Scenario Planning: The Basics

This article covers the basics of scenario planning: Why scenarios? What are scenarios? How do you develop scenarios? After covering the preliminaries—the constitution of the scenario team; interviews; research; the identification of a focal issue; set and setting for a scenario workshop; staffing; the trajectory of a scenario planning project—the article moves on to describe several methods for identifying a finite set of diverse scenario logics. After a set of scenarios has been developed, there are several different routes from scenarios to strategy. Early indicators can help identify which of several scenarios is in fact unfolding.     

Abstract: Scenario Planning,Art or Science?

This article will argue that there is a science of scenario planning; or at least a logos, a logic, a scenariology. Scenario planning is not predictive. But a good set of scenarios, scientifically developed, can reliably and predictably change minds. Scenario planning is both art and science. In joining the club of the sciences, scenario planning calls for a new kind of membership, or a new kind of science, one that, following Stuart Kauffman, relies on the importance of story. Hegel tells us that all stories, all narratives include a conflict between desire and the law, intention, and necessity. Scenarios provide a way for communities to frame their intentions. They thereby effect “downward causality” on the present in order to project the present toward a preferred future. In fulfilling the promise of this new kind of science, scenario planning breaks with positivistic science, but without falling into a postmodern nihilism. Without setting out to do so, the discipline of scenario planning introduces us to a new epistemology, a new way of knowing the truth. Drawing on pragmatism, Wittgenstein, and Richard Rorty, this article reaches the conclusion that, for scenario planners, the future replaces objectivity as the horizon for justification. What is true? We'll see.     

The Mind of the Scenario Thinker

In the face of increasing uncertainty and changes, corporations must dynamically examine their business environment and activate the knowledge creation process in a future-oriented manner without getting hung up on analyzing their past (much like driving a car using only the rear-view mirror). In the previous article, we discussed the basics of scenario planning. We should not use this tool as a mere technique. Our knowledge of the world and the environment around us is important because it underlies our scenarios. When we look toward the future in an uncertain environment, we necessarily create knowledge proactively. Scenario planning and knowledge creation are commonplace when working on knowledge of innovations that shape the future. In this article we focus on the importance of having “scenario mind,” the philosophy underlying scenario planning. With any managerial tool, you cannot create real knowledge if you use only superficial know-how, like procedures described in manuals, to seek quick results. In the following sections, we discuss how scenario planning must be recognized as a “discipline of knowledge” to be embedded as a way of thinking and behavioral pattern of each individual or organization, not as a mere tool.     

Emergence,Story, and the Challenge of Positive Scenarios

This article is divided into three parts. The first part describes the paradox of positive scenarios: they are much harder to write than negative scenarios. The second part describes the logic of emergent systems whose properties are neither reducible to nor predictable from the properties of their component parts. The third part shows how the concept of emergence can be used to lend plausibility to those optimistic scenarios that might otherwise be rejected as mere wishful thinking.     

GEOENGINEERING,THEOLOGY, AND THE MEANING OF BEING HUMAN

Because of the lack of a meaningful international response to global warming, geoengineering has emerged as a potential technological response to climate change. But, thus far, little attention has been given to how religion impacts our understanding of geoengineering. I defend the need to incorporate theological reflection in the conversation of geoengineering by investigating how geoengineering proposals contain an implicit anthropology. A significant framework for our assessment of geoengineering is the balance of human capability and fallibility—a balance that is at the center of theological and religious interpretations of the meaning of the human condition. Similarly, geoengineering challenges our past understandings of theological anthropology.     

近年来中国抑郁症高发的社会因素分析

中国社会正值心理问题高发期,抑郁症已经成为困扰中国的一大社会问题。社会因素与抑郁症的患病率上升有直接关系。社会因素有:社会大环境与中国的经济转型,东西方民族心理文化的差异以及对健康的不同认知,计划生育政策的消极效应等。社会应根据其影响因素采取相应的干预措施。     

Sample Size Planning for Detecting Mediation Effects: A Power Analysis Procedure Considering Uncertainty in Effect Size Estimates

Abstract

When planning mediation studies, researchers are often interested in the sample size needed to achieve adequate power for testing mediation. Power depends on population effect sizes, which are unknown in practice. In conventional power analysis, effect size estimates, however, are often used as population values, which could result in underpowered studies. Uncertainty in effect size estimates has been considered in other sample size planning contexts (e.g., t-test, ANOVA), but has not been handled properly for planning mediation studies. In the current study, we proposed an easy-to-use sample size planning method for testing mediation with uncertainty in effect size estimates considered. We conducted simulation studies to demonstrate the impact of uncertainty in effect size estimates on power of testing mediation, and to provide sample size suggestions under different levels of uncertainty. Empirical examples were provided to illustrate the application of our method. R functions and a web application were developed to facilitate implementation.     

