Towards Integrating Emotions into Strategic Management Research: Trait Affect and Perceptions of the Strategic Environment

This paper describes an empirical investigation of the associations between trait negative affect and perceptions of the strategic environment. Data were collected from two samples of managers undertaking a distance learning MBA course (n = 59, n = 272). In the smaller sample, significant correlations were found between negative affectivity and perceptions of poor organizational performance and industry complexity. These results were replicated in the larger sample, after controlling for other variables. Additionally, negative affectivity was found to be related to perceived industry growth, and marginally related to perceived industry competitiveness.     

Cooperation versus competition: is there really such an issue?

This author argues that youth sports can move beyond the dichotomy of cooperation versus competition by redefining competition. This can be accomplished by considering the development of cooperative skills and achievement motivation. The article addresses how cooperative skills can be taught within a competitive sport. First, it is important to understand how children and youth understand and process competition based on their developmental stage. Parents need to consider whether a child is mentally, emotionally, socially, and physically mature enough to participate in an organized sport. Readiness for a sport is just as important as readiness for school. Teaching cooperative skills within a competitive context involves a focus on personal development rather than performance. By asking themselves a series of developmental questions, such as, "Is the sport appropriate for the developmental age of the child?" parents and coaches can form realistic expectations of young athletes. Motivation is also a key determinant of a child's readiness for youth sports and competition. Children want to play a sport when they feel competent. It is up to parents and coaches to create a motivational climate that is focused on doing one's best and not on external rewards like winning. Children and youth receive specific and constructive feedback that focuses on improvement in this type of climate. The author also discusses three models of competition: the military model, the reward model, and the partnership model. The partnership model is the approach that balances competition in youth sports. The author concludes by introducing the "athletic square" model as an important and appropriate way to promote youth sports.     

Examining the nexus between domestic violence and animal abuse in a national sample of service providers

Companion animals play a complex role in families impacted by violence. An outlet of emotional support for victims, the family pet often becomes a target for physical abuse. Results from a comprehensive e-survey of domestic violence shelters nationwide (N = 767) highlight both improvements and existing gaps in service provision for domestic violence victims and their pets. Quantitative and qualitative data noted frequently encountered obstacles to successful shelter seeking by abuse victims with companion animals including a lack of availability, funding, space, and reliable programming. Although results indicate an overall improvement in organizational awareness, fewer than half of surveyed shelters include intake questions about animals. Continued awareness and an expansion of services is needed to create viable safety planning strategies and reliable alternatives for women with companion animals in order to improve the likelihood that abuse victims will seek escape and refuge for themselves, their children, and their pets.     

Student Voices Speak Quality Assurance: Continual Improvement in Online Social Work Education

As social work education expands instruction through the rise of distance education, educators seek new ways to improve quality in online courses. Quality assurance standards and student feedback offer valuable insights to ensure satisfying and effective online learning experiences. An examination of these two assessment approaches concurrently in the context of a 4-year study of student perspectives in MSW Human Behavior and the Social Environment foundation courses illustrates how systematic feedback from students can complement existing quality assurance standards. Of particular importance is the unmistakable strength of student voices about their learning from diverse perspectives in an online collaborative leaning setting that can and should be incorporated into standardized quality assessment guidelines for social work programs.     

Modeling Competing Infectious Pathogens from a Bayesian Perspective: Application to Influenza Studies with Incomplete Laboratory Results

In seasonal influenza epidemics, pathogens such as respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) often co-circulate with influenza and cause influenza-like illness (ILI) in human hosts. However, it is often impractical to test for each potential pathogen or to collect specimens for each observed ILI episode, making inference about influenza transmission difficult. In the setting of infectious diseases, missing outcomes impose a particular challenge because of the dependence among individuals. We propose a Bayesian competing-risk model for multiple co-circulating pathogens for inference on transmissibility and intervention efficacies under the assumption that missingness in the biological confirmation of the pathogen is ignorable. Simulation studies indicate a reasonable performance of the proposed model even if the number of potential pathogens is misspecified. They also show that a moderate amount of missing laboratory test results has only a small impact on inference about key parameters in the setting of close contact groups. Using the proposed model, we found that a non-pharmaceutical intervention is marginally protective against transmission of influenza A in a study conducted in elementary schools.     

Estimating the Causal Effect of Low Tidal Volume Ventilation on Survival in Patients with Acute Lung Injury

Acute lung injury (ALI) is a condition characterized by acute onset of severe hypoxemia and bilateral pulmonary infiltrates. ALI patients typically require mechanical ventilation in an intensive care unit. Low tidal volume ventilation (LTVV), a time-varying dynamic treatment regime, has been recommended as an effective ventilation strategy. This recommendation was based on the results of the ARMA study, a randomized clinical trial designed to compare low vs. high tidal volume strategies (The Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome Network, 2000) . After publication of the trial, some critics focused on the high non-adherence rates in the LTVV arm suggesting that non-adherence occurred because treating physicians felt that deviating from the prescribed regime would improve patient outcomes. In this paper, we seek to address this controversy by estimating the survival distribution in the counterfactual setting where all patients assigned to LTVV followed the regime. Inference is based on a fully Bayesian implementation of Robins' (1986) G-computation formula. In addition to re-analyzing data from the ARMA trial, we also apply our methodology to data from a subsequent trial (ALVEOLI), which implemented the LTVV regime in both of its study arms and also suffered from non-adherence.     

A prior for the variance in hierarchical models

The choice of prior distributions for the variances can be important and quite difficult in Bayesian hierarchical and variance component models. For situations where little prior information is available, a ‘nonin-formative’ type prior is usually chosen. ‘Noninformative’ priors have been discussed by many authors and used in many contexts. However, care must be taken using these prior distributions as many are improper and thus, can lead to improper posterior distributions. Additionally, in small samples, these priors can be ‘informative’. In this paper, we investigate a proper ‘vague’ prior, the uniform shrinkage prior (Strawder-man 1971; Christiansen & Morris 1997). We discuss its properties and show how posterior distributions for common hierarchical models using this prior lead to proper posterior distributions. We also illustrate the attractive frequentist properties of this prior for a normal hierarchical model including testing and estimation. To conclude, we generalize this prior to the multivariate situation of a covariance matrix.     

The Role of Racial Microaggressions,Stress, and Acculturation in Understanding Latino Health Outcomes in the USA

A growing body of literature demonstrates important negative health effects from racial microaggressions for racial/ethnic minorities. However, at present, the bulk of the literature is focused on the case of black Americans with relatively little attention as to how this may play out for other racial/ethnic groups. Here, we examine the association of health and racial microaggressions in the case of Latinos. Furthermore, we disaggregate Latinos by language preference in order to see how acculturation to the USA may moderate the effect of racial microaggressions on health outcomes for the group. In a statistical analysis of the 2004 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, we examine the association between stress from racial microaggressions and self-rated health for Latinos of different levels of linguistic acculturation. We find that more acculturated Latinos (measured in terms of language preference) are more likely to experience physical stress from perceived racial microaggressions after accounting for social and demographic factors. Further, this stress is linked to overall poorer self-rated health for the group. However, we find no such association for less acculturated, Spanish-preference Latinos.     

Lesbians and tech: Analyzing digital media technologies and lesbian experience

The rise of the popular Internet has coincided with the increasing acceptance, even assimilation, of lesbians into mainstream society. The visible presence of lesbians in the tech industry and in digitally mediated spaces raises a set of questions about the relationship between queer identities and Internet technologies. This introduction to a special issue of Journal of Lesbian Studies explores some of these questions and provides an overview of the articles that follow.