Sexual Attitudes and Behaviors Among Adolescents

The purpose of this article is to examine the self-reported sexual attitudes and behaviors of adolescents living in the Midwest. A survey was administered to 463 African American youths ages 11–19. The results indicate that intent to have sexual intercourse, reported likelihood toward having sexual intercourse, and whether participants felt that they would have sex in the next 3 months were predictors of whether they had sexual intercourse at the 3-month follow-up. The results also revealed that the opinions of referent others did not predict sexual intercourse at 3 months. Negative attitudes toward condoms did predict condom use at 3 months and the opinions of referent others also predicted condom use at 3 months. Limitations as well as future research are also discussed.     

Facilitating technology transfer among organizations: An applied communication strategy concept for organizational boundary spanners

Facilitating technology transfer from one organization to another is a complex process. Organization representatives are key players in the facilitation process and act to span the boundary between organizations. This paper offers a conceptual framework concerning organizational “boundary” spanners who must cross lines to transfer technology. From a communication viewpoint, boundary spanners need to reduce uncertainty, process information, and provide representation in order to achieve organizational outcomes of building relationships, achieving performance, and applying technology. This framework describes several strategies involved in the process of technology transfer: inquiry, self-disclosure, enhancing self-image, bargaining, and relationship-building. In short, we argue that individual boundary spanners need to be effective communicators when facilitating the technology transfer process.     

Decentralising to Villages in Indonesia: Money (and Other) Mistakes

Nearly 15 years after embarking on its large‐scale decentralisation programme, Indonesia has decided to extend its efforts to the village level. Decentralising to villages is intended to improve service delivery performance at the lowest administrative tier and reduce social inequality and poverty. A number of potential difficulties with the design of Indonesia's nascent village decentralisation initiative have already become apparent. Methods used to allocate funds to villages are particularly problematic. Oddly, fund distribution procedures insist to a large extent on equal per village allocations, despite the significant heterogeneity of villages. And they ignore other sources of revenue to which villages have access. In the event, village revenues will be very inequitably distributed: villages with high levels of poverty will receive less money than they need and villages with access to significant funding from oil and gas revenues will receive more than required. Also, village service responsibilities are unclearly defined, village financial management systems are inadequately prepared to handle large increases in funding, and mechanisms to monitor and control village spending are underdeveloped. These difficulties will severely constrain the achievement of official objectives and create further challenges for reformers in their attempts to combat corruption at the subnational level. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Efficiently Taking Soundings in a Sea of Change: Two Histories of Public Budgeting and Finance

Books reviewed:
Irene S. Rubin, Class, Tax, and Power: Municipal Budgeting in the United States.
Donald R. Stabile, The Origins of American Public Finance: Debates over Money, Debt, and Taxes in the Constitutional Era, 1776–1836.