Correlates and Consequences of Degree Purchasing among Canadian University Students

This article develops the construct of degree purchasing as an instrumental orientation towards education in which students value education primarily as a vehicle for labour market participation rather than as an avenue for learning. This study of 188 Canadian university students found that a substantial proportion of students tended to be more interested in acquiring a diploma than the learning that it represents. Female students were more instrumentally oriented than male students, and younger students devalued learning to a greater extent than older students. Finally, a degree purchasing orientation was associated with poor study habits, the use of resistance strategies in the classroom, low positive affect, and poor course performance. Implications for higher education and suggestions for future research are discussed.Cette recherche exploratoire tente d'analyser les prévalences de degree purchasing, une orientation instrumentale envers l'éducation. Les auteurs postulent que plusieurs étudiants conçoivent le diplôme universitaire comme un instrument permettant d'accéder rapidement au marché du travail sans faire les investissements requis en matière d'apprentissage. Cette recherche exploratoire réalisée auprès de 188 étudiants universitaires canadiens démontre que le degree purchasing se manifeste surtout parmi les étudiantes du sexe féminin et les étudiants moins âgés. En outre, les étudiants qui faisaient le degree purchasing avaient des mauvaises stratégies d'apprentissage ainsi qu'une faible motivation à apprendre

Predicting Individual Research Productivity: More than a Question of Time

Despite professors’ education and socialization and the significant re- wards they receive for research activities and output, the 80/20 rule seems to apply; that is, there exists a system of stars who produce a disproportionate volume of research such that most research tends to be undertaken by a small percentage of the academy (Erkut, 2002). Although a growing body of research seeks to address this imbalance, studies of research productivity have tended to reveal its institutional and non-behavioural antecedents. As a result, there exists very little re- search that considers the strategies that individuals employ to improve their personal research productivity. This exploratory, questionnaire- based study of a sample of Canadian professors attempts to address this gap by examining the relationship among a number of strategies, what professors report as being their average annual number of publications over the past five years, and their perceptions of their level of research productivity. Not surprisingly, in this study, we found that the amount of time that individuals invested in research activities predicted their level of research productivity. Additionally, strategically focusing one’s research positively influenced journal publication levels, both directly and through its interaction with seeking resources (such as research grants). A strategic focus also positively predicted self-perceived re- search productivity through its interaction with managing ideas. Finally, although the perceived need to free up time from teaching and committee work was negatively related to journal publication levels, it was positively related to perceptions of productivity. Malgré l’importance accordée à la recherche par les universités, la règle des 80/20 s’applique toujours : la majorité de la recherche est menée par une minorité de professeurs (Erkut, 2002). Les études antérieures sur la productivité des chercheurs se sont surtout concentrées sur les antécédents institutionnels, accordant peu d’attention aux stratégies individuelles visant à améliorer la productivité personnelle. Cette étude exploratoire vise à répondre à cette lacune. L’enquête révèle que le nombre d’heures qu’un individu investit dans les activités de recherche est un prédicteur du niveau de productivité. De même, l’adoption d’une stratégie de focalisation des recherches est associée à un plus haut niveau de publication dans les revues scientifiques, en particulier pour les chercheurs qui ont également fait des recherches de financement (par exemple pour des subventions de recherche). En outre, l’interaction entre la focalisation stratégique des recherches et la gestion des idées favorise la perception de soi-même comme un chercheur productif. Enfin, le sentiment de devoir réduire le temps d’enseignement et de service à la collectivité s’est avéré négativement corrélé au niveau de publication dans les revues scientifiques, mais positivement corrélé à la perception de soi comme chercheur productif.Malgré l’importance accordée à la recherche par les universités, la règle des 80/20 s’applique toujours : la majorité de la recherche est menée par une minorité de professeurs (Erkut, 2002). Les études antérieures sur la productivité des chercheurs se sont surtout concentrées sur les antécédents institutionnels, accordant peu d’attention aux stratégies individuelles visant à améliorer la productivité personnelle. Cette étude exploratoire vise à répondre à cette lacune. L’enquête révèle que le nombre d’heures qu’un individu investit dans les activités de recherche est un prédicteur du niveau de productivité. De même, l’adoption d’une stratégie de focalisation des recherches est associée à un plus haut niveau de publication dans les revues scientifi ques, en particulier pour les chercheurs qui ont également fait des recherches de financement (par exemple pour des subventions de recherche). En outre, l’interaction entre la focalisation stratégique des recherches et la gestion des idées favorise la perception de soi-même comme un chercheur productif. Enfin, le sentiment de devoir réduire le temps d’enseignement et de service à la collectivité s’est avéré négativement corrélé au niveau de publication dans les revues scientifiques, mais positivement corrélé à la perception de soi comme chercheur productif

