Reflexivity, its Meanings and Relevance for Social Work: A Critical Review of the Literature

The concept of ‘reflexivity’ has become increasinglysignificant in social work literature in relation to socialwork education, theory and practice. However, our reading ofthe literature indicates that there is a lack of clarity aboutthe concept in terms of who is being exhorted to be ‘reflexive’,when and how. This article addresses these questions througha critical review of social work literature since the 1990sthat discusses the concept of ‘reflexivity’. Giventhat many authors seem to use the concepts of ‘reflexivity’and ‘(critical) reflection’ interchangeably, wealso apply this analysis to ‘reflection’ and ‘criticalreflection’. This article raises important questions abouthow the concepts of ‘reflexivity’, ‘criticalreflection’ and ‘reflectivity’ are definedand the different consequences such definitions might have forsocial work education, theory and practice.     

Diagnosing and treating testosterone deficiency in different parts of the world. Results from global market research

Aim. This study analysed variations between different regions of the world in diagnosing and treating testosterone (T) deficiency.

Methods. Physicians were interviewed in Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom, in Brazil, in Saudi Arabia and South Korea. Items in the survey: 1) reasons/motivation to use or not to use T; 2) what category of patients would not receive T on the basis of these concerns; 3) concerns about prostate pathology in the decision not to provide T treatment; 4) phosphodiesterase type 5 (PDE-5) inhibitors are efficacious, but T treatment makes a comeback.

Results. Between 5% and 10% of consulting patients suffered from T deficiency. The fear to induce prostate cancer appeared very powerful. About 68% of physicians associate the use of T more with risks than benefits, more so in Europe than elsewhere. As a result about 35% of hypogonadal men do not receive treatment. The PDE-5 inhibitors are very prominent in the treatment of erectile dysfunction. Of patients suffering from erectile dysfunction, 18% to 29% have T deficiency which is not always diagnosed and treated.

Conclusion. World-wide physicians require more education on diagnosing T deficiency, on the role of T in erectile dysfunction and the relative safety of testosterone treatment.     

A history of nonviolence? The social construction of Costa Rican peaceful identity

Crime, violence, and insecurity are among the most important social topics in contemporary Costa Rica. These three issues play a central role in the media, politics, and everyday life, and the impression has emerged that security has changed for the worse and that society is now permanently threatened. However, crime statistics do not support this perception. The paper thus asks why violence and crime generate such huge fear in society. The thesis is that the Costa Rican national identity – with Costa Rica constructed as a nonviolent nation – impedes a realistic discussion about the phenomena and their causes, and simultaneously provides a platform for sensationalism and the social construction of fear.     

Towards the price of leasing online

We consider online optimization problems in which certain goods have to be acquired in order to provide a service or infrastructure. Classically, decisions for such problems are considered as final: one buys the goods. However, in many real world applications, there is a shift away from the idea of buying goods. Instead, leasing is often a more flexible and lucrative business model. Research has realized this shift and recently initiated the theoretical study of leasing models (Anthony and Gupta in Proceedings of the integer programming and combinatorial optimization: 12th International IPCO Conference, Ithaca, NY, USA, June 25–27, 2007; Meyerson in Proceedings of the 46th Annual IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (FOCS 2005), 23–25 Oct 2005, Pittsburgh, PA, USA, 2005; Nagarajan and Williamson in Discret Optim 10(4):361–370, 2013) We extend this line of work and suggest a more systematic study of leasing aspects for a class of online optimization problems. We provide two major technical results. We introduce the leasing variant of online set multicover and give an \(O\left( \log (mK)\log n\right) \)-competitive algorithm (with n, m, and K being the number of elements, sets, and leases, respectively). Our results also imply improvements for the non-leasing variant of online set cover. Moreover, we extend results for the leasing variant of online facility location. Nagarajan and Williamson (Discret Optim 10(4):361–370, 2013) gave an \(O\left( K\log n\right) \)-competitive algorithm for this problem (with n and K being the number of clients and leases, respectively). We remove the dependency on n (and, thereby, on time). In general, this leads to a bound of \(O\left( l_{\text {max}} \log l_{\text {max}} \right) \) (with the maximal lease length \(l_{\text {max}} \)). For many natural problem instances, the bound improves to \(O\left( K^2\right) \).     

