Judging the fairness of voice-based participation across multiple and interrelated stages of decision making

Recent multifoci research reports that multiple sources of justice exist in organizations. In expanding this framework, we address how judgments of overall procedural fairness and behavioral intentions are influenced by different experiences of voice-based participation across a multi-stage decision-making process. The results of two experiments were consistent with a fairness theory framework. Overall, decision procedures were judged to be the fairest and the intention to volunteer was highest when participants were allowed voice in their team and when their team was allowed voice by organizational authorities. When voice was denied by both the team and the organization or was denied by either party, fairness ratings, and participant intentions were depressed and did not significantly differ from each other. This pattern of results suggests that individuals are influenced by transactions across decision-making stages and that such interdependence should be considered when attempting to understand the meaningfulness of voice-based participation.     

'IT SEEMED TO HAVE TO DO WITH SOMETHING ELSE …': HENRY JAMES'S WHAT MAISIE KNEW AND BION'S THEORY OF THINKING

This article argues that what Maisie knew, as conveyed to readers of James's novel, can fruitfully be considered and interpreted in terms of Bion's theory of thinking, and especially his concepts of K and -K and the container/contained relationship. It is shown that James describes a containing relationship that Maisie, the child protagonist, has with her nurse, and the gradual growth of such a relationship in Maisie's own psyche, leading to her capacity to learn from experience. James's text is shown to contain striking instances of the creation and the destruction of meaning (K and -K) by the adults close to Maisie. It is argued that Maisie's own choice to make links and to desire knowledge is made through her complex experience of the oedipal situation, which gives her opportunities to see herself in 'the third position' (Britton, 1998). Maisie's eventual decision about her life, made by herself in the absence of any adequate parent, is based on the unconscious knowledge that destruction of meaning poisons the mind, and she must do her best to avoid it.     

Framingham vascular age is associated with worse cognitive performance in the middle-aged and elderly

“Normal” age-related cognitive decline has been associated with cardiovascular risk factors. Framingham Vascular Age is age-normed cardiovascular risk which may help communicate risk to patients and identify those at relatively higher risk. We aim to assess the association between Framingham Vascular Age and cognition. 346 “healthy” participants (57±10 years) without neuropsychiatric disorders or clinical manifestations of cardiovascular disease were studied. Cognition was evaluated using the Brief Memory and Executive Test and Framingham Vascular Age was calculated. The association between Framingham Vascular Age and cognitive performance was determined through General Linear Models to control for covariates. Framingham Vascular age was associated with poorer Memory and Executive Function/Processing Speed indices (p= 0.019 and p<0.001, respectively). We conclude Framingham Vascular Age is associated with worse Executive Function/Processing Speed and Memory. Vascular Age may help identify patients at higher risk of age-related cognitive decline with implications for communicating the morbidity associated with cardiovascular risk.     

Television sex roles in the 1980s: Do viewers' sex and sex role orientation change the picture?

This study investigated viewer perceptions of female and male television characters as a result of viewer sex and sex role orientation. Young adult viewers (N=677) rated television characters and themselves using the Personal Attributes Questionnaire (PAQ). Viewers were classified as feminine, masculine, androgynous, or undifferentiated in their PAQ orientations. The television characters were four men and four women who shared the lead and a working relationship on crime action shows. Results indicated that viewers rated all the male characters as stereotypical masculine, but only one female character as stereotypical feminine. Viewer sex and sex role orientations did affect ratings. Viewer sex had a greater impact on the ratings of female characters than on the ratings of male characters. Female viewers tended to rate female characters as higher in instrumental and masculine traits than male viewers did. Results based on sex role orientation of the viewer were inconsistent across characters, but in general, undifferentiated viewers rated both male and female characters as low in expressive and instrumental traits compared to how androgynous viewers rated them. Further, a masculine sex role orientation appeared to block perception of expressive traits in both male and female characters.This research was supported in part by a University of Akron faculty research grant.     

Second to fourth digit ratio and numerical competence in children

The ratio between the 2nd and 4th fingers (2D:4D)-a potential proxy for prenatal testosterone (T) exposure-shows a sex difference, with males usually having lower mean values; the latter potentially indicates higher prenatal T exposure. We studied relations between 2D:4D and competencies in the domains of counting, number knowledge, and visual-number representation in 73 children aged 6-11 years. Significant negative correlations between numerical performance in all of these areas and right and left hand 2D:4D ratios were found for boys but not girls. To the extent that 2D:4D ratios reflects prenatal exposure to T, the implications are (i) high prenatal T may be associated with better performance on some basic numerical measures for boys, and (ii) prenatal exposure to T may affect boys and girls differently with respect to some numerical competencies.     

Bearing Witness: The Duty of Non-indifference and the Case for Reading the News

Ignorance of current events is ordinarily treated as a moral failing. In this article, I argue that much of this ire is misplaced. The disengaged are no less positioned to do good or dispense beneficence, no more arrogant or complicit than those glued to the headlines. Nonetheless, I contend that citizens do have moral reason to remain informed – they ought not be indifferent to others. This, I show, provides a standing reason to pay attention to distant strangers: by bearing witness, we avoid indifference. It follows that we should reconsider our media diet and our critiques of the disengaged.     

The Attribution of Date Rape: Observer's Attitudes and Sexual Experiences and The Dating Situation

This study investigated the effects of individual experience with sexual aggression/victimization, rape myth score and dating situational factors on rape attributions. A sample of 332 males and 323 females from a freshman-level class read one of three rape scenarios—a planned date with monetary investment, a planned dutch-treat date and an unplanned pick-up date. ANOVAS consisting of a 3 (scenarios) × 2 (above vs. below median on rape myth scale) × 5 (level of sexual aggression/victimization) were performed separately for each sex on four ratings of the rape scenario. Sexually aggressive males and males who agreed more with rape myths were less likely to perceive the scenarios as rape, blamed the victim more, perceived the victim as desiring intercourse and viewed the assailants' behavior as less violent. The dating situation did not affect their attributions. Females tended to rate a pick-up date scenario as rape more frequently than a date with monetary investment and females who agreed more with rape myths tended to blame the victim and perceive the victim as desiring intercourse. A female's previous experience of sexual victimization did not influence attributions. The results are interpreted within a social-cultural context for males and points to the role of situational factors in understanding date rape from the female/victim perspective.     

Individualism and Resistance to Affirmative Action: A Comparison of Japanese and American Samples1

It has been proposed that part of the resistance to affirmative action in the U.S. derives from the American discomfort with categorical social arrangements. An instance of gender discrimination was described to samples of Japanese and American students. The students then evaluated a set of remedies, one of which was a classic affirmative action solution and filled out Singelis’ Self-Construal Scale (Singelis, 1994). The Japanese sample was more collectivist than the American sample and endorsed the affirmative action solution more strongly than the American sample.