The Influence of Primary School Principals´ Leadership Styles on Innovative Practices

This qualitative research explored the relationship between school principals’ leadership styles and their innovative practices in schools. The Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ; Avolio & Bass, 1995), was administered to 38 school principals in Lower Austria, who, based on their responses, were then categorized as leaders with stronger or weaker transformational leadership styles.  Six of these principals were then interviewed: three with strong transformational leadership styles (Transformational – High) and three with weaker transformational leadership styles (Transformational – Low). Interview data were coded qualitatively, and patterns and themes emerged relating to how these two groups viewed innovation in their school. The two groups of leaders were similar in that they both viewed requirements for innovation similarly.  Both groups also believed that the results of innovation could lead to an improvement in collegial collaboration and relationship.  However, leaders with stronger transformational leadership styles viewed innovation more positively and placed more importance on innovation than participants with their weaker transformational counterparts. Implications for practice are discussed

Klinisch-psychologische Aspekte der Mensch-Tier-Beziehung

Angestoßen durch aktuelle Studien von Beetz (2002), Miletski (2002) und Williams und Weinberg (2003), die sich auf den englisch und englisch-deutschsprachigen Raum beziehen war es Ziel anhand der durchgeführten Befragung von 196 männlichen Probanden erste Aufschlüsse über das Thema Zoophilie in Österreich zu ermitteln. Die Stichprobe setzt sich aus 98 inhaftierten Personen und einer nicht inhaftierten Vergleichsgruppe zusammen. Den Probanden wurden Fragebögen zu den Bereichen emotionale Kompetenz, Zoophilie, selbstverübten Gewalttaten, Einstellungen & Empathie gegenüber Tieren vorgelegt. Die Prävalenzrate sexueller Mensch-Tier-Kontakte befindet sich mit 1,02%, im Vergleich zu Studien von Hunt (1974) und Bensel (1984), in der Werte zwischen 3,9% und 5% ermittelt wurden, unter der erwarteten Häufigkeit. Angaben bezüglich gesehenem tierpornographischen Material liegen, ähnlich wie in der Studie von Miller und Knutson (1974), bei 9,20% und beziehen sich mit fast zwei Drittel auf die Gruppe der Inhaftierten. Hinsichtlich der erhobenen Konstrukte tiergerichtete Empathie, Einstellungen zu Tieren und emotionale Kompetenz konnte kein Unterschied zwischen den Gruppen erhoben werden. Bei der Beantwortung des emotionalen Kompetenzfragebogens wurde ersichtlich, dass Personen mit zoophilen Erfahrungen eine Tendenz aufweisen, anderen Personen eigene Gefühle nicht zeigen zu können. Diese Erkenntnis stützen die von Miletski (2002) und Beetz (2002) gewonnen Erkenntnisse, dass sich Personen mit zoophilen Erfahrungen als schüchtern und introvertiert beschreiben.The aim of the study was to gather first information on zoophilia and bestiality specifically in Austria. It is based on recent studies by Beetz (2002) and Miletski (2002) and Williams and Weinberg (2003), whose focus however were the English and English-German speaking regions. The sample consists of 196 males, 98 of them being imprisoned and 98 non-imprisoned. Questionnaires used were the Emotional-Competence-Questionnaire (EKF), the Pet Attitude Scale and questions on animal-directed empathy as well as questionnaires on animal cruelty, interpersonal violence and zoophilia. Prevalence-rate of sexual human-animal contact was unexpectedly low with 1,02%, being less then prevalence rates reported in studies of Hunt (1974) and Bensel (1984) whose results ranged between 3.9 and 5%. Concerning animal-pornographic material the findings reach 9.20%, which is similar to the study by Miller and Knutson (1974) and are to two-thirds related to the imprisoned males. Regarding animal-directed empathy, pet-attitude and emotional competence no difference between samples of imprisoned and non-imprisoned males was found. The questionnaire on emotional competence then revealed that persons with zoophile experience have a tendency not to expose their emotions to others. These results are in line with previous findings by Miletski (2002) and Beetz (2002) who have stated people with zoophilic tendencies to be reserved and introverted

