Management practices are at the heart of most organizations’ sustainability efforts. Despite the importance of values for the design and implementation of such practices, few researchers have analyzed how human values, particularly ethical values, relate to human resource management practices in organizations. The purpose of this conceptual paper is to integrate scholarship on organizational sustainability, human resource practices, and values in delineating how four specific values—altruism, empathy, positive norm of reciprocity, and private self-effacement—support effective human resource practices in organizations. This (...) set of distinct values has sustainability implications, global relevance, and ethical significance. Propositions that indicate relationships among these values, human resource practices, and organizational sustainability, as well as the effects of the resource-based view to potentiate these relationships, are developed. This analysis suggests that ethical and multicultural values are important for planning and implementing effective management practices and organizational sustainability. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Theorizing Chinese Masculinity: Society and Gender in ChinaKwai-Cheung LoTheorizing Chinese Masculinity: Society and Gender in China. By Kam Louie. Cam-bridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. 239. Hardcover U.S. $60.00.In Theorizing Chinese Masculinity: Society and Gender in China Kam Louie offers us a very clear and concise analysis of the cultural models of Chinese masculinity from ancient imperial times to the present age of transnational contact. Although academic (...) works on Chinese masculinity are not totally absent, systematic and thorough historical surveys of this topic are still rare. While gender studies of China are predominantly on femininity or other women-related issues, man as a gendered category has long escaped serious academic attention. Louie's book could be considered a pioneering effort to provide a rather comprehensive study of this subject. Besides describing in detail the historical development of the male image from premodern to contemporary times, Louie also focuses on the ways in which Chinese men have been represented under the Western gaze and how these representations have negotiated with the dominant Western culture.The fundamental structure of masculinity in China, according to Louie, operates according to the two poles of wen (literary attainment, cultural knowledge, the mental) and wu (martial valor, martial arts, the physical), which are far more complementary than antagonistic, although the wen polarity has always been prioritized over wu in the conventional Chinese mindset. wen maleness is exemplified by Confucius, the sage of the gentleman-scholar type, whereas Guan Yu, the God of War, represents the wu masculine ideal. These two archetypes of Chinese masculinity [End Page 497] converge in the stern observance of moral demands, self-restraint, and a resistance or even a misogynistic attitude to the faults associated with femininity (i.e., sexual pleasure, comfort, and loss of virility) in order to pursue lofty forms of justice and homosocial binding. The recent popularity of Hong Kong martial arts films in the West may help Western readers become accustomed to the traditional Chinese idea that the ideal balance of wen and wu places emphasis on strategy and learning as a means of avoiding the use of violence. Louie repeatedly asserts that, in the Chinese cultural context, all men by definition have some wen and/or some wu, thus negating a simplified dichotomy.The highest ideal of Chinese maleness is that of a single individual who can demonstrate at the highest level the cultural credentials and physical skills of wen and wu. That is to say, the great man who can hold a brush in his right hand and a sword or some other weapon in his left, demonstrating prowess in both kinds of effort. But in terms of their sex appeal, it is always the softer, cerebral, scholarly men of wen who are more attractive to Chinese women than their macho, brawny opposite. Other than analyzing the heterosexual relationships of Chinese manhood, Louie also provocatively suggests that brotherhood and passions between men are never simply homosocial but can have sexual implications. He supports this claim by making reference to many classical texts that depict men sleeping together, leading to strong emotional attachments and jealousy, as if they were in a romantic or erotic liaison. What distinguishes Louie's wen/wu duality from the conventional yin/yang binary opposition (which is also an artificial difference that defines the Chinese male in relation to Western men and reinforces the stereotype of a feminized Chinese masculinity) is that he believes his dyad of Chinese masculinity to be more resilient, flexible, and adaptable to historical change, hybridizing with Western culture while simultaneously exerting its own global influence on non-Chinese cultures.Covering a vast range of historical and contemporary materials and a variety of genres, from classical philosophy to traditional vernacular fiction (e.g., The Romance of the Three Kingdoms and The Water Margin), through Lao She's early twentieth-century novel The Two Mas, the subversive portrayals of men by modern Chinese women writers, to contemporary Hong Kong action cinema—all in a relatively slim volume—Louie is at his best, for example, when observing and depicting character, but he is not so good at analyzing his texts on a... (shrink)

In a 1988 study, James T. C. Liu used the phrase "China turning inward" to characterize the shift from Northern Song to Southern Song intellectual traditions, especially the intellectual lineage from Cheng Yi 程頤 to Zhu Xi 朱熹.1 Building upon Professor Liu's characterization, I will explore more specifically how the Way turned toward greater emphasis on inner self-cultivation as daoxue 道學....

