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Value Systems (value + system)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Psychology	30%
Business, Economics, Finance and Accounting	26%
Humanities and Social Sciences	21%
Medical Sciences	17%

Selected Abstracts

Fast analytical short-circuit current calculation of rectifier-fed auxiliary subsystems

EUROPEAN TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTRICAL POWER, Issue 3 2003
M. Kunz
The course of time of a three-phase rectifier system which its alternating valve participation can be interpreted as a continuous sequence of alternating switching states. To allow a more convenient calculation, the substitutional circuit with the converter is transformed into state-space coordinates. Hereby each operational mode of the rectifier can be represented by two linear independent space-phasor component networks. In the state-space, an analytical solution for this boundary value system can be carried out. After a retransformation back into the time domain, its time functions can be derived. In contrast to other calculation methods, no assumptions or simplifications have to be made like ideal smooth DC currents. Furthermore, all states of operation of the rectifier bridge can be easily calculated, which cover DC side idle-running to DC short-circuit. [source]

Simone de Beauvoir's Ethics, the Master/Slave Dialectic, and Eichmann as a Sub-Man

HYPATIA, Issue 2 2009
ANNE MORGAN
Simone de Beauvoir incorporates a significantly altered form of the Hegelian master/slave dialectic into The Ethics of Ambiguity. Her ethical theory explains and denounces extreme wrongdoing, such as the mass murder of millions of Jews at the hands of the Nazis. This essay demonstrates that, in the Beauvoirean dialectic, the Nazi value system (and Hitler) was the master, Adolf Eichmann was a slave, and Jews were denied human status. The analysis counters Robin May Schott's claims that "Beauvoir portrays the attitudes of the oppressor as defined fundamentally in relation to the oppressed" and that her use of the dialectic is "inadequate to account for how human beings create extreme situations of evil, such as that of genocide." [source]

Correcting misconceptions about the development of social work in China: a response to Hutchings and Taylor

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF SOCIAL WELFARE, Issue 1 2008
Cunfu Jia
Hutchings and Taylor, in their article entitled ,Defining the profession? Exploring an international definition of social work in the China context'[International Journal of Social Welfare 16: 381,389], no doubt had good intentions in offering their account of the development of social work in China, as the opening and concluding sections of the article show. Within the text, however, their critique of contemporary social work in China is, in my opinion, unfair in relation to, among other things, (i) the undemocratic nature of the Chinese political system, which they say hinders the development of social work in China; (ii) the ideology of the Communist Party, the government, and traditional Chinese culture, which they say are at odds with Western social work's value system and methodology; thus concluding that (iii) it is doubtful whether social work development in China could integrate with that of the international community. In this response, I comment on (i) the information base of the authors; (ii) the disconnection between their conceptualisation and historical facts; and (iii) their use of the international definition of social work. [source]

When multi-problem poor individuals' values meet practitioners' values!

JOURNAL OF COMMUNITY & APPLIED SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 5 2005
Liliana Sousa
Abstract Every intervention process can be thought of as a journey of partnership between people, as well as an intellectual journey of ideas and an emotional journey of relationships. This exploratory study aims at reaching a better understanding of three questions: (i) What values do individual heads of multi-problem poor households and practitioners show regarding their relationship? (ii) How might those values inform the interaction between them, in positive and/or negative ways? (iii) What might the value system which organizes the interaction between the participants be? This study was carried out using a critical incidents technique and was based on a sample comprising two sub-groups: 100 heads of multi-problem poor families and 97 professionals. Findings reveal the following individual values: heads of multi-problem poor families value instrumental support, relationships and effectiveness; while professionals' appreciate relationships, obedience to their own instructions and (in)effectiveness. These value systems seem to frame the interaction in games of responsibility avoidance that lead to the individuals' disempowerment, disguised in an aura of ,adequate impotence'. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]

Working in and around the ,chain of command': power relations among nursing staff in an urban nursing home

