Building partnerships in social work education: Towards achieving collaborative advantage for employers and universities

Summary: Better partnership working between employers and academic institutions has recently been identified as one of the key developments needed to improve social work education and practice in the UK (Social Work Reform Board, 2010). However, the praxis of collaborative working in social work education remains under-researched and it is unclear what factors are significant in promoting effective partnership. This article contributes to this debate by reporting research that examined the experience of social work academics working with employers to deliver qualifying level social work education in Northern Ireland.

Findings: This analysis explores key factors in the dynamics of the collaborative process and identifies both congruence and discord in academic and employer perspectives. The findings highlight the collaborative advantage accruing from partnership working, which include the benefits of a centrally coordinated system for the management and delivery of practice learning. However, the results also indicate that engaging in partnership working is a complex process that can create conflict and tensions, and that it is important to ground collaborations in realistic expectations of what can be achieved.

Application: This article identifies opportunities for achieving collaborative advantage and the challenges. It identifies lessons learned about the value of partnership working in social work education and ways to increase its efficacy.

The Applicability of Two Strengths-based Systemic Psychotherapy Models for Young People Following Type 1 Trauma

This paper will consider the inter-relationship of a number of overlapping disciplinary theoretical concepts relevant to a strengths-based orientation, including well-being, salutogenesis, sense of coherence, quality of life and resilience. Psychological trauma will be referenced and the current evidence base for interventions with children and young people outlined and critiqued. The relational impact of trauma on family relationships is emphasised, providing a rationale for systemic psychotherapeutic interventions as part of a holistic approach to managing the effects of trauma. The congruence between second-order systemic psychotherapy models and a strengths-based philosophy is noted, with particular reference to solution-focused brief therapy and narrative therapy, and illustrated; via a description of the process of helping someone move from a victim position to a survivor identity using solution-focused brief therapy, and through a case example applying a narrative therapy approach to a teenage boy who suffered a serious assault. The benefits of a strength-based approach to psychological trauma for the clients and therapists will be summarised and a number of potential pitfalls articulated.

Fish product mislabelling: failings of traceability in the production chain and implications for illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing

Increasing consumer demand for seafood, combined with concern over the health of our oceans, has led to many initiatives aimed at tackling destructive fishing practices and promoting the sustainability of fisheries. An important global threat to sustainable fisheries is Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing, and there is now an increased emphasis on the use of trade measures to prevent IUU-sourced fish and fish products from entering the international market. Initiatives encompass new legislation in the European Union requiring the inclusion of species names on catch labels throughout the distribution chain. Such certification measures do not, however, guarantee accuracy of species designation. Using two DNA-based methods to compare species descriptions with molecular ID, we examined 386 samples of white fish, or products labelled as primarily containing white fish, from major UK supermarket chains. Species specific real-time PCR probes were used for cod (Gadus morhua) and haddock (Melanogrammus aeglefinus) to provide a highly sensitive and species-specific test for the major species of white fish sold in the UK. Additionally, fish-specific primers were used to sequence the forensically validated barcoding gene, mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase I (COI). Overall levels of congruence between product label and genetic species identification were high, with 94.34% of samples correctly labelled, though a significant proportion in terms of potential volume, were mislabelled. Substitution was usually for a cheaper alternative and, in one case, extended to a tropical species. To our knowledge, this is the first published study encompassing a large-scale assessment of UK retailers, and if representative, indicates a potentially significant incidence of incorrect product designation.

The analysis of political will and its role in leadership: a study of portuguese mayors

