Group Dynamics in Development of the Poor: Experience from BRAC

The groups deliberately formed by nongovernmental organizations to organize the poor for their development are often subgrouped for better performance. In this connection, the study investigates the extent subgroups contribute to group performance, the mechanisms that lead to the contribution of subgroups to group performance, and changes in the contribution of subgroups to the performance of a group. Altogether 239 Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee groups, i.e., village organizations (VOs), with and without subgroups were investigated. The VOs with subgroups performed better than those without subgroups. The performance of the VOs with subgroups, however, declined over time. One of the reasons why effectiveness of VOs with subgroups declined was the belief that pursuing subgroup responsibilities would not bring any personal gain for members.     

Multilevel zero-inflated negative binomial regression modeling for over-dispersed count data with extra zeros

Count data with excess zeros often occurs in areas such as public health, epidemiology, psychology, sociology, engineering, and agriculture. Zero-inflated Poisson (ZIP) regression and zero-inflated negative binomial (ZINB) regression are useful for modeling such data, but because of hierarchical study design or the data collection procedure, zero-inflation and correlation may occur simultaneously. To overcome these challenges ZIP or ZINB may still be used. In this paper, multilevel ZINB regression is used to overcome these problems. The method of parameter estimation is an expectation-maximization algorithm in conjunction with the penalized likelihood and restricted maximum likelihood estimates for variance components. Alternative modeling strategies, namely the ZIP distribution are also considered. An application of the proposed model is shown on decayed, missing, and filled teeth of children aged 12 years old.     

Localising Social Work: Lessons Learnt from a Community Based Intervention amongst the Bedouin in Jordan

This paper presents an example of local social work practice in Jordan in the health field. It draws on a research study on Bedouin health in the North Eastern Badia. The project developed, implemented and evaluated a training intervention developed in partnership with a range of providers for improving local social work practice. Evaluation methods used included a pre and post test, focus group discussions and students' field notes. Findings revealed the significance of promoting culturally competent practice to respond to local health and social needs. Students and practice assessors agreed that the training interventions were an effective way to implement theory into local practice in relation to Bedouin society. This training intervention is an example of developing local social work practice as a way of responding critically to social inequalities.     

The Effect of Activating Metacognitive Strategies on the Listening Performance and Metacognitive Awareness of EFL Students

This study investigates the effect of activating metacognitive strategies on the listening performance of English as a foreign language (EFL) university students and explores the impact of such strategies on their metacognitive awareness of the listening task. The participants were N = 50 students of English literature at the state university of Qom, Iran. After screening the participants from among 60 students, they were randomly assigned to the experimental and control groups. The experimental group (n = 25) received the metacognitive strategy instruction based on the models proposed by Vandergrift and Tafaghodtari (2010), while the control group (n = 25) received just the listening input with no strategy instruction. The listening module of the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) was utilized to evaluate the listening performance of the participants in both groups in pretests and posttests, and the Metacognitive Awareness Listening Questionnaire (MALQ) instrument was applied to measure the metacognitive awareness of the treatment group before and after the treatment. The results of the IELTS test revealed that the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group on the posttest and according to the analysis of the MALQ instrument there was a significant improvement in the students’ level of metacognitive awareness after strategy instruction. The interview results in the discussion section also supported the findings and shed more light on the details.     

An exploratory study of subjective well-being in organizations–A mixed method research approach

ABSTRACT

Subjective well-being (SWB) has been widely found to have a profound impact on the individual, yet the process of its occurrence in public organizations remains unexplored. So the primary purpose of this paper is to explore the determining factors affecting the process of employee’s subjective well-being in public organizations using mixed methods research. Qualitative analysis using the grounded theory methodology reveals the effective factors that affect the process of employee’s subjective well-being in public organizations. Quantitative hypotheses are then developed based on a qualitative investigation. Survey data were collected from employees of public organizations in one of the provinces of Iran. Analysis of Moment Structure is used for data analysis. The results of the research revealed that both individual and organizational factors (as causal factors) influence the employees’ subjective well-being process (life satisfaction and positive affect). This phenomenon leads to the use of strategies which are affected by intervening and contextual factors. The consequences of this process are to change the attitude and behavior of individuals and improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the organization. This paper is among the first known to examine subjective well-being in public organizations using mixed methods research. The mixed methods approach offers a better insight to understanding effective factors affecting subjective well-being compared to the use of either a qualitative or quantitative method alone.     

A 6.55 factor primal-dual approximation algorithm for the connected facility location problem

In the connected facility location (ConFL) problem, we are given a graph G=(V,E) with nonnegative edge cost c _e on the edges, a set of facilities ??V, a set of demands (i.e., clients) $\mathcal{D}\subseteq VIn the connected facility location (ConFL) problem, we are given a graph G=(V,E) with nonnegative edge cost c _e on the edges, a set of facilities ℱ⊆V, a set of demands (i.e., clients) D í V\mathcal{D}\subseteq V , and a parameter M≥1. Each facility i has a nonnegative opening cost f _i and each client j has d _j units of demand. Our objective is to open some facilities, say F⊆ℱ, assign each demand j to some open facility i(j)∈F and connect all open facilities using a Steiner tree T such that the total cost, which is ?_{i ? F}f_i+?_{j ? D}d_jc_i(j)j+M?_{e ? T}c_e\sum_{i\in F}f_{i}+\sum_{j\in \mathcal{D}}d_{j}c_{i(j)j}+M\sum_{e\in T}c_{e} , is minimized. We present a primal-dual 6.55-approximation algorithm for the ConFL problem which improves the previous primal-dual 8.55-approximation algorithm given by Swamy and Kumar (Algorithmica 40:245–269, 2004).     

Implementation of Equity in Resource Allocation for Regional Earthquake Risk Mitigation Using Two‐Stage Stochastic Programming

This article presents a new methodology to implement the concept of equity in regional earthquake risk mitigation programs using an optimization framework. It presents a framework that could be used by decisionmakers (government and authorities) to structure budget allocation strategy toward different seismic risk mitigation measures, i.e., structural retrofitting for different building structural types in different locations and planning horizons. A two‐stage stochastic model is developed here to seek optimal mitigation measures based on minimizing mitigation expenditures, reconstruction expenditures, and especially large losses in highly seismically active countries. To consider fairness in the distribution of financial resources among different groups of people, the equity concept is incorporated using constraints in model formulation. These constraints limit inequity to the user‐defined level to achieve the equity‐efficiency tradeoff in the decision‐making process. To present practical application of the proposed model, it is applied to a pilot area in Tehran, the capital city of Iran. Building stocks, structural vulnerability functions, and regional seismic hazard characteristics are incorporated to compile a probabilistic seismic risk model for the pilot area. Results illustrate the variation of mitigation expenditures by location and structural type for buildings. These expenditures are sensitive to the amount of available budget and equity consideration for the constant risk aversion. Most significantly, equity is more easily achieved if the budget is unlimited. Conversely, increasing equity where the budget is limited decreases the efficiency. The risk‐return tradeoff, equity‐reconstruction expenditures tradeoff, and variation of per‐capita expected earthquake loss in different income classes are also presented.