The Role of Organizational Leaders in Sexual Orientation Equality at Organizational and Federal Levels

Purpose

This article expands the discourse of the impact of the passage of the Civil Rights Act (CRA) of 1964 to sexual orientation minorities (SOM).

Design/Methodology/Approach

We first discuss the challenges faced by SOM in the workplace. We then present a model adapted from Edelman’s “Handbook of employment discrimination research (pp. 337–352). Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer (2005)” theory of endogeneity of law to discuss the impact that such leaders and their supportive organizational SOM policies can have on the passage of nationwide SOM legislation. Finally, we discuss how organizational leaders’ beliefs and actions can play a major role in affecting organizational SOM policies.

Findings

We argue that the presence of organizational protective policies can facilitate the passage of federal SOM legislation by establishing and legitimizing social norms. We also highlight how beliefs about religion, morality, controllability, and occupational stereotypes contribute to prejudice and lack of support for SOM-protective organizational policies.

Implications

We discuss the importance that organizational SOM policies have on larger societal legislative issues, and outline how specific individual-level beliefs can impact organizational-level support for SOM.

Originality/Value

We take a novel approach by focusing on what organizational leaders can do to enact SOM policies that may further influence protective laws. We also draw upon neo-institutional theory to show specifically how organizations can affect legislation; a topic often ignored in organizational psychology.     

This century,this country: One survivor's story of posttraumatic stress syndrome

Abstract

Posttraumatic stress syndrome, also called posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), affects people who have experienced extremely traumatic events. Individuals who live with posttraumatic stress syndrome must continually overcome many obstacles to live their daily lives. The following is one woman's story of abuse, its after effects, and survival. By telling her story, I hope to make her suffering that much more meaningful. In addition, I wish to call attention to what goes on behind closed doors and explain what we can do about it.     

Me against we: In-group transgression,collective shame,and in-group-directed hostility

People can experience great distress when a group to which they belong (in-group) is perceived to have committed an immoral act. We hypothesised that people would direct hostility toward a transgressing in-group whose actions threaten their self-image and evoke collective shame. Consistent with this theorising, three studies found that reminders of in-group transgression provoked several expressions of in-group-directed hostility, including in-group-directed hostile emotion (Studies 1 and 2), in-group-directed derogation (Study 2), and in-group-directed punishment (Study 3). Across studies, collective shame—but not the related group-based emotion collective guilt—mediated the relationship between in-group transgression and in-group-directed hostility. Implications for group-based emotion, social identity, and group behaviour are discussed.     

An Investigation of Middle School Classroom Libraries

Given that much of the research on classroom libraries focus on elementary school classrooms, this study sought to examine classroom libraries at the middle school level. Access to books is especially important for middle school students given the persistent decline in reading engagement at this level. The research questions guiding this investigation focused on the nature of the libraries, the physical features of the libraries, the contributions made by the libraries to the literacy environment of the classrooms, the contents of the libraries, and teacher perceptions of their own classroom libraries. Findings indicate that teachers value classroom libraries for promoting literacy engagement and understand how these libraries provide students with immediate and easy access to books. The contents of the libraries that were examined varied in terms of genre, multicultural literature, and social justice issues.     

The Impact of the Built Environment on Children’s School Conduct Grades: The Role of Diversity of Use in a Hispanic Neighborhood

A population-based study examined the relationship between diversity of use of the built environment and teacher reports of children’s grades. Diversity of use of the built environment (i.e., proportion of a block that is residential, institutional, commercial and vacant) was assessed for all 403 city blocks in East Little Havana, Miami—a Hispanic neighborhood. Cluster analysis identified three block-types, based on diversity of use: Residential, Mixed-Use, and Commercial. Cross-classified hierarchical linear modeling was used to examine the impact of diversity of use, school, gender, and year-in-school on academic and conduct grades for 2857 public school children who lived in these blocks. Contrary to popular belief, mixed-use blocks were associated with optimal outcomes. Specifically, follow-up analyses found that a youth living on a residential block had a 74% greater odds of being in the lowest 10% of conduct grades (conduct GPA <2.17) than a youth living on a mixed-use block. In fact, an analysis of the population attributable fraction suggests that if the risk associated with residential blocks could be reduced to the level of risk associated with mixed-use blocks, a 38% reduction in Conduct GPAs <2.17 could be achieved in the total population. These findings suggest that public policy targeting the built environment may be a mechanism for community-based interventions to enhance children’s classroom conduct, and potentially related sequelae.     

Assessing the stigma of tuberculosis

Tuberculosis (TB) stigma is considered a vague concept, because it is not easily assessed. The purpose of this article is to review methodological approaches for assessing TB stigma. We reviewed the published studies and the gray literature. We also present the main features of a qualitative and quantitative assessment of TB stigma, which has been done in one specific project in Nicaragua. As a whole, we illustrate the variety of TB stigma in terms of domains, consequences, determinants and methods used; some features emerge more frequently than others from the studies. However, results of the review show a relative scarcity of the TB stigma assessment experiences, mainly in looking at the consequences for the TB patient and in the use of quantitative methods and scales. Additional assessment studies in diverse contexts are needed so that stigma will be considered a priority in the organization of care for people affected by tuberculosis.     

Influence of personality on ecological consumer behaviour

• We have recently seen the appearance of many studies which attempt to discover the behaviour patterns of ecological consumers. For that reason, it seems necessary to analyse the variables that shape this consumer profile. In this study, we have focused on psychographic variables and, in particular, on personality features. Following a survey with a random sample of 573 individuals, we designed a theoretical model which included the Big‐Five Factor Structure scale and the environmental attitude dimension referred to as “actual commitment” to measure personality and ecological behaviour, respectively. We carried out several principal factor analyses in order to validate these scales and afterwards, we performed a structural equation analysis and a logit analysis. Findings support our hypotheses since they reveal that personality is a multifaceted concept, which is positively related to ecological behaviour. Firms should focus on those people who are characterised by personality features such as extroversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness in order to persuade them to demand their products.

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The nature of illness experience: a course on boundaries

With the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education's designation of "professionalism" as one of six core competencies in residency medical education, some educators of residents and medical students believe that the concept of professional role is too restrictive and narrow for grappling with the complex dynamics of professional-patient relationships. The ethical quandaries of abortion and physician assisted suicide illustrate how individual personal values cannot be ignored in the dynamic relationship between health care professional and patient. This article describes a medical school course where students are paired with "patient mentors." Within the dynamic and intimate relationship that unfolds over several months, students explore the "experience of boundaries," and are invited to use this experience to consider their evolving professional identity.     

Physiological responses of obese subjects to external stimuli

Physiological arousal was measured in 11 obese and 11 normal-weight subjects during presentation of emotive, food, and neutral stimuli. No differential arousal (heart rate, temperature, GSR, and EMG on frontalis muscle) between the groups was obtained for any of the three types of stimuli. Discrepancies between the present findings and earlier results are discussed.