Characteristics of microcredit offering in brazilian program of microcredit in São Paulo state

The Programa Nacional do Microcrédito Produtivo Orientado (PNMPO) encourages productive activity of micro and small entrepreneurs as those present in São Paulo State, in Brazil. Thus this research aims to determine the characteristics of the supply of microcredit program of the national productive microcredit OSCIPs in the state of São Paulo. As a research method was used to develop documental analysis based on official sources of institutions’ information on their sites in the worldwide web. The results indicate the existence of different institutional settings, which show different characteristics in the supply of Oriented Productive Microcredit, but always focusing on the development of local actors.

Att bekämpa det onda eller främja det goda : Fyra verksamhetsperspektiv på individer i våldsbejakandemiljöer samt preventionsarbete runt dessa

To fight evil or promote good: Four organizational perspectives on individuals inviolent environments and prevention work around them. The purpose of this article is to examine organizational understandings and perceptions that can affect the current work with defectors from and members in violent and extremist environments. The empirical material consists primarily of answers to open questions in a survey, where professionals from four organizations are represented: social services, school, police and politics. The material is analyzed with direct qualitative content analysis and shows two contradict approaches to the problem; one that argues for ”fighting the evil” and another that argues for ”promoting the good”. The theoretical framework presented is Erving Goffmans’ frame analysis, Howard S. Beckers’ labelling process and Ingrid Sahlins’ discussion about different kinds of prevention strategies. The results show how organizational understandings and perceptions are far from uniform but rather disparate, and also that assumptions made by professionals have wide implications – often related to morally based approaches grounded on notions of good and evil.

The quality of the physical environment and its association with activities and well-being among older people in residential care facilities

The physical environment can influence older people’s health and well-being, and is often mentioned as being an important factor for person-centred care. Due to high levels of frail health, many older people spend a majority of their time within care facilities and depend on the physical environment for support in their daily life. However, the quality of the physical environment is rarely evaluated, and knowledge is sparse in terms of how well the environment meets the needs of older people. This is partly due to the lack of valid and reliable instruments that could provide important information on environmental quality. Aim: The aim of this thesis was to study the quality of the physical environment in Swedish care facilities for older people, and how it relates to residents’ activities and well-being. Methods: The thesis comprises four papers where both qualitative and quantitative methods were used. Study I involved the translation and adaptation of the Sheffield Care Environment Assessment Matrix (SCEAM) into a Swedish version (S-SCEAM). Several methods were used including forward and backward translation, test of validity via expert consultation and reliability tests. In Study II, S-SCEAM was used to assess the quality of the environment, and descriptive data were collected from 20 purposively sampled residential care facilities (RCFs). Study III was a comparative case study conducted at two RCFs using observations, interviews and S-SCEAM to examine how the physical environment relates to older people’s activities and interactions. In study IV, multilevel modeling was used to determine the association between the quality of the physical environment and the psychological and social well-being of older people living in RCFs. The data in the thesis were analysed using qualitative content analysis, and descriptive, bivariate and multilevel statistics. Results: A specific result was the production of the Swedish version of SCEAM. The instrument contains 210 items structured into eight domains reflecting the needs of older people. When using S-SCEAM, the results showed a substantial variation in the quality of the physical environment between and within RCFs. In general, private apartments and dining areas had high quality, whereas overall building layout and outdoor areas had lower quality. Also, older people’s safety was supported in the majority of facilities, whereas cognitive support and privacy had lower quality. Further, the results showed that environmental quality in terms of cognitive support was associated with residents’ social well-being. Specific environmental features, such as building design and space size, were also noted, through observation, as influencing residents’ activities, and several barriers were found that seemed to restrict residents’ full use of the environment. Conclusions: This thesis contributes to the growing evidence-based design field. The S-SCEAM can be used in future research on the association between the environment and people’s health and well-being. The instrument could also serve as a guide in the planning and design process of new RCFs.

Imaginarios sociales de adolescentes y docentes en torno al cuerpo, la corporalidad y la actividad física. Estudio cualitativo en un colegio de Bogotá, 2014-2015.