In this study, we examined the role of culture on early adolescents’ social reasoning about peer exclusion. A total of 80 U.S. and 149 Taiwanese early adolescents independently completed a social reasoning essay about peer exclusion. Analyses of the essays based on social-moral theories showed that U.S. students tended to reason about peer exclusion based on social conventional thinking whereas Taiwanese students were more attentive to personal and moral issues. Despite this difference, both groups of students referred to some common (...) social-moral concepts while reasoning about peer exclusion, including consideration of personal benefit, harming others’ welfare, personal concern, and punishment. The use of social reasoning strategies was similar across the two groups of students except that Taiwanese students relied more on judgment whereas U.S. students generated more alternative hypotheses. (shrink)

Two experiments were conducted to examine adult learners' ability to extract multiple statistics in simultaneously presented visual and auditory input. Experiment 1 used a cross‐situational learning paradigm to test whether English speakers were able to use co‐occurrences to learn word‐to‐object mappings and concurrently form object categories based on the commonalities across training stimuli. Experiment 2 replicated the first experiment and further examined whether speakers of Mandarin, a language in which final syllables of object names are more predictive of category membership (...) than English, were able to learn words and form object categories when trained with the same type of structures. The results indicate that both groups of learners successfully extracted multiple levels of co‐occurrence and used them to learn words and object categories simultaneously. However, marked individual differences in performance were also found, suggesting possible interference and competition in processing the two concurrent streams of regularities. (shrink)

Assess to quality diets is a basic human right. Geographical challenges and cultural traditions have contributed to the widespread malnutrition present among ethnic minorities of mountainous areas in Northwest Vietnam. Home gardens can play a role in increased diet diversity and micronutrient intakes. However, low production yields and plant diversity in ethnic home gardens have limited their contributions to household food security and nutrition. The pilot study tested a home garden intervention in weekly vegetable harvests and increasing household production and (...) consumption of diverse vegetables year-round. Food ethics issues encountered included limited access to quality food by resource-poor groups, conflicts arising from low preference and value given to some nutritious foods, limited access to information and technology for food production and consumption, each of which were addressed in the study design. The intervention includes: (1) nutrition-focused home garden training and (2) locally-adapted home garden packages consisting of garden planning, technical assistance, and high-yielding seed varieties. Twenty households from two ethnic villages in Son La province participated in the study and were randomly assigned into two groups (intervention and non-intervention). The total vegetable supply from weekly harvests of home garden produce was significantly higher in the intervention households (226 kg) compared to the non-intervention households (39 kg). The intervention group yielded 5.8 and 1.7 times more vegetables by weight and weight per area than those without the intervention. The vegetables were mainly consumed at home for both groups, but the intervention households gave more vegetables as gifts to neighbors. The intervention group cultivated a higher diversity of vegetables with a total of 42 different vegetables compared to 24 in the non-intervention group, which is reflected in an overall higher nutritional yield of vitamin A, iron, other micronutrients and phytochemicals. The home garden training significantly improved the amount, diversity and continuity of household food and nutrient supply. The home garden model is effective and could be scaled up to improve household vegetable supply and consumption, particularly in Northwest Vietnam. (shrink)

Accumulating evidence for the unique social, behavioral, and physical health benefits of positive emotion and related well-being constructs has led to the development and testing of positive psychological interventions to increase emotional well-being and enhance health promotion and disease prevention. PPIs are specifically aimed at improving emotional well-being and consist of practices such as gratitude, savoring, and acts of kindness. The purpose of this narrative review was to examine the literature on PPIs with a particular focus on positive emotion outcomes. (...) We evaluated the evidence on the effects of PPIs on positive emotion specifically, and discussed the range of evidence regarding the relative responsiveness of emotion measures to PPIs in order to gain a better understanding of the specific emotional pathways through which PPIs influence psychological and physical well-being. We conclude with recommendations for best evaluating effects of PPIs on positive emotion outcomes. (shrink)

This paper analyzes the impacts of index inclusions and exclusions on corporate sustainable firms by studying a sample of US stocks that are added to or deleted from the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index over the period 2002-2008. The impacts are measured in terms of stock return, risk and liquidity. We cannot find any strong evidence that announcement per se has any significant impact on stock return and risk. However, on the day of change, index inclusion (exclusion) stocks experience a (...) significant but temporary increase (decrease) in stock return. Liquidity deteriorates after the announcement day and bounces back significantly near the day of change. Systematic risk shows little change after announcements. But, idiosyncratic risk is higher after announcements. The overall results support Harris and Eitan's (The Journal of Finance 41(4), 815-829, 1986) price pressure hypothesis, which posits that event announcement does not carry information and any shift in demand (and hence the corresponding price change and liquidity change) is temporary. (shrink)

