This paper explores the gray area of questionable research practices (QRPs) between responsible conduct of research and severe research misconduct in the form of fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism (Steneck in SEE 12(1): 53–57, 2006). Up until now, we have had very little knowledge of disciplinary similarities and differences in QRPs. The paper is the first systematic account of variances and similarities. It reports on the findings of a comprehensive study comprising 22 focus groups on practices and perceptions of QRPs across (...) main areas of research. The paper supports the relevance of the idea of epistemic cultures (Knorr Cetina in: Epistemic cultures: how the sciences make knowledge, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1999), also when it comes to QRPs. It shows which QRPs researchers from different areas of research (humanities, social sciences, medical sciences, natural sciences, and technical sciences) report as the most severe and prevalent within their fields. Furthermore, it shows where in the research process these self-reported QRPs can be found. This is done by using a five-phase analytical model of the research process (idea generation, research design, data collection, data analysis, scientific publication and reporting). The paper shows that QRPs are closely connected to the distinct research practices within the different areas of research. Many QRPs can therefore only be found within one area of research, and QRPs that cut across main areas often cover relatively different practices. In a few cases, QRPs in one area are considered good research practice in another. (shrink)

In this paper we reflect on the looming question of what constitutes expertise in ethics. Based on an empirical program that involved qualitative and quantitative as well as participatory research...

ABSTRACTIn clinical circles, the concept of “moral injury” has rapidly gained traction. Yet, from a moral philosophical point of view the concept is less clear than is suggested. That is, in current conceptualizations of moral injury, trauma’s moral dimension seems to be understood in a rather mechanistic and individualized manner. This article makes a start in developing an adequately founded conceptualization of the role of morality in deployment-related distress. It does so by reviewing and synthesizing insights from different disciplines into (...) morality and trauma. This discussion will lead to three positions: values and norms are by definition characterized by conflict, moral conflict may entail important social dimensions, and moral conflict may lead to altered beliefs about previously held values. These insights provide important steps in further developing conceptions of the role of morality in deployment-related suffering. (shrink)

Background: The effectiveness of ethics education continues to be disputed. No studies exist on how nursing students perceive the effectiveness of nursing ethics education in Flanders, Belgium. Objectives: To develop a valid and reliable instrument, named the ‘Students’ Perceived Effectiveness of Ethics Education Scale’ (SPEEES), to measure students’ perceptions of the effectiveness of ethics education, and to conduct a pilot study in Flemish nursing students to investigate the perceived efficacy of nursing ethics education in Flanders. Research design: Content validity, comprehensibility (...) and usability of the SPEEES were assessed. Reliability was assessed by means of a quantitative descriptive non-experimental pilot study. Participants and research context: 86 third-year baccalaureate nursing students of two purposefully selected university colleges answered the SPEEES. Ethical considerations: Formal approval was given by the ethics committee. Informed consent was obtained and anonymity was ensured for both colleges and their participating students. Findings: The scale content validity index/Ave scores for the subscales were 1.00, 1.00 and 0.86. The comprehensibility and user-friendliness were favourable. Cronbach’s alpha was 0.94 for general effectiveness, 0.89 for teaching methods and 0.85 for ethical content. Students perceived ‘case study’, ‘lecture’ and ‘instructional dialogue’ to be effective teaching methods and ‘general ethical concepts’ to contain effective content. ‘Reflecting critically on their own values’ was mentioned as the only ethical competence that, was promoted by the ethics courses. The study revealed rather large differences between both schools in students’ perceptions of the contribution of ethics education to other ethical competences. Discussion and conclusion: The study revealed that according to the students, ethics courses failed to meet some basic objectives of ethics education. Although the SPEEES proved to be a valid and reliable measure, the pilot study suggests that there is still space for improvement and a need for larger scale research. Additional insights will enable educators to improve current nursing ethics education. (shrink)

