Using dialogue to build organization–public relationships,engage publics,and positively affect organizational outcomes

The study and practice of public relations continues to explore the many benefits accrued when organizations adopt a relational approach to public relations management. One area that is relatively unexplored in the relationship management literature is the role of dialogue in organization–public relationships. Historically, scholars have focused dialogic research on either interaction – where an organization and a public exchange information – or a debate – where organizations and public engage in a process of statement counterstatement. The current investigation explores the notion of dialogue and examines the ways in which relationship attitudes and dialogue may positively affect key public member evaluations and behavioral intent. The results suggest that both relationship attitudes and dialogue positively affect respondent evaluations of and intended behaviors toward an organization. The implications of the findings are presented and suggestions for managing organization–public relationships are considered.     

Testing of the ‘reduction of compound alternatives’ principle

This paper reports an empirical investigation of the effects of three pictorial forms of problem representation on conformance with the Reduction of Compound Alternatives Principle of expected utility theory. The most common form of representation, written problem statements, was compared with three pictorial representations: tubes containing one hundred labeled balls, decision matrices with each column proportional in size to the probability of the corresponding event, and bar graphs. The tubes representation led to fewer violations of the Principle. In addition, when subjects were trained to construct proportional matrices from written problem statements, they exhibited fewer violations than those who received the same problems already formatted in proportional matrices. The results reported here should contribute to the development of a theory of the way people frame decision problems.     

Challenging Neo‐Malthusian Deforestation Analyses in West Africa's Dynamic Forest Landscapes

Many influential analyses of West Africa take it for granted that ‘original’ forest cover has progressively been converted and savannized during the twentieth century by growing populations. By testing these assumptions against historical evidence, exemplified for Ghana and Ivory Coast, this article shows that these neo‐Malthusian deforestation narratives badly misrepresent people–forest relationships. They obscure important nonlinear dynamics, as well as widespread anthropogenic forest expansion and landscape enrichment. These processes are better captured, in broad terms, by a neo‐Boserupian perspective on population–forest dynamics. However, comprehending variations in locale‐specific trajectories of change requires fuller appreciation of social differences in environmental and resource values, of how diverse institutions shape resource access and control, and of ecological variability and path dependency in how landscapes respond to use. The second half of the article présents and illustrates such a “landscape structuretion” perspective through case studies from the forest–savanna transition zones of Ghana and Guinea.     

Comparing the Monetary and Living Standards Approaches to Poverty Using the Australian Experience

This paper compares the monetary and living standards approaches to poverty using Australian data for the period 2006–2017. The aim is to highlight the conceptual and empirical strengths and weaknesses of the two approaches and identify the similarities and differences that emerge when both are applied to examine what happened over the period and to a limited degree, why. The acknowledged limitations of estimating poverty rates by comparing household income with a poverty line have to a degree been addressed by developments in deprivation research that have generated estimates that are more directly related to living standards, more democratic and more credible. But this approach also has limitations, so its growing popularity need not signify the end of poverty line studies. This paper compares the two approaches, with specific attention paid to ensuring that the estimates are internally consistent over time and comparable at a point in time. Both show a consistent pattern of modest improvement in social disadvantage over the period examined, but they reveal different aspects of change. The monetary approach highlights the role of housing costs in driving changes in poverty, while the more nuanced explanation generated by estimates of deprivation provides detailed insights. The results suggest that each has a positive role to play in better understanding the nature of poverty and identifying the factors driving change over time.

     

Effects of Outcome and Probabilistic Ambiguity on Managerial Choices

Information ambiguity is prevalent in organizations and likely influences management decisions. This study examines, given imprecise probabilities and outcomes, how managers make choices when they are provided with single-figure benchmarks. Seventy-nine MBA students completed two experiments. We found that, in a decision framed as a decision under certainty involving an ambiguous outcome, the majority of the subjects were ambiguity prone in the loss condition and switched to ambiguity aversion in the gain condition. However, in the presence of probabilistic ambiguity in a decision under risk, this expected switching pattern was shown only when the difference in riskiness between the two choice options (in the loss condition) was perceived to be relatively small. In a companion study, we used a written protocol approach to identify factors that affect decision makers' investment choices when faced with ambiguous outcomes. Protocols frequently mentioned that the ambiguous outcome option was risky, even in the case which was framed as a decision under certainty in the problem statement. In a decision under risk with ambiguous outcomes, the combination of probabilistic risk and outcome ambiguity was seen as even more risky.     

The Corrosive Effect of Acculturation: How Mexican Americans Lose Political Trust*

Objective. Existing research establishes that political trust is not only an important determinant of individual political behavior and government effectiveness, but may also measure the health of civic society. This article looks specifically at trust among Latinos of Mexican descent, demonstrating that acculturation is corrosive of political trust. Methods. Logit and ordered logit models are used to simultaneously test two theories of acculturation—classic assimilation theory and ethnic competition theory. Data come from the Latino National Political Survey (LNPS). Results. Support is found for both modes of acculturation. Conclusions. Although the results do not conclusively side with one particular mode of acculturation, they consistently show that acculturation is corrosive of political trust. Latinos of Mexican descent become more cynical about American government as they incorporate into or are exposed to mainstream American culture, and as they become more aware of or concerned about racism and discrimination.