日常情境中前瞻记忆失败事件的归因

通过调查得到个体对日常情境中前瞻记忆失败的6种归因,在此基础上,编制12个日常生活中前瞻记忆失败的情境故事,让124名大学生被试进行归因,以确定事件重要性、人际关系和过错者身份对日常情境中前瞻记忆失败归因的影响。结果表明,被试对不重要事件的前瞻记忆失败归因为“主观无意”,重要事件归因为“主观故意”;在对事件后果和过错者人品判断时具有“对己严格”和“对人宽容”的归因特点;对包含亲子关系的前瞻记忆失败者进行责任较轻的归因与后果判断,在重要事件情境中,对包含朋友关系的前瞻记忆失败者进行责任较重的归因与后果判断。     

有关智力的遗传研究演进

智力是被行为遗传学广泛研究的重要内容之一。过去十几年问。有关智力的遗传研究超越了最基本的先天与后天之争,通过发展的遗传分析、多变量遗传分析以及对遗传与环境交互作用的探讨获得了许多重要发现。分子遗传学的发展更是为智力研究展开了新的一页,使得确定与特定认知能力有关的基因成为可能。     

Oral contraceptive use among African American adolescents: Individual and community influences

Side effects of oral contraceptives are a noteworthy problem, particularly among low-income young women who reside in inner-city communities. The problem may be compounded by inadequate family planning services, particularly when such services are provided by general medical practices with high volumes of clients. This study examined the prevalence and correlates of pill-related side effects, with particular attention to the role of clinic characteristics. Participants were 177 pregnant and parenting African American adolescents and young women (average age=18.34). The experience of a pill-related side effect was the most frequently cited barrier to birth control use, and it was significantly related to contraceptive behavior. Finally, although participants attending comprehensive clinics experienced more barriers to medical service use than those attending neighborhood clinics, they reported fewer problems with pill-related side effects and better psychological functioning. Implications for future research and policy are discussed. This study was completed with the assistance of grants from the Illinois Department of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and the Office of Research on Women's Health to Jean Rhodes. Portions of this paper were presented at the 1993 Biennial Meeting of the Society for Community Research and Action, Williamsburg, Virginia. The authors gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Julian Rappaport, Joel Meyers, Hope Landrine, Lori Ebert, the Reverend Annette Collins, Margaret Daniels, Khya Lawrence, and the professionals and participants at the service settings.     

A kinematic approach to the conceptual representations of this and that

The Italian demonstrative pronouns questo/a (‘this_[mas/fem]’) and quello/a (‘that_[mas/fem]’) implicitly convey information about objects’ distance with respect to the speaker. Our study investigated the referents of questo/a (‘this_[mas/fem]’) and quello/a (‘that_[mas/fem]’) by analysing their influence on reach-to-grasp actions towards objects located near to (12 cm) or far from (30 cm) the participant. Upon acoustic instruction containing one or the other pronoun, participants had to reach for and grasp a target object. Results showed an effect of pronoun on movement planning. When the object was in the far position, reaction times were faster for the congruent pronoun quello/a, whereas when it was in the near position they were faster for the congruent pronoun questo/a. Interactions between implied and real target distance suggest that the conceptual spaces of questo/a and quello/a do not map onto a strict distinction between peripersonal and extrapersonal space.     

家庭文化背景在儿童阅读发展中的作用

通过问卷调查和测验方法探讨了家庭文化背景与儿童阅读发展的关系。回归模型表明家庭文化背景对一、四年级儿童的阅读成就都有显著影响。路径分析进一步表明：仅父母与孩子问的文化活动对一年级儿童的阅读成就有直接影响,而家庭文化背景的四个方面相对独立地对四年级儿童的阅读发展产生影响。     

The feigenbaum scenario in a unified science of life and mind

In exploring the possibilities for creating a model of the creative cosmos, it is important to seek mathematical models that can express the common relationships unifying the sciences of matter, life and mind. Current candidates for such all embracing mathematical models come from the burgeoning fields of non‐linear dynamics that are described under varying labels as Chaos Theory, Self‐Organization Theory and Adaptive Complexity Theory. In this paper we will limit ourselves to only one mathematical model called, “The Feigenbaum Scenario.” A major virtue of The Feigenbaum Scenario is that it is relatively easy to understand by non‐mathematicians and it has led to new depths of profound understanding in a wide variety of the physical and biological sciences. Everything from purely mechanical systems, fluid dynamics and the weather to the patterns of biological growth in nature and the dynamics of heart, hormone and brain rhythms have been found to exhibit aspects of the Feigenbaum scenario. We explore the possibility that the Feigenbaum scenario can be extended to experiences of mind, sensation, perception and human behavior as well. We conclude that a major function of consciousness may be to transform the non‐linear, irrational, unconscious and difficult to predict dynamics of unconscious nature into the more linear, rational and predictable psycho‐dynamics that make human experience and social life possible.