Cultural impact on e-service use in Saudi Arabia

This research investigated the cultural impacts affecting e-service use in Saudi Arabia. Using a mixed-method approach, four new identified cultural values namely: Nepotism, fear of a lack of Interaction with other Humans, Service oriented Culture, and Employee Commitment were found to positively or negatively impact e-service use in Saudi Arabia. This research provides a road map for e-service implementers (both individuals and agencies) to achieve successful e-service usage.

From concept to capability : developing design thinking within a professional services firm

Corporate business and management are embracing design thinking for its potential to deliver competitive advantage through helping them be more innovative, differentiate their brands, and bring more customer centric products and services to market (Brown, 2008). As consumers continue to expect more personalisation and customisation from their service providers, the use of design thinking for innovation within organisations is a logical progression. To date however, there is little empirical literature discussing how organisations are setting about integrating design thinking into their culture and innovation practices. This paper is a first step in initiating a scholarly discussion on the integration of design thinking within organisational culture. Deloitte Australia is a large professional services firm employing over 5700 staff in 12 offices across Australia. The company provides a range of services to clients in the areas of audit, tax, financial advisory and consulting. In early 2011 the company made a strategic commitment to introducing design thinking into the organisation’s practices. While it already maintains a strong innovation culture, to date it had largely been operating within an analytical business environment. For Deloitte, design thinking is an opportunity to create better outcomes for the people they serve – both internal and external stakeholders (Brown and Wyatt, 2010). Research was conducted using case study methodology and ethnographic methods from June to September 2011 at the Melbourne Deloitte office. It involved three methods of data collection: semi structured interviews, participant observation and artifact analysis. This paper presents preliminary case study findings of Deloitte’s approach to building awareness and a consistent understanding of design thinking, as well as large scale capability, across the firm. Deloitte’s commitment to transforming its culture to one of design thinking poses significant potential for understanding how design thinking is comprehended, enabled and integrated within a complex organisational environment.

Standing brave in the face of rapid curriculum change : EAL/D teachers speak about critical literacy and its place in senior English teaching

Critical literacy (CL) has been the subject of much debate in the Australian public and education arenas since 2002. Recently, this debate has dissipated as literacy education agendas and attendant policies shift to embrace more hybrid models and approaches to the teaching of senior English. This paper/presentation reports on the views expressed by four teachers of senior English about critical literacy and it’s relevance to students who are from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds who are learning English while undertaking senior studies in high school. Teachers’ understandings of critical literacy are important, esp. given the emphasis on Critical and Creative Thinking and Literacy as two of the General Capabilities underpinning the Australian national curriculum. Using critical discourse analysis, data from four specialist ESL teachers in two different schools were analysed for the ways in which these teachers construct critical literacy. While all four teachers indicated significant commitment to critical literacy as an approach to English language teaching, the understandings they articulated varied from providing forms of access to powerful genres, to rationalist approaches to interrogating text, to a type of ‘critical-aesthetic’ analysis of text construction. Implications are also discussed.

Making the implicit explicit : successful student skills for commencing cohorts

Making institutional expectations explicit using clear and common language engages commencing students and promotes help-seeking behaviour. When first year students enter university they cross the threshold into an unfamiliar environment (Devlin, Kift, Nelson, Smith & McKay, 2012). Universities endeavour to provide appropriate learning support services and resources; however research suggests that there is limited up take of these services, particularly in high risk students (Nelson-Field & Goodman, 2005). The Successful Student Skills Checklist is a tool which will be trialled during the 2013 Orientation period at the QUT Caboolture campus. The new tool is a response to the university’s commitment to provide “an environment where [students] are supported to take responsibility for their own learning, and to embrace an active role in succeeding to their full potential” (QUT, 2012, 6.2.1). This paper will outline the design of the support tool implemented during Orientation, as well as discuss the anticipated outcomes of the trial.

A city for all citizens : integrating children and youth from marginalized populations into city planning

Socially just, intergenerational urban spaces should not only accommodate children and adolescents, but engage them as participants in the planning and design of welcoming spaces. With this goal, city agencies in Boulder, Colorado, the Boulder Valley School District, the Children, Youth and Environments Center at the University of Colorado, and a number of community organizations have been working in partnership to integrate young people’s ideas and concerns into the redesign of parks and civic areas and the identification of issues for city planning. Underlying their work is a commitment to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and children’s rights to active citizenship from a young age. This paper describes approaches used to engage with young people and methods of participation, and reflects on lessons learned about how to most effectively involve youth from underrepresented populations and embed diverse youth voices into the culture of city planning.