Psychedelics such as psilocybin reliably produce significantly altered states of consciousness with a variety of subjectively experienced effects. These include certain changes to perception, cognition, and affect,1 which we refer to here as the acute subjective effects of psychedelics. In recent years, psychedelics such as psilocybin have also shown considerable promise as therapeutic agents when combined with talk therapy, for example, in the treatment of major depression or substance use disorder.2 However, it is currently unclear whether the aforementioned acute subjective (...) effects are necessary to bring about the observed therapeutic effects of psilocybin and other psychedelics. This uncertainty has sparked a lively—though still largely hypothetical—debate on whether psychedelics without subjective effects (“nonsubjective psychedelics” or “non-hallucinogenic psychedelics”) could still have the same therapeutic impact, or whether the acute subjective effects are in fact necessary for this impact to be fully realized.3,4,5. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Psychedelics, including psilocybin, and other consciousness-altering compounds such as 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), currently are being scientifically investigated for their potential therapeutic uses, with a primary focus on measurable outcomes: for example, alleviation of symptoms or increases in self-reported well-being. Accordingly, much recent discussion about the possible value of these substances has turned on estimates of the magnitude and duration of persisting positive effects in comparison to harms. However, many have described the value of a psychedelic experience with little or no reference (...) to such therapeutic benefits, instead seeming to find the experience valuable in its own right. How can we make sense of such testimony? Could a psychedelic experience be valuable even if there were no persisting beneficial effects? If so, how? Using the concept of psychological richness, combined with insights from the philosophy of aesthetics and the enhancement literature, this essay explores potential sources of value in the acute subjective experience, apart from the value derived from persisting beneficial effects. (shrink)

Anticipated nostalgia is a new construct that has received limited empirical attention. It concerns the anticipation of having nostalgic feelings for one’s present and future experiences. In three...

As the USA contends with another surge in COVID-19 cases, hospitals may soon need to answer the unresolved question of who lives and dies when ventilator demand exceeds supply. Although most triage policies in the USA have seemingly converged on the use of clinical need and benefit as primary criteria for prioritisation, significant differences exist between institutions in how to assign priority to patients with identical medical prognoses: the so-called ‘tie-breaker’ situations. In particular, one’s status as a frontline healthcare worker (...) has been a proposed criterion for prioritisation in the event of a tie. This article outlines two major grounds for reconsidering HCW prioritisation. The first recognises trust as an indispensable element of clinical care and mistrust as a hindrance to any public health strategy against the virus, thus raising concerns about the outward appearance of favouritism. The second considers the ways in which proponents of HCW prioritisation deviate from the very ‘ethics frameworks’ that often preface triage policies and serve to guide resource allocation—a rhetorical strategy that may undermine the very ethical foundations on which triage policies stand. By appealing to trust and consistency, we re-examine existing arguments in favour of HCW prioritisation and provide a more tenable justification for adjudicating on tie-breaker events during crisis standards of care. (shrink)

Literature on ethical behavior has paid little attention to the mechanism between macro-environmental variables and environmental performance. This study aims at constructing a model to examine the relationships which link cultural values, population growth, economic development, and environmental performance by incorporating the mediating role of education. The multiple linear regression model was employed to test the hypotheses on a 3-year-pooled sample of 51 countries. Empirical results conclude that national culture, economic development, and population growth would significantly influence environmental performance directly. (...) In addition, through the mediating effect of education, population growth and national culture would significantly affect environmental performance indirectly. These findings provide theoretical and managerial implications for constructing the mechanism of cultural values and ethical behavior in general and environmental management in particular. (shrink)

The law applicable to genomics in the United States is currently in transition and under debate. The rapid evolution of the science, burgeoning clinical research, and growing clinical application pose serious challenges for federal and state law. Although there has been some empirical work in this area, this is the first paper to survey and interview key scientific and legal stakeholders in the field of genomics to help ground identification of the most important legal problems that must be solved to (...) successfully integrate genomics into clinical care. The respondents in this study identified a wide range of interconnected issues, focusing specifically on the need for clear guidelines about how to use these data, fear of liability for those who use these data, and the need to protect patients from use of this information particularly by insurers, while endorsing data sharing. Developing legal strategies to support appropriate use of genomics now and in the future clearly will require making trade-offs, taking into account the full complexity of this legal ecosystem. (shrink)

The Einstein-de Broglie soliton concept is applied to simulate stationary states of an electron in a hydrogen atom. According to this concept, the electron is described by the localized regular solutions to some nonlinear equations. It is shown that the electron-solilon center travels along some stationary orbit around the Coulomb center. The electromagnetic radiation is absent as the Poynting vector has non-wave asymptote O(r −3)after averaging over angles.

Customer citizenship behavior has attracted widespread attention from scholars due to its capacity of enabling enterprises to gain competitive advantages of low costs and high efficiency by giving full play to the initiative of customers. Based on the S-O-R Model, we have established the theoretical model to study the influence imposed by social support of online travel platform enterprises on customer citizenship behavior against the backdrop of the sharing economy. This research tests the fitting of the theoretical model and its (...) fundamental hypotheses using 626 samples acquired from the investigation with SPSS26.0 and AMOS25.0. Results indicate that the social support has a positive influence on customer citizenship behavior. Social support could have a positive influence on positive emotions. Social support has no significant negative effect on negative emotions. Positive emotions have a positive influence on customer citizenship behavior. Negative emotions have a negative influence on customer citizenship behavior. Positive emotions play a mediating effect in the positive influence of social support on customer citizenship behavior. Social support could have a positive influence on customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction has a positive influence on customer citizenship behavior. Customer satisfaction plays a mediating effect in the positive effect of social support on customer citizenship behavior. Positive emotions and customer satisfaction play a chain mediating effect in the positive effect of social support on customer citizenship behavior. (shrink)

