The Effects of Authentic Leadership on Strategic Internal Communication and Employee-Organization Relationships

This study examines how strategic leadership influences excellent internal public relations by establishing the linkage between authentic leadership, symmetrical and transparent communication, and employee–organization relationships. The results showed that authentic leadership as an antecedent factor plays a critical role in nurturing an organization's symmetrical and transparent communication system, which in turn, cultivates quality employee–organization relationships. An organization's symmetrical communication worldview greatly fosters its day-to-day transparent communication practice. Transparent communication, characterized by information substantiality, accountability, and employee participation, largely contributes to employee trust, control mutuality, commitment, and satisfaction. The impact of symmetrical communication on employees' relational outcomes is fully mediated via transparent communication. Significant theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.     

Knowledge translation efforts in child and youth mental health: a systematic review

The availability of knowledge translation strategies that have been empirically studied and proven useful is a critical prerequisite to narrowing the research-to-practice gap in child and youth mental health. Through this review the authors sought to determine the current state of scientific knowledge of the effectiveness of knowledge translation approaches in child and youth mental health by conducting a systematic review of the research evidence. The findings and quality of the 12 included studies are discussed. Future work of high methodological quality that explores a broader range of knowledge translation strategies and practitioners to which they are applied and that also attends to implementation process is recommended.     

Frenzied attacks. A micro‐sociological analysis of the emotional dynamics of extreme youth violence

Inspired by phenomenological and interactionist studies of youth violence, this article offers an empirical evaluation of Collins's micro‐sociological theory of violence. The main question is whether situations of extreme violence have distinct situational dynamics. Based on analyses of 159 interactions taken from judicial case files, situations of extreme youth violence, here called frenzied attacks, were identified on the basis of the state of encapsulation of the attackers (absorbed in the violence, their sole focus is the destruction of the victim) and the disproportionateness of the violence (the attackers continue to hurt the victims even though they do not pose a threat or a challenge to them). Qualitative and statistical analyses revealed that this emotional state results from a social figuration in which the emotional balance shifts toward complete dominance of the attackers. Thus, the occurrence of frenzied attacks is associated with the moment victims hit the ground, paralyse and start to apologize, with the numerical dominance of the attackers' supportive group and with feelings of group membership, in the form of solidarity excitement and family ties in the attackers' group. Alcohol intoxication is of influence as well, but contrary to the expectation, this effect was independent from solidarity excitement. The article concludes that Collins's theory on the emotional dynamics of violence adds a new dimension to the phenomenological and interactionist traditions of research.     

Contesting Dominance and Performing Badness: A Micro‐Sociological Analysis of the Forms,Situational Asymmetry,and Severity of Street Violence

This article proposes two ideal types of street violence: contesting dominance and performing badness. These ideal types were used as heuristic devices in qualitative analyses of 159 violent interactions among Dutch youth, taken from judicial case files. These analyses revealed that over half of the interactions resembled the contesting dominance type. Here, opponents engage in sequences of challenges and provocations to aggressively establish a domineering self; attackers purposively looked for or arranged confrontations that revolved around the issue of who is superior per se. The performing badness type was found in 30% of the cases. This is one‐sided violence in which attackers humiliate and toy with their victims to display their power and meanness. The relationships between these forms of violence, situational asymmetry (weak victims and supportive groups) and severity of the violence were analyzed statistically. Contesting dominance was associated with more severe violence, resulting from the greater amount of confrontational tension. Situational asymmetry was the rule in both forms of violence. The difference between the size of the attackers’ supportive group and that of the victims turned out to be especially important. The larger the difference, the more severe the violence in general, but especially in contesting dominance.     

Toward the Assessment of Public Values

Efforts to measure trends in citizen preferences have been curtailedby the tendency of public opinion analysts to study ephemeralissues, to depend upon single questions, and to analyze issuesindividually rather than in relation to competing concerns.An illustrative analysis uses conceptualization of opinionsin a value framework and factor analysis to overcome these limitations.     

Metro/Nonmetro Residence,Nonmarital Conception,and Conception Outcomes*

Abstract Two of the most significant changes affecting U.S. society during the 20th century were transformations in family structure and the transition from a nonmetropolitan/farm society to a largely metropolitan society. In this study, classic sociological theory, developed to understand differences between metro and nonmetro society, was employed. Despite contentions that the residence variable is no longer viable, we hypothesized that nonmetro interaction patterns would result in nonmetro residents making more traditional and conservative choices relative to family formation. Analysis of data from the 1995 National Survey of Family Growth provided support for these contentions. Nonmetropolitan women were significantly more likely than metropolitan women to be married at the time of conception. Further, when comparing women who were not married at conception, nonmetro women were significantly more likely than metro women to get married prior to the birth of the child, and were significantly more likely to have the pregnancy result in a live birth.     

Long range planning for public libraries—A Delphi study

Library managers in the local authority sector are increasingly needing to forecast future developments in order to have any chance of obtaining a realistic share of available resources. The Public Libraries Research Group, which was founded in 1971, produced a statement on public library aims and objectives and as a follow up to this carried out a Delphi exercise in 1973/74 to try and establish what technological, environmental, socio-economic and political pressures would effect developments in this field in the next 30 years. This was the first exercise of its type to be carried out in the United Kingdom and the full results have been published recently by the Public Libraries Research Group as a report. This paper describes how the project was evolved and carried out.     

Rebuilding Native American communities

The Wellbriety Movement in Native American communities draws on the wisdom and participation of traditional elders. Beginning with a basic community teaching called the Four Laws of Change and the Healing Forest Model, the Wellbriety Movement blends Medicine Wheel knowledge with the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous to provide culture-specific addiction recovery help for Native Americans. The four Journeys of the Sacred Hoop brought the Wellbriety Movement to Native and non-Native people alike from 1999 to 2003.