No description available.

Prior research has reported that individual differences influence both placebo and nocebo responses. The present study examined how individual personality, as well as trust, influence placebo/nocebo belief and symptom reporting after receiving an inert capsule that for some was described as an active “cognitively-enhancing” trial medication. Individuals (N = 104) were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: condition A participants were told they’d received the medication, condition B participants were told they’d received a placebo, and condition C participants were told, via random assignment, each would receive either the medication or placebo (after the experiment this condition listed the group – medication or placebo - each believed s/he was in). The study was completed in the UNT Student Health and Wellness Center to provide context in a medical setting. Of the 104 participants, 46 (44.2%) were either placed by experimental design or self-report in the medication group. Participants with a belief in medication ingestion, regardless of condition (i.e., A or C), reported significantly more symptoms (M = 16.65, SD = 3.178), than participants who believed they had ingested a placebo (M = 14.21, SD = 2.58), t (102) = 4.32, p = .001. Aspects of Neuroticism and Extroversion, as well as trust were correlated with symptom reporting and/or placebo/nocebo responses. It appears that that personality is part of a combination including trust, context and expectations. It is recommended that future research on personality and placebo effects consider the role of individual factors, context and communication of expectations.

No description available.

No description available.

Most extant studies of corporate social and environmental reporting (CSER) tend to examine the volume of CSER by companies. In contrast, the significance of this thesis lies in its focus on key stakeholders who are users of CSER and their needs. The perspectives of multiple key stakeholders, including investing, procuring and campaigning stakeholders, are investigated with respect to what they perceive to be valuable social and environmental reporting in supporting decision making. This thesis also goes beyond CSER and examines social and environmental reporting from other sources, including but not limited to reporting arising from private meetings between companies and stakeholders and information about companies’ social and environmental impact or performance from information intermediaries. Stakeholder perceptions on the value and the qualitative characteristics of social and environmental reporting have been sought through semi-structured questionnaire with individuals drawn from the key stakeholder groups. Consistent with stakeholder theory, it is expected that stakeholder needs may vary. The findings in this thesis support a hypothesised relationship between the value of social and environmental reporting and information qualitative characteristics. Other key findings show that the availability of social and environmental reporting affects stakeholders’ extent of use of social and environmental reporting and that the drivers for the value of information and the extent of use of information are different. The findings present important implications for both company managers and policy-makers. Company managers are better informed concerning stakeholder information needs. Thus they are better equipped to make decisions about the extent, scope and form of CSER. Furthermore, this thesis enables policy-makers to assess whether CSER requirements under current regulatory mechanisms reflect stakeholder needs. Finally this thesis has contributed towards enriching literature in the CSER area.

This study explores the political perspectives of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) reporting practices in a traditional economy. Previous studies on CSR reporting have identified a number of drivers/motivations of CSR disclosures including market, community and stakeholder influence. It is also argued that CSR may provide a setting for political patronage and interests, which may eventually lead to the absence of accountability. The possibility of exploiting CSR disclosures in developing countries/ traditional setting as characterized by Weber (1978) is even greater due to the prevalence of family controlled firms, political interference and favoritism, absence of rational corporate governance mechanisms and institutional investors, and inefficient and underdeveloped capital market. Yet, the role of political influence in CSR disclosures still needs to be explored and theorized. This study fills in this gap by drawing on the disclosures of corporations. Borrowing Weber's notion of traditionalism and traditional society and using the Weberian framework developed by Colignon and Covaleski (1991), this thesis explores deeply into the underlying nature of CSR practices of public limited companies in Bangladesh. Based on the Weberian framework and using the interacting methodologies of Weber, the study analyzes the structural, historical, economic and political conditions of the research site, Bangladesh, sets the tension between tradition and modernity, and identifies whether elements of traditionalism such as personal loyalty, obedience, family domination and kinship provide richer insights into the political aspects of organizations' CSR practices. The researcher employs mixed methods in this study. The study conducts OLS multiple regression to investigate the influence of political connections on CSR disclosure index. The second part of the research conducts in depth interviews with the current and former Board of Directors, CEOs, current and former policy makers in the government to provide explanatory powers as to why and how the companies use CSR as a political tool to express their allegiance towards the ruling power. The research documents association of political connections with CSRDI and also reports the presence of political motivations behind the CSR practices. The findings show that companies express their loyalty publicly by contributing to the ruling leader's programs and personal projects as CSR. The interview findings also reflect the presence of elements of traditionalism such as obedience, master-servant relationship, and family domination to understand the politically motivated CSR disclosures. As expected in a traditional setting, accountability and transparency would not transpire from imposed regulations and institutions, rather from the familial political power. This research contributes to the CSR literature by using a novel and alternative theoretical lens to understand the motivations of CSR in traditional societies. In addition, it provides a diverse methodological perspective by introducing mixed methods to critical accounting research. It also provides empirical evidence to a critique of CSR as an accountability mechanism in an arena where business depends fundamentally on political connections and familial power. Thus, the power of accounting as an articulation of accountability relationships is muted, if not ignored, in traditional societies (Dyball, Chua and Poullaos, 2006). This research opens up the scope to use the wealth of the Weberian framework to understand the accounting practices in both traditional as well as modern rational society.

Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

The objectives of this study are two-fold: (a) to delineate the factors that guide Ontario social workers’ decision-making when rendering judgments on the mandatory reporting of child maltreatment and (b) to understand how social workers maintain the therapeutic alliance with children and families following the decision to report suspected child maltreatment. The study is informed by two distinct bodies of literature: the decision-making theoretical literature within the fields of medicine, psychology, social work, and marriage and family therapy and the therapeutic alliance theoretical literature. Harnessing the advantages of online survey technology, the study surveyed registered members (n = 480) of the Ontario Association of Social Workers who provide direct service to children and families. Participants responded to prepared vignettes of suspected child maltreatment followed by Likert-scale questions (strongly agree to strongly disagree) and open-ended questions on strategies to maintain the alliance. Open-ended questions allowed respondents to offer further commentary regarding their opinions on mandatory reporting and on maintaining the therapeutic alliance. These comments added a rich source of information to the quantitative data. Multiple logistic regression analyses showed that social workers’ ethical responsibility to the College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers, their legal responsibility to the provincial mandatory reporting laws of Ontario, and consultation with peers or eliciting direction from a supervisor comprised the main factors in their decision-making around reporting suspected child maltreatment to the Children’s Aid Society. Qualitative analyses showed that social workers employ a plethora of strategies to repair the alliance following a disclosure of child maltreatment including reporting strategies, information strategies, affect regulation strategies, advocacy strategies, and resource strategies. The major limitation of the research design was the use of vignette research, which in proscribed circumstances may not reflect what the social worker does in actual practice. Design features that compensate for this limitation include (1) use of a 5-point Likert-item response of strongly agree to strongly disagree to allow respondents a range of responses; and (2) use of open-ended questions to allow respondents the opportunity to express their opinions on the issues.

Ungdomar är den mest brottsutsatta gruppen i samhället och många av de brott som begås av ungdomar kommer aldrig till polisens vetskap. Det finns en kunskapslucka när det gäller anledningar att vittna och anmäla brott. Detta för att få en tydligare bild av ungdomars synpunkter på att anmäla brott och syftet i denna studie var därför ungdomar benägenhet/attityd till att vittna och anmäla brott. Studien gjordes i form av en kvalitativ intervjustudie, där 15 gymnasie elever i åldrarna 16-18 år varav nio manliga och sex kvinnliga från två olika skolor deltog. Resultatet visar att erfarenheter, förtroendet för rättsväsendet och rädsla är bidragande faktorer i beslut om man ska kontakta eller samarbeta med polisen. Rädsla i olika former beroende på brott var den mest betydande anledningen. För att öka benägenheten för ungdomar att våga vittna och anmäla brott krävs kunskap och förtroende för polisen.

Zugl.: Münster (Westfalen), Universiẗat, Diss., 2009.