Atomic-scale computer simulation has been used to study the thermally activated atomic transport of self-interstitial atoms in the form of planar clusters in pure Cu and f -Fe. There is strong evidence that such clusters are commonly formed in metals during irradiation with high-energy particles and play an important role in accumulation and spatial distribution of surviving defects. An extensive study of the mobility of SIA clusters containing two to 331 interstitials has been carried out using the molecular dynamics simulation (...) technique for the temperature range from 180 to 1200 K. The results obtained show that clusters larger than three to four SIAs are one-dimensionally mobile in both Cu and Fe. Large clusters of more than 100 SIAs in Cu and 300 SIAs in Fe have significantly reduced mobility. The problem of describing one-dimensional motion in three-dimensional space is discussed. An attempt is made to describe the mobility of SIA clusters within the approximation of 1D diffusion. For clusters in both metals the effective migration energy of 1D diffusion as estimated via the jump frequency of the cluster centre of mass is found to be independent of the number of SIAs in the clusters, although the cluster jump frequency decreases with increasing cluster size. Mechanisms of 1D mobility of interstitial clusters are discussed. (shrink)

This study examines the spontaneous use of embodied egocentric transformation in understanding false beliefs in the minds of others. EET involves the participants mentally transforming or rotating themselves into the orientation of an agent when trying to adopt his or her visuospatial perspective. We argue that psychological perspective taking such as false belief reasoning may also involve EET because of what has been widely reported in the embodied cognition literature, showing that our processing of abstract, propositional information is often grounded (...) in concrete bodily sensations which are not apparently linked to higher cognition. In Experiment 1, an agent placed a ball into one of two boxes and left. The ball then rolled out and moved either into the other box or back into the original one. The participants were to decide from which box they themselves or the agent would try to recover the ball. Results showed that false belief performance was affected by increased orientation disparity between the participants and the agent, suggesting involvement of embodied transformation. In Experiment 2, false belief was similarly induced and the participants were to decide if the agent would try to recover the ball in one specific box. Orientation disparity was again found to affect false belief performance. The present results extend previous findings on EET in visuospatial perspective taking and suggest that false belief reasoning, which is a kind of psychological perspective taking, can also involve embodied rotation, consistent with the embodied cognition view. (shrink)

The eleventh-century Indian Buddhist master Ratnākaraśānti presents a unique Yogācāra interpretation of tantric _maṇḍala_ visualisation in the _*Guhyasamājamaṇḍalavidhiṭīkā_. In this text, he employs the neither-one-nor-many argument to assert that the qualities of the mind represented by the deities in the _maṇḍala_ are neither the same nor different from the mind itself. He also provides five scenarios of meditation to explain the necessity of practising both the perfection method (_pāramitānaya_) and the mantra method (_mantranaya_) together in Mahāyāna. Ratnākaraśānti’s explanation exerts a (...) significant influence on the works of later Buddhist masters in India and Tibet, with parts of it being reused in the _*Śrīherukopadeśanāmasvādhiṣṭhānakrama_ by Śūnyasamādhivajra (c. the eleventh century), the eighteenth chapter of the _Āmnāyamañjarī_ by Abhayākaragupta (from the late eleventh to the twelfth century) and the tantric compendium _sNgags rim chen mo_ by the Tibetan master Tsong kha pa Blo bzang grags pa (1357–1419). This paper explores how Ratnākaraśānti’s explanation has been reused and modified in these subsequent works. While Śūnyasamādhivajra faithfully reproduced Ratnākaraśānti’s Yogācāra explanation, Abhayākaragupta modified it to align with his Madhyamaka view. Abhayākaragupta in turn influenced Tsong kha pa, who accepted Abhayākaragupta’s Madhyamaka modification in his works. This paper also engages with current scholarly discussions on textual reuse and the underlying reasons behind it. While Śūnyasamādhivajra and Abhayākaragupta assimilated Ratnākaraśānti’s explanation without acknowledgement, Tsong kha pa quoted the text by name and acknowledged Abhayākaragupta’s reuse of Ratnākaraśānti’s explanation. This paper concludes by discussing the factors that determine whether the reused text is acknowledged or not, and the possible reasons behind textual reuse. (shrink)

