A Learning Real Options Framework with Application to Process Design and Capacity Planning

This paper studies the impact of learning on a multi‐staged investment scenario. In contrast to other models in the real options literature in which learning is viewed as a passive consequence of the delay period, this paper quantifies information acquisition by merging statistical decision theory with the real options framework. In this context, real option attributes are discussed from a Bayesian perspective, thresholds are identified for improved decision‐making, and information's impact on downstream decision‐making is discussed. Using real data provided by a firm in the aerospace maintenance, repair, and overhaul industry, the methodology is used to guide a multi‐phased irreversible investment decision involving process design and capacity planning.     

Drivers of rural exodus from Amazonian headwaters

Rural–urban migration can have both positive and negative environmental consequences for tropical forests. Rural residents exert pressure on the environment through farming, fishing, and forest extraction, yet conversely, protecting rural livelihoods is often the motivation for conserving large areas of threatened forest. This research examines rural settlement within the Brazilian Amazon to shed light on the drivers of on-going rural exodus and its environmental implications. Specifically, we examine the relative importance of public service provision and natural resources in determining settlement patterns along, and rural–urban migration from, eight rivers in road-less regions of the Brazilian Amazon. Data include biophysical, social, and economic variables that were assessed in 184 riverine settlements along rural–urban gradients up to 740 km from the nearest urban center. Settlements were smaller upstream, and lacked key services such as schools and healthcare. We found that clustering of rural populations close to urban centers reflects the high costs of living in remote areas, despite abundant natural resources which previously justified migration to headwaters. Impeded dry-season navigability and transport costs restricted the flow of goods and services to and from remote areas, and transaction costs of trade exchange were higher upstream. A lack of school access was the main motivation for rural–urban migration and the abandonment of remote riverine settlements. A key policy implication is that while education services could provide a powerful tool to stabilize and support rural populations, delivery is challenging in remote areas and may also encourage further rural–urban migration in the longer term. Furthermore, river-dwellers in remote areas rarely visited remote urban centers, presumably because these journeys are too costly. We examine the implications of our findings for anti-poverty subsidies and payment for ecosystem services and conclude that transport costs required to receive payment could encourage further depopulation of remote areas.     

Husbands' Participation in Housework and Child Care in India

The authors tested theories of housework among tea plantation workers in India, where women comprise the main part of the workforce and are breadwinners in their families. Analysis of 49 semistructured interviews and survey data from 3,181 female workers revealed that although women were mainly responsible for domestic labor, more than half of husbands usually or sometimes helped their wives with cooking, fuel wood collection, and child care. The analyses revealed a curvilinear relationship between husbands' earnings share and their participation in each task, supporting theories of bargaining and gender display. The probability of male participation decreased to its lowest level when men earned less than their wives. Husbands rarely helped with clothes washing—considered the most feminine task—and their participation did not respond to changes in relative earnings. These results support the authors' argument that patterns of bargaining and gender display will vary depending on the gendered nature of housework tasks within a particular society.     

A Reflection on Critical Methodology: Accountability and Beneficiary Participative Evaluation in Third Sector Research

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - Enabled by the underpinnings of critical theory, this article discusses research methodology developed with the aim of...     

Everyday politics,social practices and movement networks: daily life in Barcelona's social centres

The relations between everyday life and political participation are of interest for much contemporary social science. Yet studies of social movement protest still pay disproportionate attention to moments of mobilization, and to movements with clear organizational boundaries, tactics and goals. Exceptions have explored collective identity, ‘free spaces’ and prefigurative politics, but such processes are framed as important only in accounting for movements in abeyance, or in explaining movement persistence. This article focuses on the social practices taking place in and around social movement spaces, showing that political meanings, knowledge and alternative forms of social organization are continually being developed and cultivated. Social centres in Barcelona, Spain, autonomous political spaces hosting cultural and educational events, protest campaigns and alternative living arrangements, are used as empirical case studies. Daily practices of food provisioning, distributing space and dividing labour are politicized and politicizing as they unfold and develop over time and through diverse networks around social centres. Following Melucci, such latent processes set the conditions for social movements and mobilization to occur. However, they not only underpin mobilization, but are themselves politically expressive and prefigurative, with multiple layers of latency and visibility identifiable in performances of practices. The variety of political forms – adversarial, expressive, theoretical, and routinized everyday practices, allow diverse identities, materialities and meanings to overlap in movement spaces, and help explain networks of mutual support between loosely knit networks of activists and non‐activists. An approach which focuses on practices and networks rather than mobilization and collective actors, it is argued, helps show how everyday life and political protest are mutually constitutive.     

Social Exchange and Sexual Behavior in Young Women's Premarital Relationships in Kenya

Transactional sex, or the exchange of money and gifts for sexual activities within nonmarital relationships, has been widely considered a contributing factor to the disproportionate prevalence of HIV/AIDS among young women in sub-Saharan Africa. This study applied social exchange theory to premarital relationships in order to investigate the linkages between a variety of young women's resources-including employment and material transfers from male partners-and sexual behaviors. Data on the first month of premarital relationships (N=551 relationships) were collected from a random sample of young adult women ages 18-24 in Kisumu, Kenya, using a retrospective life history calendar. Consistent with the hypotheses, results showed that young women's income increases the likelihood of safer sexual activities, including delaying sex and using condoms consistently. Material transfers from the male partner displayed the opposite effect, supporting the view that resources obtained from within the relationship decrease young women's negotiating power.     

The Emergence of Autoclitic Frames in Atypically and Typically Developing Children as a Function of Multiple Exemplar Instruction

In two experiments, we tested the effect of multiple exemplar instruction (MEI) for training sets on the emergence of autoclitic frames for spatial relations for novel tacts and mands. In Experiment 1, we used a replicated pre- and post-intervention probe design with four students with significant learning disabilities to test for acquisition of four autoclitic frames with novel tacts and mands before and after MEI. The untaught topographies emerged for all participants. In Experiment 2, we used a multiple probe design to test the effects of the MEI procedures on the same responses in four typically developing, bilingual students. The novel usage emerged for all participants. In the latter experiment, the children demonstrated untaught usage of mand or tact frames regardless of whether they were taught to respond in either listener or speaker functions alone or across listener and speaker functions. The findings are discussed in terms of the role of MEI in the formation of abstractions.     

Standards of Care for Research with Participants Who Identify as LGBTQ+

ABSTRACT

The following standards of care have been developed to support the continued development of research with individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, plus individuals whose orientations differ from those who identify as heterosexual and cisgender (LGBTQ+). The guidelines presented are conceived as a working document that reflect the current state and body of knowledge that can inform and provide reference for counseling research, and can be used in the preparation and training of future researchers. The standards outlined in this document will continue to evolve as does research, LGBTQ+ communities, and the sociopolitical climate.