Die Auswirkung von Supplementation und Ernährung auf die Proteinsynthese im sportlichen Trainingsprozess unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Hypertrophie der Skelettmuskulatur

Aus der Analyse der vorliegenden Studienergebnisse kann abgeleitet werden, dass eine strategisch geplante zusätzliche Proteinaufnahme im Trainingsprozess dazu beitragen kann, einen gewünschten Muskelaufbau sicherzustellen, Erholungsprozesse nach Belastung zu beschleunigen, die Kraft, Schnellkraft und anaerobe Leistungsfähigkeit sowie die Immunfunktionen zu verbessern. Bezüglich der Dosis einer Proteinzufuhr herrschen in der Literatur kontroversielle Meinungen, die von der Deutsch-Österreichisch-Schweizerischen Gesellschaft für Ernährung (D-A-CH) und von der Deutschen Gemeinschaft für Ernährung (DGE) genannten Empfehlungen scheinen aber für den Sportbereich zu tief angesetzt zu sein, betragen sie doch nur etwa die Hälfte der in der internationalen Sporternährung empfohlenen Richtwerte

Der Reformvertrag von Lissabon

Die Politik im Allgemeinen und die Europäische Union im Besonderen befinden sich seit geraumer Zeit in einer Vertrauenskrise. Bereits vor dem Ausbruch der Finanzkrise im Jahr 2009 wurde der Politik und insbesondere der Europäischen Union nicht mehr die Fähigkeit zur Steuerung des gesellschaftlichen Lebens zuerkannt. Dementsprechend lässt sich die Tendenz zur Abkehr von politischen Institutionen erkennen. Dies betrifft vor allem die Europäische Union, welche von ihren Anfängen ein Projekt der Eliten Europas war und dessen Verwurzelung in der Bevölkerung nie besonders stark gewesen ist. Diesem Phänomen des Vertrauensverlustes der Unionsbürger in die Europäische Union widmet sich diese Arbeit. Der seit dem 1. Dezember 2009 in Geltung stehenden Vertrag von Lissabon sollte nicht nur die Handlungsfähigkeit der Europäischen Union bewahren, sondern ebenso die Union wieder näher an ihre Bürger heranbringen. Zu diesem Zweck wurden einerseits bestehende Institutionen gestärkt und andererseits dem Vertragswerk der Europäischen Union bislang unbekannte Instrumente eingefügt. Damit ist zunächst gemeint, dass die Erweiterung der Kompetenzen des Europäischen Parlaments weiter vorangetrieben wurde. Neben dieser seit Bestehen des Europäischen Parlaments beobachtbaren kontinuierlichen Entwicklung, wurden auch neue Wege beschritten. Durch Verankerung eines Europäischen Bürgerbegehrens im Primärrecht der Union existiert nun erstmals ein direktdemokratisches Element auf supranationaler Ebene. Darüber hinaus wurden den nationalen Parlamenten bisher nicht zustehende Kontrollbefugnisse im Hinblick auf die Einhaltung der Prinzipien der Subsidiarität und Verhältnismäßigkeit gewährt. Die Principal-agent-Theorie geht von der Übertragung bestimmter Aufgaben von einem Prinzipal an einen Agent aus und beschäftigt sich mit der damit verbundenen Schwierigkeit der Sicherstellung der verantwortungsvollen Aufgabenerfüllung durch den Agenten. Dabei wird das Instrument des Vertrages als Mittel zur Angleichung der grundsätzlich unterschiedlichen Interessen dieser Akteure verwendet. Die Principal-agent-Theorie stammt ursprünglich aus den Wirtschaftswissenschaften und hat die 130 Optimierung des Verhältnisses zwischen Arbeitgeber und Arbeitnehmer zum Gegenstand. Ihr Anwendungsbereich wird jedoch im Zuge der gegenständlichen Arbeit erweitert. Dies ist deshalb möglich, da sich die Grundannahmen dieser Theorie, wie auch die zur Überwindung des Problems verwendeten Werkzeuge, in der politischen Wirklichkeit ebenso wiederfinden. Das eigentlich aus den Rechts-wissenschaften stammende Instrument des Vertrages, hat jedoch auch Eingang in die Politikwissenschaft gefunden. So führten Staatsphilosophen der Neuzeit wie