Decision Sciences Research in China: A Critical Review and Research Agenda—Foundations and Overview*

This article focuses on decision sciences research in China, providing an overview of current research and developing a foundation for future China‐based research. China provides a unique research opportunity for decision sciences researchers, owing to its recent history, rapid economic development, and strong national culture. We examine recent economic reforms and their impact on the development of research questions in the decision sciences, as well as discuss characteristics of the diverse regions in China and their potential as sites for various types of research. We provide a brief overview of recent China‐based research on decision sciences issues relating to national culture, supply chain management, quality management, production planning and control, operations strategy, and new product development and discuss some of the unique methodological challenges inherent in China‐based research. We conclude by looking forward to emerging research opportunities in China.     

A Shared Presentation: Two Disabled Women on Video

In this paper we share our collaborative experience of making a video in which disabled women present their lives as they wish to portray them. We undertook what we hope will be perceived as emancipatory research, in which disabled and non-disabled women work together to create audio-visual teaching materials. We include a preliminary discussion about the representation of disability on British television broadcasts between October 1991 and March 1992. We look at negative imagery, charity fund raising, and positive images. The paper uses comments by disabled broadcasters and disabled academics, and reflects on their work.     

Fertility desires and fertility: Hers,his, and theirs

The relationship between desired and achieved fertility may be misspecified by excluding husbands' fertility desires or by confounding effects of shared desires with the resolution of conflicting desires. Using couple data from the classic Princeton Fertility Surveys, we find relatively large husband effects on fertility outcomes as well as unique effects of spousal disagreement. Wives and husbands were equally likely to achieve fertility desires, and disagreeing couples experienced fertility rates midway between couples who wanted the same smaller or larger number of children. These conditions do not hold, however, when we include willingness to delay births for economic mobility as part of the measure of fertility desires. Among couples who both wanted a third child, only husbands' willingness to delay births had significant negative effects on birth rates.     

Decision-making style: Impact on satisfaction of the commuter couples' lifestyle

The entry of many women into the labor force in recent years has precipitated some changes for families. Commuter marriage is an attempt by some families to integrate work and family life. This article examines the decision-making style that 39 commuter couples use to make a decision if they should commute. The results indicate a more highly planned and systematically structured decision style relates to increased satisfaction with one's decision. Specific family and couple commuter style variables are discussed in relation to desirableness of lifestyle and coping strategies for commuter couples.Special acknowledgment is extended to Jane W. Spruill for her assistance with data collection and computer analysis. Support for computer analysis is acknowledged to the University of Maryland Computer Center. This research was supported in part by a Graduate Research Board Grant and a Divisional Small Grant Award, The University of Maryland, College Park, MD. This article benefited greatly from the suggestions of Charles Hennon and two anonymous reviewers.Her research interests include family policy issues, and work and families. She received her Ph.D. from The Pennsylvania State University.     

Police control during a national political convention: A four perimeter strategy

The article examines types of role strategies utilized by police to gain control over perceived oppositional group activity. Literature in the area of formal organizations and police structures are viewed as deficient in terms of examining the combined effect of presenting multiple images of an organization to an oppositional group. Boundary-spanning roles are conceptualized as varying in terms of discretion, penetration and secrecy. Data from the 1976 Republican Convention are used to identify four types of boundary-spanning roles utilized to gain control over demonstrator activity. While each of these roles served an important control function, in combination the roles presented an inconsistent and contradictory image of the police to demonstrators. The effect of this strategy was to create confusion in the strategies and tactics of the oppositional group.Partial support for this research was obtained through an L.E.A.A. grant, Evaluation of the 1976 Republican National Convention, awarded to Midwest Research Institute (MRI). Patricia E. Erickson and James Flynn were employed as consultants to MRI for the grant period. Special thanks are extended to Bruce B. Morgan who served as project director.     

Understanding the Self Through Siblings: Self‐awareness Mediates the Sibling Effect on Social Understanding

This study addresses the role of sibling influence on social understanding in the second year of life, in a sample of families living in New Zealand who identify as Pacific Island (N = 43). We tested toddlers at 20 and 26 months on social understanding tasks, as well as their levels of self‐awareness on the Stipek self‐concept questionnaire. We hypothesized that the presence of siblings provides a rich resource from which to learn about the mind. There were significant differences in children's social understanding and self‐awareness as a function of having older siblings. Further analyses revealed that the relation between older siblings and social understanding was mediated by toddlers' level of self‐awareness.     

Cross‐Cultural Differences in Risk Perceptions of Disasters

Public risk perceptions of mass disasters carry considerable influences, both psychologically and economically, despite their oft‐times imprecise nature. Prior research has identified the presence of an optimistic bias that affects risk perception, but there is a dearth of literature examining how these perceptions differ among cultures—particularly with regard to mass disasters. The present study explores differences among Japanese, Argentinean, and North American mental health workers in their rates of the optimistic bias in risk perceptions as contrasted between natural disasters and terrorist events. The results indicate a significant difference among cultures in levels of perceived risk that do not correspond to actual exposure rates. Japanese groups had the highest risk perceptions for both types of hazards and North Americans and Argentineans had the lowest risk perceptions for terrorism. Additionally, participants across all cultures rated risk to self as lower than risk to others (optimistic bias) across all disaster types. These findings suggest that cultural factors may have a greater influence on risk perception than social exposure, and that the belief that one is more immune to disasters compared to others may be a cross‐cultural phenomenon.     

跟自己的人生平起平坐

商场女装部，一个正血拼的贵妇喊出我名字，我们有多久没见？五年？还是六年？我赶紧奉上不失礼的笑，打心底认定完全陌生的她十有八九认错人。她接着报出自己姓名和一些关键词，我才恍然记起彼此曾是同事。辞职嫁作商人妇的她妆容精致得像油画，原本黑油油的直发又染又烫。