The impact of LMX differentiation on perceptions of team conflict and procedural justice climate

The fundamental tenet of Leader Member Exchange (LMX) theory is that leaders develop different quality relationships with each of their employees; however, to our knowledge, no study has investigated the impact of LMX differentiation on teams. Drawing upon the justice literature, we suggest that fostering different quality LMX relationships runs counter to principles of equality' and consistency, which are important for maintaining social harmony in groups, and perceptions of procedural fairness. We therefore propose that differential treatment of employees by the leader (as indicated by within-team variability in LMX relationships) will have a negative effect on team reladons, and percepdons of procedural jusdce climate. Two samples of employed individuals are used to invesdgate the hypothesized reladonships. Sample A consists of 74 individuals from a variety of occupadonal and organisadonal backgrounds, and Sample B consists of 152 individuals from an Australian organisadon dealing in the sale and service of heavy machiner)'. In both samples, high LMX variability within teams is associated with higher reports of team reladonal conflict, and lower reports of procedural jusdce climate. The results suggest that leaders may need to be caudous about fostering special relationships with only a select subset of employees.

Earcon for intermittent information in monitoring environments

In this paper we discuss the first of a series of experiments evaluating earcons for critical care environments. We examine peoples’ ability to monitor earcons conveying systolic and diastolic blood pressure while conducting a distractor task. The results showed that when a beacon is present prior to the earcon, participants’ judgment of pitch and duration information improved. The results of the study also indicated presence of historical information in the earcon may interfere with participants’ judgments. However, since participants felt more confident in their recall of previous values when the historical information was present, the results may reflect insufficient training.

Decomposing school and school-type efficiency

This paper puts forward a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach to decomposing a pupil's under-attainment at school. Under-attainment is attributed to the pupil, the school and the type of funding regime under which the school operates. A pupil-level analysis is used firstly on a within school and secondly on a between school basis, grouping schools by type such as state-funded, independent and so on. Overall measures of each pupil's efficiency are thus disentangled into pupil, school and school-type efficiencies. This approach provides schools with a set of efficiency measures, each one conveying different information. © 2001 Elsevier Science B.V.

The detection and identification of extraneous metals in material conveyance systems

The aim of this work was to design and build an equipment which can detect ferrous and non-ferrous objects in conveyed commodities, discriminate between them and locate the object along the belt and on the width of the belt. The magnetic induction mechanism was used as a means of achieving the objectives of this research. In order to choose the appropriate geometry and size of the induction field source, the field distributions of different source geometries and sizes were studied in detail. From these investigations it was found the square loop geometry is the most appropriate as a field generating source for the purpose of this project. The phenomena of field distribution in the conductors was also investigated. An equipment was designed and built at the preliminary stages of thework based on a flux-gate magnetometer with the ability to detect only ferrous objects.The instrument was designed such that it could be used to detect ferrous objects in the coal conveyors of power stations. The advantages of employing this detector in the power industry over the present ferrous metal electromagnetic separators were also considered. The objectives of this project culminated in the design and construction of a ferrous and non-ferrous detector with the ability to discriminate between ferrous and non-ferrous metals and to locate the objects on the conveying system. An experimental study was carried out to test the performance of the equipment in the detection of ferrous and non-ferrous objects of a given size carried on the conveyor belt. The ability of the equipment to discriminate between the types of metals and to locate the object on the belt was also evaluated experimentally. The benefits which can be gained from the industrial implementations of the equipment were considered. Further topics which may be investigated as an extension of this work are given.

The intelligibility of noise-vocoded speech:spectral information available from across-channel comparison of amplitude envelopes

Noise-vocoded (NV) speech is often regarded as conveying phonetic information primarily through temporal-envelope cues rather than spectral cues. However, listeners may infer the formant frequencies in the vocal-tract output—a key source of phonetic detail—from across-band differences in amplitude when speech is processed through a small number of channels. The potential utility of this spectral information was assessed for NV speech created by filtering sentences into six frequency bands, and using the amplitude envelope of each band (=30 Hz) to modulate a matched noise-band carrier (N). Bands were paired, corresponding to F1 (˜N1 + N2), F2 (˜N3 + N4) and the higher formants (F3' ˜ N5 + N6), such that the frequency contour of each formant was implied by variations in relative amplitude between bands within the corresponding pair. Three-formant analogues (F0 = 150 Hz) of the NV stimuli were synthesized using frame-by-frame reconstruction of the frequency and amplitude of each formant. These analogues were less intelligible than the NV stimuli or analogues created using contours extracted from spectrograms of the original sentences, but more intelligible than when the frequency contours were replaced with constant (mean) values. Across-band comparisons of amplitude envelopes in NV speech can provide phonetically important information about the frequency contours of the underlying formants.