This article aims to explore the relation between body and space – specifically how the relation between the embodied awareness of movement and the sense of one’s body-space can be modified and changed deliberately in different kinds of dance practices. Using a multi-sited design, the ethnographical fieldwork, which formed the empirical ground for the study, was from the outset focused on acknowledging the diversity of the dancers’ practices. Each in their own way, the 13 professional dancers involved in the study (...) relate to and experience bodied potentialities, body-space and the spatiality of movement differently. Through their practice, they indicate that the body image is shaped through a multisensorial process of reification, and that seeing is to be related to a broader perceptual engagement. Furthermore, they exemplify how seeing can be deliberately used to expand the sense of their body-space and thereby to affect the spatiality of the fields of their embodied interaction. (shrink)

The present study investigates the influence of self-regulatory focus on consumer ethical beliefs (i.e., consumers’ judgment of various unethical consumer practices). The self-regulatory focus framework is highly influential and applies to an impressively wide spectrum of topics across a diverse array of domains. However, previous research has not yet examined the link between this personality construct and the consumer ethics field. Findings indicate that promotion affects one’s attitude toward questionable consumer practices with those having a stronger (versus weaker) promotion focus (...) being more likely to believe these consumer misbehaviors to be acceptable. Further, this study shows that prevention influences one’s perception of morally dubious consumer practices with those having a stronger (versus weaker) prevention focus being more inclined to believe these questionable consumer activities to be unacceptable. (shrink)

This volume brings together philosophical and interdisciplinary perspectives on improvisation. The contributions connect the theoretical dimensions of improvisation with different viewpoints on its practice in the arts and the classroom. The chapters address the phenomenon of improvisation in two related ways. On the one hand, they attend to the lived practices of improvisation both within and without the arts in order to explain the phenomenon. They also extend the scope of improvisational practices to include the role of improvisation in habit (...) and in planned action, at both individual and collective levels. Drawing on recent work done in the philosophy of mind, they also address questions such as whether improvisation is a single unified phenomenon, or whether it entails different senses that can be discerned theoretically and practically. Finally, they ask after the special kind of improvisational expertise which characterizes musicians, dancers, and other practitioners, an expertise marked by the artist's ability to participate competently in complex situations while deliberately relinquishing control. Philosophy of Improvisation will appeal to researchers working in philosophy, aesthetics, and pedagogy and the arts as well as practitioners involved in different kinds of music, dance, and theater performances. (shrink)

This paper sets out from the hypothesis that the embodied competences and expertise which characterise dance and sports activities have the potential to constructively challenge and inform phenomenological thinking. While pathological cases present experiences connected to tangible bodily deviations, the specialised movement practices of dancers and athletes present experiences which put our everyday experiences of being a moving body into perspective in a slightly different sense. These specialised experiences present factual variations of how moving, sensing and interacting can be like (...) for us as body-subjects. To use of these sources inevitably demands that qualitative research methodologies – especially short-term ethnographical fieldwork – form part of the research strategy and qualify the way the researcher involves a second-person perspective when interviewing dancers and athletes about their experiences. In the subsequent phases analysing the data generated, I argue that researchers first strive to achieve internal consistency of empirical themes identified in the case of movement practices in question thus keeping to a contextualised and lived perspective, also denoted as an emic perspective. In subsequent phases phenomenological insights are then actively engaged in the exploration and discussion of the possible transcendental structures making the described subjective experiences possible. The specialised and context-defined experiences of ‘what a moving body can be like’ are accordingly involved as factual variations to constructively add to and potentially challenge phenomenological descriptions. Lastly, I exemplify how actual research strategies have been enacted in a variety of projects involving professional dancers’, golfers’ and sports dancers’ practices and experiences, respectively. (shrink)

In this study, we demonstrate how perceptions of nursing are constructed in close connection with the development of the Nordic welfare states. Drawing on Gillian Rose's framework for analysing the social and political implications of visual materials, we analysed selected visual representations of nursing published in Danish and Norwegian professional nursing journals in the period 1965 to 2016. The analyses were conducted in an iterative process in three phases. First, we reviewed all visuals spanning the entire period to obtain an (...) overview of developmental trends in the material. Second, selected visuals and associated captions were subjected to more thorough analysis. Third, we further examined and discussed the visuals in light of societal and political movements and ideologies in Danish and Norwegian healthcare policies over this period. Our analysis shows that visual representations of the nurse–patient relationship and of the patient's and the nurse's roles and responsibilities changed over this period and that the visualisations corresponded with and supported developments in the Danish and Norwegian welfare states as these first consolidated and then moved towards individualisation and the competition state. Our study demonstrates that nurses in these states are political actors implementing health policies embedded in various knowledge regimes. (shrink)