A SEM-based approach using likelihood-based confidence interval has been proposed to form confidence intervals for unstandardized and standardized indirect effect in mediation models. However, when used with the maximum likelihood estimation, this approach requires that the variables are multivariate normally distributed. This can affect the LBCIs of unstandardized and standardized effect differently. In the present study, the robustness of this approach when the predictor is not normally distributed but the error terms are conditionally normal, which does not violate the distributional (...) assumption of ordinary least squares estimation, is compared to four other approaches: nonparametric bootstrapping, two variants of LBCI, LBCI assuming the predictor is fixed and LBCI based on ADF estimation, and Monte Carlo. A simulation study was conducted using a simple mediation model and a serial mediation model, manipulating the distribution of the predictor. The Monte Carlo method performed worst among the methods. LBCI and LBCI-Fixed-X had suboptimal performance when the distributions had high kurtosis and the population indirect effects were medium to large. In some conditions, the problem was severe even when the sample size was large. LBCI-ADF and nonparametric bootstrapping had coverage probabilities close to the nominal value in nearly all conditions, although the coverage probabilities were still suboptimal for the serial mediation model when the sample size was small with respect to the model. Implications of these findings in the context of this special case of nonnormal data were discussed. (shrink)

Academic resilience is evident in students who are living in vulnerable environments, yet achieve success in academic outcomes. As a result, substantial attention has been devoted to identifying the factors associated with academic resilience and supporting students to be resilient. This study used the Classification and Regression Tree and Multilevel Logistic Regression modeling to identify the potential factors related to students’ academic resilience. Using these tools, the study analyzed the B-S-J-G sample in PISA 2015. The variables that significantly predicted whether (...) a student is disadvantaged and resilient or not resilient were shown to be: Proportion of teachers in school with master’s degrees, Proportion of teachers in school with bachelor’s degrees, Environmental awareness, Science learning time per week, Number of learning domains with additional instruction, and Students’ expected occupational status. These findings may enlighten governments, teachers, and parents on ways to assist students to be resilient. (shrink)

Hick’s soul-making theodicy defends the omnipotence, omniscience, and all-goodness of God in the face of evil. It holds that the end of the creation process is the development of human beings into children of God. In order to achieve the end, an evil-dependent soul-making process must be employed. It then concludes that, because the end is so valuable, the omnipotent and omniscient creator’s not having prevented the existence of evil is morally justified and thus not in conflict with her being (...) all-good. In particular, God’s having created a world with evils and evil-dependent values, which may be called “an Irenaean world,” is morally justified. In the Zhuangzi, Zhuangzi holds that the actual world is, in reality, a world without evils and evil-dependent values, but with evil-independent values, which may be called “a Zhuangzian world,” while ordinary people mistakenly take the actual world to be an Irenaean world. In an insightful story in the Chapter “The Great and Venerable Teacher” of the Zhuangzi, he amounts to claiming that a Zhuangzian world is better than an Irenaean world. Without endorsing Zhuangzi’s two positions, I argue against Hick’s soul-making theodicy in this way: It is Hick’s burden to prove either that a Zhuangzian world is metaphysically impossible, or that the actual world, as an Irenaean world, is better than any Zhuangzian world. However, there are not any resources in his soul-making theodicy that can provide any such proofs. Therefore, Hick has not justified, nor rationally established, his soul-making theodicy. (shrink)

This study investigated the effect of ACEs and COVID-19 on grit and whether this effect is mediated by mindfulness. Although current scholarship has found that adverse childhood experiences have harmful consequences to individuals across the life span, less is known about the relationship between ACEs and grit. Grit is predictive of educational success and subjective wellbeing. A cross-sectional online survey administered to junior and senior students from 12 universities spread across China was conducted from September 20, 2020 to October 5, (...) 2020. The universities were selected from geographically diverse regions of China to ensure a diverse sample. We received 1,871 completed responses from 2,229 invited students. The survey response rate was 83.9%. The results indicated that ACEs had significantly negative effects on grit, while mindfulness had significantly positive effects on grit. Once controlling for level of mindfulness, the effects of ACEs on grit largely reduced and became insignificant. The findings of this research indicate that mindfulness has a significant mediational effect on the relation between ACEs and grit and call for mindfulness-based interventions for enhancing grit for the population at risks. (shrink)

With the increasing popularity of the Internet, email marketing has become a convenient and dynamic mode of communication that enables business organizations and personal sellers to promote their products or services at a much lower cost and with a potentially more global reach. This article aims to examine the impact of new media on the encoding of persuasive messages in sales emails as a channel of direct marketing, and the extent to which the use of new media influences the overall (...) interactional or social strategy of credibility enhancement and persuasion in the context of sales promotion. A genre analysis based on a modified move scheme proposed in this study was conducted on 160 sales letters randomly selected from a database of 10,972 sales letters collected from 36 categories of recipients in Hong Kong over a six-month period. Similarities and differences in discourse structures were found across the two corpora, and discussions were made with reference to a conceptual framework titled the Lingual-Belief Interaction Model proposed by the author. The model addresses the role of text, context, and interface in sales email study on the one hand, and the interplay of belief, interaction, and language in persuasive communication on the other. In-depth interviews were conducted with 16 specialist and corporate informants in the field of sales promotion communication to verify the results of analysis. (shrink)