NURSING INQUIRY, Issue 1 2002
Lori L. JervisArticle first published online: 3 APR 200
Working in and around the ,chain of command': power relations among nursing staff in an urban nursing home By most accounts, the discipline of nursing enjoys considerable hegemony in US nursing homes. Not surprisingly, the ethos of this setting is influenced, in large part, by nursing's value system. This ethos powerfully impacts both the residents who live in nursing homes and the staff who work there. Using ethnographic methods, this project explored power relations among nursing assistants and nurses in an urban nursing home in the United States. Factors contributing to tensions among nursing staff were the stigma attached to nursing homes and those who work in them, as well as the long history of class conflict and power struggles within the discipline of nursing. The latter struggles, in turn, reflected nursing's quest for professional status in the face of medicine's hegemony over health-care. Ultimately, these factors coalesced to produce a local work environment characterized by conflict , and by aides' resistance to nurses' domination. [source]

Five-Finger Exercises: Mika Waltari's Detective Stories

ORBIS LITERARUM, Issue 1 2004
Heta Pyrhönen
This essay addresses the question of what happens when authors import into their own culture a genre whose structures and conventions have been moulded in another culture. If the imported structures and conventions include a certain value system, does an author's adaptation cause them to express markedly different values than they do in their original context? I explore this question by analysing the detective stories by Mika Waltari, a reowned Finnish author, who used both the British whodunit and Edgar Allan Poe's Dupin stories as models. I first consider Waltari's use of specific generic conventions and consider the national values he makes them express. I then analyse Waltari's insertion of himself into the textual roles of detective and culprit in order to examine the link between writing detective stories and ideology. I show how Waltari creates a fundamental discrepancy between the whodunit world and the Finnish context in which he sets this world in order to emphasize the literariness of the imitated model. In his hands, writing detective stories becomes first and foremost a literary exercise that enables him to show his skilful, self-reflexive, and ironic play with literary forms and conventions. [source]

Assessment and Statistics of Surgically Induced Astigmatism

ACTA OPHTHALMOLOGICA, Issue thesis1 2008
Kristian Næser
Abstract. The aim of the thesis was to develop methods for assessment of surgically induced astigmatism (SIA) in individual eyes, and in groups of eyes. The thesis is based on 12 peer-reviewed publications, published over a period of 16 years. In these publications older and contemporary literature was reviewed1. A new method (the polar system) for analysis of SIA was developed. Multivariate statistical analysis of refractive data was described2,4. Clinical validation studies were performed. The description of a cylinder surface with polar values and differential geometry was compared. The main results were: refractive data in the form of sphere, cylinder and axis may define an individual patient or data set, but are unsuited for mathematical and statistical analyses1. The polar value system converts net astigmatisms to orthonormal components in dioptric space. A polar value is the difference in meridional power between two orthogonal meridians5,6. Any pair of polar values, separated by an arch of 45 degrees, characterizes a net astigmatism completely7. The two polar values represent the net curvital and net torsional power over the chosen meridian8. The spherical component is described by the spherical equivalent power. Several clinical studies demonstrated the efficiency of multivariate statistical analysis of refractive data4,9,11. Polar values and formal differential geometry describe astigmatic surfaces with similar concepts and mathematical functions8. Other contemporary methods, such as Long's power matrix, Holladay's and Alpins' methods, Zernike12 and Fourier analyses8, are correlated to the polar value system. In conclusion, analysis of SIA should be performed with polar values or other contemporary component systems. [source]

Parenting and Adolescents' Accuracy in Perceiving Parental Values

CHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 2 2003
Ariel Knafo
What determines adolescents' accuracy in perceiving parental values? The current study examined potential predictors including parental value communication, family value agreement, and parenting styles. In the study, 547 Israeli adolescents (aged 16 to 18) of diverse socioeconomic backgrounds participated with their parents. Adolescents reported the values they perceive their parents want them to hold. Parents reported their socialization values. Accuracy in perceiving parents' overall value system correlated positively with parents' actual and perceived value agreement and perceived parental warmth and responsiveness, but negatively with perceived value conflict, indifferent parenting, and autocratic parenting in all gender compositions of parent,child dyads. Other associations varied by dyad type. Findings were similar for predicting accuracy in perceiving two specific values: tradition and hedonism. The article discusses implications for the processes that underlie accurate perception, gender differences, and other potential influences on accuracy in value perception. [source]

