Work Motivation and Entrepreneurial Intentions

Employee motivation is fundamental to business performance, and thus underlies business profitability and global competitiveness. (Mowday & Shapiro (2004). Economists would say that it is the task of managers and leaders to personally motivate and create working conditions that serve to properly motivate their employees, such that the productivity and profitability of the firm is maximized for the benefit of shareholders and ultimately also society (Liebenstein, 1966). But asymmetry of information leads to the principal-agent problem (Ross, 1973) whereby managers cannot fully monitor the work effort levels of employees. The economist's solution is to align the incentives of the employee with the firm by sharing profit, risk and decision-making authority (Jensen & Meckling, 1976). The organisational behaviourist's approach is to understand what underlies job satisfaction and organisational citizenship behaviour (Organ, 1988) and to motivate employees to supply discretionary work effort by adjusting the working conditions associated with the work environment (see for example Vroom, 1964; Igalens & Roussel, 1999; Locke and Latham, 2004). The studies of work motivation generally acknowledge that work effort is the product of two main dimensions, viz: hours of work and intensity of work, but they pay little or no attention to the intensity aspect (see for example, Brown & Leigh, 1996, Locke & Latham, 2004)

Testing The Unconscious Effect of Visual Context Illusions

This study tested the effects of a visual context illusion when it was suppressed from the subjects conscious awareness. Using a mirror stereoscope and a particular form of binocular rivalry, subjects made estimations of size with and without awareness of the presence of the illusory elements. No differences were found, suggesting that effect of the illusion may require conscious awareness and perhaps is not a product of early visual processing. Keywords: Ebbinghaus, Consciousness, CFS, Illusio

COVID-19, macroeconomic and sustainability shocks, moral hazard and resolution of systemic banking crises:Designing Appropriate Systems of Public Support

Banks have so far weathered well the financial turbulence caused by COVID-19 while at the same time being central in the economic and financial response. As the crisis moves from its initial phase as a short-term liquidity shock, the financial sector is facing increasing volumes of non-performing loans, raising the spectre of a banking solvency crisis. In economies already burdened with low-quality assets, the COVID-19 fallout is intensifying existing problems with legacy loans heightening the risk of a banking crisis. These issues are now being worsened by the impact of inflation and the invasion of Ukraine. Thus, addressing increasing volumes of bad loans, while supporting the proper functioning of the financial system, is a major challenge with systemic repercussions for a range of economies. This paper identifies a great paradox: since the bank rescues of the 2008–9 Global Financial Crisis there has been a disproportionate focus on the liability side of bank balance sheets through resolution measures such as bail-in and the accumulation of bail-inable debt. Post-crisis bank resolution regimes have overlooked solutions lying within the asset side of bank balance sheets. This paper analyses historical evidence to argue that concentrating on a liability-focused approach to the exclusion of asset-side solutions is ill-conceived. An excessive accumulation of non-performing loans on the asset side of bank balance sheets inevitably renders resolution interventions on the liability/equity side ineffective or at the very least insufficient to maintain banking system viability and financial stability. Bank asset restructuring involving the use of asset management companies, asset protection schemes and even capital injections can play a critical role in achieving an expeditious restoration of banking systems’ health following a major macroeconomic, sustainability or financial crisis

Introgressive Hybridization and the Evolution of Lake-Adapted Catostomid Fishes.