This thesis analyses the concept of Political Will, suggests its operationalization and establishes a typological theory that provides the necessary support for the diverse strategies of action of a leader. It claims that political leadership styles articulate a choice of action that results from the Political Will of a leader, which is determined by his intention and his discerned possibilities to act. One main research question guided our research: How does a political leader select and change his leadership style? The most illustrative literature on political leadership is reviewed and the characteristics of democratic governance are analyzed. This is followed by an overview of the most noteworthy theories on the theme and a claim for the need of concept coherence, given the multiplicity of the existent standpoints. After that, we concentrate on leadership styles, with a focus on the local governance context. Human action and intentionality are addressed with particular attention, as well as the motivational drivers for action, in order to advance a conceptualization of Political Will through two dimensions: intention and possibility. This analysis led to a number of relevant propositions: (1) Political Will ‘exists’ when the agent has the intent and the possibility to act; (2) these two dimensions ‘translate’ simultaneously what the agent believes he must do and can do; (3) Intention and possibility reflect diverse but limited worldviews; (4) political leadership styles result from the agent’s Political Will; (5) different combinations of the expected and actual worldviews result in different leadership styles; and (6) political leadership styles can change accordingly to several strategies which allow conformity or reflect reaction to worldviews. We suggested the operationalization of the two dimensions of Political Will through the analytical tool of Grid-group Theory, which provided the identification of the heuristic devices that allowed further comprehension on the subjectivity of the agent’s choice. Four standard property spaces – representing four types of leadership styles – result from a preliminary approach to this process. Afterwards, and because these dimensions operate simultaneously, we advance on the analysis and suggest some plausible heuristical conflicts to happen and describe which consequences, strategies and type migrations are conceivable. An inclusive and more complete set of resulting property spaces renders fourteen different types of leadership styles and sixty different predictable causal paths that result from the expected migration strategies. Case-studies were conducted as plausibility probes designed to provide improvements to our theoretical claims and addressed the cases we selected for research purposes: Portuguese Mayors. The findings from five case studies are discussed and the probable impact and congruence of each with the theoretical claims are assessed. The communalities of the causal mechanisms related to the function of intention and possibility as the dimensions of Political Will and their role in explaining different leadership styles are, finally, addressed. To conclude, we advance some repercussions, mainly in the public policies field of research, and suggest a number of different and necessary paths for further work.

Intérêts professionnels d'élèves handicapés ou en difficulté d'adaptation ou d'apprentissage (EHDAA) inscrits à un programme d'intégration professionnelle axé sur l'horticulture

Cette recherche porte sur les intérêts professionnels d'élèves handicapés ou en difficulté d'adaptation ou d'apprentissage (EHDAA) inscrits à un programme d'intégration professionnelle axé sur l'horticulture. Elle s'attarde aussi à leur environnement scolaire et professionnel. Les résultats obtenus lors de la passation en .prétest de l'Inventaire visuel d'intérêts professionnels (IVIP) montrent que les intérêts professionnels de la majorité des élèves sont congruents avec leur formation scolaire. Quant aux résultats observés au post-test, ils révèlent que cette congruence est moins élevée dans les profils d'intérêts de ces élèves et que la majorité d'entre eux ne sont pas en emploi à la fin de leur programme d'intégration professionnelle. Cette situation pourrait entre autres s'expliquer par les limitations et les besoins spécifiques de ces élèves qui rendent difficile l'accompagnement soutenu des employeurs ainsi que par d'autres considérations telles que l'offr d'emploi et la disponibilité de programmes d'intégration professionnelle variés.

Tourism policy making: the policymakers' perspectives

This research explores tourism policy making, from the perspectives of policy makers using grounded theory. It focuses on Leeds, a city in the North of England, which is characterized by its turbulent environment. The paper identifies themes around policy making, including low status, lack of clarity, uncertainty, lack of consensus and congruence and complexity. Its findings indicate policy making is essentially a social process, involving communication and negotiation between people in the context of wider change. It suggests a social conceptualization, and further research to investigate the communications involved in producing policy rather than the current research focus on the tangible outputs of the process such as a plan or a physical development.

O impacto do patrocínio na intenção de compra dos consumidores: estudo do caso do patrocínio da volta a Portugal pela Liberty Seguros

O patrocínio, enquanto meio de comunicação, tem assumido uma importância cada vez maior nas estratégias de marketing das organizações. O mercado empresarial atual obriga a que as marcas encontrem formas diferentes das convencionais de comunicar com os seus clientes e passar-lhes a sua mensagem. Assim, as empresas procuram, por via do patrocínio, interagir com os consumidores e criar laços afetivos que os liguem às marcas que representam. A presente investigação procura perceber de que forma uma ação de patrocínio pode ter impacto na intenção de compra dos consumidores relativamente aos produtos/serviços da marca patrocinadora. Pretende-se igualmente explorar os efeitos da congruência entre o evento patrocinado e a marca patrocinadora, da atitude relativamente ao evento patrocinado e da atitude relativamente à marca patrocinadora na intenção de compra dos consumidores. Os resultados obtidos confirmam que o patrocínio tem influência na intenção de compra dos consumidores em relação aos produtos/serviços da marca patrocinadora do evento. Confirmam também que a congruência entre o evento e a marca, a atitude relativamente à marca e a atitude relativamente ao evento são variáveis que se encontram interligadas e que exercem um efeito de influência entre si, bem como em relação à intenção de compra dos consumidores.

