Die Dynamik von Führung, Vertrauen und Konflikt in virtuellen Teams

The importance of virtual teams for collaboration of globally networked organizations has long been debated. But although this new form of division of labor appears in nearly all companies, which poses special challenges to managers and team members, scientific findings and recommendations have not sufficiently been integrated into practice so far. This article discusses on the one hand the challenges and opportunities of virtual teams, on the other hand wants by the presenting of scientific findings both provide food for thought, as well as concrete recommendations for implementation in practice.     

Testing for co-directional interactions using union–intersection and intersection–union methods

When interaction terms exist in a two-factor, factorial experiment, the consideration and analysis of main effects are often restricted to those situations where the interaction between factors is not significant. Hinkelman and Kempthorne [4 Hinkelmann, K. and Kempthorne, O. 1994. Design and Analysis of Experiments. Volume 1: Introduction to Experimental Design, New York: Wiley.  [Google Scholar]] softened that stance somewhat and advocate testing main effects when the interaction is deemed co-directional but not anti-directional. A test for the main effects in that situation may be pragmatic to the practitioner and appealing to researchers in other disciplines. Intersection–union and union–intersection methods are examined for assessing the directional nature of significant interactions so that the main effects in a two-factor factorial may be evaluated. The tests suggested are conceptually straightforward and practical and maintain the nominal Type-I error rate. Examples are provided to illustrate the methods.     

Salient Beliefs About Earthquake Hazards and Household Preparedness

Prior research has found little or no direct link between beliefs about earthquake risk and household preparedness. Furthermore, only limited work has been conducted on how people's beliefs influence the nature and number of preparedness measures adopted. To address this gap, 48 qualitative interviews were undertaken with residents in three urban locations in New Zealand subject to seismic risk. The study aimed to identify the diverse hazard and preparedness‐related beliefs people hold and to articulate how these are influenced by public education to encourage preparedness. The study also explored how beliefs and competencies at personal, social, and environmental levels interact to influence people's risk management choices. Three main categories of beliefs were found: hazard beliefs; preparedness beliefs; and personal beliefs. Several salient beliefs found previously to influence the preparedness process were confirmed by this study, including beliefs related to earthquakes being an inevitable and imminent threat, self‐efficacy, outcome expectancy, personal responsibility, responsibility for others, and beliefs related to denial, fatalism, normalization bias, and optimistic bias. New salient beliefs were also identified (e.g., preparedness being a “way of life”), as well as insight into how some of these beliefs interact within the wider informational and societal context.     

Part‐time Work as Practising Resistance: The Power of Counter‐arguments

Contributing to a Foucauldian perspective on ‘discursive resistance’, this paper theorizes how part‐time workers struggle to construct a valid position in the rhetorical interplay between norm‐strengthening arguments and norm‐contesting counter‐arguments. It is thereby suggested that both the reproductive and the subversive forces of resistance may very well coexist within the everyday manoeuvres of world‐making. The analysis of these rhetorical interplays in 21 interviews shows how arguments and counter‐arguments produce full‐time work as the dominant discourse versus part‐time work as a legitimate alternative to it. Analysing in detail the effects of four rhetorical interplays, this study shows that, while two of them leave unchallenged the basic assumptions of the dominant full‐time discourse and hence tend instead to reify the dominant discourse, two other interplays succeed in contesting the dominant discourse and establishing part‐time work as a valid alternative. The authors argue that the two competing dynamics of challenging and reifying the dominant are not mutually exclusive, but do in fact coexist.     

Resolving some contradictions in the theory of linear opinion pools

Bradley (Theory Decis 85:5–20, 2018) develops some theory of the linear opinion pool, in apparent contradiction to results of Dawid et al. (Test 4:263–314, 1995). We investigate the sources of these contradictions, and in particular identify a mathematical error in Bradley (2018) that invalidates his main result.