Patients with terminal cancer who use alternative therapies: their beliefs and practices

This paper examines the extent to which patients who have been diagnosed as having terminal cancer choose to use non-medical therapies. In particular it is concerned with the illness behaviour of patients who are receiving conventional cytotoxic drug and radiation treatments, who also decide to use a wide range of ‘alternative’ medications and therapies. The paper discusses the findings of a study of 152 patients with metastatic cancer that examined the extent to which they used alternative cancer therapies, as well as the beliefs and attitudes they have about their cancer, its treatment, and the practitioners providing that treatment. Four groups of users of alternative therapies, who differ according to their commitment to and the type of therapies they use, were identified. Results of logistic regression analyses indicate that those using alternative therapies were different in range of social attitudes. These differences were primarily their greater reported ‘will to live’ and desire for control over treatment decisions, and the differing beliefs they hold about their disease.

The role of customer gratitude in strengthening seller-buyer relationships

Despite its emphasis on relationships between buyers and sellers, and the effect of emotion on behaviours, marketing literature has not yet investigated customer gratitude as an element of relational exchange. Gratitude is a significant component of personal relationships and may offer important insights into how perceptions of relationship marketing investments impact customer trust in, satisfaction with and affective commitment to a seller. In addition, customer gratitude may provide a more complete explanation of how marketing investments work. Consequently, this research contributes to marketing literature by investigating customer gratitude as a mediating mechanism in the relationship between customer perceptions of relationship marketing investments and customer trust in, satisfaction with and affective commitment to the seller: all dimensions of relationship quality.

Vision, Viability and Value: Three perspectives on the performing arts across cultures, context and nations

How can we reach out to institutions, artists and audiences with sometimes radically different agendas to encourage them to see, participate in and support the development of new practices and programs in the performing arts? In this paper, based on a plenary panel at PSi#18 Performance Culture Industry at the University of Leeds, Clarissa Ruiz (Columbia), AnuradhaKapur (India) and Sheena Wrigley (England) together with interloctorBree Hadley (Australia) speak about their work in as policy-makers, managers and producers in the performing arts in Europe, Asia and America over the past several decades. Acknowledged trailblazers in their fields, Ruiz, Kapur and Wrigley all have a commitment to creating a vital, viable and sustainable performing arts ecologies. Each has extensive experience in performance, politics, and the challenging process of managing histories, visions, stakeholders, and sometimes scarce resources to generate lasting benefits for the various communities have worked for, with and within. Their work, cultivating new initiatives, programs or policy has made them expert at brokering relationships in and in between private, public and political spheres to elevate the status of and support for performing arts as a socially and economically beneficial activity everyone can participate in. Each gives examples from their own practice to provide insight into how to negotiate the interests of artistic, government, corporate, community and education partners, and the interests of audiences, to create aesthetic, cultural and / or economic value. Together, their views offer a compelling set of perspectives on the changing meanings of the ‘value of the arts’ and the effects this has had for the artists that make and arts organisations that produce and present work in a range of different regional, national and cross-national contexts.

Legal Regulation of Corporate Social Responsibility : A Meta-Regulation Approach of Law for Raising CSR in a Weak Economy

"Even though Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become a widely accepted concept promoted by different stakeholders, business corporations' internal strategies, known as corporate self-regulation in most of the weak economies, respond poorly to this responsibility. Major laws relating to corporate regulation and responsibilities of these economies do not possess adequate ongoing influence to insist on corporate self-regulation to create a socially responsible corporate culture. This book describes how the laws relating to CSR could contribute to the inclusion of CSR principles at the core of the corporate self-regulation of these economies in general, without being intrusive in normal business practice. It formulates a meta-regulation approach to law, particularly by converging patterns of private ordering and state control in contemporary corporate law from the perspective of a weak economy. It proposes that this approach is suitable for alleviating regulators' limited access to information and expertise, inherent limitations of prescriptive rules, ensuring corporate commitment, and enhance the self-regulatory capacity of companies. This book describes various meta-regulation strategies for laws to link social values to economic incentives and disincentives, and to indirectly influence companies to incorporate CSR principles at the core of their self-regulation strategies. It investigates this phenomenon using Bangladesh as a case study."--publisher website

