Social Support Networks and School Outcomes: The Centrality of the Teacher

This investigation compares school outcomes for students who differ in the extent to which they perceive their parents, friends, and teachers—each alone and in combination—as important sources of social support. Findings indicate that middle and high school students who perceive high supportiveness from all three sources of support, as opposed to none, one, or two, have better attendance; spend more hours studying; avoid problem behavior more; have higher school satisfaction, engagement, and self-efficacy; and obtain better grades. Positive school outcomes are promoted when teacher support is perceived in combination with perceived support from parents and friends. Implications of the results for human service providers are presented.     

Rockefeller Philanthropy and the Institute of Pacific Relations: A Reappraisal of Long-Term Mutual Dependency

Archival evidence is used to explore the development of funding for the Institute of Pacific Relations (IPR) and the Canadian Institute of International Affairs (the secretariat for the Canadian national council of the IPR) provided by the Rockefeller Foundation (RF). It suggests that the withdrawal of funding should be interpreted in a long-term perspective as a joint responsibility of mutually dependent recipients and funders, rather than simply as the fault of RF decision makers responding reactively to the prevailing climate of McCarthyism. Moreover, it is argued that the conventional wisdom as to the balance of influence within the RF between key staff and trustees is in need of revision. Conceptual implications of these examples of recipient dependence are explored, including the reasons for and dangers of such mutual dependence, the meaning of donor responsibility, and the mediating role of foundation officers.     

Systems innovation manager

Each year organizations spend a significant amount of money developing new products and processes in an effort to satisfy customer demands and manufacture high-quality products efficiently. Both development processes - product and process, are complex, resource intensive and thrive on innovation. They demand a variety of skills and resources, but in particular, participation among all staff in generating ideas, managing projects and implementing change. There are currently a number of software tools and methods that facilitate change in a systems environment. These range from complex modelling tools to information management tools. The tools have been developed around paradigms, e.g. world class manufacturing, total quality management and business process reengineering. They are often complex, requiring the efforts of skilled designers and managers. Current thinking within a systems environment reflects a more participative and less specialist approach to managing innovation and change. There is a need to create compromise between detailed project engineering and good management practice. This paper introduces a new paradigm centred on good management practice, and identifies the critical issues in systems innovation and change. The paradigm is articulated through a series of change levers and a methodology that guides managers and designers. It is supported by a series of software tools that together bring innovation management to life within the industrial organization.     

Prejudice as Group Position: Microfoundations of a Sociological Approach to Racism and Race Relations

This research integrates and elaborates the basic premises of Blumer's group position theory of prejudice. It does so in order to make explicit, more fully integrated, and empirically pliable the theoretical foundations of a sociological analysis of the nature of racial prejudice. In so doing, the research identifies important areas of agreement between Gordon Allport's approach to prejudice and that of Blumer. Blumer neither provided a full synthetic statement of his several major pieces on prejudice nor pursued sustained empirical research in the area. Hence, the present article (1) identifies the core assumptions of the group position model, (2) summarizes a recent line of empirical work examining claims embedded in the group position approach, (3) specifies how this approach differs from other closely related approaches, and (4) identifies major tasks for future theoretical and empirical work.     

加拿大采矿业注重培养技术工人

采矿业面临着内外因素困扰,前进路上步履艰难,外部矿产品价格低迷,内部作业条件与环境恶劣.在这种严峻的情况下,矿业要千方百计克服矿产品开采与加工中的各种困难(挖掘深度加大、矿种品位降低、环保要求严格等等),除了提高生产效率、降低成本,最重要的是加快人才培养,改善人力资源管理.要达到上述目的,依靠传统办法,无法实现.所幸的是,进入21世纪后,以微电子技术为核心的科技进步为此提供了可靠的技术保证.这种需要与可能相结合就会诱导出一场变革,即技术革新,其中矿山自动化是这场变革中的主角.     

Criteria families use to select nursing homes

The study is conducted to determine families' rankings of characteristics they consider most important when selecting a nursing home. Friedman's two-way analysis of variance is used to test for differences in the rankings. In response to a mailed survey, 231 families rank the characteristics in the following order: quality of care, appearance, atmosphere, location, reputation, building safety, quality of food, cost, and activities. Relationships are also found between the rankings and the demographic characteristics: gender, marital status, education, income, number of homes available, patient/respondent relationship, and distance respondent lived from the chosen home.     

Characteristics of U.S. cities with extreme (high or low) crime rates: Results of discriminant analyses of 1960, 1970, and 1980 data

Why do some cities have higher or lower crime rates than others? In this study we attempt to answer this fundamental question by identifying the theoretically motivated structural covariates which differentiate U.S. cities with extreme high and low crime rates. We apply discriminant function analysis across comprehensive samples of all U.S. cities with populations of greater than 25 000 in the periods 1960, 1970, and 1980 and then posit four question: are empirical findings from regression-based studies of city crime rates replicated in discriminant studies with extreme rates? Are the covariates that predict high or low crime rates unique to specific time periods? Which covariates are better able to discriminate high or low rates for specific crimes? And are specific covariates distinguishable in crime rate changes across time periods? Among our general findings, it appears that those cities with extreme high (low) crime rates tend to be the largest (smallest), most (least) economically deprived, and most (least) socially disintegrated. Associations with these latter two characteristics appear to have grown stronger over the past three census periods. The theoretical importance of these and other findings uncovered here are discussed and interpreted through Wilson's (1987) notion of concentration effects and social isolation which may have transformed inner-city areas in recent years.