Predictors of substance use and family therapy outcome among physically and sexually abused runaway adolescents

There is a dearth of research that examines the impact of family systems therapy on problems among sexually and/or physically abused youth. Given this void, differential outcome and predictors of substance use change were evaluated for abused, as compared with nonabused, runaway adolescents who were randomly assigned to family therapy or treatment as usual. Abused adolescents reported lower family cohesion at baseline, although both abused and nonabused adolescents showed similar substance use reductions. Utilizing hierarchical linear modeling, we found that substance use changed with change in cohesion over time. These findings link change in family functioning to change in adolescent substance use, supporting fiamily systems theory. Findings suggest that a potent target of intervention involves focus on increasing positive communication interactions.     

Indian Family Exception Doctrine: still losing children despite the Indian Child Welfare Act

Since 1982, the Indian Family Exception Doctrine has been circumventing the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978. Although not clearly defined, the doctrine has been pivotal in several American Indian child welfare cases in the United States. Over time, the doctrine continues to evolve and self-define. Several phrases have become part of the definition, such as Indian family and culture. This doctrine presents major concerns and implications in the field of child welfare.     

The Impact of Organizational Culture on Time‐Based Manufacturing and Performance

Firms are utilizing an array of manufacturing practices in their quest for survival and success in the marketplace. The implementation of those practices has not always resulted in success stories as the focus had been mostly on technical issues, with little concern for “soft issues.” For example, the enabling role of organizational culture has often been ignored. Using Schein's conceptualization of culture as underlying assumptions, espoused values, and artifacts, we examine a framework that relates culture and manufacturing practices to performance. The underlying assumption of customer orientation is posited to affect espoused values such as beliefs on investing in facilities and equipment to leverage intellectual work and to promote creativity, beliefs on working with others, beliefs on making decisions that are global, beliefs on management control, and beliefs on integrating with suppliers. The espoused values are hypothesized to affect visible attributes of culture (behaviors) such as time‐based manufacturing practices, which firms are employing for competitive advantage. A sample of 224 firms is used for developing research instruments and testing the hypothesized relationships advanced. Results indicate that high levels of customer orientation lead to a set of managerial beliefs that are collaborative and integrative. In turn, certain espoused values support a high level of time‐based manufacturing practice, which leads to high performance.     

Evolving the latent variable model as an environmental DEA technology

This article tests several nonparametric DEA models for their ability to accurately decompose CO₂ emissions change using a Malmquist styled decomposition framework. This production oriented activity analysis involves panel data and two data sets from the literature for comparison. A new Latent Variable radial input-oriented technology is introduced that is closely associated with a Koopmans Efficient Slacks Based Model. The Latent Variable technology simultaneously reduces inputs and undesirable outputs in a single Multiple Objective Linear Program. This production theoretic methodology is adapted to preserve both scale efficiency and causality within the envelopment framework. Finally, the application studies demonstrate the internal consistency of the Latent Variable reduction coefficients, which overturns previous results and paves the way for further research into undesirable externalities.     

A Note on SERVQUAL Reliability and Validity in Information System Service Quality Measurement

Today's information system function includes a large service component. Recent research has examined the SERVQUAL instrument as a possible measure to assist managers and researchers in evaluating service quality. To further examine the appropriateness of the SERVQUAL measure, a large industry sample serves to verify the anticipated structure of the instrument. In addition, a high correlation with a common measure of user satisfaction indicates that the SERVQUAL metric may indeed represent accurate views of user perception. As such, the SERVQUAL instrument can serve as a useful indicator for information system managers attempting to identify areas of needed service improvement and to researchers seeking a success measure of information system services.     

Indicators of family resilience after the death of a child

The aim of this study was to identify and describe resilience qualities in families after losing a child. Questionnaires, including an open-ended question, were utilized to collect data independently from the parents and siblings of the deceased in 89 Belgian families. The results indicate that family strengths in general, and commitment to the family in particular, helped the families' adaptation after the loss. In addition, the adaptation process after the loss was aided if the family members viewed the crisis as a challenge. Both the siblings and the parents indicated that the extent to which a family experienced support from the community was directly related to family adaptation after the loss. Redefining the situation and utilizing social support from friends and family were underlined as effective family coping strategies. The findings could be used in interventions to promote family resilience, thereby affirming the reparative potential of families.     

Product Life‐Cycle Management of Packaged Software

A software product becomes less valuable for its consumers over time due to technological and economic obsolescence. As a result, firms have an opportunity to introduce and sell upgrades that provide higher utility to consumers compared to an older and out‐of‐date software product. In a market that is growing and consists of homogeneous customers, we prove that the optimal upgrade intervals are monotonically increasing throughout the product's life cycle solely because of demand and cost considerations. This finding is in conformity with empirical evidence, thus validating our theoretical model. We then present comparative statics results to show that increase in the rate of obsolescence or network externalities may sometimes increase upgrade intervals for early upgrades and decrease these for later upgrades in the product's life cycle, but increase in market growth rate always decreases these intervals. Further, when successive software upgrades are forward compatible, upgrade intervals are longer than when they are not. Finally, we present three separate extensions of our model to showcase the robustness of our results. Since upgrade development costs depend on upgrade intervals, these insights help managers understand how costing for upgrades changes over the product's life cycle.     

An Industrial Ocean-Cargo Shipping Problem

This paper reports the modeling and solution of an industrial ocean-cargo shipping problem. The problem involves the delivery of bulk products from an overseas port to transshipment ports on the Atlantic Coast, and then over land to customers. The decisions made include the number and the size of ships to charter in each time period during the planning horizon, the number and location of transshipment ports to use, and transportation from ports to customers. The complexity of this problem is compounded by the cost structure, which includes fixed charges in both ship charters and port operations. Such a large scale, dynamic, and stochastic problem is reduced to a solvable stationary, deterministic, and cyclical model. The process of modeling the problem and the solution of the resultant mixed integer program are described in detail. Recommendations from this study have been implemented.