A 'novel' approach to leadership development : using women's literary fiction to explore contemporary women's leadership issues : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Masters of Business Studies in Management at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand

The central aim of this thesis is to investigate how women’s literary fiction can be harnessed for the purpose of exploring contemporary women’s leadership issues. This thesis argues that literary fiction is a valuable source of interdisciplinary and ‘artful’ consciousness-raising material for proactively addressing at the interpersonal level a wide range of critical concerns related to women’s leadership experiences. Having identified a significant ‘gap’ in the extant literature – the underutilisation of women’s novels, short-stories and plays in leadership studies – this thesis adopts an interdisciplinary approach to demonstrate how literary works can be used to examine women’s contemporary leadership issues. For this research project I adopted an interpretive qualitative research paradigm informed by critical leadership studies and a multiplicity of feminist perspectives. I developed a systematic method for long listing and short listing appropriate texts and analysed selected works in response to a five-point conceptual framework of critical concerns arising from a review of the women and leadership literature. I also kept a reflective blog to track the iterative nature of the research process and to record my learning during this study. The findings demonstrate that women’s literary fiction offers a rich repository of thought-provoking illustrations of women’s leadership concerns, including gender binaries, power-play, socially constructed perceptions and gendered expectations, and women’s diverse range experiences as both leaders and followers. The extended analysis provides a number of in-depth examples and reflective questions, revealing myriad opportunities for critical theorising, illustrative analysis and critical reflection. Subsequently, this thesis argues that fictional stories are a viable and potentially transformative ‘artful’ intervention for addressing complex leadership issues concerned with gender within the context of women’s leadership development programmes. My recommendations for future studies include a focus on ethical leadership, the evaluation of participant ‘book club’ interventions and an extension of the reading lists to include more culturally relevant New Zealand authors. To my knowledge, there are no studies that utilise women’s literary fiction for the purpose of exploring contemporary women’s leadership concerns and questions. Consequently, my thesis makes an original contribution to the leadership and humanities field, as well as providing an innovative and creative product that can be used for critical and interdisciplinary approaches to women’s leadership development

Logistic mixed models to investigate implicit and explicit belief tracking

We investigated the proposition of a two-systems Theory of Mind in adults’ belief tracking. A sample of N = 45 participants predicted the choice of one of two opponent players after observing several rounds in an animated card game. Three matches of this card game were played and initial gaze direction on target and subsequent choice predictions were recorded for each belief task and participant. We conducted logistic regressions with mixed effects on the binary data and developed Bayesian logistic mixed models to infer implicit and explicit mentalizing in true belief and false belief tasks. Although logistic regressions with mixed effects predicted the data well a Bayesian logistic mixed model with latent task- and subject-specific parameters gave a better account of the data. As expected explicit choice predictions suggested a clear understanding of true and false beliefs (TB/FB). Surprisingly, however, model parameters for initial gaze direction also indicated belief tracking. We discuss why task-specific parameters for initial gaze directions are different from choice predictions yet reflect second-order perspective taking

The Pliocene closure fo the Central American Seaway : reconstructing surface-, intermediate- and deep-water connections

Timing of Gateway Closure The shoaling of the Isthmus of Panama and the associated reorganisation of deep-ocean circulation have been controversially reported as contributing to both a warming and a cooling of global climate. A resulting increase in moisture supply to the northern hemisphere, through the initiation or strengthening of the Gulf Stream, may have been an important precondition for Northern Hemisphere Glaciation. A robust timeframe for the closure of this major ocean gateway is essential for understanding its direct and indirect effects on global climate. Method We use radiogenic isotopes of Nd and Pb to reconstruct the history of shallow, intermediate and deep water connections between the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Equatorial Pacific Ocean from 5.0 to 2.0 million years ago. Surface water exchange is characterised using the Nd isotope composition of planktonic foraminiferal calcite. The Nd and Pb isotope compositions of early diagenetic ferromanganese coatings of the same sediment samples are employed to reconstruct intermediate and deep water exchange. Results and Conclusion Our results indicate that Caribbean Intermediate Water continued to diverge from a relatively constant Pacific deepwater Nd composition from 5.0 to 2.0 Ma. Comparison with published stable isotope and Mg/Ca records from the same ODP Sites 999, 1000 and 1241 suggest that Caribbean Intermediate Water composition continued to change even after a decrease in surface water exchange with the Pacific (4.5 Ma onwards [1]). A more rapid restriction of mixing between the Pacific and Caribbean at intermediate depths from 4 to 3.5 Ma clearly preceeded the major increase in ice-rafted-debris north of Iceland [2]. [1] Groeneveld et al. (2008) G3 9, Q01P23. [2] Jansen et al. (2000) Paleoceanography 15, 709-721

Laser Cooling of Dense Rubidium-Noble Gas Mixtures via Collisional Redistribution of Radiation