O efeito da música na relação entre marca e consumidor

Dissertação apresentada à Escola Superior de Comunicação Social como parte dos requisitos para obtenção de grau de mestre em Publicidade e Marketing.

O impacto do patrocínio na atitude e intenção de compra dos consumidores: estudo do caso do patrocínio do Festival NOS Alive

Dissertação apresentada à Escola Superior de Comunicação Social como parte dos requisitos para obtenção de grau de mestre em Publicidade e Marketing.

Prothèses totales d'épaules inversées : récupérer la fonction en cas d'incompétence de la coiffe des rotateurs

Les principales caractéristiques biomécaniques de la prothèse inversée (cupule sur le versant huméral et sphère sur le versant scapulaire), cet implant semi-contraint, consistent en une médialisation ainsi qu'un abaissement du centre de rotation. Par ce biais, le bras de levier du deltoïde est augmenté. Les fibres musculaires du deltoïde antérieur et postérieur sont ainsi également recrutées pour devenir principalement abducteur. La congruence relative des composants (semi-contrainte) confère également à la prothèse inversée une certaine stabilité primaire, importante pour pallier la déficience de la coiffe des rotateurs (sus-épineux).

Contextual factors multiplex to control multisensory processes.

This study analyzed high-density event-related potentials (ERPs) within an electrical neuroimaging framework to provide insights regarding the interaction between multisensory processes and stimulus probabilities. Specifically, we identified the spatiotemporal brain mechanisms by which the proportion of temporally congruent and task-irrelevant auditory information influences stimulus processing during a visual duration discrimination task. The spatial position (top/bottom) of the visual stimulus was indicative of how frequently the visual and auditory stimuli would be congruent in their duration (i.e., context of congruence). Stronger influences of irrelevant sound were observed when contexts associated with a high proportion of auditory-visual congruence repeated and also when contexts associated with a low proportion of congruence switched. Context of congruence and context transition resulted in weaker brain responses at 228 to 257 ms poststimulus to conditions giving rise to larger behavioral cross-modal interactions. Importantly, a control oddball task revealed that both congruent and incongruent audiovisual stimuli triggered equivalent non-linear multisensory interactions when congruence was not a relevant dimension. Collectively, these results are well explained by statistical learning, which links a particular context (here: a spatial location) with a certain level of top-down attentional control that further modulates cross-modal interactions based on whether a particular context repeated or changed. The current findings shed new light on the importance of context-based control over multisensory processing, whose influences multiplex across finer and broader time scales.

"Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference" : further exploration of attitude alignment in the context of close relationship dyads /

One hundred and five primarily Caucasian undergraduate couples were tested to study the phenomenon of attitude alignment, or the way in which individuals change their opinions to achieve greater attitudinal congruence with their romantic partners, and the hypotheses that relationship closeness, affect, attachment, social desirability, and centrality are each related to attitude alignment for individuals in close couples. The couples filled out an attitude questionnaire consisting of 50 issues in which they were asked to give their attitude on a scale from 1 to 9 as well as to rate the centrality, or importance, of that issue on a scale from 1 to 9. Before discussing four of these issues with each other - 2 were more central to the man and less central, or peripheral, to the woman, whereas the other 2 were central to the woman and peripheral to the man - the individuals completed established measures of relationship closeness, affect, attachment, and social desirability. The couples then filled out the identical attitudes questionnaire again, and their answers on the four discussion issues were compared to their prediscussion answers to determine whether attitude alignment had occurred. There were two experimental groups: a social desirability group, where the couples were told it was natural and normal to disagree with their partners, and a control group. Results indicated that attitude alignment did significantly occur across all couples, but most other variables - including centrality, relationship closeness, and affect - did not predict attitude alignment behaviour. As well, the social desirability experimental groups did not significantly differ on attitude alignment behaviours, but higher scores on the social desirability scale, specifically self-deception, significantly predicted higher attitude alignment scores across all couples. Large differences between individuals' frequency.

