As well as being a history of administrative staff colleges in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan, India, the Phillipines and Ghana between 1948 and 1984, the colleges' contribution to the development of effective managers is evaluated.

As well as being a history of administrative staff colleges in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan, India, the Phillipines and Ghana between 1948 and 1984, the colleges' contribution to the development of effective managers is evaluated.

Natural and supernatural explanations are used to interpret the same events in a number of predictable and universal ways. Yet little is known about how variation in diverse cultural ecologies influences how people integrate natural and supernatural explanations. Here, we examine explanatory coexistence in three existentially arousing domains of human thought: illness, death, and human origins using qualitative data from interviews conducted in Tanna, Vanuatu. Vanuatu, a Melanesian archipelago, provides a cultural context ideal for examining variation in explanatory coexistence due (...) to the lack of industrialization and the relatively recent introduction of Christianity and Western education. We argue for the integration of interdisciplinary methodologies from cognitive science and anthropology to inform research on explanatory coexistence. (shrink)

Mounting evidence suggests that endorsement of psychological continuity and the afterlife increases with age. This developmental change raises questions about the cognitive biases, social representations, and cultural input that may support afterlife beliefs. To what extent is there similarity versus diversity across cultures in how people reason about what happens after death? The objective of this study was to compare beliefs about the continuation of biological and psychological functions after death in Tanna, Vanuatu, and the United States. Children, adolescents, and (...) adults were primed with a story that contained either natural or supernatural cues. Participants were then asked whether or not different biological and psychological processes continue to function after death. We predicted that across cultures individuals would be more likely to endorse the continuation of psychological processes over biological processes and that a theistic prime would increase continuation responses regarding both types of process. Results largely supported predictions; U.S. participants provided more continuation responses for psychological than biological processes following both the theistic and non-theistic primes. Participants in Vanuatu, however, provided more continuation responses for biological than psychological processes following the theistic prime. The data provide evidence for both cultural similarity and variability in afterlife beliefs and demonstrate that individuals use both natural and supernatural explanations to interpret the same events. (shrink)

My conversion into a knower has been a long and winding road. From childhood reverie to the years of formal schooling, education has never ceased to lure me into its magical power. How do we really get to know/see/learn whatever happens on our educational journey? In this paper, I will re‐trace my quest for knowledge that reaches beyond the boundaries of traditional epistemology. My wonderings will take me to explore, via Jung, the possibilities of imaginative education through Gnosis and Sophia. (...) The paper intends to weave together several Jungian discourses with their versions by other thinkers who have contributed to the fields of depth psychology, esotericism, and educational philosophy. (shrink)

feminist scholars studying gender in the Pacific have analyzed the conditions of Pacific Islander women with an acute analysis on how the intersections of gender, culture, colonization, and strategies of decolonization aid in framing the experiences of Pacific Islander women. Like many introduced Western institutions in Hawai'i, medical practices in hospitals and clinics have been both criticized and welcomed among Pacific Islanders. Feminist anthropologists Vicki Lukere and Margaret Jolly have diagnosed these conflicting receptions to medical institutions in the Pacific Islands (...) as a reliance on a problematic binary of "modern" and "traditional" medical care. According to Lukere and Jolly, the... (shrink)

Examining variation in reasoning about sustainability between diverse populations provides unique insight into how group norms surrounding resource conservation develop. Cultural institutions, such as religious organizations and formal schools, can mobilize communities to solve collective challenges associated with resource depletion. This study examined conservation beliefs in a Western industrialized (Austin, Texas, USA) and a non‐Western, subsistence agricultural community (Tanna, Vanuatu) among children, adolescents, and adults (N = 171; n = 58 7–12‐year‐olds, n = 53 13–17‐year‐olds, and n = 60 18–68‐year‐olds). (...) Participants endorsed or rejected four types of justifications for engaging in land and animal conservation: sustainability, moral, religious, or permissible. In both populations, participants endorsed sustainability justifications most frequently. Religious justifications increased with age in Tanna and decreased with age in Austin. Tannese participants were also more likely to endorse multiple justifications for conservation than Austin participants. Data across all justification types show a main effect of age in both communities; endorsement of conservation decreased with age in Austin, but increased with age in Tanna. Across age groups, participants were more likely to endorse the conservation of animals than land in Austin, yet equally as likely to endorse the conservation of land and animals in Tanna. Overall, these results reveal similarities and differences in the beliefs that support the conservation of natural resources across populations. (shrink)

