The purpose of this writing is to analyses the doctrine of informed consent. Person exercises his autonomy by making informed and reasonable decisions. The writing attempts to disclose a theoretical and practical role of the informed consent institute and its influence on physician’s civil liability. This work consists of five parts. First of all is given ethical importance of informed consent doctrine. In the following parts of the work it is analyzed national and international regulations on informed consent. There is short Lithuanian case law on informed consent overview. At the end it is concluded that there are some gaps in Lithuanian law concerned with informed consent.

This thesis is divided into three texts. The first is a compendium, which situates the major themes of the second text (a fictitious novel) into a scholarly context and delves into the broader academic questions that arise from it regarding the treatment and care of people with special needs. Those themes are put into a context that enables special education teachers to expand thier notions about communicating with and understanding their autistic and special needs students. It not only examines my own autobiographical connection to the novel (by the fact that I have a sister with a combination of Down Syndrome and autism) but also extends the themes into a broader context, and looks at typical expectations in families with mentally handicapped members and the various methods and approaches of communicating with them. The third text elaborates on specific aspects of these themes in an endnote format.

This thesis is divided into three texts. The first is a compendium, which situates the major themes of the second text (a fictitious novel) into a scholarly context and delves into the broader academic questions that arise from it regarding the treatment and care of people with special needs. Those themes are put into a context that enables special education teachers to expand thier notions about communicating with and understanding their autistic and special needs students. It not only examines my own autobiographical connection to the novel (by the fact that I have a sister with a combination of Down Syndrome and autism) but also extends the themes into a broader context, and looks at typical expectations in families with mentally handicapped members and the various methods and approaches of communicating with them. The third text elaborates on specific aspects of these themes in an endnote format.

Unique characteristics of cluster randomized trials (CRTs) complicate the interpretation of standard research ethics guidelines. Variable interpretation by research ethics committees may further complicate review and conduct. An international web-based survey was administered to corresponding authors of 300 randomly sampled CRT publications. We investigated ethics review and consent practices, investigator experiences with ethics review, and the perceived need for CRT-specific ethics guidelines. The response rate was 64%. Ethics review and consent were under-reported in publications. Ethics approval was obtained in 91%, and consent from individual and cluster level participants in 79% and 82% of trials. Consent varied by level of experimental intervention, data collection, and cluster size. Respondents cited variability among ethics committees (46%), and negative impacts of ethics review on their studies (38%). The majority perceived a need for ethics guidelines (73%), and guidance for ethics committees (70%). CRT-specific ethics guidelines are required to ensure practices meet ethical standards.

Probabilities, an essential dimension of risk communication, can be presented in various formats including frequencies (e.g., 1 in 10), percentages (e.g., 10%), or verbal phrases (e.g., unlikely); the literature is mixed concerning which format best supports comprehension. Additionally, it is not well understood how people who vary in their level of numeracy understand those probabilities. The goal of the present three-phase within-participant study was to understand how the factors of format and numeracy influence comprehension and mental representations of probabilities for younger and older adults. Overall, the results of this research clearly indicated that comprehension and mental representation of health risk probabilities are influenced by format, age, and numeracy. To best support comprehension and comparison of health risk probabilities for younger adults and healthy older adults with varying numeracy, percent format should be used.

