UNEVEN PLAYING FIELDS: STATE VARIATIONS IN BOYS' AND GIRLS' ACCESS TO AND PARTICIPATION IN HIGH SCHOOL INTERSCHOLASTIC SPORTS

Using 2000 aggregate Office of Civil Rights (OCR) data combined with demographic and contextual data from National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES); this paper finds gender parity in only a handful of states, wide variation among states in girls and boys access to single-gender interscholastic sports and teams, and that states vary widely in patterns of participation in single-gender sports activities. Regression analyses suggest that gender disparities in athletic participation opportunities among states is associated with states per pupil expenditures and student racial composition. Gender disparities in single-gender athletic participation rates among states are strongly associated with participation opportunities as well as per pupil expenditures and student racial and composition.     

Adjustment of issue positions based on network strategies in an election campaign: A two-mode network autoregression model with cross-nested random effects

During election campaigns, political parties deliver statements on salient issues in the news media, which are called issue positions. This article conceptualizes issue positions as a valued and longitudinal two-mode network of parties by issues. The network is valued because parties pronounce pro or con positions on issues in more or less extreme ways. It is longitudinal because the media report new statements of parties on issues each new day.     

Personal assistance: what happens to the arrangement when the number of users increases and new user groups are included?

Using data from two representative surveys among the users of personal assistance in Norway carried out in 2002 and 2010, this paper examines developments and consequences of a strong increase of users and an extension of the target group. Users with mobility impairments still dominate, but the proportion of people with intellectual impairments, brain injuries, and sensory impairments have increased. The ‘new' users seem to be allocated fewer hours compared with those who received personal assistance at the early stages of the arrangement. Still, most users experience an increase in their welfare arrangements, as compared with the situation before they received personal assistance. The user control of the arrangement seems to be preserved, but it takes more different forms. For a higher proportion of users, one of their relatives or a guardian acts as a manager of the assistance.     

Listening in the Business Context: Reviewing the State of Research

The central role of listening in leadership has been the subject of increasing attention in recent years. In leadership studies, listening is being theorized as an essential dimension to effective leadership. Those seeking an elected office also have come to appreciate the centrality of listening by engaging in listening-centered events. However, listening leadership requires more than just the presence of listening. Listening and leadership must be connected. Using President Jimmy Carter and his July 15, 1979 “Address to the Nation on Energy and National Goals” as a case study, this essay explores the concept of listening leadership during the evolution and delivery of that speech. This essay argues that in the development and delivery of Carter's speech, the topic of listening was placed front and center for and by the President. However, Carter failed to balance the listening component of leadership with other characteristics which ultimately bifurcated listening from his role as a leader.     

Is a photograph worth a thousand films? 1

This article aims at scrutinising the narrative power of a medium which one considers unable to perform narrative tasks: photography. Not only has photography a problem when it wants to tackle issues of time, storytelling and fiction; moreover, the medium is suffering from the negative comparison with one of the media that has replaced it (‘remediated’ in the sense coined by Bolter and Grusin), film – a medium initially called ‘animated photography’. Yet the analysis of an example, a picture by Henri Cartier-Bresson which also exists in movie form, suggests that the power of a fixed image may exceed, under certain circumstances, that of a mobile image. In order to understand this paradox, however, one needs to analyse narrativity not only in terms of media forms, but also in terms of media practices and to stress the role of the reader.     

The Reflecting Team Model Used for Clinical Group Supervision Without Clients Present

An approach to group supervision, applying reflecting team, is described. Interview data showing how the approach is practiced recently are presented and analyzed qualitatively, and the results are discussed in relation to the original approach. The conclusion is that there are many pitfalls in using reflecting teams in supervision, and that following the original approach may guard against these pitfalls, but that some revisions may be needed. Supervisors, supervisees, and reflecting team members are all generally satisfied with the approach, but it remains to be established to what extent it contributes to therapist development.     

Beneficiaries’ aspirations to permanent employment within the South African Working for Water Programme

The South African Working for Water (WfW) programme is a short-term public works programme (PWP) focused on clearing invasive alien plants, while training and empowering the marginalised poor to find employment. Furthermore, it aims to develop independent, entrepreneurial contractors who should ‘exit’ from the programme into the broader labour market. However, evidence indicates that many beneficiaries have become financially dependent on this employment, and find it difficult to search for alternatives. Understanding the reasons for this dependence from the perspective of the beneficiaries of this PWP is crucial to align such projects to the actual needs of the beneficiaries, but these have not yet been considered from a sociological perspective. This article reports on data collected, through face-to-face interviews, on WfW beneficiaries’ aspirations to permanent employment in four projects in the Winelands and Overberg districts of the Western Cape. It presents the novel finding that the social structures within projects themselves seem to create a need to remain in the WfW programme. In addition, a misalignment between these projects’ implementation and beneficiaries’ aspirations to financial stability (associated with permanent employment in WfW) is highlighted. The authors argue that WfW should respond to these aspirations, rather than pursue the ostensibly unrealistic aim of creating independent entrepreneurs. Finally, the implications of these findings for PWPs globally, and their concerns regarding the inadvertent creation of beneficiary dependence, are outlined.     

The impact of mimicry on sales - Evidence from field and lab experiments

A buyer’s observation that one or more people are consuming a product can lead that buyer to consume the product as well. The evidence supporting unconscious and unintentional (automatic) mimicry of consumption suggests that it is a pervasive and robust phenomenon. However, up until now most findings on the antecedents of mimicry have been obtained from lab studies. Using a field study, the current research shows that passengers in a train mimic the consumption behavior of other passengers. Two subsequent lab studies suggest that mimicry of consumption is all the more powerful the more people there are consuming and the more intense and consistent their consumption behavior is. However, the impact of the number of people on the willingness to engage in mimicry reaches a peak at approximately eight people and is relatively constant thereafter.