How do indirect measures of evaluation work? Evaluating the inference of prejudice in the Implicit Association Test

There has been significant interest in indirect measures of attitudes like the Implicit Association Test (IAT), presumably because of the possibility of uncovering implicit prejudices. The authors derived a set of qualitative predictions for people's performance in the IAT on the basis of random walk models. These were supported in 3 experiments comparing clearly positive or negative categories to nonwords. They also provided evidence that participants shift their response criterion when doing the IAT. Because of these criterion shifts, a response pattern in the IAT can have multiple causes. Thus, it is not possible to infer a single cause (such as prejudice) from IAT results. A surprising additional result was that nonwords were treated as though they were evaluated more negatively than obviously negative items like insects, suggesting that low familiarity items may generate the pattern of data previously interpreted as evidence for implicit prejudice.

Order effects in the IAT

We demonstrate that the IAT is crucially influenced by the order in which the two IAT-blocks are administered. In three studies the IAT-effect is shown to change in magnitude and sign when the order of the ‘compatible’ and the ‘incompatible’ block is reversed. Order effects are caused by cognitive inertia, the difficulty to switch from one categorization rule to another categorization rule. Cognitive inertia distorts correlations between IAT-scores and other variables. While the common practice of counterbalancing block-order between-subjects does not cancel out these distortions, we show in study 4 that counterbalancing block-order repeatedly within-subjects can eliminate order effects.

Transnational Migration and Cross-border Mobility in the Serbian-Hungarian Border Region

The study is aiming to present migrant groups in the Serbian-Hungarian border region which are playing a role in forming transnational migration, ransnational networks and transnational spaces. Transnational migrants are using material, cultural, social and symbolical capital in various forms. The everyday activities of the people as well as their mobility, emotional attachments, and economic relationships have contributed to a transnational region the cross-border contacts in the last century were always present, even in spite of political and historical changes, only their intensity, political charge and tension has been changing. The asymmetries defining the border region has been reflected in different directions, places, time and in different volume. In this specially built and constantly reorganising scope, people who were living their everyday life have tried to use the differences for their benefit, and to improve their possibilities. With their transnational lifestyles and cross-border networks, they substantially contribute to the stability and prosperity of the cross-border region.

A Texture-based land cover classification for the delineation of a shifting cultivation landscape in the Lao PDR using landscape metrics

The delineation of shifting cultivation landscapes using remote sensing in mountainous regions is challenging. On the one hand, there are difficulties related to the distinction of forest and fallow forest classes as occurring in a shifting cultivation landscape in mountainous regions. On the other hand, the dynamic nature of the shifting cultivation system poses problems to the delineation of landscapes where shifting cultivation occurs. We present a two-step approach based on an object-oriented classification of Advanced Land Observing Satellite, Advanced Visible and Near-Infrared Spectrometer (ALOS AVNIR) and Panchromatic Remote-sensing Instrument for Stereo Mapping (ALOS PRISM) data and landscape metrics. When including texture measures in the object-oriented classification, the accuracy of forest and fallow forest classes could be increased substantially. Based on such a classification, landscape metrics in the form of land cover class ratios enabled the identification of crop-fallow rotation characteristics of the shifting cultivation land use practice. By classifying and combining these landscape metrics, shifting cultivation landscapes could be delineated using a single land cover dataset.

Frames in the Ethiopian Debate on Biofuels

Biofuel production, while highly contested, is supported by a number of policies worldwide. Ethiopia was among the first sub-Saharan countries to devise a biofuel policy strategy to guide the associated demand toward sustainable development. In this paper, I discuss Ethiopia’s biofuel policy from an interpretative research position using a frames approach and argue that useful insights can be obtained by paying more attention to national contexts and values represented in the debates on whether biofuel production can or will contribute to sustainable development. To this end, I was able to distinguish three major frames used in the Ethiopian debate on biofuels: an environmental rehabilitation frame, a green revolution frame and a legitimacy frame. The article concludes that actors advocating for frames related to social and human issues have difficulties entering the debate and forming alliances, and that those voices need to be included in order for Ethiopia to develop a sustainable biofuel sector.

