Organisational safety climate and occupational accidents and injuries: an epidemiology-based systematic review

It is widely accepted among practitioners and researchers that a good safety climate results in improved safety. However, there is a lack of systematic and detailed reviews summarising and evaluating the scientific evidence underpinning the relationship between safety climate and injuries and accidents in a company. The current research addresses this gap and studies the association of safety climate with accidents and injuries at work. Nine databases were searched for quantitative studies. After eligibility and quality selection, 17 peer-reviewed papers were analysed. Quality assessment was developed applying the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies (STROBE) guidelines, together with 9 appraisal criteria from Berra and colleagues (2008), Downs and Black (1998) and the appraisal tool from the University of Cardiff Weightman, Mann, Sander, & Turley, (2004). An evaluation summary statement was then constructed analysing the strength of the evidence provided by each study. Although 15 of the 17 studies included in this review provided full or partial support for the association of safety culture with accidents/injuries at work, scientific evidence is still unclear on the causal relationship between these two variables. Research is needed, especially longitudinal and intervention studies, to demonstrate in detail this association, which has been widely accepted in the area of occupational health and safety.     

A fractal approach to implement cooperative learning in German classrooms

The development of skills necessary to master the challenges of culturally heterogeneous classrooms is impeded seriously by linear teaching/learning procedures within the majority of educational institutions. One of the most serious obstacles is the systematic organisation of teaching according to strictly separated subject matter areas. This article describes an approach to implement cooperative learning by radically changing the organisational structure of teaching as well as the roles of teachers and students. Because this approach tries to create similar structures and processes within all organisational units from staff level to the level of cooperative teams of students, it is called a fractal model of implementation.

All students of the same grade are assigned to one of several ‘learning islands’ that comprehend those subject matter areas, which can easily be linked to each other. In our study 12th grade students will access the topic of ‘energy’ on three ‘islands’ under the perspectives of natural sciences/mathematics, linguistics, and social sciences. According to a modified version of Jigsaw learning, the students take turns as inhabitants of each of the learning islands. A team of teachers introduces the overlapping topics. Each student has to complete the assignments of one of the disciplines represented on the learning island in order to become an ‘expert’, while other students on the same learning island will become experts for the other subject matter areas. Later, back in their ‘basic teams’ they will share their different expert knowledge, teaching each other and learning from each other with increasing self‐responsibility. The teachers are available during this phase of learning as moderators of group dynamics, learning procedures, and as subject matter experts. This organizational principle is realised on all levels of the teaching/learning system, from structuring a complete grade level according to learning islands, breaking them down into expert groups, teams, and finally individual learners.

First observations and interviews with selected teachers and students show that the fractal learning model is accepted widely both by students and teachers — but there are some students and teachers who seem to b & overwhelmed by the complexity of the new situation. This difference must be taken into account if we want to promote learning in processes of social exchange.     

Improving quality of life after breast cancer: prevention of other diseases

Many women with breast cancer will be diagnosed at an early stage through screening programmes. Furthermore, most women affected by breast cancer will not die from it but from other diseases, owing to recent improvements in treatment. This article assesses whether breast cancer survivors suffer more frequently from other diseases. Specifically, it examines whether they have a higher incidence of other cancers, cardiovascular events and osteoporotic fractures. Women with breast cancer and three or more co-morbid conditions have a 20-fold higher rate of mortality from causes other than breast cancer and a 4-fold higher rate of all-cause mortality when compared with patients who have none. Breast cancer survivors are at increased risk of other cancers, such as stomach, colorectal and lung. Radiotherapy, trastuzumab and aromatase inhibitors increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. However, tamoxifen does not, although it is associated with an increased risk of venous thromboembolism. Aromatase inhibitors, but not tamoxifen, increase the risk of osteoporotoic fracture and bisphosphonate therapy should be considered.     

