Girls’ friendships as habitus in an elite,middle-class secondary school in Ireland

This study examines gendered and classed friendships in a predominantly middle-class, girls' secondary school in the southern region of the Republic of Ireland. Bourdieu's (1977) concept of habitus, interactively, with Gidden's (1984) concept of practical consciousness, and Gambetta's (1987) intentional rational choice informed the conceptual framework for the study. Narrative sources yielded data about girls' friendships and peer interactions inside and outside of school. The social class and habitus of each of the girls mediated their friendship formation and friendship choice. Data sources highlight that the middle-class girls' friendships were situated in fluid and multiple cliques; given their hegemonic positionality within the school. Contrastingly, working-class girls' friendships were situated in a contained and single clique, often evidenced by their resistance to the institutional habitus. The ways in which these peer friendships operated as powerful shapers of the girls' actions and identities is discussed. This paper provides examples of the nuanced ways that girls' friendships are developed and maintained based on conformity or resistance to the school norms and expectations of academic success. Importantly, findings evidence the differentiated and instrumental use of friendships among the middle-class and working-class girls in a competitive, elite school setting.     

The pressure cooker: When crisis stimulates explorative business model change intentions

How do firms respond to critical threats, such as regulatory turmoils or disruptive innovations? After more than three decades of contradicting theoretical arguments and inconsistent empirical results, this question remains unresolved. One view argues for and finds evidence for amplified propensity to engage in change when organization members perceive critical threat. The other view supports the threat-rigidity phenomenon, reinforcing resistance to change through a focus on habitual practices and routines. To resolve this puzzle, we draw on the multi-dimensional framework of ‘crisis’ strategic issues processing, supplemented with the behavioral decision making perspective. In particular, we investigate the conditions of emergence of radical (explorative) business model change intentions within organizations in response to major threats. The resulting model suggests that cognitive moderators – perceived predictability and time pressure – lead to highly divergent results of critical threat perception, such that low predictability and high time pressure attenuate the threat-induced explorative business model change intentions. The model is tested in two empirical contexts, real estate brokerage and higher education, finding strong empirical support.     

Organizational listening: Addressing a major gap in public relations theory and practice

An extensive body of literature theorizes public relations as two-way communication, dialogue, and relationships between organizations and their publics. Although there are alternative views, including public relations as advocacy, most theories emphasize dialogue, co-orientation, and relationships incorporating satisfaction, trust, and control mutuality—even to the extent of symmetry. Critical perspectives propose a sociocultural turn that further emphasizes stakeholders’ and societal interests. This analysis draws on a three-country study that reveals a major theory-practice gap and proposes a significant expansion of public relations theory in relation to listening to realize normative notions of public relations and give effect to claims of dialogue and engagement.     

It Takes Two? An Exploration of Processes and Outcomes in a Two‐Session Couple Intervention

Although relationship distress is common, couples often forego professional help due to concerns such as time constraints, financial costs, and stigma. The two‐session relationship checkup is an alternative format of couple intervention developed to address these concerns. In this qualitative study, we interviewed 20 coupled participants and six clinicians to examine the checkup's processes and outcomes. The phenomenological themes that emerged revealed sequential processes by which this format works. Couple themes included client motivation, the therapeutic relationship, and therapeutic change in terms of perceptions and behaviors—particularly with regard to communication. Clinician data largely mirrored these themes. The results suggest the intervention addressed barriers to help‐seeking and may be a viable selective option for at‐risk couples.     

Is Pathological Gambling Moderated by Age?

The age of a patient is a strong moderator of both the course and the evolution of disorders/diseases. However, the effects of current age in pathological gambling (PG) have rarely been examined. The aim of this study is to explore the moderating effects of the patients’ current age in relation to personality traits and clinical outcomes of PG. A total sample of 2,309 treatment-seeking patients for PG, diagnosed according to DSM-IV criteria, participated in this study and were assessed with the Diagnostic Questionnaire for Pathological Gambling according to DSM-IV criteria, the South Oaks Gambling Screen, the Symptom Checklist, the Temperament and Character Inventory-R, and other clinical and psychopathological measures. Orthogonal polynomial contrasts showed linear trends in the relationship between age and PG: the older the patient, the more comorbid health problems were visible. The presence of additional quadratic trends also suggests that age plays a significant role in moderating the possibility of existing PG problems and general psychopathology. No interaction term was found between age and sex, but it was present for age and some personality traits: self-transcendence and reward dependence (these two traits were only relevant to the level of impairment due to PG at specific ages). This study suggests that the patients’ age influences psychopathological and clinical aspects associated to PG. Intervention in the earliest manifestations of this complex problem is essential in order to better address the need of successful treatment planning.     

