Understanding the High Rates of Employment among Low‐educated Women in Portugal: A Comparatively Oriented Case Study

This article addresses the question of why Portugal is an exception among southern European countries in having a high rate of female employment. Cross‐national data show an even greater gap between Portugal and its southern European neighbours in the employment rates for low‐educated women. This article presents case‐based evidence on the work orientations, gender relations and reconciliation strategies of low‐educated women working in the clothing industry in Portugal. The analysis reveals that while economic need plays an important role in their attachment to employment, their work decisions are forged by a complex set of attitudes regarding employment and the family. Traditional values regarding the role of women in the family co‐exist with more modern values regarding their employment participation. Moreover, the institutional arrangements of childcare and reconciliation also appear to be more supportive than might be expected in a southern Europe welfare state. By focusing on a particular group of low‐educated women, the findings suggest that the same welfare policies may have different impacts on the reconciliation strategies of women of different socioeconomic groups.     

The Determinants of Lottery Sales in Portugal

In sum, this paper examines the core determinants of lottery sales in Portugal. With panel data analysis covering 18 Portuguese districts and 5 years, this study explains the variations in a district’s per-capita lottery sales in terms of key theoretical hypotheses such as per capita district income, age, education index, gender and religion. This paper concludes that the richer Portuguese districts spend more than the poorer districts and there is an inverted-U relationship between lottery sales and per capita income. The paper also concludes that married Catholic citizens spend more on lottery products than others and that the level of education returns a negative effect on lottery spending.     

Socialization into single‐parent‐by‐choice family life

This paper examines family interactions between mothers and children in single‐parent‐by‐choice (SPBC) families in Spain. The data is part of a larger multi‐sited ethnographic study focused on emergent family structures that examined families formed by women who began their family projects through adoption or assisted reproduction. Single‐mothers‐by‐choice formulate various socialization goals that are tied to the complexities of their non‐conventional family project. These goals are also realized in daily conversation, particularly when families talk about future events in their lives. Our findings expand existing family language socialization research in Western contexts, which has primarily focused on conventional two‐parent families, and invite developing a stronger dialogue between family language socialization research and current debates on changing kinship structures in post‐industrial societies. Este trabajo examina interacciones entre madres e hijos/as en familias de madres solteras por elección (MSPE) en España. Los datos provienen de una investigación etnográfica multi‐lugar más amplia centrada en modelo familiares emergentes que estudió a familias formadas por mujeres solas que han comenzado su proyecto familiar a través de la reproducción asistida o la adopción. La madres solteras por elección formulan varias metas de socialización que están ligadas a las complejidades y demandas de su proyecto familiar no convencional. Estos objetivos también se plasman en conversaciones cotidianas, especialmente cuando las familias hablan sobre eventos futuros en su vidas. Nuestros resultados amplían la investigación sobre socialización lingüística familiar en contextos occidentales, que se ha centrado principalmente en familias bi‐parentales convencionales, e invitan a desarrollar un diálogo más fructífero entre la investigación sobre socialización lingüística familiar y los debates actuales en torno a cambios en los patrones de parentesco en sociedades post‐industriales. [Spanish]     

Mobility in urban social events: Towards organizational transvergence

The paper explores the emergence of territories that are constituted through spontaneous assembling of self-organized communities resulting in what we term urban social events. A concrete event is employed, namely Embros, an open occupation of an abandoned public building in the center of Athens, to highlight the dynamics that make urban social events transformative urban phenomena. By focusing upon the entangled mobilities of diverse agents, we explain how through differential, dis-continual assembling and creative collaborations, such urban social interactions institute unbounded and immanent modes of organizing. The paper contributes to organizational territoriality studies proposing that urban social events are mobile entanglements that institute practices of creative transactions with formal or informal communities. By doing that, it places the Arts, creativity and community participation at the center of transformative organizing.     