Micro-blogging adoption in the enterprise: an empirical analysis

Given the increasing interest in using social software for company-internal communication and collaboration, this paper examines drivers and inhibitors of micro-blogging adoption at the workplace. While nearly one in two companies is currently planning to introduce social software, there is no empirically validated research on employees’ adoption. In this paper, we build on previous focus group results and test our research model in an empirical study using Structural Equation Modeling. Based on our findings, we derive recommendations on how to foster adoption. We suggest that micro-blogging should be presented to employees as an efficient means of communication, personal brand building, and knowledge management. In order to particularly promote content contribution, privacy concerns should be eased by setting clear rules on who has access to postings and for how long they will be archived.

Vertical integration and information sharing — an empirical investigation in the German apparel industry

Despite the astounding success of the fast fashion retailers, the management practices leading to these results have not been subject to extensive research so far. Given this background, we analyze the impact of information sharing and vertical integration on the performance of 51 German apparel companies. We find that the positive impact of vertical integration is mediated by information sharing, i.e. that the ability to improve the information flow is a key success factor of vertically integrated apparel supply chains. Thus, the success of an expansion strategy based on vertical integration critically depends on effective ways to share logistical information.

Modeling microblogging adoption in the enterprise

Despite a broad range of collaboration tools already available, enterprises continue to look for ways to improve internal and external communication. Microblogging is such a new communication channel with some considerable potential to improve intra-firm transparency and knowledge sharing. However, the adoption of such social software presents certain challenges to enterprises. Based on the results of four focus group sessions, we identified several new constructs to play an important role in the microblogging adoption decision. Examples include privacy concerns, communication benefits, perceptions regarding signal-to-noise ratio, as well codification effort. Integrating these findings with common views on technology acceptance, we formulate a model to predict the adoption of a microblogging system in the workspace. Our findings serve as an important guideline for managers seeking to realize the potential of microblogging in their company.

Drivers of RFID adoption in the automotive industry

The automotive industry is confronted with increasing competition, leading to higher cost pressures and the demand to optimize production processes and value chains. Here the RFID technology promises to improve a range of processes in logistics and manufacturing. Despite its promising potential in the automotive industry, RFID has not yet made a decisive step from pilots to real-life implementations in the supply chain. Building on existing models of technology adoption, we analyze RFID adoption dynamics in the automotive industry. Building on existing IOS adoption models tailored to RFID specifics and based on ten semi-structured interviews with OEMs and suppliers, we evaluate main drivers of RFID adoption in the automotive industry. Our key findings are that the use of a coercive approach by the OEM could be redundant because of the market-driven RFID adoption among many suppliers. Furthermore, suppliers implementing RFID can now gain an early mover competitive advantage by developing higher trust in their relationship with the OEM as well as accumulating unique expertise in this area.

Linking local knowledge, conservation practices and ecosystem diversity: comparing two communities in the Tunari National Park (Bolivia)

Combined approaches to conserve both biological and cultural diversity are seen as an alternative to classical nature conservation instruments. The objective of this study was to examine the influence of urbanization coupled with exclusive conservation measures, on land use, local knowledge and biodiversity in two Quechua speaking communities of Bolivia located within the Tunari National Park. We assessed and compared the links between land use, its transformation through conservation practices, local institutions and the worldviews of both communities and the implications they have for biodiversity at the level of ecosystems. Our results show that in both communities, people’s worldviews and environmental knowledge are linked with an integral and diversified use of their territory. However, the community most affected by urbanization and protected area regulations has intensified agriculture in a small area and has abandoned the use of large areas. This was accompanied by a loss of local environmental knowledge and a decrease in the diversity of ecosystems. The second community, where the park was not enforced, continues to manage their territory as a material expression of local environmental knowledge, while adopting community-based conservation measures with external support. Our findings highlight a case in which urbanization coupled with exclusive conservation approaches affects the components of both cultural and biological diversity. Actions that aim to enhance biocultural diversity in this context should therefore address the impact of factors identified as responsible for change in integrated social-ecological systems.