The relationship between burnout and risk-taking in workplace decision-making and decision-making style

This study aimed to investigate what decision-making styles might be exhibited by employees who experience burnout. Using a Work Risk Inventory (WRI), developed for this study, which included generic workplace scenarios, it was also explored whether such employees take relatively more risky decisions. Risk was conceptualised as the adoption of decisions that threaten one’s reputation at work, job performance and job security. The mediating effect of the likelihood and seriousness of the consequences of the worst that could happen in each given scenario on the relationships between dimensions of burnout and risk-taking was also tested. A total of 262 employees in various occupations completed an online survey, including measures on burnout, decision-making styles and the WRI. As predicted, dimensions of burnout – exhaustion, cynicism and professional inefficacy – correlated significantly with avoidant decision-making and negatively with rational decision-making. The seriousness of the consequences of the worst-case scenario occurring mediated the relationship between professional inefficacy and risk-taking. In the context of identifying mechanisms by which burnout leads to risky decision-making, the findings suggest that employees’ sense of professional inefficacy determines their risky decision-making. The contribution to theory and implications for practice are discussed.     

The Relation Between Therapeutic Alliance and Treatment Motivation in Residential Youth Care: A Cross-Lagged Panel Analysis

This study investigated the longitudinal relation between therapeutic alliance and treatment motivation in a sample of 174 adolescents receiving residential treatment in the Netherlands. Structural equation modeling with a cross-lagged panel design was used to examine the relation between therapeutic alliance and treatment motivation up to 9 months of treatment. Results revealed that autoregressive associations between initial therapeutic alliance and alliance at subsequent time points were significant, whereas for treatment motivation a significant association was found after 6 months, but not after 9 months. Results also showed that a higher level of therapeutic alliance after 3 months was predictive of a higher level of treatment motivation after 6 months. Furthermore, a higher level of therapeutic alliance after 6 months was predictive of a higher level of treatment motivation after 9 months. Implications for research and clinical practice are discussed.     

Ambulance allocation for maximal survival with heterogeneous outcome measures

This paper proposes new models for locating emergency medical services (EMS) by incorporating survival functions for capturing multiple-classes of heterogeneous patients. The Maximal Expected Survival Location Model for Heterogeneous Patients (MESLMHP) aims to maximize the overall expected survival probability of multiple-classes of patients, whereby different classes could be defined according to agreed patient categories based on response time targets, or by capturing differing medical conditions each with a corresponding survival function. Furthermore, we propose and demonstrate an approximation approach to solving the extended stochastic version of MESLMHP, which utilizes queuing theory to permit the modeling of congestion and utilization at each ambulance station, and does not require assumptions to be made on the utilization of ambulances. Both models are demonstrated using data from the ambulance service in Wales. We show that our multiple outcome measures and survival-maximizing approach, rather than one based on average response time targets alone or a single patient class provides more effective EMS ambulance allocations.     

Population structure and correlation between auxiliary and target variables may affect precision of estimates in forest inventory

Simulations of forest inventory in several populations compared simple random with “quick probability proportional to size” (QPPS) sampling. The latter may be applied in the absence of a list sampling frame and/or prior measurement of the auxiliary variable. The correlation between the auxiliary and target variables required to render QPPS sampling more efficient than simple random sampling varied over the range 0.3–0.6 and was lower when sampling from populations that were skewed to the right. Two possible analytical estimators of the standard error of the estimate of the mean for QPPS sampling were found to be less reliable than bootstrapping.     

The influence of religiosity on charitable behavior: A COPPS investigation

We examine the role of religion in charitable giving and find that the religious preference of both the donor and the recipient organization influence giving behavior. By exploiting a panel survey of charitable giving, we demonstrate that traditional empirical analysis on charitable giving masks important differences among donor groups. Religious giving by religious individuals is least responsive to changes in price and income, while secular giving by secular individuals has the greatest sensitivity.     

A critical examination of visualized femininity: selective inheritance and intensification of gender posing from historical painting to contemporary advertising

This study investigates the visual correspondences of gender posing behaviors, specifically exhibited by female figures, between historical European painting and contemporary American photographic advertising. While utilizing Erving Goffman’s Gender Advertisements as an analytical framework, the study focuses on the visual legacy of gender ritualization that is salient in contemporary mass media, proposing five semiotic codes to concretely analyze it. Although Goffman’s gender posing is traditionally associated with female vulnerability and indolence, the study proposes that such qualities are exploited as indicators of luxury within Western visual culture and advertising specifically. It seeks to deconstruct and re-frame the interconnected connotations of luxury and gender display, both expanding Goffman’s framework and providing a unique interpretive resource for critical readers of media texts.     

Why Are Socially Anxious Adolescents Rejected by Peers? The Role of Subject‐Group Similarity Characteristics

This study addressed the role of actual and perceived similarity in peer rejection of socially anxious adolescents. Videotapes of 20 high and 20 low socially anxious adolescents (13–17 years old) giving a speech were rated by groups of unfamiliar peers with regard to perceived similarity and desire for future interaction (lower scores indicating rejection). Actual similarity between speakers and observers regarding social anxiety and gender was also taken into account. Findings showed that high socially anxious students were more rejected and that perceived but not actual similarity between peer observers and speakers (partly) mediated rejection.     

American High School Students’ Perceptions of Determinants of Life Satisfaction

Life satisfaction can be assessed either globally or with regard to satisfaction with specific domains of life. The latter multidimensional approach presumes science has delineated with confidence the specific domains most relevant to evaluating whether the criteria for a good life have been met. This paper shares results of a qualitative study of the perceived determinants of life satisfaction among 30 high school students who were diverse in terms of mental health; 6–10 participants were classified as complete mental health, vulnerable, symptomatic but content, or troubled at two time points separated by a year. Thematic analyses of transcribed individual interviews suggested eight themes that capture the domains of life adolescents perceive influence their happiness. These themes are compared and contrasted to domains included in existing multi-dimensional measures of youth life satisfaction. The factors likely to be particularly salient to students with different levels of mental health are noted.