We need to talk

'We need to talk' examines the discursive framework of LEVEL as a feminist art collective and engages with conversation as a strategy for bringing diverse individual voices to the forefront of the feminist discussion. The words in the audio works, were recontextualised from a series of dinner party conversations, which focused on the role of women and feminism in the 21st century. The thoughts and ideas of sixty women have been transcribed, edited and re-recorded through the artists’ individual voices. Placed in a specially constructed ‘lazy susan’, this audio installation speaks of the experience of sharing information, ideas and experiences ‘around the table’. The fabric patterns on the floor cushions have been designed from banners created in collective workshops with women in Brisbane and Melbourne, Australia, as a way of translating personal statements and political ideas into the everyday.

"I will start treatment when I think the time is right":HIV-positive gay men talk about their decision not to access antiretroviral therapy.

In a qualitative study, 20 HIV-infected Australian gay men were interviewed about their decision not to access antiretroviral drug therapy. The main reasons given for the decision were fear of side effects; fear of long-term damage to body organs; the inconvenience of the treatment regimens; belief that the regimen's demands would be a threat to morale; and belief that there was no reason to start therapy in the absence of AIDS-related symptoms. Actions taken by the men to monitor and maintain their health included seeing a doctor regularly; having regular T-cell and viral load tests; and trying to maintain a positive outlook by not letting HIV/AIDS 'take over' their lives. Almost half the men considered they had been subjected to unreasonable pressure to access therapy and there was considerable pride at having resisted this pressure. The findings suggest that the men disagreed with the biomedical model for managing HIV/AIDS only on the question of if and when to access therapy. They also suggest that underlying the men's dissent from the biomedical model was a different mode of thinking than is required by the model: while the model demands thinking that is abstract, the men focused strongly on factors close to the 'here and now' of immediate experience. The practical implications of the findings are explored.

Do you really want to ask an underwriter how much money you should leave on the table?

This paper analyses whether the owners of companies seeking to list will leave less money on the table if underwriters are employed to price and market the issue. Our findings indicate that limited liability and Industrial company initial public offerings (IPOs) that have used underwriters have left
more money on the table than those not employing underwriters. Not only is there a direct cost in employing an underwriter but this study suggests there might also be an indirect cost. We also find that a positive forecast earnings per share yield may be useful in reducing the amount of money left on the table.

Factors influencing money left on the table by property trust IPO issuers

While previous listed property trust (LPT) initial public offering (IPO) studies have identified low under pricing returns, this study specifically examines the amount of money left on the table by the pre-IPO owners in this category of IPO. This study investigates 58 property trust IPOs in Australia from 1994 to 2004 and finds that the amount of money left by LPT IPOs is considerably less than industrial company IPOs, implying considerably less uncertainty about the valuation of such IPOs compared to industrials. We also find that more recent (post 2000) LPT IPOs in Australia appear to be significantly different to previous LPT IPOs in both money left and under pricing terms.

Representing the mind: adult talk to speech-delayed preschoolers

There is evidence from a range of studies that adult input influences a young child's language development Of interest is how adult input contributes to emotional and cognitive understandings. Children with special needs in mainstream schools are expected to develop social skills which entails the understanding of a situation from the perspective of other participants. The question is whether children with a speech delay hear adult language that helps them develop a theory of mind. The study of the acquisition of a theory of mind has focused on children who have been asked to carry out tasks demonstrating their understanding of what another person might be thinking. Tager-Flusberg et al. (2001) have found that children who perform better on theory of mind tasks are children who talk about thoughts and feelings. The present study looks at mental state language input provided to children that might help them learn to talk about thoughts and feelings. Activities involving children and their mothers, and activities in a preschool program were studied for cognitive and emotional content in the adult input. The input provided to normally developing children would be more supportive of the development of their talk about thoughts and feelings.

An input-output table perspective on measuring construction productivity

In the field of construction economics, input-output analysis based studies' have attracted a lot of interest from the academics and researchers. The wide efforts are to carry out analyses and comparisons of economic indicators in construction sectors across countries and years. There has been little research modelling the construction productivity using input-output tables. This research takes advantage of the input-output analysis to develop a perspective for determining the productivity of an industrial sector. The developed quantitative formulas are fully based on the economic indicators generated from an input-output table. Using the newly published OECD input-output database, historical analyses and comparisons are carried out to indicate the differences of prod uctivi ties of the construction sectors in Australia and Japan.

Differences in how english and german speakers talk and reason about CAUSE

This research identifies how English and German speakers differ in the range of situations they describe as causal and how these difference may influence causal reasoning. In Experiments 1 and 2, English and German speakers described 3D animations of complex events using CAUSE verbs (cause, get) and ENABLE verbs (let, enable). As predicted, English speakers used CAUSE verbs to describe a wider range of events than German speakers. In Experiment 3, English and German speakers viewed 3D animations of CAUSE and ENABLE events and then estimated the likelihood of the effect (E) in the presence of the affector (A), p(E|A), in hypothetical situations similar to the one they just saw. Given the results of Experiments 1 and 2, we predicted that German speakers’ estimates of p(E|A) would be higher than English speakers’ estimates of p(E|A) for ENABLE events, but not necessarily for CAUSE events. The results were as predicted. The findings suggest that English and German speakers differ in the range of situations they describe as causal and that these differences in linguistic coding may lead to differences in causal reasoning.

School mathematics and ICT: are we doing enough? - The talk

The author discusses how to improve the use of ICT in mathematics education. A number of measures are recommended including the need to conduct an ICT-and-mathematics audit across the curriculum. The author points out that ICT is changing traditional understandings of literacy and numeracy and how it is taught. ICT approaches may help to teach things in slightly different ways, but will not necessarily do this any better than old ways. The author highlights that teaching is changing from face-to-face oral discussion to virtual talk, with ICT just the latest technology in a long line of technological innovations that have transformed teaching since the nineteenth century.