In this essay, I reflect on the contradictions that arise from a personal experience of conflict with my father and the clash of traditional Filipino gender norms in the context of the practice of name changes within the institution of marriage and intersecting feminist critiques of patriarchy. My understanding of the Tagalog amor propio is self-love or self-pride within Filipino culture and signifies one's authority, place, and meaning in the community. As a concept of authority, amor propio encourages practices of (...) respect toward the authority figure. In the context of the home, amor propio is attributed to the father, and members of the family ought to respect his amor propio. This essay examines my own conflicted relationship with my father and my attempts to navigate the complex terrain of amor propio, as a Filipina, feminist/peminist, dutiful daughter. Filipino immigrant families face distinct challenges within family life owing to globalization, colonialism, and racism, so I find Jane Addams's social ethics of filial relations helpful in framing the tension between individual and social claims within the specific cultural values expected of Filipina women as dutiful daughters. Addams's feminist social sensibilities in her work at Hull House were attuned to the plight of daughters and the conflicting claims of the family emergent within the crowded immigrant neighborhoods in Chicago. She was able to articulate and sympathetically understand the generational divide within immigrant families at Hull House and sought to bridge these differences within the context of the family. I reflect on her work in my own experience as a dutiful Filipina daughter. (shrink)

In theory, physicians subscribe to and in their actions personify a set of virtues whose performance demands personal engagement. At the same time, they are instructed in their professional roles to remain emotionally and personally distant from those they are called to treat. The result, the authors argue, is an ethical conflict whose nature is described through an analysis of two narratives drawn from an online blog for young physicians. Confusion over professional responsibilities and personal roles were found to affect (...) physicians' perceptions of their clinical duties and their social roles. In addition, it sets in sharp relief contemporary debates on physician training and the ethical nature of medical professionalism. Practically, the authors suggest, the confusion may contribute to early physician burnout. Methodologically, this paper promotes the use of online discussion sites as rich repositories providing an insight into real dilemmas and the actual perception of physicians' attempts to address them. It thus promotes use of such sites as a resource in which assumptions about physicians' own perceptions about the nature of their role in contemporary society can be tested. (shrink)

This article investigates the propensity for academic dishonesty by university students using the partitioning method of decision tree analysis. A set of prediction rules are presented, and conclusions are drawn. To provide context for the decision tree approach, the partition process is compared with results of more traditional probit regression models. Results of the decision tree analysis complement the probit models in terms of predictive accuracy and confirm results previously found in the literature. In particular, students’ moral character—whether they believe (...) cheating is acceptable—is found to be the most important factor in determining the propensity for academic dishonesty. (shrink)

Gray's integration of the different levels of description and explanation in his theory is problematic: The introduction of consciousness into his theorising consists of the mind-brain identity assumption, which tells us nothing new. There need not be correlations between levels of description. Gray's account does not extend beyond “brute” correlation. Integration must be achieved in a principled, mutually constraining way.

The internet is widely used for health information and support, often by vulnerable people. Internet-based research raises both familiar and new ethical problems for researchers and ethics committees. While guidelines for internet-based research are available, it is unclear to what extent ethics committees use these. Experience of gaining research ethics approval for a UK study (SharpTalk), involving internet-based discussion groups with young people who self-harm and health professionals is described. During ethical review, unsurprisingly, concerns were raised about the vulnerability of (...) potential participants. These were dominated by the issue of anonymity, which also affected participant safety and consent. These ethical problems are discussed, and our solutions, which included: participant usernames specific to the study, a closed website, private messaging facilities, a direct contact email to researchers, information about forum rules displayed on the website, a ‘report’ button for participants, links to online support, and a discussion room for forum moderators. This experience with SharpTalk suggests that an approach to ethics, which recognises the relational aspects of research with vulnerable people, is particularly useful for internet-based health research. The solutions presented here can act as guidance for researchers developing proposals and for ethics committees reviewing them. (shrink)