Ecology and conservation of strangler figs in urban wall habitats

Hong Kong’s rugged topography demands creation of developable land by reclaiming the harbor and terracing hillslopes. The vertical faces between adjoining hillslope-platforms are often stabilized by stone retaining walls. Such artificial cliffs embedded in the urban matrix, as a habitat analogue of rocky cliffs, have been colonized by spontaneous-ruderal vegetation. Detailed field assessment of 289 walls with 793 trees permitted in-depth analysis of this unique tropical urban ecology to inform conservation. The 28 stonewall tree species, mainly native, are dominated by six keystone and companion Ficus (Moraceae) species. They can develop into large cliff hangers >?20 m height on the apparently precarious and inhospitable walls. The many joints between masonry blocks provide opportunities for lodging and germination of seeds brought by frugivorous birds and bats. The aft-soil behind walls provides catchment for normal root functions. Beginning as pioneers and persisting as climax members, they short-circuit the seral processes. Wall-gripping capability as large epilithic woody hemi-epiphytes is due to the strangler-fig habit, an evolutionary trait that originated in the tropical forest. The polymorphic roots with morphological plasticity and self-grafting ability, and their multiple modes of interactions with wall niches, account for firm attachment on the vertical habitat and exploration of proximal soils. A model of strangler-fig growth on stone walls serving as surrogate host tree is developed. The diverse and versatile rooting modes are the basis to sustain strangler-fig wall conditions to permit continuation of strangler-fig habit. Such unique nature-in-city and natural-cum-cultural gems deserve conservation as urban ecological heritage.     

Recommendations on the statistical analysis of the Comet assay

In 2010, the Statisticians in the Pharmaceutical Industry (PSI) Toxicology Special Interest Group met to discuss the design and analysis of the Comet assay. The Comet assay is one potential component of the package of safety studies required by regulatory bodies. As these studies usually involve a three-way nested experimental design and as the distribution of the measured response is usually either lognormal or lognormal plus a point mass at zero, the analysis is not straightforward. This has led to many different types of analysis being proposed in the literature, with several different methods applied within the pharmaceutical industry itself. This article summarises the PSI Toxicology Group's discussions and recommendations around these issues.     

Reliability, Validity, and Classification Accuracy of a Spanish Translation of a Measure of DSM-IV Diagnostic Criteria for Pathological Gambling

The aim of this study was to measure the reliability, validity, and classification accuracy of a Spanish translation of a measure of DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for Pathological Gambling (PG). Participants were 263 male and 23 female patients seeking treatment for PG and a matched non-psychiatric control sample of 259 men and 24 women. A Spanish translation of a 19-item measure of DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for PG (Stinchfield 2003) was administered along with other validity measures. The DSM-IV diagnostic criteria were found to be internally consistent with a coefficient alpha of .95 in the combined sample. Evidence of satisfactory convergent validity included moderate to high correlations with other measures of problem gambling. Using the standard DSM-IV cut-score of five, the ten criteria were found to yield satisfactory classification accuracy results with a high hit rate (.95), high sensitivity (.92), high specificity (.99), low false positive (.01), and low false negative rate (.08). Lowering the cut score to four resulted in modest improvements in classification accuracy and reduced the false negative rate from .08 to .05. The Spanish translation of a measure of DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for PG demonstrated satisfactory psychometric properties and a cut score of four improved diagnostic precision.     

Rural Community and Rural Resilience: What is important to farmers in keeping their country towns alive?

Many studies have highlighted the phenomenon of rural decline in parts of the developed world, summarised as a loss in agricultural employment leading to a decline in the number and size of rural settlements. This study of small towns in part of Australia’s inland rural “heartland” employs the concepts of interactional rural community of place and rural resilience to identify how farmers perceive their interactions with their local town. This study suggests that robust levels of ongoing engagement between farmers and town communities are important in maintaining rural populations and services along with both a strong local economy and environment. Face-to-face interviews with 115 farmers in two rural regions of New South Wales, Australia, highlight the importance of the local economy and jobs, the quality of the local environment and a strong sense of belonging, in contributing to a strong sense of local community and potential for resilience.