A Study of a Network Meeting: Exploring the Interplay between Inner and Outer Dialogues in Significant and Meaningful Moments

The present study is part of a series of qualitative studies focusing on dialogic practice in southern Norway. In this article, we present a qualitative study of a network meeting focusing on the interplay between the participants' inner and outer dialogues. The network meeting is between an adolescent boy, his mother and two network therapists, the same adolescent case discussed previously in this journal by Bøe et al. ( 2013 ). The aim of this study is to explore how the interplay between inner and outer dialogues contributes to significant and meaningful moments for the interlocutors. A multiperspective methodology is used that combines video recordings of a network meeting and participant interviews with text analysis. Our research found the interplay has an important role in understanding the emergence of significant and meaningful moments in therapy. A one‐sided focus on participants' utterances or inner dialogues was insufficient to explain their significance and meaning to the interlocutors. A dialogical approach provides a theoretical frame and concepts that are useful in investigations of therapeutic conversations.     

The impact of learning opportunities and decision authority on occupational health

In an investigation of 418 employees in the Norwegian Postal Service, employees with high learning opportunities and high decision authority were found to be better off on psychological functioning, health and organizational outcome variables than employees with low scores on these variables. Decision authority and learning opportunities had specific and independent impact on subjective health, psychological functioning, coping style and organizational outcome variables. There were, however, also interaction effects between demands, learning opportunities, and decision authority on subjective health. Learning opportunities and decision authority were operationalized with a questionnaire, supplemented with questions on the opportunities to learn skills beyond the present job situation. It is suggested that this is a particularly important dimension for coping with the present day rapid changes in working life, where the objective for many workers will be to broaden their repertoire and competence to increase their flexibility in the labour market.     

Regression Analysis of Restricted Mean Survival Time Based on Pseudo-Observations

Regression models for survival data are often specified from the hazard function while classical regression analysis of quantitative outcomes focuses on the mean value (possibly after suitable transformations). Methods for regression analysis of mean survival time and the related quantity, the restricted mean survival time, are reviewed and compared to a method based on pseudo-observations. Both Monte Carlo simulations and two real data sets are studied. It is concluded that while existing methods may be superior for analysis of the mean, pseudo-observations seem well suited when the restricted mean is studied.     

Business Travel from the Traveller’s Perspective: Stress,Stimulation and Normalization

For growing numbers of businesspeople, managers and public officials, work involves travel. This study investigates what business travel means to travellers. What are their experiences of travel and what are the consequences of travel for their professional and personal lives? Qualitative interviews with frequent business travellers and corporate travel managers show that travel may be both stressful and stimulating. It may be associated with physical and psychological strain, increased workloads and difficulties in balancing work and private life, but also with enriching experiences, social and professional status and a cosmopolitan identity. It may also promote travellers’ professional careers. However, in some respects, an ongoing normalization of travel seems to have moderating effects on both stress and stimulation among travellers. This normalization occurs on three different levels: the societal, organizational and individual.     

The nexus between income distribution,trade policy,and monopoly power: An assessment of the tin market

The article suggests a manner in which degrees of monopoly power can be introduced into a trade policy model of the computable general equilibrium type. The distributional effects of tariffs and subsidies are compared, first under competitive conditions and then under conditions of monopoly power.The tin market, for which Malaysia can be assumed to exert monopoly power, is used as an example to show the distributional consequences of applying a competitive model in cases where a model allowing for monopoly power would have been more appropriate. The existence of monopoly power is shown to have important distributional effects. Policy modelers, dealing with distributional issues, should therefore be careful about the assumptions made about market forms.     

The impact of learning opportunities and decision authority on occupational health

In an investigation of 418 employees in the Norwegian Postal Service, employees with high learning opportunities and high decision authority were found to be better off on psychological functioning, health and organizational outcome variables than employees with low scores on these variables. Decision authority and learning opportunities had specific and independent impact on subjective health, psychological functioning, coping style and organizational outcome variables. There were, however, also interaction effects between demands, learning opportunities, and decision authority on subjective health. Learning opportunities and decision authority were operationalized with a questionnaire, supplemented with questions on the opportunities to learn skills beyond the present job situation. It is suggested that this is a particularly important dimension for coping with the present day rapid changes in working life, where the objective for many workers will be to broaden their repertoire and competence to increase their flexibility in the labour market.     

The Good,the Bad and the Unhappy: The Cultural Meanings of Newspaper Reporting on Jackpot Winners

Accounts of jackpot winners and big gambling wins are common in Swedish newspapers. Analysis of over 2000 such newspaper articles reveals that their content is structured according to specific themes and cultural topics. Four such topics are identified: wealth as a test of morals and character, the social impact of wealth, the just and good world, and luck and the occult. Culturally structured narratives like these—which elaborate on mythological and moralistic schemes of good and evil, rewards and punishments, and which concern questions of human nature and social values—have a long history in folk tradition and in Christian moral teachings. Jackpot wins provide a discursive realm for moral and existential questions that, to some extent, fills a void left by the decline of traditional folklore and formal religion. Apparently, this discourse stimulates interest in games and constitutes one of the cultural roots of contemporary gambling.