The home learning environment includes what parents do to stimulate children’s literacy and numeracy skills at home and their overall beliefs and attitudes about children’s learning. The home literacy and numeracy environments are two of the most widely discussed aspects of the home learning environment, and past studies have identified how socioeconomic status and parents’ own abilities and interest in these domains also play a part in shaping children’s learning experiences. However, these studies are mostly from the West, and there (...) has been little focus on the situation of homes in Asia, which captures a large geographical area and a wide diversity of social, ethnic, and linguistic groups. Therefore, this paper aims to review extant studies on the home literacy and numeracy environments that have been conducted in different parts of Asia, such as China, the Philippines, India, Iran, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates. Specifically, we explore how parents in these places perceive their roles in children’s early literacy and numeracy development, the methods they regard as effective for promoting young children’s literacy and numeracy learning, and the frequency with which they engage their young children in different types of home literacy and numeracy activities. We also examine studies on the relationship of the home literacy and numeracy environment with young children’s developmental outcomes, and the effectiveness of parent training programs to improve the home literacy and numeracy environments in these contexts. By examining potential trends in findings obtained in different geographical areas, we can initially determine whether there are characteristics that are potentially unique to contexts in Asia. We propose future research directions that acknowledge the role of cultural values and social factors in shaping the home learning environment, and, by extension, in facilitating children’s early literacy and numeracy development. (shrink)

In this age of new media, children are exposed to media messages at an early age. What can we do when the mass media exert such a great influence on children? One proposal has been for the introduction of a new school subject: media education. Though media education has not been part of the official curriculum in Hong Kong, some schools, both primary and secondary, have tried it out. This paper argues for the desirability of introducing media education in primary (...) schools in Hong Kong, with regard to social change, recent education reform and learning initiatives of primary pupils. It then draws on the findings of a study conducted in a local primary school to examine the views of pupils, parents, and teachers on the effects on pupils of the implementation of media education lessons and campus radio projects in this age of new media. (shrink)

In Chinese orthography, the most common character structure consists of a semantic radical on the left and a phonetic radical on the right ; the minority, opposite arrangement also exists. Recent studies showed that SP character processing is more left hemisphere lateralized than PS character processing. Nevertheless, it remains unclear whether this is due to phonetic radical position or character type frequency. Through computational modeling with artificial lexicons, in which we implement a theory of hemispheric asymmetry in perception but do (...) not assume phonological processing being LH lateralized, we show that the difference in character type frequency alone is sufficient to exhibit the effect that the dominant type has a stronger LH lateralization than the minority type. This effect is due to higher visual similarity among characters in the dominant type than the minority type, demonstrating the modulation of visual similarity of words on hemispheric lateralization. (shrink)

Schizophrenia has been investigated predominately from psychological, psychiatric and neurobiological perspectives. This book is unique in examining it from a philosophical point of view. It should appeal to every reader who wants to better understand this major mental illness, providing unique insights into the 'experience' of schizophrenia.

Since the 1980s Disney has opened a new overseas theme park every decade. After finding success in Tokyo in 1983, subsequent parks in Paris and Hong Kong have struggled to profit financially and connect culturally with locals. For Shanghai in 2016, Disney utilized a new discourse for the parkʼs development and configuration termed “authentically Disney, distinctly Chinese.” In this paper, Disneyʼs emotional branding strategy for Shanghai Disneyland is analyzed using a framework of five antecedents for creating affective attachment to brands. (...) In addition, the pragmatics of the dyadic phrase and the intertextuality of the parkʼs composition demonstrate that unlike previous international Disneylands, Disney blurred and removed cultural and contextual references to America from Shanghai in an effort to achieve resonance with Chinese visitors. The result is Chinaʼs Disneyland, not Disneyland in China. Though Shanghaiʼs revenue and attendance figures are good so far, Disney will likely face challenges to its new emotional branding strategy from within China and the US. (shrink)

William Rowe has put forward four popular evidential arguments from evil. I argue that there was already a prominent distinction between logical and evidential arguments from evil—the IN-IM-distinction, and that its adoption leads to two important results. First, all three non-Bayesian evidential arguments are actually not evidential but logical, while the Bayesian evidential argument genuinely evidential. Second, and most importantly, Rowe’s Bayesian evidential argument is redundant, in the sense that it has the same diculties his three non-Bayesian arguments have. His (...) move from the three earlier non-Bayesian arguments to the Bayesian argument is futile. (shrink)

Thomas Fröhlich's book has made an important contribution to Tang Junyi scholarship. It is probably the most systematic study of Tang's philosophical thought in English so far. While there are a number of pioneering works in English that have touched upon various aspects of Tang's philosophy, Fröhlich's is a fully-fledged monograph dedicated to the study of Tang in a comprehensive manner. It covers, among other things, the ideas of mind and nature in Tang's thought, his civil theology, moral vision, cultural (...) conservatism, his philosophical ideas on history, politics and the demonic aspects of the political, and his... (shrink)