In recent years, the explanatory term “scaffold” has been gaining prominence in evolutionary biology. This notion has a long history in other areas, in particular, developmental psychology. In this paper, we connect these two traditions and identify a specific type of explanatory strategy shared between them, namely scaffolding explanations. We offer a new definition of “scaffold” anchored in the explanatory practices of evolutionary biologists and developmental psychologists that has yet to be clearly articulated. We conclude by offering a systematic overview (...) of the various dimensions of scaffolding explanations that further suggests both their usefulness and range of application. (shrink)

When searching for concepts in memory—as in the verbal fluency task of naming all the animals one can think of—people appear to explore internal mental representations in much the same way that animals forage in physical space: searching locally within patches of information before transitioning globally between patches. However, the definition of the patches being searched in mental space is not well specified. Do we search by activating explicit predefined categories and recall items from within that category, or do we (...) activate and recall a connected sequence of individual items without using categorical information, with each item recalled leading to the retrieval of an associated item in a stream, or both? Using semantic representations in a search of associative memory framework and data from the animal fluency task, we tested competing hypotheses based on associative and categorical search models. Associative, but not categorical, patch transitions took longer to make than position-matched productions, suggesting that categorical transitions were not true transitions. There was also clear evidence of associative search even within categorical patch boundaries. Furthermore, most individuals' behavior was best explained by an associative search model without the addition of categorical information. Thus, our results support a search process that does not use categorical information, but for which patch boundaries shift with each recall and local search is well described by a random walk in semantic space, with switches to new regions of the semantic space when the current region is depleted. (shrink)

Being a healthcare professional in both paediatric and adult hospitals will mean being exposed to human tragedies and stressful events involving conflict, misunderstanding, and moral distress. There are a number of different structured approaches to reflection and discussion designed to support healthcare professionals process and make sense of their feelings and experiences and to mitigate against direct and vicarious trauma. In this paper, we draw from our experience in a large children’s hospital and more broadly from the literature to identify (...) and analyse four established approaches to facilitated reflective discussions. Each of the four approaches seeks to acknowledge the stressful nature of health professional work and to support clinicians from all healthcare professions to develop sustainable skills so they continue to grow and thrive as health professionals. Each approach also has the potential to open up feelings of uncertainty, frustration, sorrow, anguish, and moral distress for participants. We argue, therefore, that in order to avoid unintentionally causing harm, a facilitator should have specific skills required to safely lead the discussion and be able to explain the nature, scope, safe application, and limits of each approach. With reference to a hypothetical but realistic clinical case scenario, we discuss the application and key features of each approach, including the goals, underpinning theory, and methods of facilitation. (shrink)

This essay considers biotrophic cyst and root‐knot nematodes in relation to their biology, host–parasite interactions and molecular genetics. These nematodes have to face the biological consequences of the physical constraints imposed by the soil environment in which they live while their hosts inhabit both above and below ground environments. The two groups of nematodes appear to have adopted radically different solutions to these problems with the result that one group is a host specialist and reproduces sexually while the other has (...) an enormous host range and reproduces by mitotic parthenogenesis. We consider what is known about the modes of parasitism used by these nematodes and how it relates to their host range, including the surprising finding that parasitism genes in both nematode groups have been recruited from bacteria. The nuclear and mitochondrial genomes of these two nematode groups are very different and we consider how these findings relate to the biology of the organisms. BioEssays 30:249–259, 2008. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Nurses have moral obligations incurred by membership in the profession to participate knowingly in health policy advocacy. Many barriers have historically hindered nurses from realizing their potential to advance health policy. The contemporary political context sets additional challenges to policy work due to polarization and conflict. Nursing education can help nurses recognize their role in advancing health through political advocacy in a manner that is consistent with disciplinary knowledge and ethical responsibilities. In this paper, the authors describe an exemplar of (...) Elizabeth Barrett's “Power as Knowing Participation in Change” theory as a disciplinary lens within a doctoral nursing health policy course. Barrett (radically) emphasizes “power as freedom” instead of “power as control.” This approach is congruent with nursing disciplinary values and enhances awareness of personal freedom and building collaborative relationships in the policy process. The theory was used in concert with other traditional policy content and frameworks from nursing and other disciplines. We discuss the role of nursing ethics viewed as professional responsibility for policy action, an overview of Barrett's theory, and the design of the course. Four student reflections on how the course influenced their thinking about policy advocacy are included. While not specific to policymaking, Barrett's theory provides a disciplinary grounding to increase students' awareness of freedom and choices in political advocacy participation. Our experience suggests that Barrett's work can be fruitful for enhancing nurses' awareness of choices to participate in change across settings. (shrink)

