research. However, patient reports are prone to defensive and self-presentation biases. Recent research using practice networks has relied on clinician reports, and both forensic and personality disorder researchers have recently turned to quantified data from clinically expert observers as well. However, critics have raised legitimate concerns about the reliability and validity of data from clinician informants. The aim of this study was to assess the validity and diagnostic efficiency of clinician reports of their patients' adaptive functioning and developmental histories, using patient reports as the comparative standard traditionally used …

Factors That Influence The Adoption Of Agricultural Conservation Programs In Northwest Arkansas, Edison Anthony Froelich

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A survey was developed and administered to agricultural producers in Northwest Arkansas in order to better understand producer awareness of, application for and participation in six federal and state conservation programs available in Arkansas: the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, the Arkansas Revolving Loan Program, the Arkansas Nonpoint Pollution Management Program , the Arkansas Soil Nutrient and Poultry Litter Application and Management Program, and the Surplus Poultry Litter Removal Incentives Cost Share Program. Survey results found that less than half of the sample was aware of any one of the programs. A logit model was developed …

Personality And Politics: Introduction To The Special Issue, Lauren E. Duncan, Bill E. Peterson, Eileen L. Zurbriggen

Psychology: Faculty Publications

This special issue of Journal of Personality brings together 10 original articles addressing the intersection of personality and politics. Articles build on classic traditions in political psychology by presenting both idiographic and nomothetic work on the motivational, cognitive, ideological, attitudinal, and identity correlates of many different aspects of political behavior. This work is used to understand political activism and leadership as well as everyday political behavior. We hope this collection of articles will inspire our readers to explore new investigations in personality and political psychology.

Frequency And Severity Approaches To Indexing Exposure To Trauma: The Critical Incident History Questionnaire For Police Officers, Daniel S. Weiss, Alain Brunet, Suzanne R. Best, Thomas J. Metzler, Akiva Liberman, Nnamdi Pole, Jeffrey A. Fagan, Charles R. Marmar

Psychology: Faculty Publications

The Critical Incident History Questionnaire indexes cumulative exposure to traumatic incidents in police by examining incident frequency and rated severity. In over 700 officers, event severity was negatively correlated (rs = -61) with frequency of exposure. Cumulative exposure indices that varied emphasis on frequency and severity-using both nomothetic and idiographic methods-all showed satisfactory psychometric properties and similar correlates. All indices were only modestly related to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms. Ratings of incident severity were not influenced by whether officers had ever experienced the incident. Because no index summarizing cumulative exposure to trauma had superior validity, our findings suggest that …

Enhancing Information Literacy For Vision 2030 And Beyond: Introducing Quality To Education, Augustine Gitonga

Libraries

This article is more of a political statement, though the author has no particular interest in politics. It is borne out of the realisation that politics play a major role in national education systems and successes, or, put the other way round, national education is positively or adversely affected by national politics. National policy formulation and budgetary allocations are political processes. The article therefore looks at a cross-section of issues affecting the Kenyan system with a particular interest in the accusations of weakness and failure in order to find a hope and a probable solution. It dwells mostly on local …

Productivity, Discrimination, And Lost Profits During Baseball's Integration, Jonathan Lanning

Economics Faculty Research and Scholarship

This article uses data from Major League Baseball's integration to identify the sources and magnitude of labor market discrimination. Returns to hiring black workers in this industry were high, and the industry's labor supply was uniquely suited for rapid integration, yet integration evolved slowly. Many explanations for this sluggishness are considered, including both taste-based and statistical discrimination. Ultimately, only owner and collective coworker discrimination can explain baseball's slow pace of integration. The estimated levels of discrimination are high, showing the median team sacrificed profits of nearly $2.2 million in 1950 dollars (over $19 million 2010 dollars) by delaying integration.

Review Of Punishing The Poor: The Neoliberal Government Of Social Insecurity, By Loïc Wacquant, Sanford F. Schram

Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research Faculty Research and Scholarship

No abstract provided.

A Christmas Bargain?, Susan E. Murray

Lake Union Herald

No abstract provided.

Home Owners’ Attitudes, Perceptions And Willingness To Pay For Microgeneration Technologies, Marius Claudy, Aidan O'Driscoll, Aidan Duffy

Reports

This report evaluates Irish home owners’ perceptions, attitudes and willingness to pay (WTP) for microgeneration technologies, including photovoltaic (solar panels),[1] solar water heaters, micro wind turbines and wood pellet boilers.

The data presented in the report stem from two large-scale surveys, both designed by Technological University Dublin (DIT) and commissioned on behalf of Sustainable Energy Authority Ireland (SEAI) and DIT. The first study gathered data on Irish people’s general awareness of microgeneration technologies and was conducted in March 2009. The second and main survey targeted Irish home owners in order to understand their perceptions of and attitudes to microgeneration. …

Digital Collections Manual (Version 1.0), Ellen Kathryn Corrigan, Booth Library Subcommittee On Digital Resources, Eastern Illinois University

Faculty & Staff Research & Creative Activity

No abstract provided.

Digital Collections Manual (Version 1.0), Ellen Corrigan

Faculty & Staff Research & Creative Activity

No abstract provided.

Violence Transformed 2010, Jonathan Shirland

Bridgewater Review

Violence Transformed is an annual series of exhibitions, performances and collaborative art-making events that are held in the greater Boston area. Since its beginnings five years ago, Violence Transformed has been composed of professionals from a wide range of backgrounds and disciplines, including art historians, studio artists, and specialists from the museum world.