Problema. Esta investigación se aproxima al entorno escolar con el propósito de avanzar en la comprensión de los imaginarios de los adolescentes y docentes en torno al cuerpo, la corporalidad y la AF, como un elemento relevante en el diseño de programas y planes efectivos para fomento de la práctica de AF. Objetivo. Analizar los imaginarios sociales de docentes y adolescentes en torno a los conceptos de cuerpo, corporalidad y AF. Métodos. Investigación de corte cualitativo, descriptivo e interpretativo. Se realizaron entrevistas semi-estructuradas a docentes y a estudiantes entre los 12 y 18 años de un colegio público de Bogotá. Se realizó análisis de contenido. Se compararon los resultados de estudiantes por grupos de edades y género. Resultados. Docentes y estudiantes definen el cuerpo a partir de las características biológicas, las diferencias sexuales y las funciones vitales. La definición de corporalidad en los estudiantes se encuentra ligada con la imagen y la apariencia física; los docentes la entienden como la posibilidad de interactuar con el entorno y como la materialización de la existencia. La AF en los estudiantes se asocia con la práctica de ejercicio y deporte, en los docentes se comprende como una práctica de autocuidado que permite el mantenimiento de la salud. Conclusiones. Para promover la AF tempranamente como una experiencia vital es necesario intervenir los espacios escolares. Hay que vincular al cuerpo a los procesos formativos con el propósito de desarrollar la autonomía corporal, este aspecto implica cambios en los currículos.

Sistema de responsabilidad penal para adolescentes en la reincidencia de actos delictivos de los adolescentes en conflicto con la ley. caso: centro forjar ciudad bolívar

El presente trabajo de investigación tiene como objetivo analizar el papel del Centro Forjar Ciudad Bolívar en la reincidencia de actos delictivos de los adolescentes infractores, basado en la teoría de la justicia restaurativa que se busca generar desde el Sistema de Responsabilidad Penal para Adolescentes en Colombia. De esta manera, se pretende demostrar que, al ser una política pública para generar una justicia restaurativa, su implementación ha sido fundamental dentro de la localidad, para generar un proceso de reinserción social y acompañamiento para evitar la reincidencia de actos delictivos de estos adolescentes. Para lograr este objetivo se utilizará un análisis metodológico cualitativo, basándose en estudios de las fuentes primarias, trabajo de campo a partir de entrevistas realizadas en el Centro Forjar de Ciudad Bolívar, para entender el impacto de la política pública en la localidad.

Representaciones sociales de los estudiantes de la Escuela de Medicina y Ciencias de la Salud de la Universidad del Rosario sobre las Orientaciones Sexuales Diversas a la heterosexual.

El presente es un estudio de tipo exploratorio y descriptivo de corte cualitativo, que se empleó con la finalidad de conocer las representaciones sociales frente a las orientaciones sexuales diversas a la heterosexual, que tienen 35 estudiantes de la Universidad Del Rosario, sede Quinta de Mutis de los programas de Medicina, Fisioterapia y Psicología. Se realizaron 15 entrevistas individuales semiestructuradas y a profundidad, y dos grupos focales conformados por 10 estudiantes cada uno. La información fue analizada a partir del análisis de narrativas por categorías y con la ayuda del programa Atlas Ti, se organizó en las siguientes categorías generales, que permitieron abordar los objetivos de la investigación: (a) información sobre el objeto representado, (b) actitudes y creencias hacia el objeto representado, (c) prácticas discriminatorias y (d) abordaje UR, cada una de ellas contiene diversas subcategorías que ayudaron a organizar y clasificar la información recolectada. En el estudio se encontró, de acuerdo con los objetivos propuestos, que en primer lugar existe un vacío en el conocimiento acerca de las orientaciones sexuales caracterizado por la presencia de discursos estereotipados. En segundo lugar, una actitud en su mayoría indiferente frente a las personas con orientaciones sexuales diversas a la heterosexual, así como un conjunto amplio de narrativas basadas en creencias lo cual da cuenta de que los discursos nacen del conocimiento del sentido común. Por otro lado, se encuentra que existen prácticas discriminatorias directas e indirectas, así como prejuicios dentro de las narrativas. Los estudiantes perciben que en general este es un tema que no se aborda en la Universidad, llegando al consenso en que esto debería cambiar, sin embargo, las representaciones sociales que se establecen en el desconocimiento, las actitudes indiferentes y las prácticas discriminatorias, permiten ver que aún existe un discurso heteronormativo muy arraigado, que pone barreras expresadas en los prejuicios, los estereotipos y el rechazo.

