Best-of-two contests with psychological effects

We study a best-of-two contest with two homogeneous players (teams). The winner is the player who wins in both stages. In the case of one victory for each team, a draw determines the identity of the winner. Each team has a value of winning the contest as well as a value of winning a single game. A team’s value of winning a game at its home field is higher than its value of winning a game away from home. We show that if winning in the first stage provides a psychological advantage in the second stage, each team would prefer to play the second stage at its home field.     

Soccer as a Catalyst of Patriotism

Ratings from Russian television broadcasts of international sports events featuring Russian teams and players show an increasing public interest in sports as a source of national pride. Success of Russian teams increases positive feelings of Russians for their society and is a source of social integration.     

Leading for research excellence and integrity: A qualitative investigation of the relationship-building practices of exemplary principal investigators

We conducted semi-structured, telephone interviews with 52 federally funded researchers nominated as exemplars for their integrity and professional conduct, and their scientific achievements. The aim was to identify the practices they report utilizing to build respectful relationships in their teams. We found four practices, holding meetings, providing supervision and guidance, encouraging shared ownership, and expressing values, which were also important to performing high-quality, compliant research, were essential to fostering relationships. The most common practice described for building relationships was actively and deliberately cultivating a positive team environment. Additionally, exemplars described the need to lead by example, tailor their approach to the needs of individuals, address interpersonal conflict, and hire team members cautiously. We also identified practices the exemplars reported as important to managing the demands of their work and found that encouraging shared ownership and tailoring to individuals supported this goal. Additional strategies related to prioritization and planning, seeking advice, engaging in self-care, and managing emotional reactions. Finally, we identified priorities guiding the exemplars’ practices. Key priorities included providing outstanding mentoring, building collaborations and relationships, and engaging in discovery and innovation. Investigators require exceptional leadership skills but receive limited systematic leadership training. Addressing this gap would advance research excellence and integrity.     

创业团队形成与演进过程的理论分析

20世纪90年代,在发现研究创业者个体难以客观、全面地剖析创业者对创业活动的作用规律之后,学者们将研究的焦点转向创业团队。本文围绕"什么是创业团队""创业团队如何形成""在新企业生成与成长过程中,创业团队如何演进"三个问题,系统梳理了创业团队的研究文献,并从创业团队组建逻辑、创业团队构成、创业团队过程和创业团队成员变动四个视角探索创业团队的形成和演进过程,进而提出未来的研究方向。     

大学生志愿者团队的运行机制研究——以玛丽斯特普国际组织欧盟广西大学生同伴教育项目为例

伴随着"国家危机"的扩展,"全球结社革命"的出现,"非营利组织"开始参与中国的社会公益服务,并且地位和作用越来越明显。中国青年志愿者行动是一项中国政府倡导的,与国际接轨、与社会主义市场经济同向发展的跨世纪的事业。从玛丽斯特普国际组织欧盟广西大学生同伴教育项目所合作的高校的大学生同伴教育志愿者的团队特征为起点,分析团队运行机制的现状,针对其运行机制的不足,如何加强志愿者团队运行机制建设思路进行探讨。     

Facts with feelings – social workers' experiences of sharing information across team and agency borders to safeguard children

This paper reports findings from a psychosocially informed case study of information sharing across team and agency borders, carried out in three children and family social work teams within one local authority. The study investigated practitioners' understanding and experiences of information sharing, the tasks, processes and technologies involved, as well as perceived barriers and facilitators. It also considered how the emotional and social dynamics of working contexts could impinge upon information work. Practitioners described information tasks relating to collecting, interpreting, communicating and recording information, guided by the demands of rigid organizational protocols. Performance of these tasks was, however, infused by the emotional complexities of child protection work, presenting a number of challenges for practitioners seeking robust and reliable information in the midst of ambiguity, complexity and heightened emotions. For practitioners across all teams, information work, and information itself, was both cognitive and affective and often at odds with linear processes for its exchange across team boundaries, designed to filter out all but hard evidence. Increased recognition of the dual nature (facts and feelings) of information and information work, throughout the safeguarding process, has potential to enhance the generation of shared understandings and collaborative practice across team and agency borders.     

Discrimination and Demand: The Effect of International Players on Attendance in Major League Baseball*

Objectives. This article tests the presence of demand‐driven discrimination attributable to foreign‐born players in Major League Baseball (MLB). We quantify the change in demand at MLB games given the number of foreign players on an MLB team. We further measure how matching market population demographics and team demographics affects demand. Methods. We use regression analysis to estimate the effect on attendance of a change in the number of foreign players on a team. We then use these estimates to find the change in revenue for the team. Results. The results show that the effect evolves over time. At the outset of the sample (1985), the net effect of an additional foreign‐born player was a decrease in ticket demand. This effect diminished steadily until 1992, when the net effect became positive, peaking in 2000, and then slightly decreasing until the end of the sample (2005). The matching of team and population demographics was not found to be significant. Conclusions. We discuss the implications of this result on league policy decisions.     