Jean-Jacques Rosseau, Thomas Hobbes oder John Locke die Gründung neuzeitlicher Territorialstaaten auf den Abschluss eines (imaginären) Gesell-schaftsvertrages zwischen den Menschen und einem Herrscher zurück. Somit lässt sich unter Zuhilfenahme der Konstruktion des Gesellschaftsvertrages die Principal-agent-Theorie auch in ihren Lösungsmöglichkeiten auf demokratische Re-präsentationsverhältnisse übertragen. Dabei wird der besondere Charakter der Europäischen Union jedoch nicht unberücksichtigt bleiben und auf die Schwierig-keiten von Mehrebenenpolitik ebenso eingegangen. Stets spielt dabei die Komponente des Vertrauens eine entscheidende Rolle und bildet die allesumschließende Klammer meiner Arbeit.The politics and the European Union are currently in a crisis of trust. Even before the global financial crisis revealed in 2009, people started to deny the politics and especially the European Union the capability to govern the society. Correspondingly a tendency of renunciation of political institutions can be recognized. The European Union is a project of the European elites and is concerned with this phenomenon since its foundation. This thesis focuses on the phenomenon of loss of trust of the European citizens in the European Union. The main goals of the Lisbon Treaty, which is valid since 1st of December 2009, are to improve the European Union’s capacity to act and to reduce the gap between the Union and their citizens. Therefore the Lisbon Treaty strengthens the already existing institutions and creates new, so far unknown, instruments. The broadening of the competences of the European Parliament is pushed, which can be noticed since the establishment of the European Parliament. As the European petition was anchored in the Lisbon Treaty, there exists an element of direct democracy on a supranational level for the first time ever. Beyond that, the national parliaments gained new supervisory power concerning the compliance with the Principle of subsidiarity and proportionality by the treaty of Lisbon. This thesis deals with the examination by utilizing the Principal-agent-theory. For this reason I am broadening the field of application of the Principal-agent-theory to make it useful for the purposes of political science. This is possible, because the political reality reflects not only the basic assumptions of this theory, but also the means, which are used to conquer this challenge. The Principal-agent-theory is based on the assumption, that there is a delegation of certain tasks from the principal to the agent and deals with the coherent problem of the seizure of a responsible task fulfilment through the agent. Therefore the contract is used as an instrument to adjust the fundamentally different interests of both. The origin of this tool could be found in the jurisprudence, but nevertheless it found entry in the field of political science long ago. The political philosophers of the modern history, like Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Thomas Hobbes or John Locke saw the reason for the foundation of classic territorial state in the settlement of an (imaginary) social contract between the emperor and the people. The Principal-agent-theory could be transmitted, even with its suggested 132 solutions, to democratic institutions with the aid of the concept of the social contract. In doing so the European Union and its special (supranational) character and the difficulties of multi-level policy are also taken into account. The component of trust always plays a decisive role and is supposed to be the central thread of this dissertation

Plants Developed by New Genetic Modification Techniques—Comparison of Existing Regulatory Frameworks in the EU and Non-EU Countries