Entrepreneurship rates the fuzzy-set approach

A fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis is applied to determine the necessary and sufficient conditions for higher entrepreneur rates. Based on Global Entrepreneurship Monitor data, it is shown that the most relevant conditions are Media Attention to Entrepreneurship, as well as Perceived Capabilities and Perceived Opportunities. The non-existence of Fear of Failure is also an important factor in determining higher entrepreneurship rates. When the sample is split, this condition is more important for most developed countries. This can be viewed as relevant information for policymakers to better define their policies to promote entrepreneurship, which is a key to more sustainable growth in countries.

What are the conditions for good innovation results? A fuzzy-set approach for European Union

Innovation is one of the main concerns of European Union countries since the beginning of the century. Despite failing to reach their targets, innovation remains a priority because innovation enables countries to achieve better economic performance. This study analyzes the relation between the level of innovation and the economic effects and applies a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis to study the relation between six conditions and two different outcomes. The data comes from the Union Innovation Scoreboard. The study finds that research systems, linkages and entrepreneurship, and intellectual assets are necessary conditions for the outcomes of a high level of innovation and positive economic effects. The main sufficient condition for both outcomes is a good research system.

Speed, legislatures and international treaties: Evidence from Mercosur

What causes faster or slower procedures in the parliaments when considering international treaties? This question motivates the current research, which aims to understand how the nature of coalitions influence the duration of the legislative processes. For this, the analysis covers all the treaties signed by Mercosur between 1991 and 2021 and the internalisation processes in four member states (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay). It observes how long each parliament took to approve the treaties and which was the effect of political and economic variables. A mixed-methods approach was adopted for the empirical research, combining Survival Analysis, Qualitative Comparative Analysis and Process Tracing. While the quantitative work investigates all the cases, the qualitative study illuminates the enlargement of Mercosur, with in-depth analysis of the Paraguayan approval of the Venezuelan and Bolivian accessions. This study provides important insights into the role of national legislatures in the Latin American regionalism, concluding that the government-opposition cleavage drives the parliamentarians’ behaviour on the topic of regional integration. The study also contributes to the field Mercosur studies with the characterisation of the treaties ratified domestically, by undertaking a longitudinal analysis at the 30th anniversary of the bloc.

Comparative constitutional design for divided societies: a model to explain vonstitutional asymmetries

Comparative studies on constitutional design for divided societies indicate that there is no magic formula to the challenges that these societies pose, as lots of factors influence constitutional design. In the literature on asymmetric federalism, the introduction of constitutional asymmetries is considered a flexible instrument of ethnic conflict resolution, as it provides a mixture of the two main theoretical approaches to constitutional design for divided societies (i.e., integration and accommodation). Indeed, constitutional asymmetries are a complex and multifaceted phenomenon, as their degree of intensity can vary across constitutional systems, and there are both legal and extra-legal factors that may explain such differences. This thesis argues that constitutional asymmetries provide a flexible model of constitutional design and aims to explore the legal factors that are most likely to explain the different degrees of constitutional asymmetry in divided multi-tiered systems. To this end, the research adopts a qualitative methodology, i.e., Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA), which allows an understanding of whether a condition or combination of conditions (i.e., the legal factors) determine the outcome (i.e., high, medium, low degree of constitutional asymmetry, or constitutional symmetry). The QCA is conducted on 16 divided multi-tiered systems, and for each case, the degree of constitutional asymmetry was analyzed by employing standardized indexes on subnational autonomy, allowing for a more precise measure of constitutional asymmetry than has previously been provided in the literature. Overall, the research confirms the complex nature of constitutional asymmetries, as the degrees of asymmetries vary substantially not only across systems but also within cases among the dimensions of subnational autonomy. The outcome of the Qualitative Comparative Analysis also confirms a path of complex causality since the different degrees of constitutional asymmetry always depend on several legal factors, that combined produce a low, medium, or high degree of constitutional asymmetry or, conversely, constitutional symmetry.

Coworking spaces: thriving and organizing in the new world of work

The present Ph.D. thesis proposes three studies on coworking spaces to understand how they foster thriving and organizing in the new world of work. The first study maps and analyzes the thematic structure and evolution of the academic debate that has emerged around coworking spaces in recent years. In doing so, it conducts a science mapping analysis of 351 publications on coworking spaces to detect and visualize key themes in the literature and their co-occurrence with subthemes. The second study proposes an interpretive review of 98 publications from multiple disciplines to shed light on how coworking spaces emerge as sites of organizing for professionals who are not formally connected to one another. It suggests five dimensions that articulate coworking spaces as sites of organizing – ‘materiality,’ ‘temporality,’ ‘affect,’ ‘identity,’ and ‘formalization.’ This study aims to go beyond the community-related understanding of coworking that has characterized most scholarly attention, instead focusing on coworking spaces’ organizational character. The third study investigates what drives thriving at work for remote workers in coworking spaces. In doing so, it acknowledges the potential complex set of interrelationships underpinning thriving at work and mobilizes complexity theory and qualitative comparative analysis to uncover six different, yet equifinal, configurations of antecedents driving remote workers’ thriving in coworking spaces.