Case study: house rules

Abstract only.This is a case about rules, what they mean, and when to follow them. The case consists of two stories, one set in the halls of a major university and the other, a considerable time ago, in a Midwestern barber shop. In the first instance the Dean of a major Business Administration faculty must choose between following the rules concerning paying a faculty member for additional work, therefore forgoing an opportunity to secure a great deal of money for the faculty, or pay the faculty member therefore possibly violating the faculty's Collective Agreement but, in so doing, securing the large financial contribution. The Dean asks one of his advisors to recommend a course of action. The advisor recounts a story where a barber faced a similar situation, having to choose between breaking a law prohibiting gambling in the back room of his barbershop, or forgo the additional business the recreational, but illegal, poker game generated. The similarities between the stories are used to discuss issues of ethics, the meaning of rules, and "Pro-Social Rule Breaking"

The emotional labour of quality improvement work in end of life care : a qualitative study of Patient and Family Centred Care in England

Abstract: Background: There is a growing emphasis on understanding patient experience in order to inform efforts to support improvement. This paper reports findings from an implementation study of an evidence-based intervention called Patient and Family Centred Care (PFCC) designed to tap into patient experiences as a basis for improvement. In this study the PFCC intervention was spread to a new service area (end of life care) and delivered at scale in England. The findings presented here focus specifically on one key aspect of the intervention: staff shadowing of patients, and the experiences of staff carrying out shadowing for the purposes of service improvements. Methods: The study methods were ethnographic observations of key events, semi-structured interviews with members of participating teams and the programme implementation support team and managers, and a review of the documents used in the set up and running of the programme. Results: One of the key strengths of the PFCC approach is to encourage staff through shadowing to engage with patient experience of services. Many staff described the process of shadowing as a transformative experience that alerted them to immediate areas where their services could be improved. However, engaging with patient experience of end of life care services also had unintended consequences for some staff in the form of emotional labour. Furthermore, we observed difficulties encountered by staff that are not accounted for in the existing PFCC literature relating to how care service structures may unevenly distribute the amount of ‘emotional labour’ that staff members need to invest in implementing the programme. Conclusions: Connecting with patient experience is a crucial aspect of a number of quality improvement interventions that aim to help staff to engage with the lived experience of their services and reconnect their motivations for working in the health care system. However, there may be unintended consequences for health care service staff, particularly in sensitive areas of service delivery such as end of life care. The ‘emotional labour’ for staff of engaging in quality improvement work informed by patient experience should be considered in planning and supporting patient experience led quality improvement

The case for the ability-based model of emotional intelligence in organizational behavior

In this second counterpoint article, we refute the claims of Landy, Locke, and Conte, and make the more specific case for our perspective, which is that ability-based models of emotional intelligence have value to add in the domain of organizational psychology. In this article, we address remaining issues, such as general concerns about the tenor and tone of the debates on this topic, a tendency for detractors to collapse across emotional intelligence models when reviewing the evidence and making judgments, and subsequent penchant to thereby discount all models, including the ability-based one, as lacking validity. We specifically refute the following three claims from our critics with the most recent empirically based evidence: (1) emotional intelligence is dominated by opportunistic academics-turned-consultants who have amassed much fame and fortune based on a concept that is shabby science at best; (2) the measurement of emotional intelligence is grounded in unstable, psychometrically flawed instruments, which have not demonstrated appropriate discriminant and predictive validity to warrant/justify their use; and (3) there is weak empirical evidence that emotional intelligence is related to anything of importance in organizations. We thus end with an overview of the empirical evidence supporting the role of emotional intelligence in organizational and social behavior