Bootstrapping Cognition from Behavior,A Computerized Thought Experiment

COGNITIVE SCIENCE - A MULTIDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL, Issue 3 2008
Ralf Möller
Abstract We show that simple perceptual competences can emerge from an internal simulation of action effects and are thus grounded in behavior. A simulated agent learns to distinguish between dead ends and corridors without the necessity to represent these concepts in the sensory domain. Initially, the agent is only endowed with a simple value system and the means to extract low-level features from an image. In the interaction with the environment, it acquires a visuo-tactile forward model that allows the agent to predict how the visual input is changing under its movements, and whether movements will lead to a collision. From short-term predictions based on the forward model, the agent learns an inverse model. The inverse model in turn produces suggestions about which actions should be simulated in long-term predictions, and long-term predictions eventually give rise to the perceptual ability. [source]

Personal values and relational models

EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF PERSONALITY, Issue 7 2008
Pascal Biber
Abstract In this study, the comprehensive value research by Schwartz (e.g. 1992) was linked to Fiske's relational models theory (RMT, e.g. Fiske, 1991). A sample of 297 people answered the personal values questionnaire (PVQ), the modes of relationship questionnaire (MORQ) and the relationship profile scale (RPS) in a web-based online survey. As hypothesized, the set of 10 values correlated in a systematic manner,according to the circular structure of personal value systems,with both trait-like construal of and motivational investment in the relational models communal sharing (CS), authority ranking (AR) and market pricing (MP). Further research concerning a person,environment value congruency approach to predict well-being is suggested combining the two research traditions. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]

Patients' perceptions of cultural factors affecting the quality of their medical encounters

HEALTH EXPECTATIONS, Issue 1 2005
Anna M. Nápoles-Springer PhD
Abstract Objective, The aim of this study was to identify key domains of cultural competence from the perspective of ethnically and linguistically diverse patients. Design, The study involved one-time focus groups in community settings with 61 African,Americans, 45 Latinos and 55 non-Latino Whites. Participants' mean age was 48 years, 45% were women, and 47% had less than a high school education. Participants in 19 groups were asked the meaning of ,culture' and what cultural factors influenced the quality of their medical encounters. Each text unit (TU or identifiable continuous verbal utterance) of focus group transcripts was content analysed to identify key dimensions using inductive and deductive methods. The proportion of TUs was calculated for each dimension by ethnic group. Results, Definitions of culture common to all three ethnic groups included value systems (25% of TUs), customs (17%), self-identified ethnicity (15%), nationality (11%) and stereotypes (4%). Factors influencing the quality of medical encounters common to all ethnic groups included sensitivity to complementary/alternative medicine (17%), health insurance-based discrimination (12%), social class-based discrimination (9%), ethnic concordance of physician and patient (8%), and age-based discrimination (4%). Physicians' acceptance of the role of spirtuality (2%) and of family (2%), and ethnicity-based discrimination (11%) were cultural factors specific to non-Whites. Language issues (21%) and immigration status (5%) were Latino-specific factors. Conclusions, Providing quality health care to ethnically diverse patients requires cultural flexibility to elicit and respond to cultural factors in medical encounters. Interventions to reduce disparities in health and health care in the USA need to address cultural factors that affect the quality of medical encounters. [source]

Comparing Democrats and Republicans on Intrinsic and Extrinsic Values

JOURNAL OF APPLIED SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 3 2009
Kennon M. Sheldon
Although claimed differences in values have played a prominent role in recent U.S. politics, the value systems of typical Republicans and Democrats have not been evaluated within a relevant dimensional framework. In 4 studies, party members were compared on extrinsic (money, popularity, image) and intrinsic (intimacy, helping, growth) values. Republicans were consistently higher on extrinsic relative to intrinsic values, a pattern suggested by past research to be personally and socially problematic. In Study 4, Republicans were also lower in a different measure of prosocial values, derived from social-dilemma research. All studies found an interaction such that only nonreligious Republicans were lower than Democrats on the intrinsic value of helping needy others. Implications for contemporary political discourse are discussed. [source]