Qualitative Analysis of the Interdisciplinary Interaction between Data Analysis Specialists and Novice Clinical Researchers

Background: The inherent complexity of statistical methods and clinical phenomena compel researchers with diverse domains of expertise to work in interdisciplinary teams, where none of them have a complete knowledge in their counterpart's field. As a result, knowledge exchange may often be characterized by miscommunication leading to misinterpretation, ultimately resulting in errors in research and even clinical practice. Though communication has a central role in interdisciplinary collaboration and since miscommunication can have a negative impact on research processes, to the best of our knowledge, no study has yet explored how data analysis specialists and clinical researchers communicate over time. Methods/Principal Findings: We conducted qualitative analysis of encounters between clinical researchers and data analysis specialists (epidemiologist, clinical epidemiologist, and data mining specialist). These encounters were recorded and systematically analyzed using a grounded theory methodology for extraction of emerging themes, followed by data triangulation and analysis of negative cases for validation. A policy analysis was then performed using a system dynamics methodology looking for potential interventions to improve this process. Four major emerging themes were found. Definitions using lay language were frequently employed as a way to bridge the language gap between the specialties. Thought experiments presented a series of ""what if'' situations that helped clarify how the method or information from the other field would behave, if exposed to alternative situations, ultimately aiding in explaining their main objective. Metaphors and analogies were used to translate concepts across fields, from the unfamiliar to the familiar. Prolepsis was used to anticipate study outcomes, thus helping specialists understand the current context based on an understanding of their final goal. Conclusion/Significance: The communication between clinical researchers and data analysis specialists presents multiple challenges that can lead to errors.

Denoising swallowing sound to improve the evaluator`s qualitative analysis

Swallowing dynamics involves the coordination and interaction of several muscles and nerves which allow correct food transport from mouth to stomach without laryngotracheal penetration or aspiration. Clinical swallowing assessment depends on the evaluator`s knowledge of anatomic structures and of neurophysiological processes involved in swallowing. Any alteration in those steps is denominated oropharyngeal dysphagia, which may have many causes, such as neurological or mechanical disorders. Videofluoroscopy of swallowing is presently considered to be the best exam to objectively assess the dynamics of swallowing, but the exam needs to be conducted under certain restrictions, due to patient`s exposure to radiation, which limits periodical repetition for monitoring swallowing therapy. Another method, called cervical auscultation, is a promising new diagnostic tool for the assessment of swallowing disorders. The potential to diagnose dysphagia in a noninvasive manner by assessing the sounds of swallowing is a highly attractive option for the dysphagia clinician. Even so, the captured sound has an amount of noise, which can hamper the evaluator`s decision. In that way, the present paper proposes the use of a filter to improve the quality of audible sound and facilitate the perception of examination. The wavelet denoising approach is used to decompose the noisy signal. The signal to noise ratio was evaluated to demonstrate the quantitative results of the proposed methodology. (C) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Causes of communication problems at work: A qualitative analysis of supervisor-subordinate differences

This study provided information about how individual workers perceive, describe and interpret episodes of problematic communication. Sixteen full-time workers (5 males, 11 females) were interviewed in depth about specific incidents of problematic communication within their workplace. Their descriptions of the attributed causes of the incidents were coded using a categorisation scheme developed from Coupland, Wieman, and Giles' (1991) model of sources of problematic communication. Communication problems were most commonly attributed to individual deficiency and group membership, although there were differences depending on the direction of communication. The most negative attributions (to personality flaws, to lack of skills, and to negative stereotypes of the outgroup) were most commonly applied by individuals to their supervisors, whilst attributions applied to co-workers and subordinates tended to be less negative, or even positive in some instances (where individuals attributed the fault to themselves). Overall, results highlighted distinctions between the perceptions of communication problems with supervisors and with subordinates, and are interpreted with reference to social identity theory.