Workers’ Perception of Chemical Risks: A Focus Group Study

Workers’ perceptions with respect to health and safety at work are rarely taken into account when considering the development of prevention programs. The aim of this study was to explore workers’ perceptions of chemical risks at the workplace, in order to investigate the prerequisites for a workplace health program. A qualitative study was conducted involving seven focus groups of 5–10 participants (blue‐collar workers) each. All groups were homogeneous in terms of sex, work status, language, and company membership. Results showed that several factors have an important influence on workers’ perception of chemical risks. Workers assess risks by means of both sensory and empirical diagnosis and are concerned about the long‐term health consequences. They perceive the threat of chemical risks as high. Despite this, they are resigned to accepting the risks. Existing formal sources of information are rarely consulted because they are judged to be difficult to understand and not user friendly. Instead, workers tend to obtain information from informal sources. Communication problems with and lack of trust in prevention advisers and hierarchy are frequently mentioned. Workers feel that their specific knowledge of their working conditions and their proposals for practical, cost‐effective solutions to improve health and safety at the workplace are insufficiently taken into account. The use of focus groups yielded a useful insight into workers’ perceptions of chemical risks. Our findings suggest that training programs for prevention advisers should include topics such as understanding of workers’ perceptions, usefulness of a participatory approach, and communication and education skills.     

Emotional labor in social workers' practice

The meeting between service users and social workers is emotional, since it is centered on significant challenges and changes in the service users' lives. Emotions are thus always at play in social work, but are managed in various ways by the professional. In an explorative qualitative case study at two Danish social services departments, we identified three types of emotional labor: (1) when the social worker shuts off emotions both during and after the meeting; (2) when the social worker defers emotions and processes them at a later time; and (3) when emotions dominate, and a case gets ‘under the skin’ of the social worker. Emotional labor can have both positive and negative effect on the work, and knowledge about different kinds of emotional labor can aid professional discussion about emotions at the work place as well as the psychosocial working environment for the social workers, factors which help improve practice. The study showed that emotional labor is a multidimensional concept, hence it is not just managed in different ways by social workers; it is always related to the specific emotion culture and the community of practice at the work place.     

Evaluating a Web-Based Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Maladaptive Perfectionism in University Students

Abstract

Objective: This study assessed a Web-based cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) for maladaptive perfectionism, investigating perfectionism, anxiety, depression, negative automatic thoughts, and perceived stress. Participants: Participants were undergraduate students defined as maladaptive perfectionists through a screening questionnaire at an urban university. The data were collected from July 2009 to August 2010. Methods: Forty-seven maladaptive perfectionists were randomly assigned to a 12-week CBT or a wait-list control group and assessed via questionnaires at pre- and postintervention. Statistical procedures included t tests, Pearson correlations, and analysis of covariance. Results: At the postintervention measure, the CBT group demonstrated significant decreases in anxiety sensitivity and negative automatic thoughts compared to the control group. Within the CBT group, changes in perfectionism scores were significantly correlated with positive changes in depression, anxiety, stress, and automatic thoughts. Conclusions: The treatment group improved on psychological outcomes, demonstrating the effectiveness of a Web-based CBT for perfectionism in a university setting.     

Boundary and Bias Correction in Kernel Hazard Estimation

A new class of local linear hazard estimators based on weighted least square kernel estimation is considered. The class includes the kernel hazard estimator of Ramlau-Hansen (1983), which has the same boundary correction property as the local linear regression estimator (see Fan & Gijbels, 1996). It is shown that all the local linear estimators in the class have the same pointwise asymptotic properties. We derive the multiplicative bias correction of the local linear estimator. In addition we propose a new bias correction technique based on bootstrap estimation of additive bias. This latter method has excellent theoretical properties. Based on an extensive simulation study where we compare the performance of competing estimators, we also recommend the use of the additive bias correction in applied work.     

Immigrant over-education: evidence from Denmark

This paper uses register-based panel data to examine over-education amongst immigrants in Denmark. Foreign-educated immigrants are found to be more prone to over-education than both native Danes and immigrants educated in Denmark. Labour market experience reduces this risk, whereas periods of unemployment make a person more likely to accept a job for which he is over-qualified. Over-educated workers earn slightly more than their adequately matched colleagues, but less than if they had been appropriately matched in a higher level job. Foreign-educated immigrants gain the least from over-education.     

