Conflict Resolution: Cultural Understanding Imperative

Business transactions and other potential incidences of conflict resolution must be met by participants who have transcended the isolating and often arrogant traits of individualism and must expand to embrace the collective — to realize the importance of learning and understanding cultural differences and whatever creates the uniqueness of the individual. This is particularly critical for success in the global marketplace

A qualitative study of the views of residents with dementia, their relatives and staff about work practice in long-term care settings

Background: Most people living in 24-hour care settings have dementia, and little is known about what makes long-term care a positive experience for them.Method: This carer-led qualitative study examined working practices in 24-hour long-term care-settings, including hospitals, nursing and residential homes, with the aim of finding out and making recommendations about such settings. Using semi-structured interviews, managers, nurses and care assistants were asked about work practices, such as how they coped with difficult behavior, about shifts, staffing levels, staff retention and training. Relatives of residents with dementia were asked about their role and perceptions of the care provided, and residents were asked for their opinions of their care.Results: Staff reported that residents presented with increasingly challenging behavior compared to the past, and that sometimes staffing levels and skills were inadequate. Of all the settings, hospitals had the most problems with staffing levels and retention, staff-relative relationships and staff support systems. Relatives saw their own role as positive. People with dementia of varying severity could usefully evaluate some of the services they received.Discussion: Dementia-specific training and education of staff in all long-term care-settings, including induction, should address the management of problem behavior in dementia and thereby improve staff fulfilment and relatives' satisfaction. The long-stay hospital may not be appropriate as a "home for life" for those with dementia, and we recommend that long-stay care settings should be able to cater flexibly for a range of resident needs

The Influence of the COVID-19 Pandemic on At-Risk Populations Experiencing Stress and Family Violence: The Importance of An Action Model.

Abstract The paper was entitled: “The Influence of the COVID-19 Pandemic on At-Risk Populations Experiencing stress and Family Violence: The Importance of An Action Model.” As the title of the paper indicates, the paper had an ambitious task of showing how vulnerable populations, such as African Americans, because of racism, discrimination and subsequent inequities in their life experiences (such as inadequate health care, poor working conditions, a host of underlying health conditions, and potentially greater amounts of stress) are likely to become sicker with COVID-19 (higher morbidity and mortality) and, subsequently, more likely to experience higher than normal rates of family violence. The paper discussed different types of family violence, such as elder abuse, sibling abuse, child abuse and intimate partner violence. However, whatever form of family violence that is taking place in today’s society is usually intertwined with a complex mixture of factors that begin at the wider society or macro-levels, trickling down through the community and/or middle or meso-levels, and eventually landing at the individual or micro-levels of society. To better understand the complex array of societal factors, alluded to before, all of which individually and collectively help to explain how the era of the Covid-19 pandemic increased levels of stress and later the likelihood of different types of family violence, an Action Model was used as a guiding light. In essence, rather than just make alluding relational statements, as the literature warranted, steps were taken to link these important relational statements to exact sections of the Action Model depicted in the specially modified and highly illustrated Action Model of the paper. The paper closed with some recommended policy suggestions, tips, best practices and accessible resources for both stress management and family violence prevention

Are Insider Sales Always Bad News? Evidence On Large Sales By Key Insiders

Investors often scrutinize stock trades by corporate insiders, hoping to infer the nature of any privileged information which may have motivated the trades. Conventional wisdom suggests that sales of stock by insiders reveal negative information; this interpretation is supported by empirical work such as the series of papers by Seyhun. However, this common interpretation fails to distinguish between sales by atomistic insiders and sales by controlling blockholders.  In this paper, I present evidence which suggests that sales by controlling insiders should not be considered bad news. Using both a series of logit regressions and traditional event-study tests, I examine the relationship between a firm's performance and the willingness of its controlling shareholder to sell a significant proportion of his shares. I find that firm value is just as likely to rise on the news of large insider sales as it is to fall, so that large sales need not imply negative private information.  One possible explanation for a positive response to a controlling blockholder's large sale is that such a sale makes the insider vulnerable to meaningful oversight by outside shareholders. Thus, a large sale may be a signal of the insider's willingness to expose himself to shareholder monitoring and discipline. However, regardless of the interpretation, the empirical evidence presented in the paper forces the conclusion that it is inappropriate to interpret all insider sales as bad news: insider sales occur in a variety of contexts, and creating buy/sell rules which ignore those contexts is simplistic and erroneous