In this article, we inquire into Maxine Sheets-Johnstone and Michele Merritt’s descriptions and use of dance improvisation as it relates to “thinking in movement.” We agree with them scholars that improvisational practices present interesting cases for investigating how movement, thinking, and agency intertwine. However, we also find that their descriptions of improvisation overemphasize the dimension of spontaneity as an intuitive “letting happen” of movements. To recalibrate their descriptions of improvisational practices, we couple Ezequiel Di Paolo, Thomas Buhrmann, and Xabier E. (...) Barandiaran’s enactive account of the constitution of agency with case studies of two expert performers of improvisation: a dancer and a musician. Our analyses hereof show that their improvisations unfold as a sophisticated oscillation of agency between specialized forms of mental and bodily control and, indeed, a more spontaneous “letting things happen.” In all, this article’s conclusions frame thinking in movement concerning improvisational practices as contextually embedded, purposively trained, and inherently relational. (shrink)

This article introduces the concept of inversion as a rhetorical-political strategy used to redescribe climate concerns from being sacrificed in favour of profitability to seeing that profitability necessitates climate concerns. Drawing on discourse theory and rhetorical analysis, the article analyses discursive struggles in the dominant discourse of fossil-fuel growth in Norway, from 2013 to 2019. By inverting the image of fossil-fuel dependency from growth and success to loss and stagnation in the Norwegian public discourse on fossil fuels and climate risk, (...) those who challenge the hegemonic pro-fossil fuel-investments system pave the way for an alternative description of an ideal welfare state. As such, inversion, as a practice and rhetorical-political strategy may help us understand the strategic manoeuvring of the environmental movements as counter-hegemonic forces. (shrink)

I outline a new approach to the question of when civil disobedience is legitimate by drawing on insights from the epistocracy literature. I argue that civil disobedience and epistocracy are similar in the sense that they both involve the idea that superior political judgment defeats majority authority, because this can lead to correct, i.e. just, prudent or morally right, political decisions. By reflecting on the question of when superior political judgment defeats majority authority in the epistocracy case, I identify considerations (...) that also apply to the disobedience context. I conclude that disobedience in protest of law X performed by agents who know that X is wrong is legitimate when: 1) it is not reasonably disputable that the civil dissenter knows that X is wrong 2) the adoption of X is a high-stakes political decision and 3) no destabilizing effects ensue. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Cognitive Linguistics Jahrgang: 27 Heft: 1 Seiten: 137-145.

Fenomenološki etos, po katerem je povzet naslov knjige, izhaja iz etične prenove v evropski filozofiji, ki se je začela na začetku 20. stoletja. Zasnoval ga je oče fenomenologije Edmund Husserl in se ob tem deloma navezal na Schelerjev koncept materialne etike, etike vrednot. Avtor v knjigi prikaže, kaj to pomeni na eni strani za etiko samo, na drugi strani pa za odnos med etičnostjo in religioznostjo. Celotno problematiko pa konkretizira z analizo in interpretacijo razmerja med kategoričnim imperativom in zlatim pravilom (...) kot najstarejšim moralnim pravilom vseh svetovnih civilizacij, tako da ga danes obravnavamo kot ključni element svetovnega etosa. V tem kontekstu sta prek Assmannovega in Girardovega tematiziranja krščanstva problematizirana tudi monoteistična ekskluzivnost in nasilnost. V sklepnem delu knjige je prikazan razvoj fenomenološkega etosa od Husserl prek Heideggerja in Levinasa do Derridaja in Mariona. Knjiga se sklene s predstavitvijo vloge in pomena fenomenološkega etosa v kontekstu globalne krize sodobnega sveta. (shrink)