Perspectives on professional values among nurses in Taiwan

JOURNAL OF CLINICAL NURSING, Issue 10 2009
Fu-Jin Shih
Aim., The purpose of this study was to identify the most important contemporary professional nursing values for nursing clinicians and educators in Taiwan. Background., Nursing values are constructed by members of political and social systems, including professional nursing organisations and educational institutions. Nurses' personal value systems shape the development of these professional values. An understanding of nurses' perceptions of professional values will enable the profession to examine consistencies with those reflected in existing and emerging educational and practice environments. Design., A qualitative descriptive study was conducted using the focus-group discussion method. Methods., A purposive sample of 300 registered nurses in Taiwan, consisting of 270 nursing clinicians and 30 faculty members, participated in 22 focus-group interviews. Data were analysed using a systematic process of content analysis. Results., Six prominent values related to professional nursing were identified: (a) caring for clients with a humanistic spirit; (b) providing professionally competent and holistic care; (c) fostering growth and discovering the meaning of life; (d) experiencing the ,give-and-take' of caring for others; (e) receiving fair compensation; and (f) raising the public's awareness of health promotion. Four background contexts framed the way participants viewed the appropriation of these values: (a) appraising nursing values through multiple perspectives; (b) acquiring nursing values through self-realisation; (c) recognising nursing values through professional competency and humanistic concerns and (d) fulfilling nursing values through coexisting self-actualisation. A conceptual framework was developed to represent this phenomenon. Conclusion., The most important professional nursing values according to the perspectives of nurses in Taiwan were identified. These values reflect benefits to society, to nurses themselves and to the interdisciplinary team. Relevance to clinical practice., Nurses' awareness of their own values and of how these values influence their behaviour is an essential component of humanistic nursing care. Nursing educators need to develop better strategies for reflection and integration of both personal and professional philosophies and values. [source]

When multi-problem poor individuals' values meet practitioners' values!

Sensemaking and the Distortion of Critical Upward Communication in Organizations

JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES, Issue 4 2006
Dennis Tourish
abstract Most research into feedback has focused on communication from managers to non-managerial staff. To a lesser extent, it has more recently addressed upward and 360 degree appraisal systems. In contrast, the role of informal upward communication continues to be largely neglected, especially when it concerns the transmission of opinions critical of managerial orthodoxy. There has been little examination of the sensemaking heuristics employed by both managers and non-managerial staff that stimulates the former to disregard much of the already muted critical upward communication they receive, and the latter to suppress its transmission in the first place. We therefore suggest that managers often over commit to particular courses of action, irrespective of whether they bode ill or well for the organization concerned. In so doing, they frequently demonize those who belong to stigmatized outgroups or who hold contrary value systems. We argue that the consequent elimination of critical upward communication (CUC) leads to iatrogenic phenomena , i.e. organizational problems that are derived from the treatment regime that has been prescribed, rather than from a pre-existing condition. Implications for practice and further research are considered. [source]

The Underpinnings of ,Bureaucratic' Control Systems: HRM in European Multinationals

JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES, Issue 4 2000
Anthony Ferner
This paper explores the relationship between the operation of management control systems and the mobilization of power resources in multinational companies. It argues that formal ,bureaucratic' controls depend for their effective operation on informal systems and the power relations they embody. In particular, bureaucratic control systems rely inherently on the deployment of ,social' control mechanisms relating to the creation of common value systems, understandings, and expectations about the ,rules of the game' among corporate actors. The argument is illustrated by material from case studies of HRM in British and German multinationals. [source]

Contextual constraints in knowledge management theory: the cultural embeddedness of Nonaka's knowledge-creating company

KNOWLEDGE AND PROCESS MANAGEMENT: THE JOURNAL OF CORPORATE TRANSFORMATION, Issue 1 2003
Martin Glisby
Nonaka and Takeuchi's book The Knowledge Creating Company is one of the most influential in the field of knowledge management. The famous SECI Model, representing the four modes of knowledge creation (socialization, externalization, combination and internalization) seems to have been accepted by the knowledge management community as universally valid in conception and in application. This paper argues that the model must be seen first and foremost as a product of the environment from which it emerged, namely Japan. It is contended that each of the four modes can only be understood with reference to their embeddedness in Japanese social and organizational culture and related value systems. Thus the model should be used with caution. It should be seen as a map rather than a model; or perhaps as a special kind of mirror, which allows us to see ourselves and our knowledge management practices in new ways for directing change. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]

The investigation of Chinese consumer values, consumption values, life satisfaction, and consumption behaviors