Are we there yet? Early years reform in Queensland : stakeholder perspectives on the introduction of funded preschool programs in long day care services

Australian educators are currently engaging with wide-ranging, national early childhood reform that is reshaping early childhood education and care. The Australian reform agenda reflects many of the early childhood policy directions championed by bodies such as the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development and the United Nations Children's Education Fund, and is based on the dual discourse of (i) starting strong and (ii) investing in the early years. However, despite its traction in policy rhetoric and policy there is little empirical evidence of how reform is being played out. This paper reports on research undertaken in collaboration with the Queensland Office for Early Childhood Education and Care to generate sector feedback on one element of the reform agenda, the implementation of universal preschool in Queensland. The study aimed to determine the efficacy of the new policy in supporting the provision of 'approved preschool programs' within long day care services. Drawing together the views and experiences of a range of stakeholders, including peak organisations, service providers, directors, preschool teachers and government policy officers, it provides a situated case study of the implementation of universal preschool, and offers empirical evidence of how this policy is being played out at the local level. The paper identifies the opportunities and challenges in implementing universal preschool in Queensland that may have bearing on early childhood reform in Australia as well as other countries. Discussion of key findings is set within an overview of the ECEC policy agenda in Australia, with a particular focus on the commitment to universal preschool. Les éducateurs australiens s’engagent présentement dans une vaste réforme nationale de la petite enfance qui remodèle l'éducation et l’accueil de la petite enfance. Le programme de la réforme australienne reflète plusieurs des orientations en politique de la petite enfance soutenues par des organismes comme l'Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques (OCDE) et le Fonds des Nations Unies pour les enfants (UNICEF). Il s’appuie sur le double discours de (i) un bon départ et de (ii) l’investissement dans les premières années. Cependant, en dépit de son attrait en rhétorique de politique et en politique il y a peu de données empiriques sur la façon dont la réforme se déroule. Cet article rend compte de la recherche entreprise en collaboration avec le bureau de l'éducation et l’accueil à la petite enfance du Queensland afin d’obtenir une rétroaction du secteur sur un élément de la réforme, la mise sur pied du préscolaire universel dans le Queensland. L'étude visait à déterminer l'efficacité de la nouvelle politique pour soutenir la disposition «programmes préscolaires approuvés» dans les services de garde à temps plein. En regroupant les perspectives et les expériences d'une gamme d’intervenants, y compris d’importantes organisations, des prestataires de service, des directeurs, des enseignants du préscolaire et des fonctionnaires de politique gouvernementale, elle constitue une étude de cas localisée de l'exécution la mise sur pied du préscolaire universel, et fournit des données empiriques sur la façon dont cette politique se met en place au niveau local. L’article identifie les opportunités et les défis liés à l’implantation du préscolaire universel au Queensland, qui pourraient avoir une portée sur la réforme de petite enfance en Australie ainsi que dans d'autres pays. La discussion des principaux résultats est faite en lien avec un aperçu global de la politique d'éducation et d’accueil de la petite enfance en Australie, avec un accent particulier sur l'engagement envers le préscolaire universel. Los educadores australianos actualmente están involucrados en una amplia reforma de la educación temprana nacional que está revolucionando la educación preescolar y los servicios de cuidado. El programa de reforma Australiana refleja muchas de las direcciones políticas relacionadas con la infancia temprana incitadas por organismos como la Organización de Cooperación y Desarrollo Económicos y el Fondo Educacional Infantil de las Naciones Unidas, y se basa en el doble discurso de (i) empezando fuertemente e (ii) invertir en los primeros años. Sin embargo, a pesar de su política de tracción en retórica y política, hay pocos datos empíricos de cómo la reforma se está llevando a cabo. Este documento informa sobre las investigaciones llevadas a cabo en colaboración con la Oficina de Queensland de Educación tempana y cuidados, para generar comentarios del sector, sobre uno de los elementos de la agenda de reforma, la aplicación del preescolar universal en Queensland. El estudio tiene como objetivo determinar la eficacia de la nueva política para apoyar la prestación de "programas preescolares aprovados" dentro se los servicios de guardería y cuidado. Reuniendo los puntos de vista y las experiencias de una serie de interesados, entre ellos algunas organizaciones cumbre, proveedores de servicios, los directores, los maestros preescolares y oficiales de política y gobierno, se logra un estudio simulado de la implementación del preescolar universal, y ofrece evidencia empírica de cómo esta política se está llevando a cabo en el plano local. El documento identifica las oportunidades y desafíos en la implementación del preescolar universal en Queensland, que puede repercutir en la reforma de la indancia temprana en Australia, así como en otros países. La discusión de los resultados claves se encuentra en el interior de una visión de la agenda política de ECEC en Australia, con un enfoque particular en el compromiso con el preescolar universal.

