Outcome Evaluation of Therapeutic Effectiveness

Evaluation need not be a boring exercise, carried out under sufferance simply to please the demands of administration. Nor need it be so complicated that a research officer is required to undertake it. This article reports on an evaluation of therapeutic outcomes conducted by the Manly Warringah Adolescent Service. Apart from offering general evidence of therapeutic effectiveness, an evaluation of this kind has the potential for answering some of the more interesting questions posed by clinicians. It was discovered, for example, that there was a significant, positive association between the therapist's assessment of problem resolution at termination of therapy, and client's independent assessment made three months later. Support was also found for the practice of involving the family in therapy, with such an approach offering favourable results in fewer sessions and carrying with it the additional benefits of improved family relationships.     

Eliciting Information from Experts on the Likelihood of Rapid Climate Change

The threat of so‐called rapid or abrupt climate change has generated considerable public interest because of its potentially significant impacts. The collapse of the North Atlantic Thermohaline Circulation or the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, for example, would have potentially catastrophic effects on temperatures and sea level, respectively. But how likely are such extreme climatic changes? Is it possible actually to estimate likelihoods? This article reviews the societal demand for the likelihoods of rapid or abrupt climate change, and different methods for estimating likelihoods: past experience, model simulation, or through the elicitation of expert judgments. The article describes a survey to estimate the likelihoods of two characterizations of rapid climate change, and explores the issues associated with such surveys and the value of information produced. The surveys were based on key scientists chosen for their expertise in the climate science of abrupt climate change. Most survey respondents ascribed low likelihoods to rapid climate change, due either to the collapse of the Thermohaline Circulation or increased positive feedbacks. In each case one assessment was an order of magnitude higher than the others. We explore a high rate of refusal to participate in this expert survey: many scientists prefer to rely on output from future climate model simulations.     

Influence of a parking area on soils and vegetation in an urban nature reserve

We studied the influence of a car park on soil and vegetation within Richmond Park, UK, before and after imposition of fenced boundaries restricted public access. Soil and vegetation samples were taken before (once) and after (twice) access restrictions were enforced. The over-riding trend in all the data was for soil adjacent to the car park to be less acidic and more fertile than pristine local soils, accompanied by a more eutrophic grassland community (Lolium perenne/Trifolium repens, compared with Agrostis/Festuca grassland away from the car park). The chemical influence of the car park extended at least 50 m from its boundary. A common acidophilic collembole Folsomia quadrioculata was replaced by Cryptopygus thermophilus adjacent to the car park. There was little evidence from the vegetation data that car park closure benefitted the ecosystem, but chemical data showed signs of progressive recovery in the 2 years following restrictions. Possible explanations for the car park's influence on the local landscape are suggested to include calcareous chippings and canine faecal deposits.     

Concepts of Risk in Relation to Organizational Structure and Functioning within the Personal Social Services and Probation

The main argument of this paper is that personal social services, including probation, at both a policy and practice level are increasingly focused on issues of risk. We postulate that risk assessment, risk management, the monitoring of risk and risk-taking itself are rapidly becoming the dominant raison d'être of such agencies, thus supplanting ideologies of meeting need or welfare provision. In turn they have become key to priority setting and rationing, the basis for organizational rationales and structures, the central focus for professional activity and accountability, and measuring quality. Thus an analysis of risk as an organizing principle offers fundamental insights into the rapidly changing nature and organization of statutory social work and probation. There is very little literature that focuses on risk across the spectrum of services. Risk analysis, as such, is most developed in the criminal justice and child protection fields. However, the mental health literature, being centrally preoccupied with notions of dangerousness, is quickly adopting risk terminology. Apart from work on elder abuse, literature on child welfare and community care has been framed in terms of need, issues of risk only coming to the fore around potential admission to residential care. We contend that as issues of rationing and accountability become more dominant, so do concerns with risk. Thus we predict the extension of notions of risk as central organizing principles throughout the social services and probation.     

Rights of access to land for outdoor recreation in New Zealand: : dilemmas concerning justice and equity

Rights of access to land for outdoor recreation are of current concern to many western governments. They require a balance to be struck between collective rights to the land and individual rights of exclusion. Theories of land rights have limitations in informing the appropriate apportionment of such rights for recreational access since they emanate from such a disparate range of cultural and philosophical positions and invariably they are based on the productive attributes of the land. Collectively, such theories do offer a number of characteristics that might inform land rights apportionment for access: historically determined justice, contemporary justice through citizenship, distributional equity, intergenerational equity and economic efficiency. These characteristics are explored in the context of the development of recreational access rights in New Zealand. Whilst notions of justice can be seen to be transgressed in land rights structures imposed through European settlement, these structures themselves were founded on notions of equity as a direct result of the loss of access rights in 19th Century England. The reassertion of Maori land rights compromises both distributional and intergenerational equity but may make a contribution to economic efficiency as well as re-establishing historically determined justice. The case study illustrates inherent dilemmas in rights apportionment for access to land for outdoor recreation where ultimately it may not be possible to achieve any consensual outcome.     

Practical usage of O'Brien's OLS and GLS statistics in clinical trials

Multivariate techniques of O'Brien's OLS and GLS statistics are discussed in the context of their application in clinical trials. We introduce the concept of an operational effect size and illustrate its use to evaluate power. An extension describing how to handle covariates and missing data is developed in the context of Mixed models. This extension allowing adjustment for covariates is easily programmed in any statistical package including SAS. Monte Carlo simulation is used for a number of different sample sizes to compare the actual size and power of the tests based on O'Brien's OLS and GLS statistics.     

An Observational Analysis of the Impact of Board Dynamics and Directors' Participation on Perceived Board Effectiveness

This study addresses calls for closer examination of board dynamics by offering an inside view of director interactions. Video observations of three board meetings at each of two Australian corporations matched with director interviews and secondary data reveal distinct patterns of director interactions, their sources of variation and their impact on perceived board effectiveness. The data reveal that director interactions are multidimensional and dynamic: while group interactions across agenda items are similar, with a few directors leading the discussion, the contributing directors change across items. Moreover, directors' inclusiveness and evenness of participation are associated with higher perceptions of board effectiveness. Lastly, the study found that director interactions change with the nature of the items, board climate and board meeting arrangements. The study contributes to the literature by moving beyond the individual‐level analysis of directors' skills or independence, and offering a detailed view of how the joint group and individual dimensions of board dynamics affect board functioning.