Cognitive Algebra in Sport Decision-Making

Two studies examined whether simple algebraic rules that have been shown to be operative in many applied settings may also be found in sport decision-making. The theoretical framework for these studies was the Functional Theory of Cognition (Anderson, Contributions to information integration theory. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1996). The way in which novices but already experienced team sport players (soccer, basketball, and handball players) combine different informational cues (relative importance of the game, numerical status of the team, current score, and time left to play) for deciding a quick restart of play near the end of a match was examined. The basic finding are consistent with the proposition that the knowledge bases at work for judging the appropriateness of this type of sport decisions are structured according to simple algebraic rules.     

The Role of Race in Football Card Prices*

Objective. Several studies have examined the impact of race and the value of baseball cards, but few have investigated the role of race on football card values. Methods. Data were derived from 1,279 black and white football players who were selected to participate in at least one Pro Bowl and who started their careers between 1946, the year professional football in the United States became racially integrated when Kenny Washington played in a game for the Los Angeles Rams, and 1988, the last year of Topps' monopoly in the football card market. Data for each player's race, value of their rookie card, card availability, card vintage, performance, Hall of Fame status, and position were obtained. Results. When controlling for other factors, race has no effect on the value of players' rookie cards, whereas card vintage exerted the most influence on the value of players' cards. Conclusions. Football card values are largely driven by objective markers, supporting the conclusion that the market performs pretty much as expected for a collector market. Speculations on the absence of race effect, limitations related to the study, and suggestions for future research are offered.     

Does race matter? Assessing consumer discrimination in the secondary basketball card market

Sociologists continue to observe the ways race permeates America's social institutions, the institution of sport being no exception. Although researchers have explored customer racial discrimination via examinations of the secondary sports card market, only three studies have explored the phenomenon in the context of basketball, a sporting context with a higher proportion of non-White players than the baseball and football leagues that have been the primary focus to date. We explore the unique way race matters on the hardwood by employing a methodological approach that previously has been used to study card collecting in other contexts. Data were obtained for 215 retired players and their rookie cards. Controlling for other factors, to include career performance, position, and card scarcity, the results reveal no direct effect of race on card values, but there is an interaction effect between race and Hall of Fame status that impacts card prices. The potential source and implications of this interaction are discussed as well as suggestions for future research.     

Local Authority Intake Teams

Summary Amongst the many developments in social services organisationin the decade since Seebohm, specialist Intake Teams responsiblefor all initial referrals and short term work received by anArea Team, remain a popular form of local organization. Thispaper describes a small national survey of English local authoritiesto collect information on both intake teams and their long termcounterparts, and briefly outlines some of the major findings.The survey produced a broad picture of both the present structureof local authority fieldwork departments, and the personal characteristicsof social workers and their team leaders. The paper goes onto examine the relationship between intake and long term teams,particularly in terms of referral rates, relative caseloadsand the case transfer process; and concludes with an outlineof teams satisfaction with the intake system, and some indicationsof desired future developments.     

Needs Assessment, Street-level Bureaucracy and the New Community Care

In the wake of the Seebohm reforms of the personal social services, a number of studies were carried out in the 1970s to explore the role of frontline professionals in identifying and meeting social need. A common finding was that social workers behaved like "street-level bureaucrats", using their discretionary authority defensively to manage an otherwise overwhelming workload. In the 1990s, top-down assessment and care management systems were put in place as part of community care reforms. Their aim was to reduce the scope of professional discretion so as to standardize responses to need and control demand according to resources available. In this paper, the authors consider the success of new systems in controlling "bottom-up" decision-making by drawing on a recent empirical study of needs assessment practice in three types of social work team. They point out that the assessment practice of those teams facing the highest bombardment rates was most obviously criteria-driven, reinforced by the use of new technology. Rather than creating informal stereotypes to manage demand, social workers could mobilize legitimate forms of rationing to protect their time and other resources. Yet the sense of professional identity, the level of frontline autonomy, and the ways in which this was exercised, varied across the different types of team. The authors conclude, therefore, that the scope of discretionary space available to frontline staff in social services departments, and the practices to which it gives rise, are empirical questions only adequately addressed by methodologies able to connect with "bottom-up" decision-making.     

Team-Based Volunteerism with the Seriously Ill: A Qualitative Analysis from 10 Volunteers' Perspectives

Volunteers offer means through which social workers may extend their ability to support individuals with serious illnesses near the end of life. This study explored the experience of volunteers on teams organized initially as a grassroots movement in response to stigmatized and often socially isolated people with HIV/AIDS dying in the community. Volunteer care teams later expanded to individuals with other serious illnesses. This model spread as a means of meeting the growing need for practical support for seriously ill homebound individuals. Yet, little has been reported in the scientific literature about the interworkings of these teams and their optimal level of functioning. Qualitative inquiry, in the form of semi-structured interviews, explored perspectives of 10 volunteers with experience in volunteer team caring and identified the social processes that shaped their work. The volunteers discussed balance between positive life meaning gained from volunteer work, lessons learned, and negative aspects of a volunteer team approach to caring for the seriously ill in the community. Further investigation is warranted to validate the volunteer care team approach as a cost-effective tool to help seriously ill individuals and caregivers.     