Academics and activists in the policy process : engagement with Australian media inquiries 2011-13

After its narrow re-election in June 2010, the Australian Labor government undertook a series of public inquiries into reform of Australian media, communications and copyright laws. One important driver of policy reform was the government’s commitment to building a National Broadband Network (NBN), and the implications this had for existing broadcasting and telecommunications policy, as it would constitute a major driver of convergence of media and communications access devices and content platforms. These inquiries included: the Convergence Review of media and communications legislation; the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) review of the National Classification Scheme; the Independent Media Inquiry (Finkelstein Review) into Media and Media Regulation; and the ALRC review of Copyright and the Digital Economy. One unusual feature of this review process, discussed in the paper, was the degree to which academics were involved in the process, not simply as providers of expert opinion, but as review chairs seconded from their universities. This paper considers the role played by activist groups in all of these inquiries and their relationship to the various participants in the inquiries, as well as the implications of academics being engaged in such inquiries, not simply as activist-scholars, but as those primarily responsible for delivering policy review outcomes. The latter brings to the forefront issues arising in from direct engagement with governments and state agencies themselves, which challenges traditional understandings of the academic community as “critical outsiders” towards such policy processes.

Improving the ability of guarantors to make a real choice : lenders' practices in taking third party guarantees

This article considers recent cases on guarantees of business loans to identify the lending practices that led the court to set aside the guarantee as against the creditor on the basis that the creditor had engaged in unconscionable conduct. It also explores the role of industry codes of practice in preventing unconscionable conduct, including whether there is a correlation between commitment to an industry code and higher standards of lending practices; whether compliance with an industry code would have produced different outcomes in the cases considered; and whether lenders need to do more than comply with an industry code to ensure their practices are fair and reasonable.

Heritage language for Chinese Australians : negotiating 'Chineseness' and, capitalising on resources in the lived world

The ethnic identity and commitment of Heritage Language Learners play salient roles in Heritage Language learning process. The mutually constitutive effect amongst Heritage Language Learner's ethnic identity, commitment, and Heritage Language proficiency has been well documented in social psychological and poststructuralist literatures. Both social psychological and poststructural schools offer meaningful insights into particular contexts but receive critiques from other contexts. In addition, the two schools largely oppose each other. This study uses Bourdieu's sociological triad of habitus, capital, and field to reconcile the two schools through the examination of Chinese Heritage Language Learners in Australia, an idiosyncratic social, cultural, and historical context for these learners. Specifically, this study investigates how young Chinese Australian adults (18-35 in age) negotiate their 'Chineseness' and capitalise on resources through Chinese Heritage Language learning in the lived world. The study adopts an explanatory mixed methods design to combine the quantitative approach with the qualitative approach. The initial quantitative phase addresses the first research question: Is Chinese Heritage Language proficiency of young Chinese Australian adults influenced by their investment of capital, the strength of their habitus of 'Chineseness', or both? The subsequent qualitative phase addresses the second research question: How do young Chinese Australian adults understand their Chinese Heritage Language learning in relation to (potential) profits produced by this linguistic capital in given fields? The initial quantitative phase applies Structural Equation Modelling to analyse the data from an online survey with 230 respondents. Findings indicate the statistically significant positive contribution made by the habitus of 'Chineseness' and by investment of capital to Chinese Heritage Language proficiency (r = .71 and r = .86 respectively). Subsequent multiple regression analysis demonstrates that 62% of the variance of Chinese Heritage Language proficiency can be accounted for by the joint contribution of 'Chineseness' and 'capital'. The qualitative phase of the study uses multiple interviews with five participants. It reveals that Chinese Heritage Language offers meaningful benefits for participants in the forms of capital production and habitus capture or recapture. Findings from the two phases talk to each other in terms of the inherent entanglement amongst habitus of 'Chineseness', investment of capital, and Chinese Heritage Language proficiency. The study offers important contributions. Theoretically, by virtue of Bourdieu's signature concepts of habitus, capital, and field, the study provides answers to questions that both social psychological and poststructuralist theories have long been struggling to answer. Methodologically, the position of 'pluralism' talks back to Bourdieu's theory and forwards to the mixed methods design. Particularly, the study makes a methodological breakthrough: A set of instruments was developed and validated to quantify Bourdieu's key concepts of capital and habitus within certain social fields. Practically, understanding Chinese Australians' heterogeneity and the potential drivers behind Chinese Heritage Language learning contributes to the growing interest in Chinese Australians' contemporary life experiences and helps to better accommodate linguistically diverse Chinese Heritage Language Learners in Chinese language courses. In addition, this study is very timely. It resonates with the recently released Australia in the Asian Century White Paper: Chinese Australians, with sound knowledge of Chinese culture and language obtained through negotiating their 'Chineseness' and capitalising on diverse resources for learning, will help to serve Australia's economic, social, and political needs in unique ways.