A study of load support and other criteria appropriate to the selection of industrial conveyor belts

A study of conveying practice demonstrates that belt conveyors provide a versatile and. much-used method of transporting bulk materials, but a review of belting manufacturers' design procedures shows that belt design and selection rules are often based on experience with all-cotton belts no longer in common use, and are net completely relevant to modern synthetic constructions. In particular, provision of the property "load support", which was not critical with cotton belts, is shown to determine the outcome of most belt selection exercises and lead to gross over specification of other design properties in many cases. The results of an original experimental investigation into this property, carried out to determine the belt and conveyor parameters that affect it, how the major role that belt stiffness plays in its provision; the basis for a belt stiffness test relevant to service conditions is given. A proposal for a more rational method of specifying load support data results from the work, but correlation of the test results with service performance is necessary before the absolute toad support capability required from a belt for given working conditions can be quantified. A study to attain this correlation is the major proposal for future work resulting from the present investigation, but a full review of the literature on conveyor design and a study of present practice within the belting industry demonstrate other, less critical, factors that could profitably be investigated. It is suggested that the most suitable method of studying these would be a rational data collection system to provide information on various facets of belt service behaviour; a basis for such a system is proposed. In addition to the work above, proposals for simplifying the present belt selection methods are made and a strain transducer suitable for use in future experimental investigations is developed.

Subspace modelling for structured noise suppression

The problem of structured noise suppression is addressed by i)modelling the subspaces hosting the components of the signal conveying the information and ii)applying a nonlin- ear non-extensive technique for effecting the right separation. Although the approach is applicable to all situations satisfying the hypothesis of the proposed framework, this work is motivated by a particular scenario, namely, the cancellation of low frequency noise in broadband seismic signals.

Drying of biomass for second generation synfuel production

Drying is a major and challenging step in the pre-treatment of biomass for production of second generation synfuels for transport. The biomass feedstocks are mostly wet and need to be dried from 30 to 60 wt% moisture content to about 10-15 wt%. The present survey aims to define and evaluate a few of the most promising optimised concepts for biomass pre-treatment scheme in the production of second generation synfuels for transport. The most promising commercially available drying processes were reviewed, focusing on the applications, operational factors and emissions of dryers. The most common dryers applied now for biomass in bio-energy plants are direct rotary dryers, but the use of steam drying techniques is increasing. Steam drying systems enable the integration of the dryer to existing energy sources. In addition to integration, emissions and fire or explosion risks have to be considered when selecting a dryer for the plant. In steam drying there will be no gaseous emissions, but the aqueous effluents need often treatment. Concepts for biomass pre-treatment were defined for two different cases including a large-scale wood-based gasification synfuel production and a small-scale pyrolysis process based on wood chips and miscanthus bundles. For the first case a pneumatic conveying steam dryer was suggested. In the second case the flue gas will be used as drying medium in a direct or indirect rotary dryer.

The effectiveness of direct -instruction and student -centered teaching methods on students' functional understanding of plagiarism

In an attempt to improve students' functional understanding of plagiarism a variety of approaches were tried within the context of a more comprehensive information literacy program. Sessions were taught as a one hour "module" inside a required communications skills class at a small private university. Approaches taken included control sessions (a straightforward PowerPoint presentation of the material), direct instruction sessions (featuring mostly direct lecture but with some seatwork as well), and student-centered sessions (utilizing role playing and group exercises). Students were taught basic content and definitions regarding plagiarism, what circumstances or instances constitute plagiarism, where to go for help in avoiding plagiarism, and what constitutes appropriate paraphrasing and citation. Pre-test and post-test scores determined students' functional understanding primarily by their ability to recognize properly and improperly paraphrased text, content understanding by their combined total score on a multiple choice quiz, and their attitude and conceptual understanding by their ability to recognize circumstances which would constitute plagiarism. While students improved across all methods the study was unable to identify one that performed significantly better than the others. The results supported the need for more education with regard to plagiarism and suggested a need for perhaps more time on task and/or a mixed approach towards conveying the content.

Water Quality and Wet Season Diatom Assemblage Characteristics from the Tamiami Trail Pilot Swales Sites (Everglades National Park, Florida, USA)

A pivotal component of hydrological restoration of the Florida Everglades is the improvement of water conveyance to Everglades National Park by the degradation of the current network of canals, roadways and levees. The Tamiami Trail (L29) road/canal complex represents a major barrier to natural water flows into the park and a variety of modification options for flow improvement are currently being explored, including the installation of spreader swales immediately downstream of culverts conveying water under Tamiami Trail from the L29 canal into Everglades National Park. In this study, we evaluated water column chemistry and wet-season diatom community structure to provide baseline information for use in future monitoring activities related to the proposed Tamiami Trail modifications. Water chemistry showed pronounced fluctuations in response to precipitation and anthropogenically mediated hydrological events. Differences in water quality variables among sites were dampened during periods of inundation, and became more pronounced during periods of low canal stage, suggesting the importance of small-scale mechanisms related to isolation of habitat patches. Diatom assemblages were unexpectedly speciose (127 taxa in 40 samples) compared to typical Everglades assemblages, and spatially heterogeneous in sites associated with concentric areas of dense vegetation immediately downstream of culverts. We also observed significant compositional dissimilarities among transects, indicating that culvert pool and north transect assemblages were substantially influenced by propagule input from the canal and areas to the north, while south transect sites were compositionally similar to typical sawgrass prairie diatom communities. Central transect sites were compositionally intermediate to their north and south counterparts. We propose that the position and spatial extent of this “transitional assemblage” is a sensitive indicator of subtle environmental change related to Tamiami Trail modifications.