The development of new genetic modification techniques (nGMs), also referred to as “new (breeding) techniques” in other sources, has raised worldwide discussions regarding their regulation. Different existing regulatory frameworks for genetically modified organisms (GMO) cover nGMs to varying degrees. Coverage of nGMs depends mostly on the regulatory trigger. In general two different trigger systems can be distinguished, taking into account either the process applied during development or the characteristics of the resulting product. A key question is whether regulatory frameworks either based on process- or product-oriented triggers are more advantageous for the regulation of nGM applications. We analyzed regulatory frameworks for GMO from different countries covering both trigger systems with a focus on their applicability to plants developed by various nGMs. The study is based on a literature analysis and qualitative interviews with regulatory experts and risk assessors of GMO in the respective countries. The applied principles of risk assessment are very similar in all investigated countries independent of the applied trigger for regulation. Even though the regulatory trigger is either process- or product-oriented, both triggers systems show features of the respective other in practice. In addition our analysis shows that both trigger systems have a number of generic advantages and disadvantages, but neither system can be regarded as superior at a general level. More decisive for the regulation of organisms or products, especially nGM applications, are the variable criteria and exceptions used to implement the triggers in the different regulatory frameworks. There are discussions and consultations in some countries about whether changes in legislation are necessary to establish a desired level of regulation of nGMs. We identified five strategies for countries that desire to regulate nGM applications for biosafety–ranging from applying existing biosafety frameworks without further amendments to establishing new stand-alone legislation. Due to varying degrees of nGM regulation, international harmonization will supposedly not be achieved in the near future. In the context of international trade, transparency of the regulatory status of individual nGM products is a crucial issue. We therefore propose to introduce an international public registry listing all biotechnology products commercially used in agriculture

An EU Perspective on Biosafety Considerations for Plants Developed by Genome Editing and Other New Genetic Modification Techniques (nGMs)

The question whether new genetic modification techniques (nGM) in plant development might result in non-negligible negative effects for the environment and/or health is significant for the discussion concerning their regulation. However, current knowledge to address this issue is limited for most nGMs, particularly for recently developed nGMs, like genome editing, and their newly emerging variations, e.g., base editing. This leads to uncertainties regarding the risk/safety-status of plants which are developed with a broad range of different nGMs, especially genome editing, and other nGMs such as cisgenesis, transgrafting, haploid induction or reverse breeding. A literature survey was conducted to identify plants developed by nGMs which are relevant for future agricultural use. Such nGM plants were analyzed for hazards associated either (i) with their developed traits and their use or (ii) with unintended changes resulting from the nGMs or other methods applied during breeding. Several traits are likely to become particularly relevant in the future for nGM plants, namely herbicide resistance (HR), resistance to different plant pathogens as well as modified composition, morphology, fitness (e.g., increased resistance to cold/frost, drought, or salinity) or modified reproductive characteristics. Some traits such as resistance to certain herbicides are already known from existing GM crops and their previous assessments identified issues of concern and/or risks, such as the development of herbicide resistant weeds. Other traits in nGM plants are novel; meaning they are not present in agricultural plants currently cultivated with a history of safe use, and their underlying physiological mechanisms are not yet sufficiently elucidated. Characteristics of some genome editing applications, e.g., the small extent of genomic sequence change and their higher targeting efficiency, i.e., precision, cannot be considered an indication of safety per se, especially in relation to novel traits created by such modifications. All nGMs considered here can result in unintended changes of different types and frequencies. However, the rapid development of nGM plants can compromise the detection and elimination of unintended effects. Thus, a case-specific premarket risk assessment should be conducted for nGM plants, including an appropriate molecular characterization to identify unintended changes and/or confirm the absence of unwanted transgenic sequences

Corrigendum: An EU Perspective on Biosafety Considerations for Plants Developed by Genome Editing and Other New Genetic Modification Techniques (nGMs)