It takes more than good intentions : institutional and attitudinal impediments to engaging young people in participatory planning

While participatory processes have become an important part of planning, young people are a particularly vulnerable group in terms of potential marginalisation and exclusion from effective participation. Including the views of young people in participatory planning is not simply a matter of bringing them into existing processes. Instead, participatory processes must find ways to integrate and accommodate their needs and ways of expressing their views. Without these adjustments young people may simply move from being kept outside the planning process to a situation where, although they are formally included, their claims are not taken seriously and they are not treated with equal respect. In this paper we reflect on the success of a community advisory committee, formed to consider water planning issues, in integrating the views of young people into their deliberations. Using Iris Marion Young’s (1995) ideas of communicative democracy we highlight the challenges and opportunities presented by this participatory approach, as articulated by both the young people involved and the adult participants. We specifically consider how the elements of greeting, rhetoric and narrative were reflected in the committee process. We argue that both planners and adult participants need to ensure that participatory processes allow for the equal engagement of all participants and place equal value on their contributions. Our research shows that this involves both an institutional and attitudinal commitment to include the views of young people. The institutional commitment requires young people to be included in processes and for their involvement to be supported. However, the attitudinal commitment it is equally important and requires that adult participants be prepared not only to accept the views of younger participants but to actively encourage and support their full participation.

A transcription factor map as revealed by a genome-wide gene expression analysis of whole-blood mRNA transcriptome in multiple sclerosis

Background Several lines of evidence suggests that transcription factors are involved in the pathogenesis of Multiple Sclerosis (MS) but a complete mapping the whole network has been elusive. One of the reasons is that there are several clinical subtypes of MS and transcription factors which may be involved in one subtype may not be in others. We investigated the possibility that this network could be mapped using microarray technologies and modern bioinformatics methods on a dataset from whole blood in 99 untreated MS patients (36 Relapse Remitting MS, 43 Primary Progressive MS, and 20 Secondary Progressive MS) and 45 age-matched healthy controls, Methodology/Principal Findings We have used two different analytical methodologies: a differential expression analysis and a differential co-expression analysis, which have converged on a significant number of regulatory motifs that seem to be statistically overrepresented in genes which are either differentially expressed (or differentially co-expressed) in cases and controls (e.g. V$KROX_Q6, p-value < 3.31E-6; V$CREBP1_Q2, p-value < 9.93E-6, V$YY1_02, p-value < 1.65E-5). Conclusions/significance: Our analysis uncovered a network of transcription factors that potentially dysregulate several genes in MS or one or more of its disease subtypes. Analysing the published literature we have found that these transcription factors are involved in the early T-lymphocyte specification and commitment as well as in oligodendrocytes dedifferentiation and development. The most significant transcription factors motifs were for the Early Growth response EGR/KROX family, ATF2, YY1 (Yin and Yang 1), E2F-1/DP-1 and E2F-4/DP-2 heterodimers, SOX5, and CREB and ATF families.