PSYCHOLOGY & MARKETING, Issue 7 2009
Ge Xiao
The primary objective of this study was to investigate how the changing value systems of modern Chinese consumers affect their consumption behaviors and life satisfaction through the mediating variables of consumption values. The results of the multivariate data analysis show that three out of four types of consumer values (i.e., functional, emotional, and social) were positively related to foreign brand purchasing. Among all accepted relationships, the one between collectivism and functional value was the highest, whereas the collectivism and epistemic value relationship was the lowest. Individualism and collectivism were both found to be positively related to foreign brand purchasing and life satisfaction. Compared to collectivists, individualists were less satisfied with their current lives, but they held a more favorable attitude toward foreign brands. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [source]

A KOREAN PERSPECTIVE ON DEVELOPING A GLOBAL POLICY FOR ADVANCE DIRECTIVES

BIOETHICS, Issue 3 2010
SOYOON KIM
ABSTRACT Despite the wide and daunting array of cross-cultural obstacles that the formulation of a global policy on advance directives will clearly pose, the need is equally evident. Specifically, the expansion of medical services driven by medical tourism, just to name one important example, makes this issue urgently relevant. While ensuring consistency across national borders, a global policy will have the additional and perhaps even more important effect of increasing the use of advance directives in clinical settings and enhancing their effectiveness within each country, regardless of where that country's state of the law currently stands. One cross-cultural issue that may represent a major obstacle in formulating, let alone applying, a global policy is whether patient autonomy as the underlying principle for the use of advance directives is a universal norm or a construct of western traditions that must be reconciled with alternative value systems that may place lesser significance on individual choice. A global policy, at a minimum, must emphasize respect for patient autonomy, provision of medical information, limits to the obligations for physicians, and portability. And though the development of a global policy will be no easy task, active engagement in close collaboration with the World Health Organization can make it possible. [source]

Balancing product and process sustainability against business profitability: sustainability as a competitive strategy in the property development process

BUSINESS STRATEGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT, Issue 2 2009
John R. Bryson
Abstract This paper explores the activities of two UK-based property development companies that have integrated sustainability into their business models as a source of competitive advantage in response to an evolving public sector sustainability agenda. These companies have combined different individual competencies and developed new routines and business practices that provide them with distinctiveness in the marketplace. These new routines represent entrepreneurial behaviour constructed around the identification of profitable market niches based on values derived from incorporating sustainability into private sector business models. This incorporation requires the development of a framework for balancing sustainability and related value systems against more mainstream concerns with maximizing profitability. This paper identifies this framework and explores the ways in which these firms have developed a discursive formation of profit and value that is used to balance the tensions that exist in a business model formulated around balancing a double bottom line. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment. [source]

Same Beginnings, Different Stories: A Comparison of American and Chinese Children's Narratives

CHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 5 2000
Qi Wang
This study examined social, emotional, and cognitive characteristics of American and Chinese children's narratives. Twenty-four American and 26 Chinese 6-year-old children participated. Each child was interviewed individually twice with a 1-week delay interval. During the two interviews, children were asked to tell 11 stories prompted by pictures and standard verbal leads and to recount 7 emotional memories. Content analyses were performed on children's stories and memories. In line with predictions, findings indicated that compared with American children, Chinese children showed greater orientation toward social engagement, greater concern with moral correctness, greater concern with authority, a less autonomous orientation, more expressions of emotions, and more situational details in both their stories and memories. A few gender differences were found. Findings are discussed in terms of different value systems and early socialization practices in these two cultures. [source]

Using Exemplary Business Practices to Identify Buddhist and Confucian Ethical Value Systems1

BUSINESS AND SOCIETY REVIEW, Issue 4 2009
JAMES WEBER
ABSTRACT Initially, a brief history of Buddhism and Confucianism describes for the reader a framework developed to determine right versus wrong action and to guide followers of these religions to do the right thing in social or business practice. In addition, this article uncovers exemplary business practices grounded in Buddhist and Confucian ethical values system and practiced in the global business arena and uses these discoveries to describe an application of Buddhist and Confucian ethical values systems. The result is the recognition that these ethical values systems have an honorable and moral place in global business practice. [source]