Racial Identity–Related Differential Attributions of Inadequate Responses to Hurricane Katrina: A Social Identity Perspective

This study examines the attribution of responsibility for the problematic response to Hurricane Katrina in the fall of 2005. Based on social identity theory, the study compared the attribution with racism and non-racism factors (situational vs. dispositional attributions) between African American and European American students (n = 505). As hypothesized, African American identity was related to greater racism attribution, even after controlling for demographics, faith factors, and cognitive-emotional reactions to the hurricanes. European American identity was associated with more executive-responsibility attributions, but the effect vanished after adjusting other factors. The study underscores the importance of acknowledging group identity rather than an overarching American identity in exploring the race effect after a national collective trauma. The consequential implications for disaster planning, future research investigation, and social service delivery are discussed.     

Racial differences in end-of-life planning: why don't Blacks and Latinos prepare for the inevitable?

I evaluate the extent to which ethnic disparities in advance care planning reflect cultural and religious attitudes and experience with the painful deaths of loved ones. Data are from a sample of 293 chronically ill older adults who are seeking care at one of two large medical centers in urban New Jersey. Blacks and Hispanics are significantly less likely than Whites to have a living will, a durable power of attorney for health care (DPAHC), and to have discussed their end of life treatment preferences. Multivariate analyses reveal that the Black-White gap in advance care planning is largely accounted for by Blacks' belief that God controls the timing and nature of death. The Hispanic-White gap is partially accounted for by the belief that one's illness negatively affects one's family. Ethnic disparities are starkest for living will and DPAHC use, and less pronounced for discussions. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.     

Conceptualizing social-ecological drivers of change in urban forest patches

Urban Ecosystems - We introduce a conceptual model of the urban forest patch as a complex social-ecological system, incorporating cross-scale interactions. We developed this model through an...     

An Evaluation of the Rai and Van Ryzin Dose-Response Model in Teratology

The underlying assumptions of the Rai and Van Ryzin dose-response model for reproductive toxicological data are evaluated on the basis of existing experimental data. The model under consideration is unusual in its use of litter size to completely account for extra-binomial variation in the data by associating litter size with reproductive outcome. The experimental data show that controlling litter size is not sufficient to account for the litter-to-litter variability in responses. It is also shown that the two linear components of the Rai and Van Ryzin model are inappropriate. For the component which applies to the dam, the data suggest a strong nonlinearity, supported by rejection of the linear model via statistical hypothesis tests. In the component involving litter size, a relationship with dose is not apparent. The litter size parameters offer considerable potential for bias in estimation; bias which is at least partly masked by the model having good prediction characteristics due to the increased number of parameters. A simulation study is presented to illustrate how the Rai and Van Ryzin model can exaggerate litter size effects on the probability of response when the simulated data arise from a model involving a nonlinear dam component, common to this type of data, and no effect of litter size.     

Using leadership criteria to measure and reward performance

Physicians speak of performance and outcomes. They speak of customers and patients. While many leaders nod their heads, shake hands in agreement, and establish liaisons, agreements are implemented without an appropriate understanding of how to recognize and measure leadership performance. How are physicians and other management team members measured? Are you measuring the right things? Physician executives should be measured for simplicity, for streamlining, for standardization, and for knowing the right processes. That's productivity. They should be measured for taking risks, for being creative, and for exploring and initiating new ways to use existing resources. That's entrepreneurship. And they should be measured for kindness, for empathy, for building trust, for sharing with colleagues, and for working together. That's teamwork.     

Organizational discourse as a creative space for play: the potential of postmodernist and surrealist forms of play

In recent times there have been a number of calls in the organizational discourse to consider entertaining the notion of ‘play’. Not overt physical play such as having a game of golf among work mates or team building through rock climbing, but intellectual play. These calls have generally arisen in the work of those scholars championing a postmodernist or post-structuralist perspective. These calls, however, are seldom accompanied by a coherent appraisal of why and how play is productive of something that non-play cannot or has difficulty in producing. In particular, what has been left out of much of this discourse is an appraisal of the underlying psychodynamics that are involved. This paper argues that play takes place in a space created to enhance illusion and that space, and the illusion itself, need careful handling at a variety of levels. Just as the space for play is created for the child to exercise their imagination and as a learning environment, it can equally be the space occupied by the neurotic - indeed, some postmodernists, intent upon play, have been charged with aiding, abetting and creating individuals who become delusional, have fragmented identity and may become schizophrenic. While this latter critique may seem somewhat harsh, it should prompt us to consider the idea of the attributes of a ‘safe’ space in which to play. Much of the organizational discourse on play has also asked us to take play ‘seriously’ as way of enhancing our theory development. This paper does not accept the ‘serious’- ‘non-serious’ dichotomy, but instead argues that play is a differentiated level of reality. This differentiated level of reality is inhabited by much in the way of paradox and irony that are essential for play to occur. These paradoxes and ironies are identified in an effort to enhance the outcome of play. In identifying some of the underlying psychodynamics of play, what emerges is an appreciation of how play is an activity that has the potential to help in our theory development of organizations. In the context of discussing the emergence of a new postmodern theory movement in the organizational discourse, various forms of postmodernist play are identified. In this discussion it will also be noted that these postmodernist forms of play have parallels in other fields. In the realm of art, for example, surrealism engages in similar forms of play. These forms of play are identified in the quest to better understand the dynamics of intellectual play and how we might better draw upon such dynamics to enhance the theoretical grounding of our own field. It is also intended, by examining the notion of intellectual play in a manner outlined in this paper, that basic aspects of postmodernist theorizing might also be better understood.     

The Potential Impact of ‘Public Access’ Legislation on Access to Forestry Literature

There have been increasing calls for the United States (U.S.) government’s implementation of broad public access policies mandating free online access to federally funded research. This study examines the potential impact of such a policy on peer-reviewed forestry literature. The authors analyze information about federal government authorship, federal government funding, and U.S. authorship indicated in articles published in five core forestry journals in 2006. The results of the analysis provide evidence that federal public access legislation would have a significant impact on the accessibility of forestry literature published in leading journals in the field.