Factors Associated with Recruitment and Retention in Randomized Controlled Trials of Behavioral Interventions for Patients with Pediatric Type 1 Diabetes

The purpose of this study is to describe recruitment and retention experiences from three behavioral randomized controlled trials conducted among youth with type 1 diabetes. Eligibility, recruitment, and retention data were examined. Study-specific differential study participation and loss-to-follow-up analyses assessed the relations of patient characteristics with treatment completion and 6-month retention. Multivariable logistic regression identified factors independently associated with 6-month retention among all participants. Approximately 70–92 % of randomized participants completed treatment and 58–90 % were retained for follow-up. Older patients and non-Caucasian patients were less likely to enroll. Treatment completion and 6-month retention were less likely among youth who were older, had worse baseline glycemic control, lower household income, and/or unmarried parents. Some subgroups of patients are less likely to participate in research and are more susceptible to loss-to-follow-up. More work is needed to understand the facilitators and barriers to research participation.     

Knowledge management in decision making and decision support

A knowledge-oriented view of decisions and decision making is introduced, as a complement to classical perspectives and as a contribution of under-standing computer-based possibilities for relaxing strains on decision makers. This perspective includes a model of knowledge management activities performed by a decision maker and a taxonomy of knowledge types. It leads to a characterization of decision-support-system purpose, traits, and potentials that offers a basis for new research into computer-based possibilities for knowledge management. Clyde W. Holsapple holds the Rosenthal Endowed Chair in Management Information Systems and is Professor of Decision Science and Information Systems at the College of Business and Economics, University of Kentucky.     

A Neo-Meadian Approach to Human Agency: Relating the Social and the Psychological in the Ontogenesis of Perspective-Coordinating Persons

How can human agency be reconciled with bio-physical determinism? Starting with a discussion of the long standing debate between determinism and agency, we argue that the seeds of a reconciliation can be found in George Herbert Mead’s ideas concerning social acts, perspectives, differentiation, self-other interactivity, and conscious understanding. Drawing on more recent reformulations of Mead’s ideas, we present an integrated account of the ontogenesis of human agency. Human agency, we argue, should be conceptualized in terms of distanciation from immediate experience, and we show how social interactions, institutions and symbolic resources foster the development of agency in increasingly complex ways. We conclude by situating our work in relation to other developmental accounts and the larger project of theorizing and empirically supporting a compatibilist rendering of human agency as the “determined” self-determination of persons.     

Occupational structure and proprietor preferences: Subject matter displayed by art dealers

A structural model is developed facilitating explanation of art dealer's painting preferences. It is argued that social strains in the form of divergent occupational role patterns are structured in the occupation of art dealership. Two incompatible role models for art dealers are identified: business and artistic. The relative orientation of the art dealers to the artistic or business roles is shown to be differentially associated with their painting preference-subject matter displayed. The model advanced is based upon data produced from Los Angeles art dealers, and it focuses upon bringing together a study of the occupation and a study of painting preferences in the occupation.