In social and organizational research, theory is conventionally used to explain social phenomena. However, theory may be transformative in the sense that in using and testing the theory in a practical domain, researchers may attempt to help practitioners transform and improve their social practices and institutions. This idea is illustrated by a research-and-development project in Denmark, headed by the author, which used transformative theory to design professional conferences that are more conducive to participant learning and involvement than is the conventional, (...) lecture-based format. A number of learning techniques were derived from the theory and were tested as hypotheses: When implemented in thirty live conference experiments, did they contribute to learning, as specified by the theory? Used in this manner, transformative theory may supplement the aspirations motivating change agents by some of the well-known qualities of scientific research, including theoretical grounding, a coherent ontology, testable hypotheses, systematic evaluation, external validity, and theory–action consistency. (shrink)

The article investigates how dancers can actively shape and handle the ways they are affected throughout their artistic practices. To do so, we adopt a phenomenological-ethnographic approach, analysing the dance-artist Kitt Johnson's site-specific performance production called Mellemrum ('the space between spaces'). We put ethnographically based interview data in a dialectical interaction with the existing notions of affectivity and affective scaffolding — showing their usefulness, while also noting the need for the further notion of what we call affective engagement. This notion, (...) we argue, is needed to account for how artists actively handle their affective involvements. Specifically, as we show, in Mellemrum the dancers deliberately and strategically juggle between (i) a self-affective engagement, (ii) an affective engagement with the environment (space and people), and(iii) an affective-aesthetic engagement with the choreography and artistic ideas of the performance. (shrink)

This article explores a question format consisting of `you say' plus a version of what the co-participant has said, which is used to ask for confirmation of something said in an earlier sequence. Questions using this you say x format often request not only confirmation but also accounts and can, on occasions, be taken as challenging the interactional balance, that is, be treated as disaffiliative. The article investigates the sequential, prosodic and grammatical conditions for affiliative and disaffiliative uses of you (...) say x questions and discusses the potential institution specificity of the phenomenon. It is found that the clearly disaffiliative you say x questions are parts of dispreferred and disaligning moves, that they have `marked' prosody, that they raise problems, and that they are most often prefaced by `objecting' particles. Affiliative you say x questions are aligning next sequences in environments where the focus is on information delivery. They have `unmarked' prosody and they contribute to getting information on record. You say x questions which call for accounts without being clearly disaffiliative, are also examined. Even though they often raise problematic issues, they are not sequentially disaligning and have less `marked' prosody than the disaffiliative cases. (shrink)

Previous studies show evidence of double standards in terms of individuals being more tolerant of questionable consumer practices than of similar business practices. However, whether these double standards are necessarily due to the fact that one party is a business company while the other is a consumer was not addressed. The results of our two experimental studies, conducted among 277 (Study 1) and 264 (Study 2) participants from a Western European country by means of an anonymous self-administered online survey, demonstrate (...) that the respondents were not only harsher in their judgments of unethical business (vs. consumer) behavior, but also harsher in their judgments of unethical behavior by prosperous (vs. non-prosperous) consumers and prosperous (vs. non-prosperous) business companies (Study 1). Further, they were also less tolerant of unethical behavior by consumers (vs. one’s best friend) and business companies with which they have a less than good (vs. a good) relationship (Study 2). These results indicate that double standards are due to differences in perceived wealth between subjects and in the individual’s relationship with subjects. These two factors imply that double standards are not strictly reserved to consumer–business relations, but might also be used in business–business and consumer–consumer relations. Further, these results indicate that companies need to be aware of the fact that good financial figures may backfire as they might lead individuals to be more critical of a company’s deceptive practices. Moreover, these findings point to the importance of businesses investing resources—and to keep investing resources—in developing a good relationship with stakeholders as these good relationships lead to stakeholders being less prone to make moral condemnations. (shrink)