This article critiques the concept and discourse of social responsibility in terms of theoretical coherence, empirical salience, normative viability, and power/knowledge implications from a Marxist-institutionalist perspective. The social responsibility concept and discourse is found to be problematic along each of the above dimensions. The basic point can be stated succinctly: The concept and discourse of social responsibility are viable only in the absence of a historically grounded understanding of capitalist political economy. At the same time, however, the article argues that (...) social responsibility constitutes an influential ideology with material implications for stakeholder groups. (shrink)

Social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic has presented millions of people with extraordinary challenges that are associated with significant amounts of stress. Emotion regulation is crucial during this crisis as people seek to mitigate the stress and uncertainty of the present moment. In this study, we surveyed a nationally representative sample of 297 adults from the United States on their levels of perceived stress related to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as their level of engagement of different emotion regulation strategies (...) during the pandemic. We performed multiple linear regression analyses to assess which regulation strategies were associated with individual differences in perceived stress. Among all emotion regulation strategies, psychological distancing, which involves thinking about stressful circumstances in an objective, impartial way, was uniquely associated with reductions in perceived stress due to COVID-19 across individuals. This effect was not moderated by age, gender, socioeconomic status, race/ethnicity, or trait-related difficulty in regulating emotion. Conversely, situation modification was associated with significantly greater perceived stress overall. These results suggest the broad applicability and utility of psychological distancing during pandemic-related social distancing as part of an adaptive emotion regulation toolkit and motivate the investigation of interventions involving psychological distancing in this context. (shrink)

Summary: Throughout the history of science, indeed throughout the history of knowledge, unification has been touted as a central aim of intellectual inquiry. We’ve always wanted to discover not only numerous bare facts about the universe, but to show how such facts are linked and interrelated. Large amounts of time and effort have been spent trying to show diverse arrays of things can be seen as different manifestations of some common underlying entities or properties. Thales is said to have originated (...) philosophy and science with his declaration that everything was, at base, a form of water. Plato’s theory of the forms was thought to be a magnificent accomplishment because it gave a unified solution to the separate problems of the relation between knowledge and belief, the grounding of objective values, and how continuity is possible amid change. Pasteur made numerous medical advancements possible by demonstrating the interconnection between microorganisms and human disease symptoms. Many technological advances were aided by Maxwell’s showing that light is a kind of electromagnetic radiation. The attempt to unify the various known forces is often referred to as “The Holy Grail” of physics. Some philosophers have even suggested that providing explanations is itself just a sort of unifying of our knowledge. But while unification (like simplicity) has often been hailed as a tremendous virtue in science, the meaning of the term is not altogether clear. Scientists often don’t specify what, precisely, they mean by unification. And in cases where what they mean is clear, different thinkers plainly mean different things by the term. What are the various senses of unification, and why has unification been such an important aim in the history of inquiry? (shrink)

This essay identifies epistemological, theoretical and methodological problems in a potentially influential subset of the interdisciplinary corporate responsibility literature, that which appears in the management literature. The received conceptualization of stakeholder analysis is criticised by identifying six sets of factors conventionally considered as promoting social responsibilities in the firm: inter-organizational factors, economic competitors, institutional investors, end-consumers, government regulators and non-governmental organizations. Each is addressed on conceptual grounds, its empirical salience in terms of the latest relevant research and prospects to be (...) a significant factor in promoting outcomes consistent with social welfare. Despite obvious antagonistic relations between organization centred economic objectives and extra-organizational-directed social considerations, the huge body of research we address drifts in a disengaged Sargasso Sea. The essay argues for appropriate directions for continuing business ethics/responsibility/corporate citizenship research, suggesting certain sociological works on moral leadership, moral courage, and academic leadership. (shrink)

