Inclusion of persons with disabilities in mainstream employment: is it really all about the money? A case study of four large companies in Norway and Sweden

This study investigates how large companies respond to public policy measures to ensure the inclusion of persons with disabilities in mainstream employment based on a case study of four companies in Norway and Sweden. The qualitative interviews, which were conducted with company managers, government representatives in Norway, and non-governmental organisations in Sweden, revealed three overarching themes: (1) ‘legitimacy’, (2) ‘financial interests’ and (3) ‘non-financial support’. The results indicate a more proactive response from the Swedish companies, especially regarding persons with intellectual and learning difficulties. The Norwegian companies reveal a high commitment to their own employees. These findings cannot be explained solely using neo-institutional theory, which holds that organisations demonstrate ‘conformity with powerful institutional myths to strengthen support and secure survival'. The results indicate that inclusive targeted corporate policies and programmes, advisory support, and the agency and value choices of the management might matter more.     

Functions of Concordance and Dependence with Related Measures

Some functions that serve as building blocks for construction of a wider range of modes of concordance and dependence are pointed. We probe into interplays of such modes. From the standpoint of their conformity to stochastic dominance ordering of distributions within a Fréchet class, all such derived modes display some parallelism under certain conditions. We finally suggest a novel numeric measure of dependence that covers similar existing measures in literature.     

A Preliminary Investigation of Risks for Adverse Outcomes of Relationship Seeking on Social Network Sites (SNS): A Descriptive Study of Women Over 50 Seeking Relationships on MySpace in Hillsborough County,Florida

In contrast to younger populations, little attention has been paid to the increase in seniors using Internet-based venues to find relationships and the potential risk for adverse outcomes this poses. This study examined data collected via an online survey from 45 ethnically diverse women aged 50+ “seeking relationships” on MySpace. The majority of women reported a relationship with someone they met online (85%). They also reported experiencing adverse events including financial exploitation (40%), threats (55%), and physical harm (38%) by someone they met online at levels greater than traditional relationship seeking in the general population. Directions for future research are explored.     

Increasing Sales by Managing the Interlocking Contingencies Between Sales Representatives and Customers Using Behavioral Self-Monitoring

Interlocking contingencies that exist between a customer and sales representatives (SRs) may contribute to buying decisions. Verbal behaviors related to closing sales were identified by analyzing these contingencies statistically. Self-observation checklists were then implemented. On average, the six targeted verbal behaviors related to sales increased 12 percentage points over baseline, compared to a 2% point increase in the comparison group. These changes were associated with 126% more sales for the experimental group compared with 36% more sales for the comparison group. For each SR, this increase in sales translates into $1,094,444 more in annualized revenue.     

No association of serum PSA with vitamin D or total oxidant-antioxidant capacity in healthy men

Background and aim: Vitamin D deficiency and oxidative stress were suggested to be related to prostate cancer risk. We aimed to investigate the association of serum PSA concentration with vitamin D and total oxidant/antioxidant levels.

Materials and methods: A total of 95 healthy men were enrolled for the cross sectional study. Serum PSA, 25(OH)D, serum total oxidant status, and total antioxidant status were measured.

Results: Serum PSA was significantly negatively correlated with serum total oxidant status (r=??0.309, p?=?.003) but there was no significant correlation between PSA and 25(OH)D (p?=?.383) or total antioxidant levels (p?=?.233). After adjustment for age BMI and smoking status with multiple regression analysis, there was no significant association between serum PSA and total oxidant status.

Conclusion: We find no evidence for an association between PSA and vitamin D levels or serum total oxidant/antioxidant levels.     

Signatures of series and parallel systems consisting of non disjoint modules

System signature is a useful tool to analyze coherent systems. In reliability theory, a large number of systems is actually the composition of disjoint subsystems (modules). However, in real life, there are situations in which the subsystems have common components. In this article, we consider the problem of obtaining signatures as well as minimal signatures of series and parallel systems that are composed of subsystems sharing a component. That is, these subsystems are no longer disjoint. Computational results are also presented to illustrate our findings.     

Positives and negatives of online dating according to women 50+

ABSTRACT

To understand the positives and negatives of online dating according to the lived experience of older women, telephone interviews were conducted with 45 women ages 50+ who date online. Interviews were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim, and thematically team coded. The opportunity to expand one’s social network for both friendships and romantic partners, the ability to control dating risks and pace of relationship formation, and knowing more about one’s partner were significant reported benefits of online dating. Dating online also includes unique risks, such as pervasive lying, attempted financial exploitation in the form of scammers, and unwanted electronic sexual aggression.