The question whether new genetic modification techniques (nGM) in plant development might result in non-negligible negative effects for the environment and/or health is significant for the discussion concerning their regulation. However, current knowledge to address this issue is limited for most nGMs, particularly for recently developed nGMs, like genome editing, and their newly emerging variations, e.g., base editing. This leads to uncertainties regarding the risk/safety-status of plants which are developed with a broad range of different nGMs, especially genome editing, and other nGMs such as cisgenesis, transgrafting, haploid induction or reverse breeding. A literature survey was conducted to identify plants developed by nGMs which are relevant for future agricultural use. Such nGM plants were analyzed for hazards associated either (i) with their developed traits and their use or (ii) with unintended changes resulting from the nGMs or other methods applied during breeding. Several traits are likely to become particularly relevant in the future for nGM plants, namely herbicide resistance (HR), resistance to different plant pathogens as well as modified composition, morphology, fitness (e.g., increased resistance to cold/frost, drought, or salinity) or modified reproductive characteristics. Some traits such as resistance to certain herbicides are already known from existing GM crops and their previous assessments identified issues of concern and/or risks, such as the development of herbicide resistant weeds. Other traits in nGM plants are novel; meaning they are not present in agricultural plants currently cultivated with a history of safe use, and their underlying physiological mechanisms are not yet sufficiently elucidated. Characteristics of some genome editing applications, e.g., the small extent of genomic sequence change and their higher targeting efficiency, i.e., precision, cannot be considered an indication of safety per se, especially in relation to novel traits created by such modifications. All nGMs considered here can result in unintended changes of different types and frequencies. However, the rapid development of nGM plants can compromise the detection and elimination of unintended effects. Thus, a case-specific premarket risk assessment should be conducted for nGM plants, including an appropriate molecular characterization to identify unintended changes and/or confirm the absence of unwanted transgenic sequences

Development of novel 2D and 3D correlative microscopy to characterise the composition and multiscale structure of suspended sediment aggregates.

Suspended cohesive sediments form aggregates or 'flocs' and are often closely associated with carbo, nutrients, pathogens and pollutants, which makes understanding their composition, transport and fate highly desirable. Accurate prediction of floc behaviour requires the quantification of 3-dimensional (3D) properties (size, shoe and internal structure) that span several scales (i.e. nanometre [nm] to millimetre [mm]-scale). Traditional techniques (optical cameras and electron microscopy [EM]), however, can only provide 2-dimensional (2D) simplifications of 3D floc geometries. Additionally, the existence of a resolution gap between conventional optical microscopy (COM) and transmission EM (TEM) prevents an understanding of how floc nm-scale constituents and internal structure influence mm-scale floc properties. Here, we develop a novel correlative imaging workflow combining 3D X-ray micro-computed tomography (μCT), 3D focused ion beam nanotomography (FIB-nt) and 2D scanning EM (SEM) and TEM (STEM) which allows us to stabilise, visualise and quantify the composition and multi scale structure of sediment flocs for the first time. This new technique allowed the quantification of 3D floc geometries, the identification of individual floc components (e.g., clays, non-clay minerals and bacteria), and characterisation of particle-particle and structural associations across scales. This novel dataset demonstrates the truly complex structure of natural flocs at multiple scales. The integration of multiscale, state-of-the-art instrumentation/techniques offers the potential to generate fundamental new understanding of floc composition, structure and behaviour

Climate Change and the Potential Spreading of Marine Mucilage and Microbial Pathogens in the Mediterranean Sea

Background: Marine snow (small amorphous aggregates with colloidal properties) is present in all oceans of the world. Surface water warming and the consequent increase of water column stability can favour the coalescence of marine snow into marine mucilage, large marine aggregates representing an ephemeral and extreme habitat. Marine mucilage characterize aquatic systems with altered environmental conditions. Methodology/Principal Findings: We investigated, by means of molecular techniques, viruses and prokaryotes within the mucilage and in surrounding seawater to examine the potential of mucilage to host new microbial diversity and/or spread marine diseases. We found that marine mucilage contained a large and unexpectedly exclusive microbial biodiversity and hosted pathogenic species that were absent in surrounding seawater. We also investigated the relationship between climate change and the frequency of mucilage in the Mediterranean Sea over the last 200 years and found that the number of mucilage outbreaks increased almost exponentially in the last 20 years. The increasing frequency of mucilage outbreaks is closely associated with the temperature anomalies. Conclusions/Significance: We conclude that the spreading of mucilage in the Mediterranean Sea is linked to climate-driven sea surface warming. The mucilage can act as a controlling factor of microbial diversity across wide oceanic regions and could have the potential to act as a carrier of specific microorganisms, thereby increasing the spread of pathogenic bacteria