The generation game

Purpose – Explores the limited value of concepts such as Baby-Boomer, Generation X and Generation Y and advances the view that life course is more valuable. Design/methodology/approach – Examines how young adults in Britain, born between 1975 and 1982, conceptualized the notion of work-life balance as they were about to leave university and enter full-time paid employment. Findings – Reveals that the notion of individual choice strongly underpins young adults’ conceptualization of work-life balance and expectations of work-life balance support; while young British and Asian adults largely considered it to be a matter of individual choice, there were variations in their preferences for how to prioritize their impending employment and personal lives; and four emerging patterns of work-life balance orientation preferences were found – balancer, careerist, career-sacrificer and integrator. Practical implications – Provides support for the argument that the work-life balance perceptions of young adults who would belong to the so-called Generation Y cannot be generalized and simplified as being either work-centric or life-centric. The picture is a lot more complex given the diversity within this group of young adults. Social implications – Highlights how, instead of looking for generational differences (or age-related differences) which can be divisive, it is more useful to look at the issue of multi-generations in a broader way. Originality/value – By using a life-course approach instead of a generational approach, is able to take into account how past transitions have shaped the way work-life balance was discussed by the young adults and how anticipated future transitions were expected by the young adults to change their needs and therefore expectations of employer and government support

Review of Aquaculture Genetic Researches in Thailand

Aquaculture business has been well established in Thailand for more than 40 years. The most recent data indicated a total production of 260 380 tons. Sixty-five percent of the total production came from coastal aquaculture, mainly tiger prawn (Penaeus monodon) culture. Other important species for coastal aquaculture are banana prawn (P. merguensis), cockle (Anadara granosa), green mussel (Perna viridis), oyster (Crassostrea belcheri, Saccostrea commercialis), sea bass (Lates calcarifer) and grouper (Epinephelus tauvina). Freshwater aquaculture, although produced only 35% of the annual production, provides major protein source for people in rural areas. Important freshwater species are Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus), tawes (Puntius gonionotus), sepat Siam (Trichogasterpectoralis), walking catfish (Glorias spp.), stripped catfish (Pangasius sutchi) and giant freshwater prawn (Macrobrachium rosenbergii). Optimum aquacultural practises, namely stocking density, nutrition requirement and water quality have been obtained in most cultured species. But genetic approach has not been considered, thus resulting in deterioration in economic traits which might be due to excessive inbreeding (reviewed by Uraiwan 1989) and/or negative selection (Wongsangchan 1985). The history of researches on genetics in aquaculture in Thailand started in 1982 when the aquaculture genetic programme in form of a network has been established at the National Inland Fisheries Institute, Department of Fisheries. This programme was supported by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC, Canada) in cooperation with Dalhousie University, Canada (Uraiwan 1989). In the same year a genetic improvement programme aiming at improving economic characters of some economic fish species has been conducted at the Department of Aquaculture, Kasetsart University. Paralelly a course in Fish Genetics has been offered. Since then different approaches of genetics have been applied with final objectives on improving aquaculture production of the country. Researches being conducted are reviewed according to the following fish species

Entitled or misunderstood? Towards the repositioning of the sense of entitlement concept in the generational difference debate

This paper contributes to debates in the broad area of generational differences at work. Specifically, we locate this study within the literature of the work values and expectations of the ‘Millennial generation’, also known as ‘GenMe’ (Twenge, 2006; 2010). Much has been made in the media and popular practitioner literature about how the latest generation of workers have a ‘sense of entitlement’ and therefore expect more from the workplace than previous generations. In this paper, we argue that this mainstream view of the sense of entitlement as a concept is problematic and requires a more critical examination. We consider two divergent bodies of literature on the sense of entitlement in relation to generational differences at work – a manageralist approach, which conceptualises sense of entitlement to work-life balance (WLB) as a negative trait, and a second body, based on the seminal work by Sue Lewis and colleagues, that treats sense of entitlement as a situated process rather than an internal characteristic. We use data from a study of young adults leaving university in the UK, inspired by Sue’s work. Our analysis challenges the notion of today’s younger workers as more ‘entitled’ than previous generations. This study extends existing research by providing a contextualised analysis of young people’s situated accounts of sense of entitlement at work

Screening Of Traditionally Used Endemic Soqotraen Plants For Cytotoxic Activity

Thirty extracts obtained from 10 endemic plant species belonging to 8 plant families used in the traditional medicine in Socotra have been tested for cytotoxic activity against FL-cells. Extracts of Eureiandra balfourii and Commiphora ornifolia showed the strongest activity against FL-cells with IC50 < 10 &#956;g/ml and 39.3 &#956;g/ml respectively. Keywords: Cytotoxicity, Soqotra, Fl-cellsAfrican Journal of Traditional and Complementary Medicine Vol. 4 (4) 2007: pp. 529-53

Kearifan Lokal Masyarakat Dalam Mengelola Areal Bekas Ladang Berpindah Di Desa Sehe Lusur Kecamatan Kuala Behe Kabupaten Landak the Comunity of Local Wisdom in Managing Used-areas of Shifting Cultivation in Sehe Lusur Village Sub District of Kuala Beh

