Academic economists behaving badly? A survey on three areas of unethical behavior

This article measures the degree to which academic economists have engaged in unethical behavior and the degree to which academic economists believe the profession as a whole engages in unethical behavior. Three main types of unethical behavior are examined: (1) falsification of research; (2) expropriation of graduate student research or including an undeserving co-author on a research paper; and (3) exchange of grades for gifts, money, or sex. Using a unique data set gathered at the 1998 American Economic Association (AEA) meetings, we find that there is a significant amount of misconduct, particularly in the second category.     

Unterrichtsqualität an einer besonderen Schule: Videobasierte Evaluation eines Oberstufen-Internats für leistungsstarke und hoch motivierte Schülerinnen und Schüler

Based on theoretical constructs and empirical work on quality of instruction, this contribution reports on the evaluation of a upper secondary boarding school for highly motivated and high-achieving students. The evaluation of instructional processes is based on high-inference video ratings of aspects of instructional quality. Additionally, aspects of cognitively activating teaching that are supposed to tap the full capabilities of the students are assessed as a higher standard for upper secondary teaching. Interviews with the teaching staff show a high level of acceptance of this approach to instruction as a means to cater to the needs of the high-achieving. As expected, comparing the teaching assessments with a reference sample of TIMSS and TIMSS-R videos shows a good quality of teaching in the areas of classroom management and individual learning support. For the different aspects of cognitive activation there are some lessons at a high level, while for some aspects the variation within the school is rather large.     

Madness and work: short- and long-term effects of mental illness on occupational careers

This study assesses the impact of mental illness on occupational careers. Thirty-six married men who first entered mental hospitals in the 1950s were followed up in 1972 and eighteen men who were first hospitalized in 1973-74 were interviewed. Their histories reveal the importance of the development of competence in the work role prior to the onset of mental illness. Those who were able to develop competence were likely to retain their jobs through the initial episode of illness and to remain occupationally stable in the ensuing years even in the face of persistent symptomatology. The data are interpreted as evidence that the label, "mental patient," does not constitute a master status and in and of itself does not significantly affect occupational careers.     

Women's experiences of self-reporting health online prior to their first midwifery visit: A qualitative study

Background

Information and communication technologies are increasingly used in health care to meet demands of efficiency, safety and patient-centered care. At a large Danish regional hospital, women report their physical, mental health and personal needs prior to their first antenatal visit. Little is known about the process of self-reporting health, and how this information is managed during the client-professional meeting.

Would Palliative Care Patients Benefit from Social Workers' Retaining the Traditional 'Casework' Role rather than Working as Care Managers? A Prospective Serial Qualitative Interview Study

Social workers have made a significant contribution to the developmentand delivery of palliative care. Both palliative care and socialwork are rapidly evolving but, given their changing contextsand increasing workloads, can they sustain compatibility? Advancesin treatment of life-threatening illness mean that people livelonger in a period of palliative care. Social work has undergoneradical change in the wake of the 1990 NHS and Community CareAct and subsequent local-authority modernizations, with socialworkers now given the role of care managers, rather than themore traditional ‘casework’ or therapeutic role.This paper aims to explore the current and potential role ofthe social worker in palliative care for people with cancerand other prolonged life-threatening illness. It draws uponevidence from a prospective qualitative, patient-centred researchstudy, which detailed the experiences of forty people with lungcancer and advanced cardiac failure, and their personal andprofessional carers (Murray et al., 2002). A total of two hundredand nineteen qualitative interviews were carried out. We found that social workers were conspicuous by their absencefrom the lives of these forty vulnerable adults, who were livingand dying in the community with many unmet needs which, potentially,could be met by social-work input. The study highlights sixareas of concern in which social-work assessment and interventioncould have impacted on dying patients’ quality of lifeand that of their carers: loss and dependency, family-centredissues, carers’ needs, practical tasks, emotional andspiritual struggles, and finally, support needs of staff. Theseareas are outlined to explore the territory which a social workermight inhabit if resources and policies permitted.     

Developing expert systems for management applications

The Alvey Report has resulted in a growing interest in the UK in ‘expert systems’. It is fairly generally accepted, at least in the UK, that such systems function in a particular type of way, i.e. they arrive at decisions through a process of rule based inference. It is suggested that it may be more fruitful to regard rule based inference as one approach to the construction of expert systems, and that proven techniques of operational research may well be more useful in constructing other types of expert system. Alternative applications of expert systems are derived on the basis of a broader definition of an expert system in terms of what it does rather than how it does it. A parallel is drawn between these applications and some typical concerns of business research. It is suggested that a useful aid in identifying promising business applications of expert systems is to set up four ‘dimensions’ along which different types of system differ. Examples are given of where other techniques might conceivably be useful in applications of expert systems.     

Improving homeless persons' utilisation of primary care: lessons to be learned from an outreach programme in The Netherlands

Elissen AMJ, Van Raak AJA, Derckx EWCC, Vrijhoef HJM. Improving homeless persons' utilisation of primary care: lessons to be learned from an outreach programme in The Netherlands Faced with rising homelessness, countries around the world are in need of innovative approaches to caring for those without shelter, who, more often than not, suffer from severe health problems. We conducted a case study of an innovative Dutch Primary Care for the Homeless (PCH) programme to gain insight into clients' demographic characteristics, health problems and service use, and to develop an explanation for its success in increasing the latter. Our analyses are based on a combination of quantitative and qualitative data. The results of the study suggest that the success of the PCH programme can be explained by the providers' pragmatism and will to adapt their mode of care provision to the behavioural patterns and needs of their homeless clients.     

The simulation of industrial robot systems

This paper describes the GRASP computer aided design system for modelling and evaluating industrial robot workplaces. GRASP satisfies a range of simulation needs within the context of designing, implementing and operating industrial robotic systems. The GRASP software may be used to investigate robots operating by themselves or, more likely, as part of an integrated cell. Facilities within GRASP assist workplace layout, position and velocity evaluations, clash detection and co-ordination between items. A robot library exists and is being extended, and an embryo off-line programming facility has been used under restricted conditions. GRASP has been used to help solve a wide range of practical industrial robot problems and has proved itself technically, and also as an educational tool, by showing how a proposed system would operate. The paper describes the facilities within GRASP.     

How Funding of Non-profit Social Organizations Affects the Number of Volunteers

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - In recent decades, significant changes have occurred to how charities and non-profit organizations are funded. However,...