Tuning Clinical Recruitment around Cultural Taboos in a Human Microbiome Study

ABSTRACT

Human microbial communities are bodies of microorganisms that reside in or on different body parts. Importantly, they have been found to affect human health. However, scientific research on human microbial communities has created new challenges for human subject recruitment. First, individuals are asked to collect samples of bodily substances that can be seen as repulsive (e.g. feces and urine). Second, because scientists want to understand how human microbial communities evolve over time, individuals are asked to commit to a regular sample collection for extended periods of time. A longitudinal qualitative study of the work of scientists, physicians, research staff, and study coordinators involved in a human microbiome research project has found that these actors can bypass some aspects of these recruitment and retention challenges through ‘tuning work’. Tuning work is a collaborative process where professionals agree to adjust their practices towards shared goals. Such professionals reconfigure their work practices, personal routines, and the study protocol in an effort to obviate cultural taboos against handling bodily substances. The burden of long-term participation provides fewer opportunities for tuning work for these professionals, however. As such, long-term commitment by human subjects remains a recruitment and retention obstacle.     

我国人体临床试验和研究中有关伦理审查的若干问题

目前我国对涉及人体的临床试验与研究进行伦理审查时,存在的主要问题是:(1)对伦理审查的目的、意义不是足够清楚;(2)伦理委员会的构成不符合要求,缺少独立性;(3)有盲目运用伦理准则或方法,忽视文化、心理的差异的倾向。这些影响了伦理审查的效用,需要有针对性地加以改进。     

Developing an Output‐Oriented Super Slacks‐Based Measure Model with an Application to Third‐Party Reverse Logistics Providers

Outsourcing is an increasingly significant topic pursued via corporations seeking enhanced efficiency. Third‐party reverse logistics involves the employ of external firms to carry out some or all of the firm's logistics activities. Output‐oriented super slacks‐based measure (SBM) model is one of the models in data envelopment analysis (DEA). In many real‐world applications, data are often stochastic. A successful approach to address uncertainty in data is to replace deterministic data via random variables, leading to chance‐constrained DEA. In this paper, a chance‐constrained output‐oriented super SBM model is developed and also its deterministic equivalent, which is a nonlinear program, is derived. Furthermore, it is shown that the deterministic equivalent of the stochastic output‐oriented super SBM model can be converted into a quadratic program. In addition, sensitivity analysis of the stochastic output‐oriented super SBM model is discussed with respect to changes on parameters. Finally, a numerical example demonstrates the application of the proposed model. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

西医院校中医学教学远期效果的强化途径

根据教学认知结构理论,突出"学科结构"教学,引导学生将所学的知识按照知识结构的形式构建个人的认知结构,有助于今后信息的检索和提取从而获得长期记一忆.突出"医疗特色"教学,使学生明晰中医理论发生发展的脉络本质,并与其它医学相比较凸显中医特色.使学生不仅对中医产生正确的认知和情感,而且记忆长久,从而使教学远期效果的实现成为可能.     

审美主体与伦理主体的比较研究

本文通过对审美主体和伦理主体的比较研究揭示了个体存在的伦理层面的含义。首先考察了老庄和海德格尔的后现代宗教式的主体和儒家形而上的宗教主体,以及儒家就伦理问题对于老庄的挑战。结论是他们都缺乏把他者的生存作为自己的绝对的责任的伦理含义,因而是审美主体：其次,通过对于环境主体和伦理主体及审美主体的关系的讨论,阐释了这样一个哲学基本问题：伦理存在必须以有限性存在为前提;而后者只是一个哲学的抽象。片面地强调人的有限性(尼采),片面强调有限存在与超越者的关系(老庄和海德格尔),或否认人的有限性,这些观点都忽略了人在这个世界上的伦理责任。后现代伦理学是指我,作为一个个体(me),对于他者的一切负有不可推卸的责任。     

Subjectivity,Reflection and Freedom in Later Foucault

Abstract

This paper proposes a new reading of the interaction between subjectivity, reflection and freedom within Foucault’s later work. I begin by introducing three approaches to subjectivity, locating these in relation both to Foucault’s texts and to the recent literature. I suggest that Foucault himself operates within what I call the ‘entanglement approach’, and, as such, he faces a potentially serious challenge, a challenge forcefully articulated by Han. Using Kant’s treatment of reflection as a point of comparison, I argue that Foucault possesses the resources to meet this challenge. The key, I contend, is to distinguish two related theses about reflection and freedom: Foucault’s position is distinctive precisely because he accepts one of these theses whilst rejecting the other. I conclude by indicating how this reading might connect to the longstanding question of Foucault’s own right to appeal to normative standards.     

Split Self Affairs and Their Treatment

SUMMARY

The Split Self Affair is a long-term serious relationship. The split being played out in the affair reflects an internal split between doing things “right” and the emotional self. Treatment for those involved centers on understanding the origins of the internal split and on reclaiming the neglected emotional self. Long term individual therapy is the treatment of choice, augmented by other modalities.     

Shattering the subject: Georges Bataille and the limits of therapy

This article is an analysis of the work of the French intellectual Georges Bataille (1897–1962) and its implications for interrogating the limits of therapy. One of the central concepts of Bataille's thought is transgression and the destabilizing effects of transgression on any concept of the limit. I explore this thinking through an analysis of Bataille's personal and theoretical relationship to psychoanalysis. Bataille's radicalization of psychoanalysis is then pursued through his use of mythic representations of the ‘shattered subject’. These models of the shattered subject offer an interrogation of some of the theoretical and practical limits of therapy, particularly when it is centred on the individual. Drawing on these models it is then argued that Bataille offers a new ethics of abjection, which proposes that we must interrogate the subject in terms of what our culture regards as ‘waste’. Comparison is made between Bataille's thought and that of Jacques Lacan, and it is argued that Bataille offers a potential radicalization of Lacan's concept of the Real and his ‘ethics of psychoanalysis’. The limits of Bataille's own writing are critically interrogated, drawing on the readings of his work by Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault.     

Minimizing subject loss in a longitudinal study of deviant behavior

A number of techniques are described to prevent attrition of four different categories of subjects in a longitudinal study of deviant behavior.Difficult to schedule subjects required persistence, empathy and flexibility to ensure their continued participation.Reluctant subjects were persuaded to participate by taking special care to build rapport with that family.Subjects who initially refused were turned around by assuming that a subject's refusal one year was circumstantial, and approaching that subject the following year with personalized correspondence that emphasized the importance of their contribution to the research. Persistence was an important factor in successfully locating and recruitingtransient subjects.     

Future-Oriented Job Analysis: A Description of the Process and Its Organizational Implications

An application of a future-oriented job analysis (FOJA) procedure used to gain an understanding of newly formed entry-level positions in a large insurance organization is described. A brief review of the relevant literature is presented to serve as a foundation upon which to consider the current FOJA procedure. Specific assumptions, stages, and results of the current procedure are detailed. The benefits of this application of FOJA are also discussed.