Various kinds of user and patient involvement are spreading in healthcare in most Western countries. The purpose of this study is to critically assess the actual conditions for patients’ involvement in healthcare practice in Greenland and to point to possibilities for development. Patients’ perspectives on their own conduct of everyday life with illness and their possibilities for participation when hospitalized are examined in relation to the conditions in a hospital setting dominated by biomedical practice. On a theoretical level, it is (...) argued that the concept of ‘participation’ is preferable to the concept ‘involvement’ in healthcare. The study shows that there are several interconnected areas for development: the structural frames of hospital practice, including professionals’ possibilities for handling patient participation, and the agency of the patients conducting their everyday lives when hospitalized. Consequences of the biomedical hegemony are discussed in relation to WHO ́s broader approach to disease, illness and health and the still existing postcolonial traces of power and hierarchy. Finally it is argued that patient participation during hospitalization will promote the patients ́ conduct of everyday life, the cultural knowledge of the professionals, and the democratization of the healthcare sector. Such changes might be connected to a more encompassing democratic societal development – in Greenland as well as globally. (shrink)

As screen-based virtual worlds have gradually begun facilitating more and more of our social interactions, some researchers have argued that the virtual worlds of these interactions do not allow for embodied social understanding. The aim of this article is to examine exactly the possibility of this by looking to esports practitioners’ experiences of interacting with each other during performance. By engaging in an integration of qualitative research methodologies and phenomenology, we investigate the actual first-person experiences of interaction in the virtual (...) worlds of the popular team-based esports practices Counter Strike: Global Offensive and League of Legends. Our analysis discloses how the practitioners’ interactions essentially depend on intercorporeality – understood as a form of reciprocity of bodily intentionality between the players. This is an intercorporeality that is present throughout the players’ performance, but which especially comes to the front when they engage in feinting. Acknowledging the intercorporeality integral to at least some esports practices helps fuzzying the sharp division between virtuality and embodied social understanding. Doing so highlights the fluidity of our embodied condition, and it raises interesting questions concerning the possibility of yet other forms of embodied sociality in a wider range of virtual formats in the world. (shrink)

De onmacht van deskundigen om de crisis te bezweren komt voort uit een deficiënte benadering van de problemen. Volgens kunstenaar en filosofe Tine Wilde is een Artistieke Wending nodig om complexe vraagstukken zoals de crisis op te kunnen lossen. In dit artikel pleit zij voor het toepassen van de intuïtieve aanpak die filosofen en kunstenaars hanteren, 'vertraagd onbewust nadenken'. In deze houding ligt de macht vervat, waarover in principe ieder van ons kan beschikken. Dit is een indirecte macht, die (...) langer nodig heeft om zich in een ongelofelijk complexe wereld te laten gelden, maar uiteindelijk veel ‘sterker’ en duurzamer is. (shrink)

This paper is concerned with English noun phrases that denote generalized instances: they do not refer to actual spatio-temporal instances, but to virtual ones that are abstracted from a limited number of actual instances, e.g., a student in Three times, a student complained (Langacker, Foundations of Cognitive Grammar. Volume II: Descriptive application, Stanford University Press, 1991, Dynamicity, fictivity, and scanning: The imaginative basis of logic and linguistic meaning, Cambridge University Press, 2005, forthcoming). Langacker likens generalized instances to generic ones, which (...) constitute “global” generalizations over all actual instances of a type. On the basis of authentic data, I argue that, even though the profiled instance denoted by generic and generalized noun phrases is similar, the way the respective instances are accessed in discourse is very different. My data set consists of English noun phrases that are explicitly marked for generalized instantiation by the addition of a secondary determiner such as same in The twin brothers bought the same car or kind of in There was no way we could match that kind of offer. I compare noun phrases of four sets of secondary determiners, viz. adjectives of multiple exposure (usual), of identity (same, identical), of similarity (similar, comparable) and type noun constructions (kind of/type of/sort of). These data also allow me to refine the concept of generalized instantiation in terms of its semantic subtypes, the semantic interaction between secondary determiner and primary determiner, and the selection criteria for secondary determiners that can express it. (shrink)

eSports practice designates a unique set of activities tethered to competitive, virtual environments, or worlds. This correlation between eSports practitioner and virtual world, we argue, is inadequately accounted for solely in terms of something physical or intellectual. Instead, we favor a perspective on eSports practice to be analyzed as a perceptual and embodied phenomenon. In this article, we present the phenomenological approach and focus on the embodied sensations of eSports practitioners as they cope with and perceive within their virtual worlds. (...) By approaching eSports phenomenologically, we uncover ways in which its unique forms of virtual involvement overlap with as well as differentiate themselves from traditional structures of embodiment. (shrink)

