Making media work in space: An interdisciplinary perspective on media and communication requirements for current and future space communities

As humans expand into space communities will form. These have already begun to form in small ways, such as long-duration missions on the International Space Station and the space shuttle, and small-scale tourist excursions into space. Social, behavioural and communications data emerging from such existing communities in space suggest that the physically-bounded, work-oriented and traditionally male-dominated nature of these extremely remote groups present specific problems for the resident astronauts, groups of them viewed as ‘communities’, and their associated groups who remain on Earth, including mission controllers, management and astronauts’ families. Notionally feminine group attributes such as adaptive competence, social adaptation skills and social sensitivity will be crucial to the viability of space communities and in the absence of gender equity, ‘staying in touch’ by means of ‘news from home’ becomes more important than ever. A template of news and media forms and technologies is suggested to service those needs and enhance the social viability of future terraforming activities.

The construction of masculinities and femininities in the Church of England:the case of the male clergy spouse

The ordination of women to the priesthood in the Church of England in 1994 signified great change. The impact of the new priests was well documented, and their integration became the focus of much research in the following years. One important area of change was the altered dynamics of gender identity. New roles had opened up for women, but new identities had also emerged for men. While women priests were a new historical emergence, so too were clergy husbands. This paper will consider the historical construction of masculinities and femininities within the church and will go on to look at this in the context of clergy spouses, specifically focusing on men occupying this role. Some provisional findings, acting as work in progress, will be considered.

When electronic management tools work - and don't work - in social-based distribution channels:a study of IT manufacturers and resellers

Electronic information tools have become increasingly popular with channel manufacturers in their efforts to manage resellers. Although these tools have been found to increase the efficiency of communications, researchers and practitioners alike have questioned their effectiveness. To investigate how top-down electronic information affects social channel relationships we consider the use of such tools in information technology distribution channels. Using electronic communications theory and channel governance theory we hypothesize that the usefulness of the tools is a function of the type of information inherent in each tool (demand creation information or supply fulfillment information) and the particular communications characteristics of this information.

The social construction of sleep and work in the British print news media

This article presents a sociological study of sleep issues in the British print news media, with particular focus on the relationship between sleep, work and the changing demands of ‘flexible capitalism’. Drawing on over 1000 newspaper articles from 1984 to 2005, we explore how and why sleep is framed or constructed in terms of continuity and change (in British working life and work cultures) and, equally, viewed as a neglected component of our social lives which is too easily sacrificed to the demands of the 24/7 society, long hours culture and the struggle to create a harmonious work-life balance. This is particularly the case for certain British work cultures in which sleep has conflicting and contrasting associations. Finally, we reflect on the broader class-based discourses and debates that arise from certain workers having their sleep patterns increasingly scrutinized and regulated, and the role of the media in any ensuing sleep/work ‘crisis’.

The fallacy of integration:work and non-work in professional services

Many organisations are encouraging their staff to integrate work and non-work, but a qualitative study of young professionals found that many crave greater segregation rather than more integration. Most wished to build boundaries to separate the two and simplify a complex world. Where working practices render traditional boundaries of time and space ineffective, this population seems to create new idiosyncratic boundaries to segregate work from non-work. These idiosyncratic boundaries depended on age, culture and life-stage though for most of this population there was no appreciable gender difference in attitudes to segregating work and non-work. Gender differences only became noticeable for parents. A matrix defining the dimensions to these boundaries is proposed that may advance understanding of how individuals separate their work and personal lives. In turn, this may facilitate the development of policies and practices to integrate work and non-work that meet individual as well as organisational needs.

Product variety and just-in-time conflict and challenge

This paper addresses the question of how just-in-time can be implemented within high variety manufacture. To illustrate some of the principles in relation to the high variety-low volume situation the case of a computer manufacturer is considered in detail. For contrast the paper also considers the case of the manufacture of highly-configured four wheel drive vehicles where both variety and volumes are high. The most important issue in high variety/low volume production is that JIT operation should be seen in terms of the tactical holding of inventory in upstream buffers within the supply chain so that value is not added to work in progress prematurely. Tactical buffers ensure that service levels are maintained and the risk of stock-outs is minimized. In high variety/high volume production schedule integrity is the key factor, unreliable schedules being a major inhibitor to the introduction of JIT.

Leisure at work in Britain, West Germany, France and Japan : a cross-cultural comparative study

The aim of this thesis was to investigate the impact of changing values and attitudes toward work and the workplace in Britain, West Germany, France and Japan. A cross-national approach was adopted in order to gain a better understanding of differences and similarities in behaviour and to identify aspects specific to each society. Although the relationship between work and leisure has been thoroughly examined and there is a growing body of literature on changes in the values associated with these two phenomena, little research has been carried out into leisure at work. Studies of work time have tended to consider it as a homogeneous block, whereas recent research suggests that more attention should be devoted to unravelling the multiple uses of time at the workplace. The present study sought to review and analyse this new approach to the study of work time, and special attention is devoted to an examination of definitions of leisure, recreation, free time and work within the context of the workplace. The cross-cultural comparative approach gave rise to several problems due to the number of countries involved and the unusual combination of factors being investigated. The main difficulties were differences in the amount and quality of literature available, the non-comparability of existing data, definitions of concepts and socio-linguistic terms, and problems over access to organizations for fieldwork. Much of the literature generalizes about patterns of behaviour and few authors isolate factors specific to particular societies. In this thesis new empirical work is therefore used to ascertain the extent to which generalizations can be made from the literature and characteristics peculiar to each of the four countries identified. White-collar employees in large, broadly comparable companies were studied using identical questionnaires in the appropriate language. Respondents selected were men and women, aged between 20-65 years and either managers or non-managers. Patterns of leisure at work were found to be broadly similar in the national contexts, but with the Japanese and the West Germans experiencing the least leisure at work, and the British and the French perceiving the most. The general trend seems to be toward convergence of attitudes regarding leisure at work in the four countries. Explanations for variations in practice were sought within the wider societal contexts of each country.

Time and professional work in public sector organisations: an examination of four occupational groups in education and medicine

The aim of this thesis is to examine the experience of time of four professional occupational groups working in public sector organisations and the factors affecting this experience. The literature on time and work is examined to delineate the key parameters of research in this area. A broad organisation behaviour approach to the experience of time and work is developed in which individual, occupational, organisational and socio-political factors are inter-related. The experience of secondary school teachers, further education lecturers, general medical practitioners and hosoital consultants is then examined. Multiple methods of data collection are used: open-ended interviews, a questionnaire survey and the analysis of key documents relating to the institutional settings in which the four groups work. The research aims to develop our knowledge of working time by considering the dimensions of the experience of time at work, the contexts in wlhich this experience is generated and the constraints these contexts give rIse to. By developing our understanding of time as a key feature of work experience we also extend our knowledge of organisation behaviour in general. In conclusion a model of the factors relating the experience of time to the negotiation of time at work is presented.