Ergonomics work analysis applied to dentistry--a Brazilian case study

This paper presents the Ergonomic Work Analysis method in a Brazilian Dentist's office. Through the study, the constraints and the strategies in avoiding them were identified. It was found that dentists hardly use the position most indicated by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the Federation Dentaire Internacionale (FDI) for both the patient and the dentist, which is respectively supine and 9 o'clock, due to the limited space and layout. Five types of treatments performed by the professional have been studied. The frequency and duration of actions in these treatments were accounted for and the standard positions adopted were identified. The AET was found to be a very suitable method to grasp the dentist's activity and build a point of view of the profession, which is characterized as: stressful, perfectionist and restrictive. Time management is presented as an important strategy to control the tension arising from performing the treatments.     

Urban impacts on tropical island streams: Some key aspects influencing ecosystem response

Improving our understanding of the impacts of urbanization on tropical island streams is critical as urbanization becomes a dominant feature in tropical areas. Although the ??urban stream syndrome?? has been successful in summarizing urban impacts on streams, the response of some island streams is different to that expected. Here we review available information on urban impacts to tropical island streams and describe unique responses to urbanization. We identified three key aspects that play particularly important or unique roles in determining tropical-island stream integrity: biotic response to water pollution, movement barriers along the stream network, and altered geomorphology that results in habitat loss. As expected, water pollution negatively impacts stream ecosystems in tropical islands and in some regions impacts can be severe, as untreated wastewaters are directly discharged into streams. While aquatic insects show the expected responses to pollution, other native fauna (e.g., shrimps and fishes) appear to be less impacted by moderate levels of pollution. Movement barriers along the stream network are especially important as much of the tropical island fauna have diadromous (either amphidromous or catadromous) life histories. Most native freshwater mollusks, shrimps, and fishes inhabiting tropical islands are diadromous and depend on unimpeded connections between freshwater and marine environments to complete their life cycles. The presence of these species in urban streams is best explained by longitudinal connectivity rather than by the degree of urban impact. Finally, in streams that remain connected to marine environments, the presence of native shrimps and fishes is strongly related to the physical habitat. Fish assemblages in channelized and severely altered stream reaches are almost completely devoid of native fauna and tend to be dominated by non-native species. In contrast, relatively diverse shrimp and fish assemblages can be found in reaches that retain their physical habitat complexity, even when they are impacted by urbanization. Our understanding of urban impacts on tropical island streams remains limited. However, the identification of key aspects can help us better understand urban impacts on streams in tropical islands, and best focus our management and research efforts to protect these unique ecosystems.     

Dimensions of Social Stratification and Their Relation to Mortality: A Comparison Across Gender and Life Course Periods in Finland

Social Indicators Research - Differences in mortality between groups with different socioeconomic positions (SEP) are well-established, but the relative contribution of different SEP measures is...     

Diaspora as aesthetic formation: community sports events and the making of a Somali diaspora

This paper uses the concept of aesthetic formation to examine the practices through which diasporic imaginations become tangible and experienced as ‘real’. The authors interpret sport as an embodied aesthetic practice through which diasporas materialise, with important implications for identification and belonging. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork on a transnational community-based sports event, the Amsterdam Futsal Tournament, the paper discusses how articulations of Somali diasporism become tangible and embodied in subjects who participate in this event. The authors conclude that these materialisation practices can simultaneously elicit multiple forms and levels of belonging that also foster a sense of integration and belonging to the nation.     

Being a desirable migrant: perception and racialisation of Icelandic migrants in Norway

In the aftermath of the financial crisis that hit Iceland in October 2008, increased numbers of Icelanders migrated to Norway to seek employment due to difficult economic circumstances in Iceland. Using critical perspectives from postcolonial studies and critical whiteness studies, the paper explores how these Icelandic migrants in Norway make sense of their new position as economic migrants within a global economy characterised by a growing sense of precariousness, while past inequalities and racism continue to matter. We also examine how these migrants are perceived in Norwegian media, and how social discourses of Icelandic migrants reflect larger Norwegian debates on racism, desirability and cultural belonging. Media discourses in Norway and interviews with Icelandic migrants reveal a hierarchy of acceptability of migrants. Icelanders are positioned as highly desirable compared to other migrant groups due to the intersection of perceived racial belonging, nationality and class. Our discussion contributes, furthermore, towards a critical analysis of the category migrant, by exploring how the term immigrant (innvandrer/innflytjandi) is used in narratives of Icelandic migrants in Norway and in Norwegian media discussions, showing the negative and racialised connotations of the term immigrant and how its understanding is linked with vulnerable positions and discrimination.     