This paper is about one of the puzzles of bodily self-consciousness: can an experience be both and at the same time an experience of one′s physicality and of one′s subjectivity ? We will answer this question positively by determining a form of experience where the body′s physicality is experienced in a non-reifying manner. We will consider a form of experience of oneself as bodily which is different from both “prenoetic embodiment” and “pre-reflective bodily consciousness” and rather corresponds to a form (...) of reflective access to subjectivity at the bodily level. In particular, we argue that subjectivity is bodily expressed, thereby allowing the experience of the body′s subjectivity directly during perceptual experiences of the body. We use an interweaving of phenomenological explorations and ethnographical methods which allows validating this proposal by considering the experience of body experts (dancers). (shrink)

“Sometimes there is no other word but ‘beautiful’ to describe the evocation of the death of an otherwise insignificant warrior”. Buxton (2004, 151-152) refers to a group of similes and comparisons in Homeric death scenes that thus far has not been studied thoroughly. There is an abundance of dying scenes in the Homeric epics, especially in the “Iliad”, and in particular those illustrated by similes and comparisons add significant meaning to the plot. Similes and comparisons have various literary functions and (...) are often used as structuring elements in the narrative. Death similes are used to characterize the victim and aggressor during their fatal confrontation. By extension, they equally provide a characterization of death itself, which can be depicted from different points of view. Death can be seen as a natural part of the cycle of human life or, in the heroic war ideology, as an instrument to win glory. Many of the typically “Homeric” similes and comparisons used in death scenes have been imitated in later epics. Not only the bare images, but also the deeper message they can imply is often transferred to its new context. This paper describes the occurrence of death similes in the “Iliad” and “Odyssey” as a foundation for its reception in the “Posthomerica” of Quintus of Smyrna. This 3rd century AD epic provides a clear example of Homeric imitatio and aemulatio. Quintus’ typically Homeric style includes an abundant use of Homeric similes, also in dying scenes. In fact, similes prove to be even more frequently used for this purpose in the Posthomerica than in the Homeric epics. This study analyses Quintus’ rich reception of the Homeric death simile and its effects on the narrative structures of the Posthomerica. Although obviously inspired by Homer, Quintus’ use of death similes is further elaborated to support the plot by means of a linearly evolving characterization of both death and its aggressors and victims. This study therefore proposes an interpretation of the Posthomerica as an original literary composition. (shrink)

Acts of civil disobedience are undertaken in defense of a variety of causes ranging from banning GMO crops and prohibiting abortion to fighting inequality and saving the environment. Recently, Brownlee has argued that the merit of a cause is not relevant to the establishment of a moral right to civil disobedience. Instead, it is the fact that a dissenter believes his cause for protest to be morally right that is salient. We may term her and similar such theories belief-relative theories (...) of civil disobedience. In this paper, I first argue that Brownlee’s important argument from conscientious conviction fails in its aim to establish a belief-relative moral right to civil disobedience. I then provide a more general argument that no purely belief-relative theory of civil disobedience grounded in a basic moral value will be tenable. Any moral warrant of civil disobedience that is derived from a value must be limited by the value from which it is derived, as well as by other similarly weighty values. If the moral warrant of civil disobedience is derived from the value of autonomy, then the warrant does not extend to acts of civil disobedience that violate the autonomy of others, or other similarly weighty values. Furthermore, granting a right to disobey in promotion of a grossly unjust view is problematic because civil disobedience ought to serve the role of promoting justice. (shrink)