Ernest Sosa has proposed at least three responses to the dream argument for skepticism in his writings in the past decade. The first and the main purpose of this paper is to critically examine the three Sosaian responses, as well as a Wittgensteinian response Sosa would endorse, by investigating whether they can refute the six different versions of the dream argument found in a passage in the Zhuangzi. The second purpose of this paper is exactly to offer an exposition of (...) the passage in the Zhuangzi so as to show that there were already sophisticated versions of the dream argument in ancient China. The main results of the critical examination are as follows. For four of the six versions of the dream argument found in the Zhuangzi, each of them can be refuted by either the Wittgensteinian response or one of the three Sosaian responses. With respect to the remaining two versions of the dream argument, one of them can be refuted partially by two of Sosa’s responses. First, that version of the dream argument can be refuted by one of Sosa’s responses, provided the imagination model of dreaming is adopted. Second, it can also be refuted by another of Sosa’s responses without assuming the imagination model of dreaming, though both the view that there is unsafe knowledge and a certain externalist reliabilism need to be adopted. However, another of the two remaining versions of the dream argument cannot be refuted by any of the Sosaian responses, nor the Wittgensteinian response. This shows that the three Sosaian responses and the Wittgensteinian response cannot refute significantly many different versions of the dream argument. Sosa’s responses, including the Wittgensteinian response, therefore are not in general successful in the refutation of he dream argument for skepticism. (shrink)

In the Tractatus Logico‐Philosophicus, Wittgenstein adopts a version of logical atomism. This chapter offers an exposition of the Tractarian version of logical atomism. Wittgenstein argues that the constituents of the end products of complete analysis are simple signs, and that there are necessarily existent objects. The chapter explains Wittgenstein's main argument for the possibility of complete analysis. It comments on three recent interpretations of the substance argument and offers an exposition of the substance argument. According to the Tractatus, propositions show (...) the logical form of reality, which is constituted by the logical forms of states of affairs. The substance argument is a reductio ad absurdum. The reductio is the premise that the world had no substance, which is equivalent to the claim that there were no necessarily existent simple objects. The world has substance constituted by necessarily existent simple objects. (shrink)

This study investigates the use of modal verbs in Chinese–English government press conference interpretation. Modal verbs mark the speaker’s opinion of or attitude toward the event described in a sentence. Interpreters also use modal verbs to indicate the stances of the source language speakers. The use of modal verbs has been examined in such contexts as research papers, textbooks, and second language learners’ output; however, studies that compare differences in modal verbs between source and target languages in the context of (...) interpreting are sparse. The investigation being reported is based on a comparable corpus—an original Chinese GPC and its English-translated version—and a parallel corpus—a translated English GPC and the original English version from the US. The results of the comparable corpus analysis indicate that the frequency of modal verbs in translated English is significantly higher than in original Chinese, in which only 40% of the modal verbs in translated English are consistent with their Chinese counterparts, while others are employed through amplification and value variation. The results of the parallel corpus analysis suggest that the increase of modal verbs in the target texts may help to achieve certain types of pragmatic functions in English. (shrink)

With people’s concerns about the environment growing, the demand for organic food has increased. However, few studies have focused on organic dining intention. Therefore, this study examined generativity, which is defined as the direction and care for the growth of future generations through self-expanding forms, and its influence on attitude toward organic food, environment concern and dining intention. The moderating effect of age was also examined. A total of 418 responses were collected through a face-to-face survey from Shanghai respondents. PLS-SEM (...) was utilized to verify the model and test the relationships among the constructs. The results show that generativity directly influences environmental concerns, attitudes toward organic food and dining intentions. Furthermore, environmental concerns and attitudes toward organic food are mediating variables for generativity to affect dining intentions. The older the age group, the more likely it is for generativity to have a positive influence on attitude toward organic food and environmental concerns. Theoretical and practical implications are also discussed in this study. (shrink)

Epigenetic research has brought several important technological achievements, including identifying epigenetic clocks and signatures, and developing epigenetic editing. The potential military applications of such technologies we discuss are stratifying soldiers’ health, exposure to trauma using epigenetic testing, information about biological clocks, confirming child soldiers’ minor status using epigenetic clocks, and inducing epigenetic modifications in soldiers. These uses could become a reality. This article presents a comprehensive literature review, and analysis by interdisciplinary experts of the scientific, legal, ethical, and societal issues (...) surrounding epigenetics and the military. Notwithstanding the potential benefit from these applications, our findings indicate that the current lack of scientific validation for epigenetic technologies suggests a careful scientific review and the establishment of a robust governance framework before consideration for use in the military. In this article, we highlight general concerns about the application of epigenetic technologies in the military context, especially discrimination and data privacy issues if soldiers are used as research subjects. We also highlight the potential of epigenetic clocks to support child soldiers’ rights and ethical questions about using epigenetic engineering for soldiers’ enhancement and conclude with considerations for an ethical framework for epigenetic applications in the military, defense, and security contexts. (shrink)