Coevolution of Heliconius spp. and Passiflora spp. : a phylogenetic comparison

Although a substantial amount of research has been done on all aspects ofHeliconius biology and their ecological interactions with Passiflora, there has not hitherto been a phylogenetic examination of this association for coevolution. To test the HeliconiuslPassilfora association for coevolutionary congruence, phylogenies for each group were established and compared. The phylogeny for 14 species ofHeliconiinae from Costa Rica was based on combined sequence data from rRNA ITS 2 and partial EF-1a gene regions. For the Passifloraceae, 17 host plant species were utilized to establish a phylogeny based on tRNALeucine and ITS 1/5.8S1 ITS 2 sequence data. The phylogenies for both groups were largely in agreement with current classification (for Passifloraceae) and previously established phylogenies. Associations with the large subgenera Passiflora and Decaloba correspond with the two major Advanced Radiation groups in Heliconius. Although strict congruence above subgenus level was not observed, broad scale congruence was evident. One main host shift as well as other possible explanations for lack of strict congruence are suggested.

The Importance and achievement of work values and locus of control as factors in work motivation

The present research study examined the relationships in a work motivation context among perceived importance and achievement of work values, locus of control and internal work motivation. The congruence of a work value was considered to be the discrepancy between the importance of a work value and the perceived achievement of that value. The theoretical framework utilized was based on a self-perpetuating cycle of motivation which included the perceived importance and achievement of work values and internal work motivation as separate and distinct, yet interrelated factors. It was hypothesized that individuals who experienced high congruence of work values would experience higher levels of internal work motivation than individuals who had low congruence of work values. It was also hypothesized that individuals who had an internal locus of control would experience more internal work motivation individuals well, the and have higher congruence of work values than who had an external locus of control. As possibility of locus of control as a moderator between importance of work values and internal work motivation was explored. Survey data were collected from 184 managerial level employees of the XYZ company during an ongoing training session. The following instruments were employed to measure the variables: Elizur's (1984) Importance of Work Values, Hunt and Saul's (1985) Achievement of Work Values, Hatfield, Robinson and Huseman's (1975) Job Perception Scale, a modified version of Rotter's (1966) I-E Locus of Control Scale and the Internal Work Motivation Scale (Hackman & Oldham, 1980) which is a part of the Job Diagnostic Survey. The findings indicated that locus of control was not a significant factor in determining congruence between work values or internal work motivation for this sample. Furthermore, locus of control was also found not to be a moderator between the importance of work values and internal work motivation. All individuals in this study had relatively high levels of internal work motivation. However, individuals who had higher congruence of work values did have significantly higher internal work motivation than those who had low congruence of work values for a majority of the 21 values. This was particularly true for the intrinsic values which included responsibility, meaningfulness and use of abilities. In addition, the data were analysed into a hierarchy of needs to indicate possible organizational development or human resource development needs for the XYZ corporation.

VOCATIONAL INTERESTS: CONSTRUCT VALIDITY AND MEASUREMENT

This dissertation addressed several questions relevant to vocational interests and personality characteristics, examining (a) the roles of personality, vocational interests, and sexual fantasies in defining a general factor of Masculinity/Femininity (M/F) (Study 1), (b) the validity of a new measure of vocational interests (Study 2), and (c) the individual difference characteristics that discriminate between students in various academic majors, and that predict academic outcomes (Study 3). In Study 1, vocational interests, personality, and sexual fantasies were examined to find whether these variables would yield a general Masculinity/Femininity (M/F) factor, and whether that factor would still emerge when controlling for participant sex. The results of Study 1 revealed that a general factor of M/F did emerge. When sex was removed, the loadings of vocational interests decreased from high to very low, suggesting that the link of vocational interests with other indicators of M/F is mainly due to sex differences in these variables. The purpose of Study 2 was to validate the Oregon Vocational Interest Scales (ORVIS), a new public domain vocational interests questionnaire designed to measure eight vocational interest scales. ORVIS scores obtained in a college and community sample were compared with those of two personality measures and two cognitive ability tests. Results from this study showed that the ORVIS scales were reliable and showed good construct validity. The purpose of Study 3, using the ORVIS along with the HEXACO-PI and tests of cognitive ability, was to examine the individual difference characteristics of students in different academic majors, and to use the congruence between a student's academic major and vocational interests as a predictor of academic outcomes, such as GPA, academic major change, and satisfaction with major. The results of Study 3 revealed that students in different academic majors show theoretically meaningful differences in personality, abilities, and interests. Conscientiousness and math ability were found to be the best predictors of academic outcomes. However, congruence between major and interests did not add significant predictive validity to any of these outcomes beyond personality and ability. Together, these three studies show the role of vocational interests in defming MlF and in predicting various academic outcomes.