Social Service Teams and their Managers

Summary A study is reported of the perceived effectiveness of teamsof social workers and their managers. Prior studies are reviewedand shown to give disproportionate emphasis to the supervisionelement in the manager's task. It is shown that in the sampleof teams studied the correlates of perceived team effectivenesswere quite different in area teams from those found in socialwork teams. Social work teams required a manager who was primarilysupportive, whereas in area teams the manager's role was foundto be less important than were group process variables.     

Do we follow others when we should outside the lab? Evidence from the AP top 25

We use data from the Associated Press college American football poll to analyze two types of ex-post optimality of social learning in a non-lab setting. The poll is a weekly subjective ranking of the top 25 teams, voted on by over 60 sports journalists. Voters potentially can learn from their peers by observing the aggregate ranks before updating their individual ranks. Our results indicate that, while voters do learn from their peers to some extent, the informativeness of peer ranks appears to be under-valued.     

The effects of inter-league competition on labor market discrimination: assessing the impacts of the world hockey association

This paper argues that the presence of competitive, as opposed to monopsonistic, labor markets should reduce the level of entry discrimination. For those teams that have a “taste” for discrimination, competitive labor markets increase the cost of discriminating, because competition bids-up the salaries of the preferred players, relative to the salaries of the non-preferred players. The paper empirically tests this notion by examining the impact on French Canadian players of the short-lived World Hockey Association (WHA).     

Team Building, Inter-agency Team Development and Social Work Practice

Correspondence to Paul Iles, Human Resources Strategy Lecturer, Open Business School, Open University School of Management, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes, MK 76A Y Summary The need to improve the effectiveness of working teams in socialwork practice has often been recognized, and a variety of teamdevelopment techniques exist which aim to develop teamwork skills.Some of the more important techniques are reviewed, along withthe evidence for the effectiveness of team development strategies.Such approaches have however primarily been employed with teamsin single autonomous organizations, and their transferabilityto multi-disciplinary or inter-agency teams remains problematic.Drawing on an intervention with a Community Drug Team involvingsocial work, health and other professionals, and an action researchproject designed to promote better collaboration between hospitalsocial workers and nursing staff in a hospital maternity unitante-natal clinic, a framework for inter-agency team developmentis described and its relevance for social work practice discussed.     

Major League Baseball Players' Life Expectancies*

Objective. We examine the importance of anthropometric and performance measures, and age, period, and cohort effects in explaining life expectancies among major league baseball (MLB) players over the past century. Methods. We use discrete time hazard models to calculate life tables with covariates with data from Total Baseball, a rich source of information on all players who played in the major league. Results. Compared to 20‐year‐old U.S. males, MLB players can expect almost five additional years of life. Height, weight, handedness, and player ratings are unassociated with the risk of death in this population of highly active and successful adults. Career length is inversely associated with the risk of death, likely because those who play longer gain additional incomes, physical fitness, and training. Conclusions. Our results indicate improvements in life expectancies with time for all age groups and indicate possible improvements in longevity in the general U.S. population.     

Inside the interdisciplinary team experiences of hospice social workers

Interdisciplinary teamwork is the foundation for the delivery of hospice care. This project interviewed 23 hospice social workers by telephone to explore their experiences with hospice team collaboration. Two research questions were explored: (1) What do social workers perceive as the strengths of interdisciplinary collaboration and (2) What are the challenges for social workers on interdisciplinary hospice teams? Participants identified issues related to team process, administrative processes, and barriers to effective team collaboration. Collaboration was said to be fostered by good communication, trust, roles, joint visitation, respect, team building activities, and administrative interest and support. Challenges to collaboration included large caseloads, a focus on the medical model, limited visits, personality and team conflict. Opportunities for improved collaboration between social workers and hospice team members exist through active evaluation of collaboration and strategic initiatives aimed at improving collaboration.     

WHAT ARE THE SOCIAL COSTS OF GAMBLING?: THE CASE OF THE QUEENSLAND MACHINE GAMING INDUSTRY

Gambling has frequently been blamed for contributing to a range of social and economic problems for players and their families. The introduction of gaming machines (more commonly referred to as “poker machines” or “pokies”) to clubs and hotels in Queensland in 1992 attracted such criticism. This paper presents data from a survey conducted in Brisbane in May 1994, funded by the Department of Family Services and Aboriginal and Islander Affairs, which seeks to assess the characteristics of gaming machine players and to evaluate the extent to which players and their families seem disproportionately likely to experience social and economic difficulties. The survey led to a number of noteworthy findings, many of which challenge conventional stereotypes concerning the characteristics of players and the consequences of their playing. Firstly, men, the young and those in employment are disproportionately likely to be players. Secondly, playing is spread evenly across different occupations and levels of educational achievement. Thirdly, most players appear not to play very often or spend very large amounts of money. Fourthly, while there is evidence that money is being diverted from necessities to machine gaming, there is virtually no evidence of an association between machine playing and economic hardship.