The food and package delivery workforce in China has grown substantially in the past decade. However, delivery drivers face volatile and stressful work conditions, which can give rise to high turnover and burnout. Past research has indicated that job demands and resources significantly predict burnout. Scholars have also found evidence that mindfulness may be a protective factor against negative outcomes like burnout. Using data collected from 240 food and package delivery drivers in Beijing, China, we examined the effects of JD-R (...) on burnout and whether these relations were moderated by mindfulness. Estimates produced by regression analyses indicated that job demands have significantly positive effects on burnout, while job resources have a significant negative effect on burnout. Mindfulness significantly moderated the effects of JD and JR on burnout. Results suggest that mindfulness is a protective factor for delivery drivers. Practice and policy implications are discussed. (shrink)

The idea of “just war” is not alien to Chinese thought. The term “yi zhan” (usually translated as “just war” or “righteous war” in English) is used in Mencius, was renewed by Mao Zedong, and is still being used in China today (zhengyi zhanzheng). The best place to start exploring this Chinese idea is in the enormous Art of War corpus in premodern China, of which the Seven Military Classics is the best representative. This set of treatises served as the (...) military bible in imperial China from 1078 CE. Ideas analogous to ius ad bellum and ius in bello can be found in these texts. These norms are present in these military texts, elaborated in subsequent commentaries, understood as a matter of fact in Chinese political history, and recently and briefly acknowledged by a few Chinese military scholars in the mainland and in Taiwan. This Chinese just war ethics has its distinctiveness vis-à-vis James Turner Johnson's articulation of the Western classic view. It differs from Johnson's claims that military lethal violence is intrinsically morally neutral and that last resort is not a primary consideration in deciding for war. Contemporary Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) military publications show that the PLA understands the general idea of just war, but they acknowledge only the ad bellum part, not the in bello components. (shrink)

The unreasonable shift point will cause a large shift impact, which will affect the engine fuel economy and the service life of the wet clutch. To decrease shift impact on agricultural tractors with HMCVT and find the best working point, the following methods are proposed in this paper: firstly, conducting all-factor method and response surface method to design and carry out bench test of shift impact; secondly, using the basic linear fitting, RSM, and stepwise regression analysis to establish comprehensive mathematical (...) models and selecting models with high prediction accuracy; thirdly, putting forward the method of determining the weight of variance to match parameters of three quality evaluation indexes with inconsistent correlation; finally, establishing the total shift quality evaluation index and obtaining the optimal shift working point. It is found that oil filling pressure has a significant effect on speed drop, while the engine speed has a significance on the dynamic load and sliding friction. To make the transmission section of the best quality, the oil pressure at this time is 1 MPa and the engine speed is 1040 r/min. The results show that the proposed method can determine the optimal shift point and provide a reference for developing the control strategy. (shrink)

Harmony has become a major challenge for modern governance in the twenty-first century because of the multi-religious, multi-racial and multi-ethnic character of our increasingly globalized societies. Governments all over the world are facing growing pressure to integrate the many diverse elements and subcultures which make up modern pluralistic societies. This book examines the idea of harmony, and its place in politics and governance, both in theory and practice, in Asia, the West and elsewhere. It explores and analyses the meanings, mechanisms, (...) dimensions and methodologies of harmony as a normative political ideal in both Western and Asian philosophical traditions. The book argues that in Western political thought - which sees politics as primarily concerned with resolving social conflicts and protecting individual rights - the concept of harmony has often been neglected. In contrast, since earliest times harmony or ‘he’ has been a profound theme in Confucian thought, and current leaders of many East Asian governments, and the Chinese government, have explicitly declared that the realisation of a harmonious society is their aim. The book also assesses how harmony is pursued, jeopardized or deformed in the real world of politics, based upon empirical analysis of a variety of different cultural, social and political contexts, including: China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, Denmark, Latin America and the Scandinavian countries. It shows how harmony as an organizing concept can help to promote new thinking in governance, and overcome problems of modern-day governance like distrust, adversarial conflicts, hyper-individualism, coercive state intervention, and free-market alienation. It also discusses the potential problems posed by the pursuit of harmony, in particular in the grave threat of totalitarianism, and considers how these risks could best be mitigated. (shrink)

In this essay, I compare two pioneer thinkers of the “just war” tradition across cultures: Gratian in the Christian tradition, and Mengzi (Mencius) in the Confucian tradition. I examine their historical-cultural contexts and the need for both to discuss just war, introduce the nature of their treatises and the rudimentary theories of just war therein, and trace the influence both thinkers’ theories have had on subsequent just war ethics. Both deemed just cause, proper authority, and right intention to be necessary (...) conditions for initiating a just war. However, Gratian’s theory has a presumption against injustice whereas Mengzi’s theory has a presumption against war. As a jurist of the Church, Gratian sought to discriminate just from unjust wars, while Mengzi, a moral-political advisor to rulers, was more concerned with avoiding bloodshed and building lasting peace. In addition to examining these thinkers’ respective historical influences, I submit that Gratian’s Decretum and the Mengzi are pioneering in two more senses. First, they offer important clues to understanding how just war ideas were developed very differently in medieval Europe and in premodern China. Second, both embodied features that helped shape their subsequent intellectual tradition, which in turn molded the different legacies of these two works. (shrink)