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.     

Two hospice patients and the roles of the physician and the physician executive

Hospice care is available nearly everywhere. Yet some physicians aren't aware of its role in end-of-life care. Explore what hospice care provides and how patients and their families may benefit.     

Outcomes of a technology-based social norms intervention to deter alcohol use in freshman residence halls

OBJECTIVE: The authors tested a prototype intervention designed to deter alcohol use in residence halls. PARTICIPANTS: Approximately 384 freshmen participated in the study over a 2-year period. METHODS: The authors devised a feedback method that assessed residents' blood alcohol concentration (BAC) at night and allowed the readings to be retrieved the next day via the Web. Residents in an intervention hall received their BAC readings as well as normative feedback. In a comparison hall, residents could retrieve only the BAC readings. RESULTS: The authors found statistically significant hall differences, but they were small in size and not meaningful. CONCLUSIONS: Qualitative findings suggest the intervention had an overall positive impact, but the actions of a subgroup of rebellious drinkers might have obscured the effect. Social norms interventions could provoke some episodes of excessive drinking in students who find these messages objectionable. More research is needed to evaluate delayed BAC feedback.     

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.     

A Mandatory Student Health Insurance Program at a Large State University

Abstract

A new compulsory-with-waiver health insurance plan at the State University of New York at Buffalo (SUN-YAB) was designed in 1976 after assessing available literature on students' insurance, morbidity, health care costs, attitudes, data from past SUNYAB insurance plans and health service statistics. Previous findings that the morbidity of this population is low is corroborated by the data available on the students considered within this project. Illnesses common to this age group are predominantly acute, and require a low rate of hospitalization. The new insurance program cost an unmarried single student $67.00 and was a success by several criteria. Approximately 5,000 more students were enrolled in the complusory plan than in the previous voluntary one. Among students interviewed, both those who enrolled and those who did not, felt that the idea of compulsory health insurance for students was a good idea. Virtually all full-time students in the university were covered by some health insurance.     

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.     

A close look at why one social norms campaign did not reduce student drinking

The authors examined 3 possible explanations for the failure of a social norms campaign at a large public university. They administered an anonymous survey to 2 random samples of undergraduate classes: a baseline assessment of 616 students before the campaign's implementation and a follow-up survey of 723 students 4 academic years later. At follow-up, 66.5% of the students were aware of the campaign, yet the survey revealed no reduction in perceived drinking norms or alcohol use in this group. An analysis of the postcampaign sample revealed that (1) a majority of the students did not find the statistics used in the campaign messages credible, (2) higher levels of alcohol use predicted lower levels of perceived campaign credibility, and (3) only 38.5% of the students understood the campaign's intended purpose. If they are to influence personally relevant drinking norms, these campaigns must undergo further development to enhance message credibility and participants' understanding.