The effects of technical and social conditions on workplace trust

This paper investigates the extent to which the technical and social contexts of organizations independently affect levels of workplace trust. We argue that, in an organizational context, trust is not just a relationship between an individual subject (the truster) and an object (the trustee) but is subject to effects from the conditions of the work relationship itself. We describe the organizational context as comprising both a technical system of production (where work gets done through the specification of tasks) and a social system of work (where problems of effort, compliance, conformity and motivation are managed). We analyse the relationship between trust and these two aspects of workplace context (technical and social systems). We also operationalize this in terms of differences between industries,  occupational composition and human resource management practices. The model is tested using data drawn from the 1995 Australian Workplace Industrial Relations Survey. The results confirm that differences in industry, occupational composition and HRM practices all impact on levels of workplace trust. We review these results in terms of their implications for future research into the problem of analysing variation in trust at both the workplace and individual levels.

Gender and national identity : the people's theatre in the Philippines (1967-2000)

The Philippine Education Theater Association (PETA), the People’s Theatre in the Philippines was founded within the bounds of the nationalist leftist tradition. Its origin therefore determines to a great extent the contours of the discourse on the feminist movement in the Philippines, its participation within the cultural movement and the founding years of the pioneering People’s Theatre in the country. As a grass roots theatre from a Third World nation, the PETA theatre model responded to the needs in raising socio-political and economic consciousness and can therefore serve as an alternative tool to formal education for other Third World countries. This thesis argues, the People’s Theatre development is determined within the matrix of gender, class, politics and the nationalist movement to which it is intertwined or inextricably linked. The feminist, nationalist and radical movements have become superimposed upon the history of the People’s Theatre and have nurtured its development as a consciousness raising educational tool.

Review of the literature on the use of social media by people with traumatic brain injury (TBI)

Purpose: To review the literature relating to use of social media by people with a traumatic brain injury (TBI), specifically its use for social engagement, information exchange or rehabilitation.

Method: A systematic review with a qualitative meta-synthesis of content themes was conducted. In June 2014, 10 databases were searched for relevant, peer-reviewed research studies in English that related to both TBI and social media.

Results: Sixteen studies met the inclusion criteria, with Facebook™ and Twitter™ being the most common social media represented in the included studies. Content analysis identified three major categories of meaning in relation to social media and TBI: (1) risks and benefits; (2) barriers and facilitators; and (3) purposes of use of social media. A greater emphasis was evident regarding potential risks and apparent barriers to social media use, with little focus on facilitators of successful use by people with TBI.

Conclusions: Research to date reveals a range of benefits to the use of social media by people with TBI however there is little empirical research investigating its use. Further research focusing on ways to remove the barriers and increase facilitators for the use of social media by people with TBI is needed. Implications for Rehabilitation: Communication disabilities following traumatic brain injury (TBI) can be wide-ranging in scope and social isolation with loss of friendships after TBI is common. For many people, social media is rapidly becoming a usual part of everyday communication and its use has the potential to increase communication and social participation for people with TBI.There is emerging evidence and commentary regarding the perceived benefits and risks, barriers and facilitators and purposes of use of social media within the TBI population.Risks associated with using social media, and low accessibility of social media sites, form barriers to its use. Facilitators for social media use in people with TBI include training the person with TBI and their communication partners in ways to enjoy and use social media safely.There is minimal rigorous evaluation of social media use by people with TBI and scant information regarding social media use by people with communication disabilities after TBI. Further investigation is needed into the potential benefits of social media use on communication, social participation and social support with the aim of reducing social isolation in people with TBI.

Learning from the margins : young women, social exclusion and education

This collection of ground-breaking international essays address the educational, social, work and biographical experiences of young women who are routinely constructed as ‘at risk’ and on the margins. Drawing on research from an international range of scholars, this book brings together important new perspectives on the gendered dimensions of social exclusion and educational marginalisation.

Corporate social responsibility, new activism and public relations

Purpose – This paper aims to analyse why some contemporary corporate organisations are reluctant to articulate the effect of their market positioning behaviour on the unwilling communities that oppose their activities. It describes the communicative interactions between several large corporate organisations and the grassroots activist groups opposing their activities, in Victoria, Australia.

Design/methodology/approach – Extensive secondary data were collected, including extensive newspaper and radio transcripts from the campaign periods, web site downloads, letters and other campaign documents. The research design applied to the data, a qualitative, interpretative analysis, drawing on key theoretical frameworks.

Findings – The research findings suggest that powerful protest strategies, combined with the right political and social conditions, and a shift in the locus of politics and expertise, bring to light public concerns about the ethics of corporate practices, such as public relations, used egocentrically by organisations, to harmonise their activities in late modern Western society. It finds that no serious overhaul of business ethics can occur until the unity of public relations is critically scrutinised and reformed. It helps define an alternative holistic communicative approach which could be applied more widely to business practice that helps avoid the limitations and relativism of public relations.