     

Charm offensive: mediatized country image transformations in international relations

ABSTRACT

This paper focuses on what has come to be known as a ‘charm offensive,’ a diplomatic technique countries may use to shift their international image through strategic public relations campaigns utilizing personal magnetism. The charm of the selected representative is meant to appeal to a broad international audience with the hope of improving the country's brand. The paper examines the concept and practice of a charm offensive through two case studies. The first is the Iranian charm offensive during the 2015 negotiations of the nuclear deal with the United States, when Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mohammad Javad Zarif aimed to improve his country's controversial international image through gentle, diplomatic communication and an aura of civility. The second case study is the charm offensive of North Korea from the 2018 Winter Olympics until the historic meeting of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and US President Donald J. Trump in June 2018. Both case studies analyze the media representations of the particular charm offensive in two countries, the United States and a regionally more proximate, and therefore likely more directly affected country: Israel and South Korea, respectively. I argue that quick image-transformations often characterize contemporary, highly mediatized international diplomatic communication. Unlike classical cases of soft power, the temporary alliances forged through charm offensives are not built on shared values, but on momentary appearances, and sometimes on deception.     

Quo vadis, Hausgemeinschaft? Zum Wandel nachbarschaftlicher Beziehungen in den östlichen Bundesländern

Before the reunification of Germany, the contact to neighbours is now often said with romantically transformed undertones, to have enjoyed a high level of stability, solidarity, human warmth, and community-mindedness. The structure of neighbourly relations in a socialistic housing block community collective is discussed in this paper, in retrospect. Furthermore, the meaning of these informal contacts is dealt with in terms of being a socialistic collective personal niche or important resource compensating the East-German economy of deficiency. A qualitative empirical study deals with the changing processes within neighbour contacts after the fall of the ?Wall“ between East and West and subsequent end of the GDR. The results indicate a number of relationships changing in housing blocks and between neigbours in the community. However, assumptions cannot be confirmed which state neighbourly relationships or contacts have been broken off with only negative results. Reasons for a change in East German neighbourhoods do not seem to be alone a result of the political turn-around. The reason for that is the particular neighbourhood structure of the so-called really existing socialism (real existierender Sozialismus) in the past times of the GDR.     

Constructions,reconstructions and deconstructions of ‘family’ amongst people who live apart together (LATs)

This article explores how people who live apart from their partners in Britain describe and understand ‘family’. It investigates whether, and how far, non‐cohabiting partners, friends, ‘blood’ and legal ties are seen as ‘family’, and how practices of care and support, and feelings of closeness are related to these constructions. It suggests that people in LAT relationships creatively draw and re‐draw the boundaries of family belonging in ways that involve emotionally subjective understandings of family life, and that also refer to normative constructions of what ‘family’ ought to be, as well as to practical recognitions of lived family ‘realities’. This often involves handling uncertainties about what constitutes ‘family’.     

Women’s land ownership and participation in decision-making about reproductive health in Malawi

Given the centrality of land to rural livelihoods and the high rates of fertility in Africa, there is a need for more research that explores the intersection between gendered patterns of land ownership and reproductive health outcomes. Drawing on a household bargaining framework, I hypothesize that women’s land ownership should be associated with increases in women’s decision-making in multiple domains in the household including financial decision-making (the focus of bargaining literature), but also decision-making about reproductive health. Using the 2010 Malawi Demographic Health Survey (DHS), I find women’s ownership of land (sole or joint) is associated with increases in women’s participation in financial decision-making in the household and women’s sole ownership of land is associated with increases in women’s participation in reproductive health decision-making. However, women’s joint ownership of land with spouses is negatively associated with participation in reproductive health decision-making, perhaps because of backlash or intra-household conflict.     

‘A Hidden Group of Children’: Support in Schools for Children who Experience Parental Imprisonment

Schools have been identified as playing a key role in supporting the children of prisoners. This paper reports on a study, which explored the support provision offered in schools to children who experience parental imprisonment. By interviewing school representatives, stakeholders, parents and children, we illustrate the support available in schools, the issues that arise and ways in which support provision can be strengthened. Our findings indicate that children of prisoners often constitute a ‘forgotten’ group in schools, and we suggest that an awareness of these children and the challenges they face needs to be raised amongst education practitioners and policy‐makers.