Decision-Making Processes in the Workplace: How Exhaustion, Lack of Resources and Job Demands Impair Them and Affect Performance

The present study aims to connect more the I/O and the decision-making psychological domains, by showing how some common components across jobs interfere with decision-making and affecting performance. Two distinct constructs that can contribute to positive workplace performance have been considered: decision-making competency (DMCy) and decision environment management (DEM). Both factors are presumed to involve self-regulatory mechanisms connected to decision processes by influencing performance in relation to work environment conditions. In the framework of the job demands-resources (JD-R) model, the present study tested how such components as job demands, job resources and exhaustion can moderate decision-making processes and performance, where high resources are advantageous for decision-making processes and performance at work, while the same effect happens with low job demands and/or low exhaustion. In line with the formulated hypotheses, results confirm the relations between both the decision-making competences, performance (i.e., in-role and extra-role) and moderators considered. In particular, employees with low levels of DMCy show to be more sensitive to job demands toward in-role performance, whereas high DEM levels increase the sensitivity of employees toward job resources and exhaustion in relation to extra-role performance. These findings indicate that decision-making processes, as well as work environment conditions, are jointly related to employee functioning

Multidisciplinary care planning in the primary care management of completed stroke: a systematic review

Background: Chronic disease management requires input from multiple health professionals, both specialist and primary care providers. This study sought to assess the impact of co-ordinated multidisciplinary care in primary care, represented by the delivery of formal care planning by primary care teams or shared across primary-secondary teams, on outcomes in stroke, relative to usual care

Reconceptualizing Profit-Orientation in Management: A Karmic View on "Return on Investment" Calculations

From the perspective of the present day, Puritan-inspired capitalism seems to have succeeded globally, including in India. Connected to this, short-term profit-orientation in management seems to constrain the scope of different management approaches in a tight ideological corset. This article discusses the possibility of replacing this Puritan doctrine with the crucial elements of Indian philosophy: Karma and samsara. In doing so, the possibility of revising the guiding principles in capitalist management becomes conceivable, namely the monetary focus of profit-orientation and its short-term orientation. This perspective allows a detachment of the concept of profit from the realm of money, as the seemingly only objectifiable measure of profit. Furthermore it allows a removal of the expectation that every "investment" has to directly "pay off". A karmic view offers management a possible facility for being more caring about the needs and fates of other stakeholders, as profit-orientation would no longer be attached as a factual constraint to merely accumulate money. (author's abstract

Stress ocupacional e alteração do Estatuto da Carreira Docente português

Este estudo foi realizado com 1162 professores, tendo como objetivo analisar a experiência de stress e a síndrome de “burnout”, antes a após a alteração do Estatuto da Carreira Docente em Portugal. Assim, foram efetuadas duas avaliações em momentos temporais distintos, assumindo-se um plano transversal de recolha de dados (2004/2005, n=689 e 2008/2009, n=473). O protocolo de avaliação incluiu medidas de fontes de stress (Questionário de Stress nos Professores, Gomes, Silva, Mourisco, Mota, & Montenegro, 2006) e de “burnout” (Inventário de “Burnout” de Maslach – Versão para Professores, Maslach, Jackson, & Leiter, 1996; Maslach, Jackson, & Schwab, 1996, Adaptação de Gomes et al., 2006). Os resultados indicaram que a experiência de stress e de “burnout” aumentou entre as duas avaliações, verificando-se em 2008/2009 aumentos em áreas relacionadas com as pressões de tempo/excesso de trabalho e com o trabalho burocrático/administrativo e, inversamente, diminuições em áreas relacionadas com as diferentes capacidades e motivações dos alunos. Quanto à predição da síndrome de “burnout”, não se verificaram alterações substanciais nas variáveis preditoras nos dois momentos. Em síntese, os resultados indicaram aumentos nas exigências profissionais dos professores, mas não se pode afirmar que tal se deva às alterações do Estatuto da Carreira Docente uma vez que não observámos alterações no stress associado à carreira docente.(undefined