Surviving the suicides of significant others: a case study

Psychological pain has been reported to be major contributing factor for completed suicide, and classical suicidology based its wisdom on this construct. In this paper we report the case of a patient whose family experienced a high number of suicides apparently due to an escalation of psychological pain in the family members after the successive suicides. We also briefly discuss the problem of helping survivors after the suicide of loved one.     

论神话的交流模式

神话话语的神话性,典型地反映了与经验思维完全不同的神话思维模式.对神话话语的传播过程的探讨,是研究人类文明传承机制的重要一环.神话话语的交流或传播,只有放在人类一般交流方式的总体框架内加以考察,才有可能揭示其中的本质规律.     

Quality Management in Public-Sector Organizations: Evidence from Six EU Countries

Although there is considerable evidence for the hypothesis that an efficient use of management techniques is the key to a good public service delivery, a lot of studies come to the conclusion that there is only partial, reluctant implementation or even a general lack of the use of such techniques by public managers. This paper examines the determinants for the use of quality management techniques in public sector organizations from six EU countries. It turns out that especially more organizational autonomy and result control appear to be of importance while, surprisingly, the combination of these variables leads to negative results.     

Pitfalls of Computed Tomography 3D Reconstruction Models in Cranial Nonmetric Analysis*

Many studies in the literature have highlighted the utility of virtual 3D databanks as a substitute for real skeletal collections and the important application of radiological records in personal identification. However, none have investigated the accuracy of virtual material compared to skeletal remains in nonmetric variant analysis using 3D models. The present study investigates the accuracy of 20 computed tomography (CT) 3D reconstruction models compared to the real crania, focusing on the quality of the reproduction of the real crania and the possibility to detect 29 dental/cranial morphological variations in 3D images. An interobserver analysis was performed to evaluate trait identification, number, position, and shape. Results demonstrate a false bone loss in 3D models in some cranial regions, specifically the maxillary and occipital bones in 85% and 20% of the samples. Additional analyses revealed several difficulties in the detection of cranial nonmetric traits in 3D models, resulting in incorrect identification in circa 70% of the traits. In particular, pitfalls included the detection of erroneous position, error in presence/absence rates, in number, and in shape. The lowest percentages of correct evaluations were found in traits localized in the lateral side of the cranium and for the infraorbital suture, mastoid foramen, and crenulation. The present study highlights important pitfalls in CT scan when compared with the real crania for nonmetric analysis. This may have crucial consequences in cases where 3D databanks are used as a source of reference population data for nonmetric traits and pathologies and during bone-CT comparisons for identification purposes.     

Societal Actors Shape Collective Identities of Minorities: Procedural Fairness Climate Effects on Identification,Subjective Well-Being and Psychological Health

In the present studies, we aimed to show that the perceived procedural fairness of societal actors’ multicultural decisions promotes ethnic minority members’ societal identification. These enhanced identification levels, in turn, contribute to better psychological health and well-being. Firstly, a vignette study in a sample of African Americans explored the effect of procedural fairness climate on identification. The second and third studies used self-report questionnaires. Study 2 consisted of a sample of sojourners in a university context, Study 3 analyzed online data through an African American sample. The studies provided evidence for the effect of procedural fairness climate on increased societal identification, which in turn mediates the fairness effect on increased well-being and psychological health. Societal actors can use procedural fairness to increase well-being when making decisions that involve ethnic minorities.

     

Structural reform histories and perceptions of organizational autonomy: Do senior managers perceive less strategic policy autonomy when faced with frequent and intense restructuring?

Through recurrent structural reform programmes governments are on a quest to design public organizations that will stand the test of their environment. One of the approaches to uncertain or sensitive issues has been to create various forms of (semi‐)autonomous organizations with substantial strategic discretion. However, while governments repeatedly experiment with designs, one might simultaneously expect that such interference through repeated structural change may limit the degree of strategic policy autonomy perceived by senior managers. More specifically, we propose that intense structural reforms may inadvertently reduce strategic policy autonomy perceptions through two mechanisms. First, intense sequences of structural reforms may lead to perceptions of relatively controlling political principals. Second, they may reduce an organization's ability to accrue resources beneficial to autonomy, such as a strong internal culture, network embeddedness and expertise. Results indicate that strategic policy autonomy perceptions will indeed be detrimentally affected for organizations that experience intense sequences of structural reform.     

Perceptions of Problem Behavior in Adolescents’ Families: Perceiver,Target, and Family Effects

Considerable research has focused on the reliability and validity of informant reports of family behavior, especially maternal reports of adolescent problem behavior. None of these studies, however, has based their orientation on a theoretical model of interpersonal perception. In this study we used the social relations model (SRM) to examine family members’ reports of each others’ externalizing and internalizing problem behavior. Two parents and two adolescents in 69 families rated each others’ behavior within a round-robin design. SRM analysis showed that within-family perceptions of externalizing and internalizing behaviors are consistently due to three sources of variance; perceiver, target, and family effects. A family/contextual effect on informant reports of problem behavior has not been previously reported.     

Characterizing the Self-System over Time in Adolescence: Internal Structure and Associations with Internalizing Symptoms

The longitudinal effects among self and identity processes, and between these processes and internalizing symptoms, are not well understood. As a result, the present study was designed to ascertain the over-time effects among identity commitment, reconsideration of commitments, and self-concept clarity, as well as to map the interplay of these self and identity processes with anxiety and depressive symptoms in early adolescence. A sample of 923 Dutch adolescents (mean age 12.4 years at Time 1; 49.3% female) participated at each of five annual assessments. Multivariate growth curve and cross-lagged panel models indicated that the association between self-concept clarity and commitment was bidirectional, that reconsideration occurs based on problems or dissatisfaction with self-concept clarity and with identity commitments, and that self-concept clarity (but not commitment or reconsideration) temporally precedes depressive and anxiety symptoms. Results are discussed in terms of the structure of the self-system and its associations with internalizing symptoms.     

From environmental policy concepts to practicable tools: Knowledge creation and delegation in multilevel systems

The problem‐solving capacity and problem‐generating potential of multilevel systems entail the need for the delegation of authority. When the problem concerned is about how to put an abstract policy concept into a practicable policy tool, the choice of the respective delegation trajectory depends on the policy models or the policy‐relevant knowledge that the respective political levels can supply. When regarding the European Union (EU) level as the starting point of knowledge creation and delegation trajectories, and concentrating on transaction costs, policy knowledge and models generated at the international level provide the most cost‐effective solution. Only when the international level is not able to provide further policy knowledge and innovation does the EU delegate its definitional authority, first downward to the member states and then sideways to EU agencies. We illustrate the plausibility of our dynamic understanding of multilevel governance by using Environmental Policy Integration as an example.