Early versions of satellite and radiosonde datasets suggested that the tropical surface had warmed more than the troposphere, while climate models consistently showed tropospheric amplification of surface warming in response to human-caused increases in greenhouse gases. We revisit such comparisons here using new observational estimates of surface and tropospheric temperature changes. We find that there is no longer a serious discrepancy between modeled and observed trends in the tropics. Our results contradict a recent claim that all simulated temperature trends in (...) the tropical troposphere are inconsistent with observations. This claim was based on the use of older radiosonde and satellite datasets and on two methodological errors: the neglect of observational trend uncertainties introduced by interannual climate variability and application of an inappropriate statistical “consistency test”.This emerging reconciliation of models and observations has two primary explanations. First, because of changes in the treatment of buoy and satellite information, new surface temperature datasets yield slightly reduced tropical warming relative to earlier versions. Second, recently developed satellite and radiosonde datasets now show larger warming of the tropical lower troposphere. In the case of a new satellite dataset from remote sensing systems, enhancedRSS warming is due to an improved procedure of adjusting for inter-satellite biases. When the RSS-derived tropospheric temperature trend is compared with four different observed estimates of surface temperature change, the surface warming is invariably amplified in the tropical troposphere, consistent with model results. Even if we use data from a second satellite dataset with smaller tropospheric warming than in remote sensing systems RSS, observed tropical lapse rates are not significantly different from those in all model simulations.Our results contradict a recent claim that all simulated temperature trends in the tropical troposphere and in tropical lapse rates are inconsistent with observations. This claim was based on the use of older radiosonde and satellite datasets and on two methodological errors: the neglect of observational trend uncertainties introduced by interannual climate variability and application of an inappropriate statistical “consistency test”. (shrink)

Presents a plethora of approaches to developing human potential in areas not conventionally addressed. Organized in two parts, this international collection of essays provides viable educational alternatives to those currently holding sway in an era of high-stakes accountability.

History in a Post-Truth World: Theory and Praxis explores one of the most significant paradigm shifts in public discourse. A post-truth environment that primarily appeals to emotion, elevates personal belief and devalues expert opinion has important implications far beyond Brexit or the election of Donald Trump, and has a profound impact on how history is produced and consumed. Post-truth history is not merely a synonym for lies. This book argues that indifference to historicity by both the purveyor and recipient, contempt (...) for expert opinion that contradicts it, and ideological motivation are its key characteristics. Taking a multidisciplinary approach, this work explores some of the following questions. What exactly is post-truth history? Does it represent a new phenomenon? Does the historian have a special role to play in preserving public memory from 'alternative facts'? Do academics more generally have an obligation to combat fake news and fake history both in universities and on social media? How has a 'post-truth culture' impacted professional and popular historical discourse? Looking at theoretical dimensions and case studies from around the world, this book explores the violent potential of post-truth history and calls on readers to resist. (shrink)

