Capturing hearts and minds: The influence of relational identification with the leader on followers' mobilization and cardiovascular reactivity

The influence of relational identification (RI) on leadership processes and the effects of social identity leadership on followers' responses to stress have received scant theoretical and research attention. The present research advances theoretical understanding by testing the assertion that high RI with the leader drives follower mobilization of effort and psychophysiological responses to stress. Two experimental scenario studies (Study 1 and Study 2) support the hypothesis that being led by an individual with whom followers perceive high RI increases follower intentional mobilization. Study 2 additionally showed that high (vs. low) RI increases follower resource appraisals and cognitive task performance. A laboratory experiment (Study 3) assessing cardiovascular (CV) reactivity showed that, compared to neutral (i.e., non-affiliated) leadership, being led by an individual with whom participants felt low RI elicited a maladaptive (i.e., threat) response to a pressurized task. In addition, relative to the low RI and neutral conditions, high RI with the leader did not engender greater challenge or threat reactivity. In conclusion, advancing social identity leadership and challenge and threat theory, findings suggest that leaders should be mindful of the deleterious effects (i.e., reduced mobilization and greater threat state) of low RI to optimize follower mobilization of effort and psychophysiological responses to stress.     

From Foster Care to Adoption and Guardianship: A Twenty-First Century Challenge

For nearly four decades, child welfare policy and practice have focused on the achievement of legal permanence for children in foster care. Although federal child welfare policy has resulted in the movement of children from state custody to legally permanent adoptive or guardianship families, little is known about the quality and enduring nature of these placements. A significant challenge of the twenty-first century child welfare system is how to ensure the well-being of children currently living with adoptive parents or guardians. This paper discusses child welfare policy and trends related to post-permanency well-being, including the decrease in Title IV-E foster care caseloads nationwide and the simultaneous increase in Title IV-E adoptive and guardianship caseloads. We highlight the needs of a twenty-first century child welfare system, including increased federal efforts to ensure child permanence and well-being after legal adoption or guardianship has been achieved, as well as more rigorous longitudinal and interdisciplinary research focused on the post-permanency adjustment of children and their families.     

Rendering sexism invisible in workplace narratives. A narrative analysis of female entrepreneurs’ stories of not being talked to by men

Entrepreneurism is widely regarded as being one way in which women can sidestep the sexism of male‐dominated institutionalized work environments and enter into a world in which men and women operate on a level playing field. Yet, in a corpus of stories of female entrepreneurs’ experiences, we noted that being ignored by men was a constant theme. Taking a social constructionist and narrative approach to identity, we analyse the gendered identity work that female entrepreneurs do in these stories and we seek to explicate the process through which female entrepreneurs do not evaluate being ignored by men as sexism‐in‐action. Using positioning theory as an analytical tool, we analyse these stories at three different levels: the here‐and‐now interaction between interviewer and storyteller; the there‐and‐then identity work of the characters in the storyworld; and the wider societal Discourses that the storytellers enact, and which are enacted by such identity work. Findings indicate that despite making gendered difference, inferiority and lack of agency relevant, the stories are not evaluated as sexism‐in‐action because the female entrepreneurs enact a postfeminist and neoliberal Discourse of freedom, autonomy and choice, rather than a feminist Discourse of discrimination and sexism.     

R×C ecological inference: bounds, correlations, flexibility and transparency of assumptions

Summary.  Despite its potential pitfalls, ecological inference is an unavoidable part of some quantitative settings, including US voting rights litigation. In such applications, the analyst will typically encounter two-way tables with more than two rows and columns. Although several ecological inference methods are currently available for 2×2 tables, there are fewer options for analysing general R × C tables, and virtually none that model counts as opposed to fractions. We propose a count R × C method that respects the bounds deterministically, that allows for complex relationships between internal cell quantities, that is easily extensible and that results from transparent assumptions. We study the method via simulation, and then apply it to an example that is drawn from the state of Texas relevant to recent redistricting litigation there.     

Active‐controlled,non‐inferiority trials in oncology: arbitrary limits,infeasible sample sizes and uninformative data analysis. Is there another way?

In oncology, it may not always be possible to evaluate the efficacy of new medicines in placebo-controlled trials. Furthermore, while some newer, biologically targeted anti-cancer treatments may be expected to deliver therapeutic benefit in terms of better tolerability or improved symptom control, they may not always be expected to provide increased efficacy relative to existing therapies. This naturally leads to the use of active-control, non-inferiority trials to evaluate such treatments. In recent evaluations of anti-cancer treatments, the non-inferiority margin has often been defined in terms of demonstrating that at least 50% of the active control effect has been retained by the new drug using methods such as those described by Rothmann et al., Statistics in Medicine 2003; 22:239-264 and Wang and Hung Controlled Clinical Trials 2003; 24:147-155. However, this approach can lead to prohibitively large clinical trials and results in a tendency to dichotomize trial outcome as either 'success' or 'failure' and thus oversimplifies interpretation. With relatively modest modification, these methods can be used to define a stepwise approach to design and analysis. In the first design step, the trial is sized to show indirectly that the new drug would have beaten placebo; in the second analysis step, the probability that the new drug is superior to placebo is assessed and, if sufficiently high in the third and final step, the relative efficacy of the new drug to control is assessed on a continuum of effect retention via an 'effect retention likelihood plot'. This stepwise approach is likely to provide a more complete assessment of relative efficacy so that the value of new treatments can be better judged.     

Social Cognitive Predictors of the Career Goals of Korean American Students

Limited empirical study of the career development of Asian Americans in general and Korean Americans in particular has been conducted. The authors present the results of a theory‐based exploration of the career goals of Korean American university students in which ethnic identity, self‐efficacy, outcome expectations, and career interests were used to predict goal intentions for science and nonscience careers. Outcome expectations and career interests predicted a moderate amount of variance in science career goal intentions and a moderate to large amount of variance in nonscience career goal intentions. Korean American students' career goal development seems similar to that of American college students.     

Implications of Ethnic Identity Exploration and Ethnic Identity Affirmation and Belonging for Intergroup Attitudes Among Adolescents

The present paper develops and tests two temporal models of the relationships among adolescents' ethnic identity exploration, ethnic identity affirmation and belonging, and attitudes toward their racial/ethnic ingroup and outgroups. Structural equation models for Euro‐Americans, Asian Americans, and Latinos revealed that all hypothesized relationships were positive and significant. The model in which ethnic identity exploration (at Time 1) predicts ethnic identity affirmation and belonging (at Time 2) was superior to the alternative model in which the relationship between them was reversed (i.e., affirmation and belonging at Time 1 predicts exploration at Time 2). Results (1) support the importance of exploration as a basis for establishing a secure attachment to one's ethnic identity, which, in turn, has positive implications for attitudes toward one's own group and other groups and (2) suggest that maintenance of ethnic identity is compatible with positive attitudes toward ethnic outgroups.     

Ecological research can augment restoration practice in urban areas degraded by invasive species—examples from Chicago Wilderness

Urban biodiversity conservation needs a firm scientific foundation, one that draws upon active and regionally calibrated research programs. Until recently this foundation has not existed. In this paper we examine the way in which the emerging discipline of restoration ecology in an urban context can learn from the experiences of ongoing restoration projects and in turn how novel insights from research of urban soils can help these projects define and reach their goals. Limitations on collaboration between academic researchers and practitioners continues be problematic. We discuss a model whereby this impediment may be removed. A case study of Rhamnus cathartica, an invader of Midwestern woodlands which modifies some important soil ecosystem properties will be used to illustrate the potential for engagement between research and practice.