The experience of grace is currently attracting increased empirical interest. Validated instruments to assess aspects of the experience of grace in a secularized context are scarce which limits current psychological research on grace in other than highly religious populations. We present a bottom-up construction of the Experiencing Grace Scale (EGS) and evidence supporting its reliability and validity. Confirmatory factor analysis showed a good fit for the four subscales: Appraising Grace, Giving Grace, Receiving Grace, and Divine Grace. Reliability analysis showed overall (...) good internal consistency and test–retest stability. Convergent validity was demonstrated by means of expected associations between subscales of the EGS and other relevant measures. Predictive validity was confirmed by associations between subscales of the EGS at measurement Wave 1 with mental well-being scales at Wave 2. The EGS contributes to further research on the experience of grace and its relationship to other psychosocial variables in the field of positive psychology. (shrink)

knj. 1. Brentano -- Heidegger -- Husserl -- knj. 2. Heidegger -- Levinas-Lacan -- Derrida.

The organizational theory literature is reasonably unanimous that team autonomy is a key factor for employee well-being and motivation as well as organizational performance. However, team autonomy is challenged when its processes and outputs need to be aligned with actors and factors external to a team. There are likely challenges and conflicts between team autonomy and the need for coherence in the wider system. Team autonomy has a range of implications and is challenged by a number of factors, such as (...) knowledge complexity and decision-making, learning, large-scale problems, product and technical interdependencies, the use of platforms, virtual collaboration and diversity. Alignment with the external is particularly necessary in multi-team environments with many technical interdependencies, where a single team’s failure to deliver a sufficient level of quality may lead to system-wide consequences. Therefore, teams in complex environments increasingly need to regulate and manage their work in cooperation with internal and external partners and systems. Such dependencies challenge team autonomy. In this special issue of AI&S, we want to address these topics in more detail, particularly in the context of software-intensive organizations and digital transformations. The scope and, thus, the consequences of a team’s work can be far-reaching when the team’s effort and output take place partially or completely in fully digitized contexts and processes. The articles in this special issue show various ways of dealing with the challenge of balancing autonomy and alignment with the external. A key focus is to show the buffering function: how teams, with the help of processes, technology, new organizational forms and time and space are able to find the buffer needed for maintaining team autonomy. (shrink)

Publication Zero Point shows the results of a four-years inquiry into the concept of 'measurability'. The book encompasses thirty-eight pictureworks and a philosophical thought experiment. It invites the reader to contemplate and compile their personal 'zero point' as a portrait of God. -/- Measurability appears to be a problematic concept. The boundaries between fixed and fluid; between sharp and vague; between coloured and non-coloured; between love and hate. When does one state of affairs turn into the other? When is something (...) still measurable? And: is it essential for something to be measurable at all? -/- A single drinking glass was the starting point for transformational processes of photographic images into multi-layered pictureworks. Pictorial spaces that are variable and subject to chance in an experimental, unconscious method of choice, chance, inspiration, and demolition. The results of split, remodel, and repeat invite you to explore and contemplate the notions of space and time as a dimension, in which meaning remains something definitely unfinished, but in which measurability is crucial. After all, when there is nothing to hold on to, you have to choose a point of departure from which you can reorganise your life. -/- There are several ways to leaf through the book and engage in its content. Each of the thirty-eight pictureworks is accompanied by a philosophical caption. These captions are part of a larger philosophical deliberation of three countenances which together make a portrait of God. Each caption can be read separately next to the picturework. Each picturework can be enjoyed next to a specific caption. Another way to work with the captions is to read them within their larger con text: unfold the last page of the book, reflect, and search for cross-references next to any particular picturework. (shrink)