The Association of Military Sexual Harassment/Assault with Suicidal Ideation, Plans, Attempts, and Mortality Among Service Members and Veterans: A Meta-Analysis and Research Study

Rates of death by suicide and sexual harassment/assault that occurs during military service (MSH/A) are higher among service members/veterans than rates of suicide and sexual violence among civilians. Suicide risk includes thoughts and attempts, and research examining the strength of the relationship between suicide risk and sexual violence across past studies that examined this association are limited to civilians. Moreover, current theories hypothesizing which factors are related to suicide risk do not adequately predict suicide among service members and veterans, and do not account for factors such as MSH/A. This two-study dissertation first calculated the magnitude of the relationship between suicide risk and MSH/A among service members/veterans across studies and tested for factors that may increase this association (gender, marital status, service member versus veteran status, and military branch). Second, a novel theory, The Three-Step Theory of Suicide, was tested to identify whether it explains suicide risk among men service members and veterans. This theory indicates that a risk factor for suicide is psychological pain, which was operationalized as exposure to MSH/A in the current study. Findings indicate MSH/A and suicidal thoughts and attempts are related. Moreover, the relationship of these factors is stronger among women, married, service members, and those in the Air Force relative to men, those who are not married, veterans, and all other branches, respectively. When testing The Three-Step Theory of Suicide, higher hopelessness and lower connectedness were associated with increased suicide ideation, whereas MSH/A and other factors were not associated with suicide ideation and attempts. A secondary analysis allowed for increased statistical power by combining military and/or premilitary sexual harassment/assault, which represented exposure to psychological pain. This analysis indicated that the combination of exposure to psychological pain and higher hopelessness were associated with suicide ideation. Service members/veterans with histories of MSH/A should be considered at higher risk of suicide, and those who identify as women, married, a service member, or in the Air Force may be at greatest risk. To reduce suicide risk in men, interventions that reduce feelings of hopelessness may be particularly helpful

Depression Mediates the Association of Disordered Eating Behaviors and Sexual Function in Female Service Members and Veterans

Poor sexual function is comprised of diminished sexual desire and arousal, presence of sexual pain, inability to reach orgasm, and low satisfaction. Worse sexual function is associated with disordered eating behavior; however, the mechanism through which this association exists remains unclear. Theory of sexual function suggests that depression mediates the association of disordered eating behaviors and poor sexual function in female service members and veterans, but this has yet to be tested empirically. The purpose of the current study was to examine whether depression mediated the association of disordered eating behaviors and sexual dysfunction. Participants (N=511) were partnered females who completed measures of sexual function, disordered eating behavior, depression severity, and demographic and military characteristics. Nearly 60% reported probable sexual dysfunction, 19.6% reported probable eating disorder, and 44.4% reported probable depressive disorder. Higher depression symptoms were associated with lower sexual function (r=-.40, p Depression is a potential mechanism through which disordered eating behaviors are related to poor sexual function. Findings are congruent with sexual function theory, and underscore the importance of addressing depression when treating sexual function in those with disordered eating behavior

Structure in Zero-Divisor Graphs of Commutative Rings

In this research, we associate a graph in a natural way with the zero-divisors of a commutative ring. We endeavor to characterize various attributes of the graph, including connectivity, diameter, and symmetry. In exploring symmetry in the graph, we examine the automorphism group of the graph, and provide a complete characterization for the rings ZN. Secondly, we seek ring-theoretic properties which may be described in terms of the associated zero-divisor graph. These include, among other results, a strong relationship between finite local rings and graphs admitting a vertex connected to every other vertex

The Falkens: A Tax Case

Personal finance students want to learn about taxes. Personal finance texts, however, often concentrate on an overview of the tax system; since rules and forms change annually, textbook authors concentrate their short problems on the fundamentals. The Falken case allows students to use actual forms and schedules to complete a comprehensive example. Instructors can include only those “modules” that meet their students’ needs, and they easily can update the exhibits as laws change