Invisible Whispering: Restructuring Collaborative Decision Making with Instant Messaging

Organizational decision making is dominated by teams. When an important decision is required, a team is often formed to make it or to advise the individual decision maker, because a team has more resources, knowledge, and political insight than any one individual working alone. As teams have become geographically distributed, collaboration technology has come to play an important role in such collective decision making efforts. Instant messaging (IM) is an increasingly prevalent workplace collaboration technology that enables near‐synchronous text exchanges on a variety of devices. We examined the use of IM during face‐to‐face, telephone, and computer‐mediated team meetings, a practice we call “invisible whispering.” We introduce Goffman's characterization of social interaction as dramatic performance, differentiable into “front stage” and “backstage” exchanges, to analyze how invisible whispering alters the socio‐spatial and temporal boundaries of team decision making. Using IM, workers were able to influence front stage decision making through backstage conversations, often participating in multiple backstage conversations simultaneously. This type of interaction would be either physically impossible or socially constrained without the use of IM. We examine how invisible whispering changes the processes of collaborative decision making and how these new processes may affect the efficiency and effectiveness of collaborative decision making, as well as participation, satisfaction, relationships among team members, and individual attention.     

Seeking safer sexual spaces: queer and trans young people labeled with intellectual disabilities and the paradoxical risks of restriction

Young lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people labeled with intellectual disabilities have unique sexual health needs that are not being met. Denial by others of their right to pleasure and the exercise of heightened external control over their sexuality are commonplace. Current research indicates that these youth are at heightened risk for compromised sexual health. This study aimed to explore the ways in which social and environmental conditions influence vulnerability to adverse sexual health outcomes for this population. We used a community-based research approach to conduct qualitative interviews and focus groups with 10 young LGBT people (aged 17-26) labeled with intellectual disabilities. Participants reported multiple limitations on their autonomy that resulted in having sex in places where they did not feel comfortable and were unlikely to practice safer sex. Attempts by authority figures to protect youth through limits on their autonomy may be unintentionally leading to negative sexual health outcomes.     

A framework for examining leadership in extreme contexts

In this review, we develop a framework to guide future research and to examine the execution of leadership in extreme contexts. We start by defining and distinguishing extreme contexts from crisis and other contexts. A five component typology is developed comprised of magnitude of consequences, form of threat, probability of consequences, location in time and physical or psychological–social proximity. We discuss the unique influences these components have on leadership processes in extreme contexts examining the relevance of organization types such as critical action and high reliability organizations. Further, we present a set of factors that may attenuate or intensify the dimensions comprising an extreme context, thus influencing either a team or organization's ability for adaptive leadership response. Ultimately this framework seeks to develop a richer understanding of extreme contexts to advance the future development of contextualized theories of leadership for extreme contexts.     

How beliefs about substance use differ by socio-demographic characteristics,individual experiences,and neighborhood environments among urban adolescents

In this article, we tested a series of Item Response Theory (IRT) models to examine the individual and neighborhood variation in perceived risk along dimensions of substance use (alcohol, marijuana, and hard drugs) and usage patterns (light/experimental use, moderate use, heavy/regular use). Data were gathered from 2266 adolescents aged 9, 12, and 15 residing in 79 Chicago neighborhoods. Developmental patterns for age and amount of use were observed whereby older respondents rated alcohol and marijuana as less harmful compared to the younger respondents, but rated hard drugs as more harmful. Risk perceptions were found to be more closely tied to one's direct experience with drugs rather than a general constellation of beliefs. Neighborhood variation in risk perceptions was also observed for hard drugs and three patterns of use, controlling for characteristics of individual residents. Neighborhoods did not vary in risk perceptions toward alcohol use. Individual-level factors rather than characteristics of the neighborhoods explained the observed neighborhood variation in perceptions toward marijuana use. These findings illustrate the complex links between individual and contextual factors in the development of beliefs about the health risks associated with substance use.     

Comparison of web and mail surveys in collecting illicit drug use data: a randomized experiment

This randomized experiment examined survey mode effects for self-reporting illicit drug use by comparing prevalence estimates between a Web-based survey and a mail-based survey. A random sample of 7,000 traditional-aged undergraduate students attending a large public university in the United States was selected to participate in the spring of 2001. Students were randomly assigned to self-administer a survey via the Web or U.S. mail. The Web survey produced a significantly higher response rate than the U.S. mail survey. The prevalence estimates of illicit drug use (lifetime and past year) did not differ significantly between the two survey modes. The findings provide preliminary evidence that Web and U.S. mail surveys produce similar results regarding illicit drug use among undergraduate students. Although additional research is needed involving more diverse samples, these findings bode well for using Web surveys in college-based research.     

Great minds don't always think alike: the challenges of conducting substance abuse prevention research in public schools

Prevention researchers and school personnel lack a common understanding concerning the opportunities and burdens of school-based drug prevention research. In this article, we review issues related to researching substance abuse prevention programs in school settings, and assess challenges related to recruitment, communication, research design, surveying, and ensuring program fidelity. We conclude that before any school is enrolled, there must be a mutual understanding as to the nature and extent of the study's requirements and what adjustments a school will have to make to support a successful collaboration. Further, researchers must understand that schools' responsibilities for preparing students to perform well on academic and standardized tests will always overshadow the value they place on participating in studies to evaluate the effectiveness of prevention curricula.     

What clients of couple therapy model developers and their former students say about change, part I: model-dependent common factors across three models

Some researchers have hypothesized that factors common across therapy models are largely responsible for change. In this study we conducted semi-structured, open-ended qualitative interviews with three different MFT model developers (Dr. Susan M. Johnson, Emotionally Focused Therapy; Dr. Frank M. Dattilio, Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy; and Dr. Richard C. Schwartz, Internal Family Systems Therapy), Dr. Johnson and Dr. Schwartz's former students, and each of their former clients who had terminated therapy successfully. We examined possible common factors in our qualitative data analysis. Common factors fell into two main categories of model-dependent factors and model-independent factors. This article-the first of two-reviews the model-dependent common factors, common elements found across three distinct therapies. They include common conceptualizations, common interventions, and common outcomes, each with several subcategories. We discuss the clinical, training, and research implications of the results.