Globalization is a ubiquitousyet highly elusive term. The debate on the cont and meaning of globalization is still waged largely in binary terms; for example, globalization is understood either as increasing standardization or as increasing difference. This article argues that the effects of globalization are best understood in terms of the following three sets of simultaneous contradictions: convergence and divergence, inclusion and exclusion, and centralization and decentralization. These contradictions can be fruitfully “unpacked” and examined through critical stakeholder analysis (CSA). This (...) technique focuses on broader structural commonalties and differences among key stakeholder groups, factors that are not incorporated in mainstream stakeholder theory. The associated normative agenda of CSA promotes a common understanding of key issues within a focal organizational field, the negotiated settlement of zero-sum situations that optimize collective stakeholder interests within that field, and the containment and minimization of negative externalities within as well as between fields. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:W. T. Jones SOMNIO ERGO SUM: DESCARTES'S THREE DREAMS What is remarkable about Descartes's dreams is not that he dreamed (for even philosophers presumably dream), but that he wrote down a description of his dreams and of his interpretation of them and then kept this record for more than thirty years, until his death.* What is remarkable, in a word, is that this thinker, who prided himself on (...) his rationalism and who has come to represent, at least to philosophers, the very spirit of rationalism, should have taken his dreams so seriously. Philosophers—perhaps because the dreams conflict with their view of Descartes, perhaps because they conflict with their view of themselves and their discipline—have tended to play down the dreams or to ignore them altogether. Thus, though Bernard Williams, the author of a recent volume on Descartes, refers to the dreams as "a significant event," he proceeds in a footnote to undercut the adjective by quoting Christiaan Huygens, apparently with approval, to the effect that the dreams show "a great weakness [in Descartes], and I think that it will seem much the same to Catholics who have freed themselves from bigotry." If we try to free ourselves from what seems to be a standing philosophical prejudice against dreams and dreaming, what can Descartes's dreams tell us about his theories? That is the topic of this article. But first a caveat concerning my position on the interpretation of dreams generally. The interpreter of a dream, like the interpreter of other cultural products, has to try to steer a course between the Scylla of overinterpretation (reading into the dream something that is not expressed in it) and the Charybdis of underinterpretation (missing something that is actually expressed in the dream). My own bias leads me to fear overinterpretation more than underinterpretation; I had?Descartes's original Latin record of the dreams no longer survives. A new English translation by my colleague, John F. Benton, of a late seventeenth-century paraphrase of a portion of Descartes's text appears as an appendix to this article. 145 146Philosophy and Literature rather go aground on Charybdis than be shipwrecked on the Scylla of the Freudians and the Jungians.2 I am skeptical of interpretations of Descartes's dreams that are not supported by nondream materials—on the assumption that any dynamic element expressed in the dreams that is not also expressed in nondream materials is unlikely to be of much importance for understanding Descartes's thought. Therefore, instead of beginning with the dreams and then looking here and there in nondream materials for supporting evidence, I shall begin with nondream materials and only later turn to the dreams. In a word, I shall try to read back both from nondream material and from dream material to dynamic elements which may be present in, and shaping, both. My hope is that the uncovering of these elements will result in a better understanding of nondream and dream material alike. I Accordingly, I shall begin with a brief account of some of the themes of two of Descartes's best known philosophical writings, The Discourse on Method (1637) and the Meditations on First Philosophy (1641). The Discourse is particularly relevant to our inquiry because it "covers" the period in which the dreams occur, but in a very different medium from that of the Olympica and at a later date. The Discourse was in fact a discreet, as it were sanitized, version of the whole long voyage of discovery in which the dreams were but one, if nonetheless a critical, episode. Descartes tells us he had been educated "at one of the most celebrated schools in Europe" and had not beenjudged by his instructors "inferior" to his fellow students. Yet, on completing his course of study, he found himself "embarrassed with so many doubts and errors" that the only result of his efforts to instruct himself had been the "increasing discovery" of his own ignorance. Having gone through all the sciences of his time—languages, literature, rhetoric, theology, philosophy—without learning anything of consequence, he had then turned to travel, to seeing courts and armies, hoping thereby to discover the answers he sought "in... (shrink)

Superoxide is produced by a NADPH oxidase of phagocytic cells and contributes to their microbicidal activities. The oxidase is activated when receptors in the neutrophil plasma membrane bind to the target microbe. These receptors recognise antibodies and complement fragments which coat the target cell. The oxidase electron transport chain, located in the plasma membrane, comprises a low potential cytochrome b heterodimer (gp 91‐phox and p22‐phox) associated with FAD. It is non‐functional until at least three proteins, p67‐phox, p47‐phox and p21rac (and (...) possibly others), move from the cytosol to dock on the cytochrome b. The docking involves the interaction of SH3 domains may become exposed follwoing phosphorylation of p47‐phox by protein kinase C or, in model systems, by addition of arachidonic acid to reconstitution mixtures. Following the docking process the electron‐transporting component is able to transfer electrons from NADPH to oxygen. This electrogenic event is charge‐compensated by the opening of a prton channel. Components of the oxidase are expressed in non‐phagocytes, where their function is uncretain but could be related to some signal function of superoxide. (shrink)