Originality/value – The research flags new ways of thinking expressed in the notion of public communication that could lead to creative and unusual coherences vital to deal with the apparent ecological challenges for society in late modernity.

Sources of stress in impoverished neighbourhoods : insights into links between neighbourhood environments and health

Objective : We consider associations between individual, household and area-level characteristics and self-reported health.
Method : Data is taken from baseline surveys undertaken in 13 socio-economically disadvantaged neighbourhoods in Victoria (n=3,944). The neighbourhoods are sites undergoing Neighbourhood Renewal (NR), a State government initiative redressing place-based disadvantage.
Analysis :This focused on the relationship between area and compositional factors and self-reported health. Area was coded into three categories; LGA, NR residents living in public housing (NRPU) and NR residents who lived in private housing (NRPR). Compositional factors included age, gender, marital status, identifying as a person with a disability, level of education, unemployment and receipt of pensions/benefits.
Results : There was a gradient in socio-economic disadvantage on all measures. People living in NR public housing were more disadvantaged than people living in NR private housing who, in turn, were more disadvantaged than people in the same LGA. NR public housing residents reported the worst health status and LGA residents reported the best.
Conclusions : Associations between compositional characteristics of disability, educational achievement and unemployment income and poorer self-reported health were shown. They suggested that area characteristics, with housing policies, may be contributing to differences in self-reported health at the neighbourhood level.
Implications : The clustering of socio-economic disadvantage and health outcomes requires the integration of health and social support interventions that address the circumstances of people and places.

Intersection of autonomy and social control : negotiating teenage motherhood

Contrary to popular belief, teenage mothers are a declining proportion of birthing women; however they receive much negative public attention. Of particular public concern is the high cost of supporting teenage mothers, in terms of financial, health and welfare resources. Historically, the typical founding mother of white Australia was single, but post-war changes in the family structure incorporated the expectation that children be born into two-parent households with the male as the breadwinner. Policy changes in the seventies saw the introduction of the Sole Parents Pension which meant that many birthing teenage women could choose to keep their infants rather than have a clandestine adoption or an enforced marriage. The parenting practices of teenage mothers have been criticised for being less than optimal, and mother and child are reported as being disadvantaged cognitively, psychosocially, and educationally. One widespread nursing service which provides support for new mothers in Victoria is the Maternal and Child Health Service; however, teenage mothers appear reluctant to use such services. Why this should be so became an important question for this research, since little is known about the parenting practices of teenage mothers. This study therefore sought to explore mothering from the perspective of five sole supporting teenage mothers each of whom had a child over six months of age. The research methodology took an interpretive ethnographic approach and was guided by feminist principles. The data were collected through repeated interviewing, participant observation, informal discussions with key informants, field notes and journalling. Data analysis was aided by the use of the software, program NUD-IST. It was found that the young women in this study each chose to give birth with full realisation that their existence was dependent on the Welfare State. Unanticipated, however, were the many structural barriers which made their lives cataclysmic, but these reinforced their determination to prove themselves worthy and capable mothers. The young women negotiated motherhood through a range of social supports and through maternal practice. Unquestionably, their social dependency on the welfare system forced them into marginal citizen status. Moreover, absolute and intrinsic poverty levels were experienced, brought about by inadequate welfare payments. Formal support agencies, such as the Maternal and Child Health nurses were rarely approached to provide childrearing support beyond the initial months following birthing, since the teenagers' basic needs such as shelter, food and clothing took precedence over their parenting needs. Additionally, some nurses were perceived to hold judgmental attitudes towards teenage mothers. It was far easier to forestall confrontation with nurses and the other 'older' women clientele by avoiding them. Thus XI they turned to charitable agencies who provided a safety net in the form of emergency supplies of money, food, or equipment. Informal networks of friends provided alternative modes of support when family help failed to materialise. The children, however, provided the young women with an opportunity to transform their lives by breaking free of the past, and by creating a new, mature existence for themselves. Despite being abandoned by family, friends, lovers and society, in the privacy and isolation of their own homes, they attempted to provide a more nurturing environment for their children than they themselves had received. Each bestowed unconditional maternal love on the child and were rewarded through the pleasures of watching their children grow and develop into worthwhile individuals. The children became the focus of their attention and their reason for living. In the course of their welfare dependency, the young women became public property, targets of surveillance, and were subjected to stigmatising and condescending public attitudes wherever they went. In this way, it was evident that they were an oppressed group, but each found ways of resisting. Rather than focussing on their oppressive or disabling lives, or dwelling on their disadvantaged status, the young women sought their identities as mature women through motherhood and by demonstrating that they could do this important job well. Through motherhood their lives had meaning and a sense of purpose. The thesis concludes that motherhood in the teenage years is difficult. However, if appropriate supports are made available, teenage mothers need be no different from non-teenage mothers. But with state resources shrinking, and their own resources limited, teenage mothers are disadvantaged. In some ways, this study showed that all levels of support were inadequate, although those provided through the charitable organizations were seen to be the most appropriate. This reflects the current policy of economic rationalism adopted by most Western liberal democracies in the 1980s and 1990s and no less by the former Keating Labor Government in Australia.

