Customer emotions in service failure and recovery encounters

Emotions play a significant role in the workplace, and considerable attention has been given to the study of employee emotions. Customers also play a central function in organizations, but much less is known about customer emotions. This chapter reviews the growing literature on customer emotions in employee–customer interfaces with a focus on service failure and recovery encounters, where emotions are heightened. It highlights emerging themes and key findings, addresses the measurement, modeling, and management of customer emotions, and identifies future research streams. Attention is given to emotional contagion, relationships between affective and cognitive processes, customer anger, customer rage, and individual differences.

Rethinking the development, dissemination and adoption of agricultural technologies

This paper focuses on the higher order factors affecting successful adoption of technologies. Drawing on the "actor-oriented perspective" in rural sociology, it is argued that successful examples of adoption at this higher level result from a complex conjunction of people and events, with outcomes that may have been quite unanticipated at the outset. From this perspective, research and extension projects and programs are viewed as arenas in which social actors–village leaders, farmers, researchers (local and international), aid officials, municipal agents, extension workers, and traders–pursue their own short- and long-term objectives and strategies. To this end, they maneuver, negotiate, organize, cooperate, participate, coerce, obstruct, form coalitions, adopt, adapt, and reject, all within a specific geographical and historical context.

Tolerance to the cataleptic effect that follows repeated nitric oxide synthase inhibition may be related to functional enzymatic recovery

Systemic or intra-striatal acute administration of nitric oxide synthase (NOS) inhibitors causes catalepsy in rodents. This effect disappears after sub-chronic treatment. The aim of the present study was to investigate if this tolerance is related to changes in the expression of NOS or dopamine-2 (D(2)) receptor or to a recovery of NOS activity. Male albino Swiss mice (25-30 g) received single or sub-chronic (once a day for 4 days) i.p. injections of saline or L-nitro-arginine (L-NOARG, 40 mg/kg), a non-selective inhibitor of neuronal nitric oxide synthase (nNOS). Twenty-four hours after the last injection, the animals were killed and their brains were removed for immunohistochemistry assay to detect the presence of nNOS or for `in-situ` hybridisation study using (35)S-labeled oligonucleotide probe complementary to D(2) receptor mRNA. The results were analysed by computerised densitometry. Independent groups of animals received the same treatment, but were submitted to the catalepsy test and had their brain removed to measure nitrite and nitrate (NOx) concentrations in the striatum. Acute administration of L-NOARG caused catalepsy that disappeared after sub-chronic treatment. The levels of NOx were significantly reduced after acute L-NOARG treatment. The decrease in NOx after drug injection suffered a partial tolerance after sub-chronic treatment. The catalepsy time after acute or sub-chronic treatment with L-NOARG was negatively (r = -0.717) correlated with NOx levels. Animals that received repeated L-NOARG injections also showed an increase in the number of nNOS-positive neurons in the striatum. No change in D(2) receptor mRNA expression was found in the dorsal striatum, nucleus accumbens and substantia nigra. Together, these results suggest that tolerance to L-NOARG cataleptic effects do not depend on changes in D(2) receptors. They may depend, however, on plastic changes in nNOS neurons resulting in partial recovery of NO formation in the striatum.

Pain and distress reactivity and recovery as early predictors of temperament in toddlers born preterm

Background: Pain reactivity may reflect underlying mechanisms of constitutional aspects of temperament. Aim: To examine whether the neonatal biobehavioral reactivity and recovery responses from pain and distress, as well as the gestational age, the illness severity and the amount of painful procedures undergone the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) stay, predict temperament later in toddlerhood, in vulnerable children born preterm. Study design: Prospective-longitudinal study. Subjects: Twenty-six preterm and very low birth weight infants followed from birth to toddlerhood. Outcome measures: Illness severity was assessed with the Clinical Risk Index for Babies (CRIB) score. The medical charts were reviewed prospectively for obtaining the amount of pain exposure in NICU. For assessing the behavioral and cardiac reactivity and recovery from pain and distress, the neonates were evaluated during routine blood collection in the NICU in the first 10 days of life. Pain and distress reactivity and recovery was measured using the Neonatal Facial Coding System score, the duration of crying. and the magnitude of average heart rate. At toddlerhood, mothers answered the Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire. Results: Higher biobehavioral reactivity to pain and distress predicted higher temperamental Negative Affect, above and beyond gestational age, illness severity and amount of pain exposure in NICU. However, we did not find a predictive relation between gestational age, CRIB score and number of painful procedures undergone NICU and toddler`s temperament. Conclusions: The findings highlight the relevance of the neonatal individual characteristics of reactivity for identifying more vulnerable infants for future problems in biobehavioral regulation. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Migration of Husbands, Remittances and Agricultural Production: Impacts when Wives Head Households in Rural Kenya