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / This thesis investigates the situated knowing-in-practice of locally-based community organisations, and studies how this practice knowledge is translated and contested in inter-organisational relations in the community services field of practices. Despite participation in government-led consultation processes, community organisations express frustration that the resulting policies and plans inadequately take account of the contributions from their practice knowledge. The funding of locally-based community organisations is gradually diminishing in real terms and in the competitive tendering environment, large nationally-based organisations often attract the new funding sources. The concern of locally-based community organisations is that the apparent lack of understanding of their distinctive practice knowing is threatening their capacity to improve the well-being of local people and their communities. In this study, I work with practitioners, service participants and management committee members to present an account of their knowing-in-practice, its character and conditions of efficacy; and then investigate what happens when this local practice knowledge is translated into results-based accountability (RBA) planning with diverse organisations and institutions. This thesis analyses three points of observation: knowing in a community of practitioners; knowing in a community organisation and knowing in the community services field of practices. In choosing these points of observation, the inquiry explores some of the relations and intra-actions from the single organisation to the institutional at a time when state government bureaucracy has mandated that community organisations implement RBA to articulate outcomes that can be measured by performance indicators. A feminist, performative, relational practice-based approach employs participatory action research to achieve an enabling research experience for the participants. It aims to intervene strategically to enhance recognition of the distinctive contributions of community organisations’ practice knowledge. This thesis reconfigures understandings of the roles, contributions and accountabilities of locally-based community organisations. Observations of situated practices together with the accounts of workers and service participants demonstrate how community organisations facilitate service participants’ struggles over social justice. A new topology for rethinking social justice as processual and practice-based is developed. It demonstrates how these struggles are a dynamic complex of iteratively-enfolded practices of respect and recognition, redistribution and distributive justice, representation and participation, belonging and inclusion. The focus on the practising of social justice in this thesis offers an alternative to the neo-liberal discourse that positions community organisations as sub-contractors accountable to government for delivering measurable outputs, outcomes and efficiencies in specified service provision contracts. The study shows how knowing-in-practice in locally-based community organisations contests the representational conception of knowledge inextricably entangled with accountability and performance measurement apparatus such as RBA. Further, it suggests that practitioner and service participant contributions are marginalised and diminished in RBA through the privileging of knowledge that takes an ‘expert’, quantifiable and calculative form. Thus crucially, harnessing local practice knowing requires re-imagining and enacting knowledge spaces that assemble and take seriously all relevant stakeholder perspectives, diverse knowledges and methods.

This paper tests the relation between pricing efficiency and liquidity, with and without, the effects of asymmetric information. First, we show that informed trading is negatively related to liquidity. This result is consistent with previous researches, which find that informed trading reduces liquidity. Second, this report explores the direct relation between price efficiency and liquidity by applying a cross-sectional regression. The result indicates that liquidity associated with asymmetric information effects enhances pricing efficiency. The cross-sectional relation between relative informational efficiency and liquidity combed with informed trading is significantly positive. Third, we find that pure liquidity trading also contributes to price informativeness. The positive relation between relative informational efficiency and liquidity unrelated to asymmetric information cannot be rejected.

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / This thesis investigates the situated knowing-in-practice of locally-based community organisations, and studies how this practice knowledge is translated and contested in inter-organisational relations in the community services field of practices. Despite participation in government-led consultation processes, community organisations express frustration that the resulting policies and plans inadequately take account of the contributions from their practice knowledge. The funding of locally-based community organisations is gradually diminishing in real terms and in the competitive tendering environment, large nationally-based organisations often attract the new funding sources. The concern of locally-based community organisations is that the apparent lack of understanding of their distinctive practice knowing is threatening their capacity to improve the well-being of local people and their communities. In this study, I work with practitioners, service participants and management committee members to present an account of their knowing-in-practice, its character and conditions of efficacy; and then investigate what happens when this local practice knowledge is translated into results-based accountability (RBA) planning with diverse organisations and institutions. This thesis analyses three points of observation: knowing in a community of practitioners; knowing in a community organisation and knowing in the community services field of practices. In choosing these points of observation, the inquiry explores some of the relations and intra-actions from the single organisation to the institutional at a time when state government bureaucracy has mandated that community organisations implement RBA to articulate outcomes that can be measured by performance indicators. A feminist, performative, relational practice-based approach employs participatory action research to achieve an enabling research experience for the participants. It aims to intervene strategically to enhance recognition of the distinctive contributions of community organisations’ practice knowledge. This thesis reconfigures understandings of the roles, contributions and accountabilities of locally-based community organisations. Observations of situated practices together with the accounts of workers and service participants demonstrate how community organisations facilitate service participants’ struggles over social justice. A new topology for rethinking social justice as processual and practice-based is developed. It demonstrates how these struggles are a dynamic complex of iteratively-enfolded practices of respect and recognition, redistribution and distributive justice, representation and participation, belonging and inclusion. The focus on the practising of social justice in this thesis offers an alternative to the neo-liberal discourse that positions community organisations as sub-contractors accountable to government for delivering measurable outputs, outcomes and efficiencies in specified service provision contracts. The study shows how knowing-in-practice in locally-based community organisations contests the representational conception of knowledge inextricably entangled with accountability and performance measurement apparatus such as RBA. Further, it suggests that practitioner and service participant contributions are marginalised and diminished in RBA through the privileging of knowledge that takes an ‘expert’, quantifiable and calculative form. Thus crucially, harnessing local practice knowing requires re-imagining and enacting knowledge spaces that assemble and take seriously all relevant stakeholder perspectives, diverse knowledges and methods.

Univ., Diss.--Düsseldorf, 2005. / Literaturverz. S. [387] - 423.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, June, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.