‘Are you gonna show this to white people?’: Chicana/o and Latina/o students’ counter-narratives on race,place, and representation

This article explores the recurring narratives on race, place and representation that emerged in the talk of Chicana/o and Latina/o sixth-graders at a middle school in East Los Angeles, California. Discourse analytic methods are used to closely examine how these narratives were constructed within the contexts of everyday classroom interactions. Drawing on the notion of counter-storytelling from critical race theory, the article highlights how these sixth-grade students articulated counter-narratives about who they were and what their community was like – often in direct opposition to what they perceived as white people’s stereotypical assumptions and misperceptions. It is argued that these narratives constitute a powerful and sophisticated critique of dominant narratives that frame working-class Chicana/o and Latina/o students in racist and pejorative terms. The article ends with a discussion of implications for understanding youth agency and the politics of representation.     

Navigating health care: brokerage and access for undocumented Latino immigrants under the 2010 Affordable Care Act

ABSTRACT

Brokerage is a prominent mechanism that explains access for Latino immigrants to many American institutions. However, few studies examine the dual nature of brokerage in answering questions on access to health care for undocumented Latino immigrants. The growing importance of Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) and ethnic navigators connecting immigrants to health care under the 2010 Affordable Care Act calls attention to the duality of brokers and its role in access. The study draws from 44 in-depth interviews with providers, clinic directors, navigators, and immigrant patients and two years of fieldwork in FQHCs in California’s San Francisco Bay Area (2011–2013). Results show that brokers enable access through coaching and myth-busting but they also hinder it through scrutiny and bureaucratic filtering. The widespread dependence on brokerage, I argue, leads to ersatz brokerage, such as when providers navigate the health-care system for the undocumented without the appropriate linguistic resources or coordination. Furthermore, the study shows that the duality in brokerage generates misinformation, churning, and alienation. Understanding the relational processes that both include and exclude vulnerable populations from needed services enhances theories of immigrant integration and can help design more efficient policies and address inequalities related to documentation status.     

Examining educational inequalities in two national systems: a comparison of the North African second generation in France and the Mexican second generation in the United States

This paper aims to compare the educational outcomes of children of immigrants in France and in the United States to highlight the ethnic educational inequalities in both countries. The comparison focuses on children from two groups: North Africans in France and Mexicans in the United States. By using two longitudinal datasets, the French Educational Panel Survey and Add Health, we examine aspirations, expectations, and secondary attainment in the two contexts. We explore in particular the role of parental education on attainment. Immigrant families have high educational aspirations in both contexts. North-African families express higher aspirations than native French with similar background, while there are no significant differences between second-generation Mexicans and the majority group net of parental education. Second-generation children are disadvantaged in school in both countries; they are more likely to drop out and less likely to graduate from high school, but most of the disadvantage is related to their social background. Net of social background, the Mexican second generation does not differ from the majority group while the North African second generation is more likely to get the French high school diploma than their peers of French origins, in line with their high aspirations. However, North Africans are more likely to receive the technological baccalauréat than the general baccalauréat.     

Workplace resources to improve both employee well-being and performance: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Organisations are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of employees in gaining and maintaining competitive advantage. The happy worker–productive worker thesis suggests that workers who experience high levels of well-being also perform well and vice versa; however, organisations need to know how to ensure such happy and productive workers. The present review and meta-analysis identifies workplace resources at the individual, the group, the leader, and the organisational levels that are related to both employee well-being and organisational performance. We examine which types of resources are most important in predicting both employee well-being and performance. We identified 84 quantitative studies published in print and online from 2003 to November 2015. Resources at either of the four levels were related to both employee well-being and performance. We found no significant differences in employee well-being and organisational performance between the four levels of workplace resources, suggesting that interventions may focus on any of these levels. Cross-sectional studies showed stronger relationships with well-being and performance than longitudinal studies. Studies using objective performance ratings provided weaker relationships between resources and performance than self-rated and leader/third-party-rated studies.     

Generating a smallest binary tree by proper selection of the longest edges to bisect in a unit simplex refinement

In several areas like global optimization using branch-and-bound methods for mixture design, the unit n-simplex is refined by longest edge bisection (LEB). This process provides a binary search tree. For \(n>2\), simplices appearing during the refinement process can have more than one longest edge (LE). The size of the resulting binary tree depends on the specific sequence of bisected longest edges. The questions are how to calculate the size of one of the smallest binary trees generated by LEB and how to find the corresponding sequence of LEs to bisect, which can be represented by a set of LE indices. Algorithms answering these questions are presented here. We focus on sets of LE indices that are repeated at a level of the binary tree. A set of LEs was presented in Aparicio et al. (Informatica 26(1):17–32, 2015), for \(n=3\). An additional question is whether this set is the best one under the so-called \(m_k\)-valid condition.