This paper uses data collected from migrants' wives in the Nyeri district of Kenya. The main objective is to determine whether migration and remittances contribute to the development of agriculture. Our results suggest that most migrants are pushed out of rural areas, belong to the group of low-paid workers in urban areas, send little and irregular remittances to their wives back in rural areas and that these remittances are mainly used for consumption purposes and do not contribute to any significant development in agriculture. Our results also indicate that altruism or social obligation might be the main reason for migrants sending remittances back to their rural wives.

Maned wolf survival rate in central Brazil

Although many carnivores are of conservation concern, most are poorly studied. The maned wolf Chrysocyon brachyurus Illiger, 1811 is the largest South American canid with a broad distribution; however, the largest portion of its range is in the Brazilian Cerrado savannah, where due to intensive agricultural expansion, it is threatened by habitat loss. Maned wolf population trends are virtually unknown. We analyzed radio telemetry data from a 13-year study in Emas National Park, central Brazil, with Burnham`s live recapture/dead recovery models in the program MARK to obtain the first analytically sound estimate of the apparent maned wolf survival rate. We constructed 16 candidate models including variation in survival rate and resighting probability associated with an individual`s sex or age and year of study. Apparent adult survival rate throughout the study ranged from 0.28 (se=0.08) to 0.97 (se=0.06). There was no evidence for sex specificity but strong support for time variation. Model weights supported an age effect and the subadult survival rate was 0.63 (se=0.15). Results indicate similar life patterns for male and female maned wolves and similar mortality risks for adults and subadults in the study area. The observed temporal fluctuations of adult survival rate are important for population dynamics as they decrease average population growth rates. Population dynamics are central for conservation planning and our results are an important step towards a better understanding of the maned wolf`s ecology.

Progressive recovery of osseoperception as a function of the combination of implant-supported prostheses

The extraction of teeth involves the elimination of extremely sensitive periodontal mechanoreceptors, which play an important role in oral sensory perception. Objectives: The aim of this study was to evaluate the recovery of interocclusal sensory perception for micro-thickness in individuals with different types of implant-supported prostheses. Materials and Methods: Wearers of complete dentures (CDs) comprised the negative control group (group A, n=17). The experimental group consisted of wearers of prostheses supported by osseointegrated implants (Group B, n=29), which was subsequently divided into 4 subgroups: B(1) (n=5) - implant supported overdentures (ISO) occluding with CD; B(2) (n=6) - implant-supported fixed prostheses (ISFP) occluding with CD; B3 (n=8) - wearers of maxillary and mandibular ISFP, and B(4) (n=10) - ISFP occluding with natural dentition (ND). Individuals with ND represented the positive control group (Group C, n=24). Aluminum foils measuring 10 mu m, 24 mu m, 30 mu m, 50 mu m, 80 mu m, and 104 mu m thickness were placed within the premolar area, adding up to 120 tests for each individual. Results: The mean tactile thresholds of groups A, B(1), B(2), B(3), B(4), and C were 92 mu m, 27 mu m, 27 mu m, 14 mu m, 10 mu m, and 10 mu m, respectively. [Correction added after publication online 18 April 2008: in the preceding sentence 92 mu m, 27 mu m, 14 mu m, 10 mu m and 10 mu m, was corrected to 92 mu m, 27 mu m, 27 mu m, 14 mu m, 10 mu m and 10 mu m.] The Kruskal-Wallis test revealed significant difference among groups (P < 0.05). The Dunn test revealed that group A was statistically different from groups C, B(3), and B(4), and that B(1) and B(2) were statistically different from group C. Conclusion: Progressive recovery of osseoperception as a function of the combination of implant-supported prostheses could be observed. Moreover, ISO and/or ISFP combinations may similarly maximize the recovery of osseoperception.