The 'Consumer Principle' in the Care of Elderly People: Free Choice and Actual Choice in the German Welfare State

In the mid-1990s, together with new long-term care legislation, the German welfare state introduced care markets and consumer choice between family care and different types of formal care. However, instead of using the new option to choose publicly funded care by long-term care agencies, the majority of elderly people in need of care continued to decide in favour of care exclusively provided by family members. The article examines how the persistence of family care in spite of the new options of consumer choice can be explained, using data from representative surveys on the care of elderly people in Germany and the results of guided interviews by the authors with family members involved in care. The findings indicate that there are two main reasons. The first is that elderly people and their families orient their behaviour towards traditional care values in which the first priority is given to mutual support between spouses and generations. The second reason is that elderly people on the one hand and care agencies on the other have substantially different definitions of a good quality of care.     

Games and Mechanism Design in Machine Scheduling—An Introduction

We survey different models, techniques, and some recent results to tackle machine scheduling problems within a distributed setting. In traditional optimization, a central authority is asked to solve a (computationally hard) optimization problem. In contrast, in distributed settings there are several agents, possibly equipped with private information that is not publicly known, and these agents must interact to derive a solution to the problem. Usually the agents have their individual preferences, which induces them to behave strategically to manipulate the resulting solution. Nevertheless, one is often interested in the global performance of such systems. The analysis of such distributed settings requires techniques from classical optimization, game theory, and economic theory. The paper therefore briefly introduces the most important of the underlying concepts and gives a selection of typical research questions and recent results, focusing on applications to machine scheduling problems. This includes the study of the so‐called price of anarchy for settings where the agents do not possess private information, as well as the design and analysis of (truthful) mechanisms in settings where the agents do possess private information.     

Life Satisfaction Among Children in Different Family Structures: A Comparative Study of 36 Western Societies

This paper examines differences in life satisfaction among children in different family structures in 36 western, industrialised countries (n = 184 496). Children living with both biological parents reported higher levels of life satisfaction than children living with a single parent or parent–step‐parent. Children in joint physical custody reported significantly higher levels of life satisfaction than their counterparts in other types of non‐intact families. Controlling perceived family affluence, the difference between joint physical custody families and single mother or mother–stepfather families became non‐significant. Difficulties in communicating with parents were strongly associated with less life satisfaction but did not mediate the relation between family structure and life satisfaction. Children in the Nordic countries characterised by strong welfare systems reported significantly higher levels of life satisfaction in all living arrangements except in single father households. Differences in economic inequality between countries moderated the association between certain family structures, perceived family affluence and life satisfaction.     

Doing gender in public services: Affective labour of employment agents

The restructuring of state bureaucracies into service organizations and the new welfare state paradigm of activation have changed the work requirements of front‐line workers in public employment agencies across Europe. Public employment agents are less engaged in bureaucratic labour, but have to perform service work. They use affective means to motivate and to monitor and sanction jobseekers. This article provides evidence that these transformations in Austria, Germany and Switzerland did not suspend the gendering of public service work. We discovered four typical modes of affectively enacting the state: both male and female employment agents follow feminized service work patterns or masculinized entrepreneurial norms. To prevent a possible loss of their professional status, some employment agents reinterpret affective labour as professional service work that demands high expertise. Others resist the activation paradigm by performing traditionally feminized care work or by still adhering to affect‐neutral male bureaucratic work.     

Brokerage and governance for business networks: a metasynthesis-based discussion

This article reviews and discusses empirical literature on the micro-mechanisms of Burt’s concept of brokerage for inter-firm business networks from a governance perspective. Using a combination of a literature review and a qualitative metasynthesis, research gaps are first identified in the literature about these micro-mechanisms and then filled with interpretations, stemming from a qualitative metasynthesis of 13 in-depth case studies on brokerage for business network environments. The paper discusses three related elements and their inter-relationship in the brokerage process: the enabling factors for brokerage in business networks; the brokerage activities, particularly the combination of “bonding”, “bridging”, exclusion, and moderation/negotiation in different network configurations; and the outcomes of brokerage for business networks. We argue that network managers should take care of these elements when using brokerage to govern business networks. For example, the positional factors of agents in the network who take over brokerage functions need to be monitored and a balance of their embeddedness in the network and independence of focal firms should be safeguarded. Moreover, activities associated with brokerage should be steered and controlled in order to generate network benefits such as a higher collaborative stance of the partaking firms or learning processes amongst them.