“One who elects to serve mankind by taking the law into his own hands thereby demonstrates his conviction that his own ability to determine policy is superior to democratic decision making. [Defendants’] professed unselfish motivation, rather than a justification, actually identifies a form of arrogance which organized society cannot tolerate.” Those were the words of Justice Harris L. Hartz at the sentencing hearing of three nuns convicted of trespassing and vandalizing government property to demonstrate against U.S. foreign policy. Citizens engaging (...) in civil disobedience are indeed at times accused of being arrogant because they apparently think their own political judgment is superior to that of the democratic majority. This paper examines and evaluates the claim that dissenters are epistemically arrogant. Contrary to the dominant viewpoint in the literature, I argue that epistemic arrogance involves inflating the epistemic worth of one’s view. Indeed, the most plausible charge against civil dissenters consists of two claims: (A) civil dissenters have a higher degree of rational certainty in P than is warranted, and (B) civil dissenters use a method of expression that requires a higher level of rational certainty than is warranted in the propositions that their political view is right and the injustice they fight is substantial. I argue that civil disobedience does not necessarily involve epistemic arrogance. Whether an act of civil disobedience evinces epistemic arrogance has to be determined on a case-by-case basis depending on the extent to which each dissenter lives up to (A) and (B). (shrink)

This study explored 12 cancer patients’ experiences from participating in an online and on-site Shared Reading group for 16 weeks in Norway. Shared Reading is a practice in which prose and poetry are read aloud in small parts and discussed along the way. The study is a qualitative evaluation study with a particular focus on how the participants experienced the reading group supported their life living with cancer. The study was mainly based on the data collected from focus group discussions (...) with the participants, which was analysed qualitatively through open coding. In total, four themes were identified: open space, disconnecting through connecting, community, and resonances and echoes. The participants expressed that the RG helped them to “balance life and cancer”, and “disconnect” from their illness. The cognitive effort needed was beneficial for the participants as a form for “cognitive training.” Since many of the participants had, due to their illness, completely stopped reading books, the reading group also brought literature back into the participants’ lives. Furthermore, it was essential for the participants to feel they contributed to a community, to feel useful and valuable for others. The texts were also important, as some of them resonated strongly with the participants in the way of activating memories and connecting a text to own experiences. After a session, a text could still have an impact as an echo. The results are synthesised, discussed, and supported through the framework of self-determination theory and, more specifically, the basic psychological need theory. The reading group was experienced as a support for autonomy, competence, and relatedness and promoted a feeling of intrinsic motivation that brought about new dimensions in the participants’ lives. The study wishes to increase our knowledge of the benefits of integrating Shared Reading groups as a low-cost, literature-based psychosocial support in cancer organisations. (shrink)

This article analyses the micro dynamics of agency represented in the life story of a Mexican right-wing female politician — particularly how agency manifests itself in the way she repeats the rhetorical structures of her party’s discourse. Although claiming to be a modern woman, a high ranking political participant, she repeatedly refers to the traditional ideal of motherhood that also figures prominently in the right-wing party to which she belongs. Still, at some point, she goes beyond merely repeating the dominant (...) discourse in constructing her own political subjectivity. In tracking her life story, the micro dynamics of her agency are explored through text and discourse analysis in which intertextuality and intersectionality of gender are instrumental. An attempt is made to overcome framing agency in the dichotomy between compliance and resistance. In doing so, the article also engages in recent debate on agency in European Journal of Women’s Studies. (shrink)

Inspired by an institutional logics approach, this article analyzes the barriers to and drivers of the integration of social media in the communication practices in Norwegian ministries. Drawing on rich ethnographic data, the paper analyzes the process of integrating social media logic into government communication units that were largely organized through a news media regime. To understand the process, it emphasizes four dimensions: how the symbolic resources, material resources, formal rules and practices have defined the logics of government communication in (...) the period studied (May 2015–May 2016). The analysis meets the call for more empirical investigation into the interplay between the traditional news logics and new digital logics. (shrink)

The present study investigates the influence of self-regulatory focus on consumer ethical beliefs (i.e., consumers' judgment of various unethical consumer practices). The self-regulatory focus framework is highly influential and applies to an impressively wide spectrum of topics across a diverse array of domains. However, previous research has not yet examined the link between this personality construct and the consumer ethics field. Findings indicate that promotion affects one's attitude toward questionable consumer practices with those having a stronger (versus weaker) promotion focus (...) being more likely to believe these consumer misbehaviors to be acceptable. Further, this study shows that prevention influences one's perception of morally dubious consumer practices with those having a stronger (versus weaker) prevention focus being more inclined to believe these questionable consumer activities to be unacceptable. (shrink)