Hybridization has been identified as a significant factor in the evolution of plants as groups of interbreeding species retain their phenotypic integrity despite gene exchange among forms. Recent studies have identified similar interactions in animals; however, the role of hybridization in the evolution of animals has been contested. Here we examine patterns of gene flow among four species of catostomid fishes from the Klamath and Rogue rivers using molecular and morphological traits. Catostomus rimiculus from the Rogue and Klamath basins represent a monophyletic group for nuclear and morphological traits; however, the Klamath form shares mtDNA lineages with other Klamath Basin species (C. snyderi, Chasmistes brevirostris, Deltistes luxatus). Within other Klamath Basin taxa, D. luxatus was largely fixed for alternate nuclear alleles relative to C. rimiculus, while Ch. brevirostris and C. snyderi exhibited a mixture of these alleles. Deltistes luxatus was the only Klamath Basin species that exhibited consistent covariation of nuclear and mitochondrial traits and was the primary source of mismatched mtDNA in Ch. brevirostris and C. snyderi, suggesting asymmetrical introgression into the latter species. In Upper Klamath Lake, D. luxatus spawning was more likely to overlap spatially and temporally with C. snyderi and Ch. brevirostris than either of those two with each other. The latter two species could not be distinguished with any molecular markers but were morphologically diagnosable in Upper Klamath Lake, where they were largely spatially and temporally segregated during spawning. We examine parallel evolution and syngameon hypotheses and conclude that observed patterns are most easily explained by introgressive hybridization among Klamath Basin catostomids

PHYSIOLOGICAL AND BEHAVIORAL STUDIES OF SOUND LOCATION PROCESSING IN AUDITORY CORTEX OF THE MARMOSET MONKEY

For many animals, the ability to localize sound sources provides a key source of information about the objects and events in the world around them. Unlike visual information, sound is not easily occluded by physical objects, and can reach the sensory epithelia from any direction, day and night. Integration of sound localization cues first occurs well below the level of auditory cortex, yet it has been well documented that auditory cortex is required for many behaviors requiring sound localization. However, the nature of spatial representation and computation in auditory cortex remains incompletely understood. This is may be due in part to the lack of studies which have measured responses from the full spatial field, and also to the lack of studies in awake, behaving animals. In this thesis, we present data from neurons in primary auditory cortex (A1), the rostral core areas (R/RT), and the caudal belt (CM/CL) of awake marmoset monkeys (Callithrix jacchus) responding to broadband sounds presented from the full spatial field. The marmoset is a well established model system for the study of auditory processing and is an arboreal animal for which spatial processing is vital in its natural habitat, making it an ideal candidate for the study of spatial processing in auditory cortex. It was found that distributions of spatial receptive fields were highly heterogeneous, with neurons tuned to contralateral and ipsilateral locations, above and below the horizon, and in the rear as well as the frontal locations. Receptive field statistics varied between areas, with the caudal areas showing the most spatial selectivity, but spatial tuning was observed in neurons from all areas recorded. We also introduced a novel approach to characterize spatial tuning in a multi-source acoustic environment by presenting sounds from all sound sources simultaneously. Using this method it was found that most neurons exhibit drastically different spatial tuning in a multi-source environment compared to the single source condition, probably reflecting highly nonlinear mechanisms underlying spatial processing. Further, we describe an auditory operant conditioning task developed in this thesis in which marmosets can be trained easily and generalize between stimulus types. This task was used to measure spatial hearing acuity (minimum audible angle) for azimuth and elevation, and found marmosets to be have acuity roughly as expected based on head size. This task is ideal for use in both head-fixed and head-free restrained neural recordings; when comparing neural responses the location discrimination task to those measured while marmosets sat passively, a subset of neurons was found with increased firing rates to one or more target locations during task engagement. Effects were similar across areas, but were largest in the caudal areas CM/CL. Together, these results suggest that spatial tuning auditory cortex of awake, behaving animals is highly selective and can be dynamically modulated to accommodate specific task demands

The effects of air and lip-pressure variations on the motion of a clarinet reed within an artificial embouchure

To observe the influence of air and lip-pressure variations on reed motion, a blowing chamber containing an artificial-embouchure device was constructed into which a clarinet was inserted and sealed at the barrel joint. A DC light source was directed through the bell end of the clarinet into a photo transistor mounted near the mouthpiece. Light fluctuations produced by the reed's movement were converted to voltages and directed to an analog-to-digital converter unit interfaced with an Apple lie computer. In air-pressure experiments, lip pressure was held constant while air pressure was varied. In lip-pressure experiments, air pressure was held constant while lip pressure was varied. Intensities were measured on a sound-level meter and air-pressure was monitored via a U-tube water manometer connected to the chamber; thus, the reed's vibrational patterns were observed at specific air pressures, lip pressures, and itensities