We describe experiments on the laser cooling of both helium-rubidium and argon-rubidium gas mixtures by collisional redistribution of radiation. Frequent alkali-noble gas collisions in the ultradense gas, with typically 200\,bar of noble buffer gas pressure, shift a highly red detuned optical beam into resonance with a rubidium D-line transition, while spontaneous decay occurs close to the unshifted atomic resonance frequency. The technique allows for the laser cooling of macroscopic ensembles of gas atoms. The use of helium as a buffer gas leads to smaller temperature changes within the gas volume due to the high thermal conductivity of this buffer gas, as compared to the heavier argon noble gas, while the heat transfer within the cell is improved.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figure

Quantifying the abundance of four large epiphytic fern species in remnant complex notophyll vine forest on the Atherton Tableland, north Queensland, Australia

Epiphytes are generally considered rare in complex forests on the western edge of the Atherton Tablelands, north Queensland. This assertion is based on comparisons with wetter forests in the Wet Tropics bioregion, but is of limited use in restoration projects where targets need to be quantified. We quantified ‘rarity’ for a subset of the epiphyte community in one of the largest remaining patches of Type 5b rainforest at Wongabel State Forest(17°18' S, 145°28' E). The bundance of large individuals of the epiphytic fern species Asplenium australasicum, Drynaria rigidula, Platycerium bifurcatum, and Platycerium superbum were recorded from 100 identified midstorey or canopy trees. Epiphytes were less rare than the canopy trees sampled, averaging 1.7 individuals per tree. A clumped distribution was suggested with large epiphytes only occurring on 57 of the 100 trees. As tree size increased so did the number of individuals and species of large epiphytes recorded; only trees taller than 20 m yielded more than one epiphyte. Trees from the Meliaceae and Rutaceae hosted the most epiphytes, but host tree specificity patterns were not conclusive. Techniques for including epiphytes in restoration planning and projects are considered, and a quantified restoration target for epiphyte communities in Type 5b plantings is outlined

Consistency tests for Planck and WMAP in the low multipole domain

Recently, full sky maps from Planck have been made publicly available. In this paper, we do consistency tests for the three Planck CMB sky maps. We assume that the difference between two maps represents the contributions from systematics, noise, foregrounds and other sources, and that a precise representation of the Cosmic Microwave Background should be uncorrelated with it. We investigate the cross correlation in pixel space between the difference maps and the various Planck maps and find no significant correlations, in comparison to 10000 random Gaussian simulated maps. Additionally we investigate the difference map between the WMAP ILC 9 year map and the ILC 7 year map. We perform cross correlations between this difference map, and the ILC9 and ILC7, and find significant correlations only for the ILC9, at more than the 99.99% level. Likewise, a comparison between the Planck NILC map and the WMAP ILC9 map, shows a strong correlation for the ILC9 map with the difference map, also at more than the 99.99% level. Thus the ILC9 appears to be more contaminated than the ILC7, which should be taken into consideration when using WMAP maps for cosmological analyses.Comment: 9 pages, 19 figures, submitted to JCA

The Price of Prejudice: Labour Market Discrimination on the Grounds of Gender and Ethnicity

Despite some progress, there is still evidence of discrimination on the grounds of gender and ethnic or racial origins in OECD labour markets. Field experiments show pervasive ethnic discrimination in many countries. We show indirect cross-country/time-series evidence that, using product market regulation as an instrument, suggests that on average at least 8% of the gender employment gap and a larger proportion of the gender wage gap can be attributed to discrimination. Virtually all OECD countries have enacted anti-discrimination laws in recent decades, and evaluations as well as cross-country analysis suggest that, if well-designed, these laws can be effective in reducing disparities in labour market outcomes. However, enforcement of anti-discrimination legislation is essentially based on victims' willingness to claim their rights. Thus, public awareness of legal rules and their expected consequences (notably, victims' costs and benefits of lodging complaints) is a crucial element of an effective policy strategy to establish a culture of equal treatment. However, legal rules are likely to have more impact if the enforcement is not exclusively dependent on individuals. In this respect, specific agencies may play a key role.field experiments; employment gaps; gender gaps; anti-discrimination laws

Viscous fingering of miscible slices

Viscous fingering of a miscible high viscosity slice of fluid displaced by a lower viscosity fluid is studied in porous media by direct numerical simulations of Darcy's law coupled to the evolution equation for the concentration of a solute controlling the viscosity of miscible solutions. In contrast with fingering between two semi-infinite regions, fingering of finite slices is a transient phenomenon due to the decrease in time of the viscosity ratio across the interface induced by fingering and dispersion processes. We show that fingering contributes transiently to the broadening of the peak in time by increasing its variance. A quantitative analysis of the asymptotic contribution of fingering to this variance is conducted as a function of the four relevant parameters of the problem i.e. the log-mobility ratio R, the length of the slice l, the Peclet number Pe and the ratio between transverse and axial dispersion coefficients $\epsilon$. Relevance of the results is discussed in relation with transport of viscous samples in chromatographic columns and propagation of contaminants in porous media.Comment: 10 pages, 13 figure