Hope comes in many forms:out-group expressions of hope override low support and promote reconciliation in conflicts

In conflicts, political attitudes are based to some extent on the perception of the outgroup as sharing the goal of peace and supporting steps to achieve it. However, intractable conflicts are characterized by inconsistent and negative interactions, which prevent clear messages of outgroup support. This problem calls for alternative ways to convey support between groups in conflict. One such method is emotional expressions. The current research tested whether, in the absence of outgroup support for peace, observing expressions of outgroup hope induces conciliatory attitudes. Results from two experimental studies, conducted within the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, revealed support for this hypothesis. Expressions of Palestinian hope induced acceptance of a peace agreement through Israeli hope and positive perceptions of the proposal when outgroup support expressions were low. Findings demonstrate the importance of hope as a means of conveying information within processes of conflict resolution, overriding messages of low outgroup support for peace.

Enviromagnetic, major element, and grain-size analyses of surface sediment samples along the continental margin between East Brazil and Patagonia

Continental margin sediments of SE South America originate from various terrestrial sources, each conveying specific magnetic and element signatures. Here, we aim to identify the sources and transport characteristics of shelf and slope sediments deposited between East Brazil and Patagonia (20°-48°S) using enviromagnetic, major element, and grain-size data. A set of five source-indicative parameters (i.e., chi-fd%, ARM/IRM, S0.3T, SIRM/Fe and Fe/K) of 25 surface samples (16-1805 m water depth) was analyzed by fuzzy c-means clustering and non-linear mapping to depict and unmix sediment-province characteristics. This multivariate approach yields three regionally coherent sediment provinces with petrologically and climatically distinct source regions. The southernmost province is entirely restricted to the slope off the Argentinean Pampas and has been identified as relict Andean-sourced sands with coarse unaltered magnetite. The direct transport to the slope was enabled by Rio Colorado and Rio Negro meltwaters during glacial and deglacial phases of low sea level. The adjacent shelf province consists of coastal loessoidal sands (highest hematite and goethite proportions) delivered from the Argentinean Pampas by wave erosion and westerly winds. The northernmost province includes the Plata mudbelt and Rio Grande Cone. It contains tropically weathered clayey silts from the La Plata Drainage Basin with pronounced proportions of fine magnetite, which were distributed up to ~24° S by the Brazilian Coastal Current and admixed to coarser relict sediments of Pampean loessoidal origin. Grain-size analyses of all samples showed that sediment fractionation during transport and deposition had little impact on magnetic and element source characteristics. This study corroborates the high potential of the chosen approach to access sediment origin in regions with contrasting sediment sources, complex transport dynamics, and large grain-size variability.

La metáfora en los museos de historia social

Antes de la puesta en práctica de los archivos en papel en el siglo XIX había muchas formas líricas de conocer el pasado, por ejemplo, a través del canto y de la pintura. En la evolución de los museos del siglo XIX, los artefactos ocuparon el lugar del conocimiento correspondiente de la “verdad” que se creía existente en el papel archivado. El trabajo del Museo procedió con la certeza del sentido común de una correspondencia individualizada racional entre un artefacto y su significado. La confianza en la capacidad denotativa del artefacto era así la estrategia para transmitir significado a los visitantes. Los museos están alejándose ahora de la denotación como estrategia de comunicación primaria, y uno de los modos que surge es la metáfora. Así como se entendía antiguamente que el significado fijo de los objetos residía en su pura materialidad, ahora vemos el resurgir de la materialidad en los museos, pero esta vez a través de la metáfora, teóricamente entendida como apoyada en la experiencia material del mundo por parte de nuestros cuerpos humanos.

Grammar in dictionaries revisited: the case of verbs with se

This paper is a study about the way in which se structures are represented in 20 verb entries of nine dictionaries of Spanish language. There is a large number of these structures and they are problematic for native and non native speakers. Verbs of the analysis are middle-high frequency and, in the most part of the cases, very polysemous, and this allows to observe interconnections between the different se structures and the different meanings of each verb. Data of the lexicographic analysis are cross-checked with corpus analysis of the same units. As a result, it is observed that there is a large variety in the data which are offered in each dictionary and in the way they are offered, inter and intradictionary. The reasons range from the theoretical overall of each Project to practical performance. This leads to the conclusion that it is necessary to further progress in the dictionary model it is being handled, in order to offer lexico-grammatical phenomenon such as se verbs in an accurate, clear and exhaustive way.