Research on local wisdom in managing used-areas of shifting cultivation in Sehe Lusur Village, sub district of Kuala Behe District of Landak. The aims to determine the shape of local wisdom in managing used-areas of shifting cultivation and to determine the the influence factors such as: age, knowledge, education, perception, lenght of stay and villagers experiences. The samples were using purposive sampling technique. The data were collected through a descriptive method in the form of a survey with interview techniques. Data were analyzed with chi-square. The research showed that in those areas people planted some useful crops and perennials by intercropping. The lands managed traditionally and no special treatment. They rely on soil fertility and work together or mutual cooperation (pengari). The yields are partially self-consumed and sold. There were differences in the frequency rate of local wisdom in managing those areas. The frequencies were tend to moderate. The level of knowledge factor showed a real relationship, education showed a strong relationship; whereas factors of age, perception, length of stay and work experience do not indicate a real relationship with the local wisdom in managing the used-areas of shifting cultivation areas. Keywords: local wisdom, villagers, used-areas of shifting cultivation, forest areas, mix farm

The impact of global economic crisis and austerity on quality of working life and work-life balance: a capabilities perspective

This paper draws on the capabilities approach as a framework for examining the impact of the global economic crisis and austerity on quality of working life and work-life balance. Our paper focuses on Greece, an extreme case of a country in economic crisis, characterised by a weak institutional basis. We build on the work of Barbara Hobson and colleagues who first applied the capabilities approach to explore work-life balance capabilities. Our study contributes to the development of theory by emphasising the sense of entitlement concept within the capabilities approach and by proposing a modified conceptual framework that encapsulates the link between capabilities, agency, and the sense of entitlement, where the latter acts as a cognitive ‘filter’ that enhances or weakens an individual’s perception of her/his agency to enact on her/his capabilities. Drawing on the accounts of twenty Greek professional and managerial workers, we illustrate how the crisis and austerity measures have eroded working conditions and thus the sense of entitlement, leading to the weakening of our participants’ agency and capabilities to achieve quality of working life and work-life balance

Focus group methodology in a life course approach – individual accounts within a peer cohort group

This paper explores the use of focus group methodology as part of a life course approach building on Julia Brannen’s pioneering work in these two areas. Much life course research uses individual interviews, including biographical interview techniques. It is less usual to find focus groups used within the life course perspective. This paper draws on a PhD study of young British and Asian adults’ experiences of the transition from university to full-time employment, using focus groups as part of a multi-method approach, within a life course perspective. The study drew explicitly on Julia Brannen’s approach to life course transitions. Three focus group excerpts are presented and discussed to illustrate how focus group data can further the understanding of the ways in which a group of peers discuss the transition to work and especially future work–life balance. We show how focus group discussions about individual choice for future work and ‘life’ or ‘lifestyle’ can highlight shared assumptions of this birth cohort group as well as areas of disagreement and contention, rooted in both individual experiences and societal and socio-cultural expectations. We relate this to Julia Brannen’s conceptualisation of the three different modalities which young people draw on to talk about the future

From theory to impact: bringing work-life initiatives into the mainstream

In this special issue we focus on the work and influence of Sue Lewis, one of the Community, Work and Family’s two founding editors. In launching this journal Sue, together with Carolyn Kagan, aimed to encourage debate and critical examination of, and reflection on, existing perspectives, frameworks and practices (Kagan and Lewis, 2015). They also explicitly aimed “to publish work that challenged the status quo, encouraged personal reflection and reflexivity, and put professional and lay views side by side” (Kagan and Lewis, 2015). For this special issue we invited researchers who have worked with Sue at different stages of her career – from her Ph.D. supervisor (Cary Cooper), some of her international research partners (Marcie Pitt-Catsouphes, Ellen Kossek), her previous colleagues at Manchester Metropolitan University (Carolyn Kagan, Rebecca Lawthom), her national and international research partners on a series of European projects (Julia Brannen, Ann Nilsen, Laura den Dulk, Bram Peper), through to one of Sue’s former Ph.D. students and colleague at Middlesex University (Uracha Chatrakul Na Ayudhya) and early career researchers (Sweta Rajan-Rankin). In the articles that are to follow, the authors draw upon and highlight the considerable and invaluable influences that Sue’s work has had in the field of Community, Work and Family

The initial temporal evolution of a feedback dynamo for Mercury

Various possibilities are currently under discussion to explain the observed weakness of the intrinsic magnetic field of planet Mercury. One of the possible dynamo scenarios is a dynamo with feedback from the magnetosphere. Due to its weak magnetic field Mercury exhibits a small magnetosphere whose subsolar magnetopause distance is only about 1.7 Hermean radii. We consider the magnetic field due to magnetopause currents in the dynamo region. Since the external field of magnetospheric origin is antiparallel to the dipole component of the dynamo field, a negative feedback results. For an alpha-omega-dynamo two stationary solutions of such a feedback dynamo emerge, one with a weak and the other with a strong magnetic field. The question, however, is how these solutions can be realized. To address this problem, we discuss various scenarios for a simple dynamo model and the conditions under which a steady weak magnetic field can be reached. We find that the feedback mechanism quenches the overall field to a low value of about 100 to 150 nT if the dynamo is not driven too strongly