Women, religion and social change in the Philippines : refractions of the past in urban filipinas' religious practices today

This research is an exploration of the place of religious beliefs and practices in the life of contemporary, predominantly Catholic, Filipinas in a large Quezon City Barangay in Metro Manila. I use an iterative discussion of the present in the light of historical studies, which point to women in pre-Spanish ‘Filipino’ society having been the custodians of a rich religious heritage and the central performers in a great variety of ritual activities. I contend that although the widespread Catholic evangelisation, which accompanied colonisation, privileged male religious leadership, Filipinos have retained their belief in feminine personages being primary conduits of access to spiritual agency through which the course of life is directed. In continuity with pre-Hispanic practices, religious activities continue to be conceived in popular consciousness as predominantly women’s sphere of work in the Philippines. I argue that the reason for this is that power is not conceived as a unitary, undifferentiated entity. There are gendered avenues to prestige and power in the Philippines, one of which directly concerns religious leadership and authority. The legitimacy of religious leadership in the Philippines is heavily dependent on the ability to foster and maintain harmonious social relations. At the local level, this leadership role is largely vested in mature influential women, who are the primary arbiters of social values in their local communities. I hold that Filipinos have appropriated symbols of Catholicism in ways that allow for a continuation and strengthening of their basic indigenous beliefs so that Filipinos’ religious beliefs and practices are not dichotomous, as has sometimes been argued. Rather, I illustrate from my research that present day urban Filipinos engage in a blend of formal and informal religious practices and that in the rituals associated with both of these forms of religious practice, women exercise important and influential roles. From the position of a feminist perspective I draw on individual women’s articulation of their life stories, combined with my observation and participation in the religious practices of Catholic women from different ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds, to discuss the role of Filipinas in local level community religious leadership. I make interconnections between women’s influence in this sphere, their positioning in family social relations, their role in the celebration of All Saints and All Souls Days in Metro Manila’s cemeteries and the ubiquity and importance of Marian devotions. I accompany these discussions with an extensive body of pictorial plates.

Passing time in Clifton Court : an ethnographic study of a unit for confused older people

An exploration of how the residents of a 30 bed unit for confused older people spent their time and a description of the impact upon this of any associated factors. The study demonstrates that it is possible for for elders with dementia and mental health problems to enjoy a range of activities, however, these need to be individualised to take into account the skills they have to meet the challenges with which they are presented. The informed contribution from the activities personnel and the support of nurses is vital to ensure a high quality of social interaction. Sound leadership at the clinical level is essential.

Wool industry : a decade of turbulence : an examination of some of the factors contributing to the crisis within Australia's wool industry, and the resulting economic, social and demographic effects on a small isolated rural community

A central issue of this thesis has been an examination of the effects that the current wool crisis has had on the Balmoral district, an area almost solely devoted to the production of wool and wool sheep. Examines the methods being utilised to try to alleviate some of these effects.

Reproduction and social control : women in Australia 1900-1999

Examines the conditions of Australian women in their reproductive lives, in a social and scientific context throughout the twentieth century. Aims to identify those areas which have influenced change (if it has occurred), the types of change and the impact those changes have had on the lives of women, given the premise that the social life of women, in all its forms, is predicated by their reproductive function.

Nursing and justice as a basic human need

This paper explores the idea that justice is a basic human need akin to those famously depicted in Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs and, as such, warrants recognition as a core element in representative ideas about nursing. Early nurse theorists positioned the principles and practice of nursing as having their origins in ‘universal human needs’. The principle of deriving nursing care from human needs was thought to provide a guide not only for promoting health, but for preventing disease and illness. The nursing profession has had a longstanding commitment to social justice as a core professional value and ideal, obligating nurses to address the social conditions that undermine people’s health.The idea of justice as a universal human need per se and its possible relationship to people’s health outcomes has, however, not been considered. One reason for this is that justice in nursing discourse has more commonly been associated with law and ethics, and the legal and ethical responsibilities of nurses in relation to individualized patient care and, more recently, changing systems of care to improve health and health outcomes. Although this association is not incorrect, it is incomplete.A key aim of this paper is to redress this oversight and to encourage a broader conceptualization of justice as necessary for human survival, health and development, not merely as a professional value, or legal or ethical principle for guiding human conduct.

Migration, citizenship and intercultural relations : looking through the lens of social inclusion

Migration, Citizenship and Intercultural Relations reflects on the tensions and contradictions that arise within debates on social inclusion, arguing that both the concept of social inclusion and policy surrounding it need to incorporate visions of citizenship that value ethnic diversity. Presenting the latest empirical research from Australia and engaging with contemporary global debates on questions of identity, citizenship, intercultural relations and social inclusion, this book unsettles fixed assumptions about who is included as a valued citizen and explores the possibilities for engendering inclusive visions of citizenship in local, national and transnational spaces.