How does consumer age affect the desire for new products and brands? A multi-group causal analysis

Marketing lacks comprehension on the increasingly important segment of mature consumers in regard to their behavior and respective reasons for certain behavior. This study on the desire for alternative products or brands within the domain of fast moving consumer goods was capable of verifying differences among age-groups. While the keenness for cross-buying increases with age, the desire for switching to other familiar brands than the one usually purchased, and the desire for switching to new brand alternatives decrease with age; Thus indicating age-patterns in product category-specific innovativeness and variety seeking. The study also considers a wide range of behavioral determinants such as product satisfaction, product involvement, category experience, perceived purchase risk etc. mediating the effect of age on these desires, giving a fairly good picture of the unveiled causes for the age group differences. Furthermore, the issue of age potentially operating as a moderating variable on the effects of the behavioral determinants on the desires for product and brand alternatives found consideration in this study, but was proven to be of marginal relevance.     

Getting tuned in to those who are different: The role of empathy as mediator between diversity and performance

We present a theoretical model on the processes that mediate and moderate the diversity-performance relationship. Past research on this topic—for example the categorization elaboration model (van Knippenberg et al. 2004)—has often focused on information elaboration as mediator. Complementing this cognitive perspective, we propose that group diversity can also stimulate group members to engage with each other emotionally, resulting in higher levels of empathy—an emotional state which arises from the comprehension and apprehension of fellow group members’ emotional state. Empathy, in turn, is likely to enhance performance through processes within a single group member and through processes between group members. At the core of the model lies the proposition that group- as well as individual-level empathy mediate the relationship between diversity of organizational units and the performance of individual members and groups at large (multilevel mediation). Furthermore, we specify moderating conditions for the relationship between diversity and empathy. Diversity beliefs and diversity climates are introduced as second-order moderators.     

Tenure Profiles and Efficient Separation in a Stochastic Productivity Model

We develop a theoretical model based on efficient bargaining, where both log outside productivity and log productivity in the current job follow a random walk. This setting allows the application of real option theory. We derive the efficient worker-firm separation rule. We show that wage data from completed job spells are uninformative about the true tenure profile. The model is estimated on the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. It fits the observed distribution of job tenures well. Selection of favorable random walks can account for the concavity in tenure profiles. About 80% of the estimated wage returns to tenure is due to selectivity in the realized outside productivities.     

Dividend yield and stability versus performance on the German stock market: a descriptive study

It is often examined in the literature whether the dividend yields of stocks correlate with their total returns. This paper analyzes the effect of dividend yield on return as well as on risk and on performance of stocks and stock portfolios on the German market. Not only the influence of dividend yield but also of dividend stability is subject to our analysis. Furthermore, tax aspects are considered. However, this study should rather be seen as an empirical analysis of the influence of dividends as a capital market anomaly than a theoretical based validation approach. Our data set comprises daily adjusted stock prices and dividend payment data from the German capital market over the period 3 January 2000–31 July 2008. This period was characterized by a high volatility of the stock market. In addition to the existing literature examining mainly the long-term influence of dividend yields, we also want to find out whether stocks with high and stable dividend payments are able to reduce the risk of a stock investment in short time periods characterized by extreme conditions. We use blue chips (DAX), stocks of medium-sized companies (MDAX), and stocks of technology firms (TecDAX). Our findings suggest that stock performance generally improves with an increasing dividend yield, where this result is actually based on risk reduction instead of a higher return. However, this risk reduction diminishes with an increasing degree of diversification.     

An axiomatic approach to predictability of outcomes in an interactive setting

This article is an axiomatic approach to the problem of ranking game forms in terms of the predictability they offer to individuals. Two criteria are proposed and characterized, the CardMin and the CardMax. Both compare game forms on the basis of the number of distinct outcomes that can result from the choice of a CardMin (resp. CardMax) strategy. The CardMin (resp. CardMax) strategy is defined as a strategy leading to the smallest (resp. highest) number of different outcomes. In both cases, the lower these numbers the better the game form.     

Applying multivariate techniques to high-dimensional temporally correlated fMRI data

In first-level analyses of functional magnetic resonance imaging data, adjustments for temporal correlation as a Satterthwaite approximation or a prewhitening method are usually implemented in the univariate model to keep the nominal test level. In doing so, the temporal correlation structure of the data is estimated, assuming an autoregressive process of order one.We show that this is applicable in multivariate approaches too - more precisely in the so-called stabilized multivariate test statistics. Furthermore, we propose a block-wise permutation method including a random shift that renders an approximation of the temporal correlation structure unnecessary but also approximately keeps the nominal test level in spite of the dependence of sample elements.Although the intentions are different, a comparison of the multivariate methods with the multiple ones shows that the global approach may achieve advantages if applied to suitable regions of interest. This is illustrated using an example from fMRI studies.