Local linear regression with adaptive orthogonal fitting for the wind power application

Short-term forecasting of wind generation requires a model of the function for the conversion of meteorological variables (mainly wind speed) to power production. Such a power curve is nonlinear and bounded, in addition to being nonstationary. Local linear regression is an appealing nonparametric approach for power curve estimation, for which the model coefficients can be tracked with recursive Least Squares (LS) methods. This may lead to an inaccurate estimate of the true power curve, owing to the assumption that a noise component is present on the response variable axis only. Therefore, this assumption is relaxed here, by describing a local linear regression with orthogonal fit. Local linear coefficients are defined as those which minimize a weighted Total Least Squares (TLS) criterion. An adaptive estimation method is introduced in order to accommodate nonstationarity. This has the additional benefit of lowering the computational costs of updating local coefficients every time new observations become available. The estimation method is based on tracking the left-most eigenvector of the augmented covariance matrix. A robustification of the estimation method is also proposed. Simulations on semi-artificial datasets (for which the true power curve is available) underline the properties of the proposed regression and related estimation methods. An important result is the significantly higher ability of local polynomial regression with orthogonal fit to accurately approximate the target regression, even though it may hardly be visible when calculating error criteria against corrupted data.     

Law Struggles and Hegemonic Processes in Neoliberal India: Gramscian Reflections on Land Acquisition Legislation

Abstract

This article explores how, in the context of an unfolding process of neoliberalisation in India, new terrains of resistance are crystallising for subaltern groups seeking to contest the marginalising consequences of this process. We focus particularly on the emergence of India's ‘new rights agenda’ through a study of the making of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill, 2013. Conceiving of the emergence of the ‘new rights agenda’ as a hegemonic process, we decipher how law-making is a complex and contradictory practice seeking to negotiate a compromise equilibrium between, on the one hand, subaltern groups vulnerable to marginalisation and capable of mobilisation; and, on the other, dominant groups whose economic interests are linked to the exploitation of the spaces of accumulation recently pried open by market-oriented reforms. The negotiation of this equilibrium, we suggest, is ultimately intended to facilitate India's process of neoliberalisation.     

Chinks in Gender?

This comment argues that differences between clinical and normal populations, between clinical data and sociological data, and differences in social class and cultural settings should be taken into account in order to understand the varying psychological dynamics behind self representations. Research from the Nordic countries indicates that young women's relationships with their mothers and fathers are becoming more similar. The daughters appreciate their mothers' ability to combine independent lives of their own with care for children and family, and fathers are to a higher degree than before perceived as warm and caring figures. This may imply that the gender-differentiated psychological roles of the mother and the father in the heterosexual nuclear family are becoming less distinct. If chinks undermine not only the merged attachment but also gender as such, this question arises: What ways and to what extent are the new psychological dispositions Susie Orbach describes actually gendered?     

Transnational diaspora entrepreneurship in emerging markets: Bridging institutional divides

Transnational diasporan entrepreneurs are migrants and their descendants who establish entrepreneurial activities that span the national business environments of their countries of origin and countries of residence. We explore how business incubators contribute to the economic development of emerging markets by organizing their programs to bridge the institutional divides that transnational diaspora entrepreneurs face when establishing their multi-territorial ventures in these markets. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork conducted in the Netherlands during 2007, we present the case study of IntEnt, an incubator providing services exclusively to transnational diasporan entrepreneurs. We apply Bergek and Norrman's (2008) assessment framework to this case, examining IntEnt's goals, model (selection, business support, and mediation activities), and outcomes. Employing Eisenhardt's case-based theory development approach (1989), we then leverage case findings to generate theory about the institutional challenges faced by transnational diaspora entrepreneurs and the role that incubators can play in helping these entrepreneurs overcome these challenges.     

Child labour or school attendance? Evidence from Zambia

In this paper we investigate what affects school attendance and child labour in an LDC, using data for Zambia. Since the data comes from a household survey with information on all household members it allows us to take account of unobserved household effects by introducing household-specific effects in a logit model. The empirical analysis suggests that both economic and sociological variables are important determinants for the choice between school attendance and child labour. In particular, we find some support for the hypothesis that poverty forces households to keep their children away from school. JEL classification: J24, I21, O15 Received May 20, 1996/Accepted January 2, 1997