The Pursuit of Continuous Improvement in the Field of Intergenerational Relationships: The Discipline of the Second Curve

This article presents a case for the field of intergenerational relationships to embrace the challenges associated with progressing its reputation, boundaries, and potential in the twenty-first century. The concept of the Sigmoid curve based upon curvilinear logic and the discipline of the second curve is introduced as a means of understanding how individuals, organizations, and institutions need to deal with the challenge of constant renewal as a consequence of rapid social change. The field of intergenerational relationships is challenged to align itself with the discipline of the second curve by (1) improving the impact of research through knowledge-based transfer and (2) exploring new fields of inquiry in the interest of maintaining and advancing relevance and legitimacy.     

积极老龄化理念下的老年教育课程建设策略

发展老年教育是实施积极老龄化战略的重要举措,课程建设是教育目标得以实现的基本保证.结合当前老年教育课程建设的不足,本文提出,老年教育课程建设应以健康、参与和保障三大支柱作为服务目标,着力从课程目标取向、课程内容建构、课程实施形式以及课程师资组成等方面回应和落实积极老龄化理念的要求.     

Using the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) to Predict Emotional and Behavioral Difficulties on Positive and Negative Affect Among Adolescents in Disadvantaged Communities

The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) was used to predict the positive and negative affects of emotional and behavioral difficulties among adolescent boys and girls aged between 14 and 21 years living in disadvantaged communities. A total of 316 adolescents—181 boys and 135 girls—living in the Seri Pantai and Pantai Ria Public Housing Projects in Kuala Lumpur were invited to complete the questionnaire. The results showed that conduct and peer problems were the most prevalent emotional and behavioral difficulties experienced by these adolescents. As expected, the emotional symptoms were more common among the girls than the boys. A further analysis showed that emotional symptoms, peer problems, and low prosocial behavior were predictors of the negative affect of emotional and behavioral difficulties while negative emotional symptoms and high hyperactivity were predictors of a positive affect. The findings suggested that three subscales of SDQ are required to produce a negative affect, and two subscales of SDQ for a positive affect.     

中国"三农"问题的解决趋势

解决"三农"问题需从农村基础设施的完善、农村劳动力的转移和传统农业的改造三个方面探索制度困境与出路,制度变迁和政府扶植是关键所在,而在具体操作过程中又要避免政府的过度干预。     

A Legal Structure for Limiting the Agency Cost of Stock Rights Transfer

The unilateral disposition of stock rights’ voting rights detracts from the welfare of the other shareholders. Contractual arrangements restricting or prohibiting the transfer of stock rights under the capital majority rule may infringe upon shareholders’ right of withdrawal, further weakening stock market constraints on senior management and indirectly raising the agency cost of management abuse of power for private ends. In creating a legal structure for stock rights transfer, we need to find an appropriate balance between freedom of contract, capital majority rule and reduction of agency costs. Judges should determine that the transfer of voting rights is invalid in order to ensure that voting rights match residual claim rights and maintain the constraints on senior management represented by shareholder voting rights. The general prohibition of stock rights transfer in the articles of association blocks shareholders’ right of withdrawal; this is not conducive to restraining potential abuses of power on the part of senior management and should be made invalid. Judges must differentiate between long- and short-term contracts and the initial and revised clauses of the articles of association in order to distinguish between the efficacy of different arrangements limiting transfer of stock rights as laid down in the articles of association.     

论行政主体的积极义务

强化行政主体的积极义务是当代行政法治的基本格局。行政主体的积极义务是行政主体为了满足公共利益的需要,在没有严格法律规定的情况下积极主动履行的、严格遵守法定行政程序的以促进社会发展为目的的义务。其主要类型包括积极实现宪法基本原则的义务、促进社会福利的义务、改善社会环境的义务等七项。行政主体积极义务的提出对于更新我国的行政法治观念和行政立法格局、促进服务型政府建立都具有重大意义。     

高绩效工作系统对员工敬业度的影响机理研究

基于对782名服务业和制造业员工进行的调查,分析了高绩效工作系统对员工敬业度的影响及作用机制。研究表明,高绩效工作系统对员工敬业度的积极影响不是直接的,工作幸福感的核心概念——积极情绪和工作满意度在其中起完全中介作用,而消极情绪的中介作用未得到支持。研究发现,高绩效工作系统实质上是动机激励的工作环境塑造系统,由此形成了激发员工内在工作动机和积极心理体验的组织环境。此外,进一步揭示了工作幸福感是促进员工敬业的关键环节,启示组织应加强员工工作中的情感管理,塑造员工积极的心理力量,从而构建幸福组织。     

Coordinating Production and Marketing with Dynamic Transfer Prices

Decentralized decision making is a fact in the modern business world accompanied by extensive research that looks into its consequences for overall firm profits. We study the interactions of decentralized marketing and operations divisions in a corporation and explore their impact on overall firm profits in the case with and without coordination of the two decentralized units. We assume that the marketing department is responsible for the price that influences the demand (sales), and the operations department is responsible for the production rate. We allow for backlogging over time. We model the interdependence involving marketing and operations decisions as a non‐cooperative differential game, with the two divisions as strategically interacting players. We find that, without coordination, strategic interactions of marketing and production result in inefficiencies that can quantitatively be substantial. Next, we introduce a dynamic transfer pricing scheme as a coordination device and evaluate if it establishes efficient (first best and fully coordinated) outcomes. We show that if production and marketing play a game with pre‐commitment strategies, there exists a dynamic transfer price that efficiently (fully) coordinates decentralized decision making and hence results in Pareto‐efficient company profits. If the two decentralized divisions play a game without pre‐commitment, dynamic transfer prices can partially coordinate decentralized decision making but fail to fully eliminate overall inefficiencies arising from strategic interactions among decentralized divisions.     

The Effect of Language Differences and National Culture on Operational Process Compliance

With increasing frequency, firms are locating their operations in disparate countries with distinct national cultures and languages. This study develops and empirically tests hypotheses relating an operation's process compliance performance to (1) the presence of a language difference between the location of the operation and that of headquarters and (2) the national culture of the location of the operation and that of headquarters. Employing an international sample of pharmaceutical manufacturing plants located primarily in Western nations, the analysis reveals that a language difference between the location of a plant and the firm's headquarters is consistently related to decreased process compliance at the plant level. Regarding national culture, only limited evidence of a direct relationship between national cultural dimensions (at either the plant or headquarters location) and process compliance exists. However, the analysis does suggest that cultural congruence between the location of the plant and that of headquarters can relate to improved compliance performance. Such a relationship depends on the specific national cultural dimension studied. While these results are obtained in a specific manufacturing setting, they potentially have implications for process compliance in any global operation.     

Task partitioning in new product development teams: A knowledge and learning perspective

R&D alliances and outsourcing elements of the new product development process are now commonplace practices among many firms. However, little previous work has examined how these organizational choices influence project knowledge and learning. Based on a comparison of three new product development projects in the software industry, this paper examines how task partitioning in the project influences learning and knowledge development within the firm. The paper suggests that internal development projects encourage synthetic learning and development of architectural and tacit knowledge; in contrast, outsourcing and joint ventures encourage analytic learning and development of component and explicit knowledge.