Business games and implementation research

This paper reviews some recent research in OR implementation and suggests that a new approach is required, which will take fuller account of the perceptions of managers concerned with the problem. Research games in business settings seem to offer a means for such approach. Some lessons learned from a business game used in this way are described and their implications for modelbuilders are discussed.     

Risk-taking/gambling-like behavior in preschool children

The types and characteristics of risk-taking or gambling-like behaviors in children are not well understood. Social learning, as one potential etiological factor of risktaking behavior in preschool children, was empirically examined. Prior to playing a risk-taking game, children in the experimental group were exposed to a peer model who had ostensibly won a large prize, whereas control children were exposed to a peer model who had won nothing. Children in the experimental group initiated more risks to win the large prize in the high-risk situation than children in the control group. The results indicated that modeling can enhance risk-taking/gambling-like behavior in young children. Parallels to compulsive gambling in adults, and recommendations for future research were also discussed.The authors wish to thank Melissa Warren and Earlene Goodman for their valuable assistance during the course of this study.Portions of this paper were presented at the meeting of the Western Psychological Association, San Francisco, CA 1991.     

Pathways to solutions

Problems may be viewed from many different angles and in many different ways. The order in which facts are collected, the attitudes of the people involved in the problem, the climate in which the problem finds itself to be, all play their parts in determining what the problem is perceived to be and how it is tackled. This paper reports on the several ways in which an apparently simple problem was approached and recognises that the process of solution which is adopted can dictate the eventual outcome and determine what the recommendations will be.     

The Effects of Modeling and Experience on Young Children's Persistence at a Gambling Game

Gambling is common among children and adolescents, but Hide is known about factors initiating or maintaining this behavior. Fifty-one male and 51 female kindergarten and first grade children were invited to play a game involving repeated opportunities to select colored chips from a cup while blindfolded. Children playing for tangible incentives elected to play longer than those who were not (p < .001). Seeing a videotaped model win or fail to win a large prize had no effect on persistence with the game. Playing again one week later, children playing for incentives exhibited a more successful strategy, quitting sooner (p < .04) and with more winnings (p < .03). The parameters of experiential versus observational learning are discussed, with implications for educating children about risk-taking.     

Government,management and the environmental crisis

In case there should be any doubt that the human predicament will soon be a global crisis the reasons why this must be so are discussed. The increased use of resources and the growing dependence on a fuel-based technology are crisis enough, but to this is added the growing population of the part of the world less advanced in technology, where attitudes are different and cannot be changed to conform to the richer population's idea of what is what in the world.Most of our problems are created because the total effect of an operation is not properly considered when it is undertaken for the part that is wanted. Thus the rich countries have got themselves into a predicament the fault for which the poor see lying entirely with the rich, while the rich see the danger in the growing poor populations.The mechanism of evolution by selection from spontaneous variety must be followed because we cannot foresee needs. To keep the process healthy we must retain room for manoeuvre and choice and we must studiously avoid trying to operate monolithic technological ways of maintaining our society.Policies should seek to anticipate the imminent pressures of the future so as to retain freedom of movement, and the most obvious policy should be to make the price of fuel artificially high to conserve resources and stimulate the right kind of new technologies.     

Adapting production for private label goods

Linear Programming (LP) is a valuable tool of operational research and has been applied successfully to problems of production scheduling, particularly in the process industries. It is dependent to a large degree on forecasts of demand for the products: when demand is erratic, production scheduling suffers, whatever the technique employed. LP is sometimes adopted, however, in situations which do not necessarily warrant its use. Such a case arose when considering the production difficulties of private label goods in the food industry. The problem was eventually modified with the full cooperation of management, despite initial opposition. The solution found was to adapt as a company to market conditions, instead of forcing the production function to operate within artificial constraints.     

Scientific method and the environmental scene: the need for an experimenting,evolving society

The idea is abroad that there is a technique, called the scientific method, which solves problems: this is a fallacy: and there is no certainty that solutions are even possible. Malthus's warning was correct and growth of population and consumption is now almost out of control. Evolutionary mechanisms have been stultified so that they no longer guarantee the creation of higher forms, and the variety on which it thrives has been destroyed. Planners plan as if they were planning the result of an election instead of merely the election itself. They do not understand freedom nor its value for a healthy society. Instead they have organised the proliferation of the illiterate and the unemployed.