Household Saving Behavior and the Influence of Family-Owned Business

This study focused on the lifecycle income objective of business-owning (farm and nonfarm) households. We hypothesized that the complex relationship between household and business management decisions had the potential to challenge predictions from standard household savings theory. Specifically, we tested for differences in saving behavior of these entrepreneurial households relative to the average US household. A limited dependent variable model was performed, keying in on the saving behavior and ability of household respondents in the Survey of Consumer Finances for 2007. The estimation results indicated that, along with standard demographic influences of savings models, households owning a farm or nonfarm business had a significantly higher likelihood of maintaining private saving in a given year. Our results highlight the necessity for future research on household saving behavior to account for the differing objectives and choice sets faced by households that own businesses when conducting analyses of household saving.     

Die Eliminationsmethode – Förderung kreativer Ideen durch die Elimination bekannter Lösungen

This pilot study presents the first implementation and evaluation of a new technique to raise creative performances by eliminating common ideas and conventional solutions in a first step and subsequently generate new ideas. This technique is termed “elimination method”. The experiment of this study was conducted with individually working subjects, not involving group interaction. 30 subjects worked on a creativity task with the elimination method, 30 subjects worked on the same creativity task with brainstorming technique instructions. They produced 1919 ideas which could be summarized to 268 different cognitive elements as the baseline of the research. The theoretical focus of this study is to highlight the role of common knowledge in group discussion and the corresponding intra-individual processes and cognitive processes. Overall results of data examination were in line with expectations and support future testing of the proposed elimination method in a group context. This study was able to show that the instructions for the elimination method induced effects as intended, producing mainly common ideas in the first step and mainly new ideas in the second step, overall resembling the output of the brainstorming condition. The second step of the elimination method outperformed the brainstorming condition in producing idea output with a higher creative density and one-tailed differences were significant (p? =? 0.028). Furthermore, interactions between method and creativity measures were explored. Findings were connected to corresponding research where appropriate and implications for future research were remarked upon.     

Musculoskeletal symptoms and workers' perception about job factors in a pulp and paper industry

The study aimed to conduct a literature review as a step of the development of a new questionnaire about the nursing workers' perception of job factors that may lead to musculoskeletal symptoms. An information synthesis was achieved by collecting data from studies that fitted the search criteria. The results showed that despite the existence of several job factors related to musculoskeletal symptoms, no specific questionnaire that evaluates this relationship was found. Therefore, this literature review presents important topics for developing the first questionnaire to analyze work activities that may contribute to pain and discomfort among nursing personnel.     

Seniors and technology, ergonomic needs and design considerations

This work is based on the ergonomic approach and the principles of universal design, with the aim of establishing the cognitive design features that interfaces must comply, for older adults achieve a good performance during their interaction with technological aids. Describes the analysis of exploratory experiences with a group of 17 older adults was aimed first to establish the main barriers to implementation that arise during these activities, and secondly to set the variables to be addressed and the procedure required to develop depth study, where the relationship establish between the quality of the stimuli and the level of performance achieved in the implementation of older adults with interfaces, observing each of the cognitive functions that promote independence, attention, motivation, memory these processes. The study in depth, looking for describe gaps and mismatches encountered during execution, which hamper the harmonious interaction processes through participatory methodological approach that allows to specify requirements for the creation of stimulating interfaces for cognitive skills and committed with the levels of autonomy of the elderly.     

Body postures versus production requirements - the case of a fiberglass parts factory

This study aimed to perform an ergonomic analysis in a fiberglass parts factory. For this purpose, was used the methodology of Ergonomic Work Analysis (EWA). At the end of the study it was possible to identify some ways to the development of improvements in order to contribute to the transformation of working conditions in the sector analyzed.     

Study of activities of postmen motorcyclists: a look at motorcycle accidents

This article presents the steps of transforming the material and organizational aspects in the work environment, beyond the social order for the proper development of activities in the Household Distribution Center, the Postmen Motorcyclists. The demand was made by managers from the accident records, establishing the need to identify the working conditions of postmen motorcyclists, regarding motorcycle accidents occurring on public roads. Method: Based on the characteristics of the steps required by the methodology, was necessary to realize internal and external observations, with the aim of identifying the dynamics of the accident and the collective dimensions of activity which requires a strategy for monitoring the work on the street.