Taina Vuorela’s (Phil. Lic.) will defend here dissertation entitled “Approaches to a Business Negotiation Case Study: Teamwork, Humour and Teaching” at the Helsinki School of Economics (Main Building, Great Hall) on December 7 at 12.00 noon. The field of the study is international business communication. Professor (emeritus) Kari Sajavaara, PhD, (Jyväskylä University) will act as opponent and Professor Mirjaliisa Charles, PhD, (Helsinki School of Economics) as custodian.
The startin
A new book by Francis Green, Professor of Economics at the University of Kent, is about to have a major impact on how we perceive the quality of work and working life.
Titled Demanding Work: The Paradox of Job Quality in the Affluent Economy (Princeton University Press), Professor Green’s book uses information drawn from high-quality social surveys and administrative data to present a unique and authoritative account of changing job quality in contemporary society.
In his
Children aged 10 and 11 are sexually mature, and neither they nor society are suitably prepared for the implications of that.
This is the message of Professors Mark Hanson and Peter Gluckman, whose review of the evolution of puberty is published online this week in Trends in Endocrinology and Metabolism.
Hanson and Gluckman, who respectively head the Centre for the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) at the University of Southampton, and the Liggins Instit
In interrogating suspected perpetrators it’s important to be able to determine who is telling the truth. A new dissertation from Göteborg University in Sweden shows that strategic questioning can considerably enhance the interrogator’s ability to assess the reliability of information.
In many contexts, such as in the justice system, it is important to be able to judge who is lying and who is telling the truth. Such judgments are not least important when it comes to interrogating s
Low job satisfaction in working mothers increases the stress levels of their children, but spending longer in childcare can help overcome these effects, new research has shown.
In a study involving more than 50 nursery school children, researchers found higher levels of the stress hormone cortisol in children whose mothers found their jobs less rewarding, or left them feeling emotionally exhausted, than those who reported more enjoyment from their jobs.
Levels of cortis
The dramatic rise in the number of Britons going broke has been partly caused by a dangerous addiction to reinvention and ‘want now’ consumerism, according to Professor Anthony Elliott of the University of Kent.
Elliott, Professor of Sociology in Kent’s School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research, argues that consumers are so bewitched by seductive services, designer goods and hi-tech products that they become addicted to spending. This is an addiction that is blind
Just five years ago Britain’s coffee houses were in a sorry state of decline. Today, and confounding many pundits’ expectations, coffee houses are springing up across the UK’s cities, towns and villages in the form of latte-serving cafes and coffee shop chains. But, what is everyday life like in these new public places in the city? And is Britain’s new cappuccino community livelier than the traditional pub crowd?
Researchers, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and b
As older workers approach 65 and the official retirement age, many say that they want the Government and employers to be more flexible over retirement age so that they can continue working if they desire. They think that people should be able to retire before 65 or continue to work if that is what they want. Many of those interviewed now want to go on working as they think they still have much to offer their employers. However, they do not want the official age of retirement to rise from 65 years a
Jenny Billings, Research Fellow in the Centre for Health Services Studies at the University of Kent, has responded to the current controversy surrounding the legal challenge to a law that allows young girls to have abortions without parental knowledge by saying, ‘Confidentiality is at the forefront of teenagers’ minds when they are using sexual health services.’
Billings, an experienced researcher and lecturer with a special interest in health service research and evaluation, p
New research from the forthcoming issue of the Journal of Consumer Research reveals that we pick certain brand names for an entirely narcissistic reason – because they contain letters of the alphabet that are in our own name. The theory is an extension of the ’name letter effect,’ which has demonstrated that people indeed like the letters in their name more so than others letters. The current research extends this phenomenon to consumerism and defines ’name letter branding,’
While our insatiable devotion to buying more stuff is no revelation, it is not completely understood where this materialistic mentality comes from. A forthcoming study from the forthcoming issue of the Journal of Consumer Research seeks to better explain the cultivation of this rather unattractive, yet inimitably American trait, arguing that television plays a significant role in creating materialists.
“The more television individuals watch, the more materialistic they apparently become,
In an article in the forthcoming December 2005 issue of the Journal of Consumer Research, researchers compare the focusing on the process of decision-making to focusing on the outcome of the decision. They found that feeling responsible for the outcome of a decision may drive people to a third choice – inaction.
“For many high stakes decisions, such as financial investments and healthcare choices, a focus on process or outcome may turn out to be a critical decision factor,” write
When someone in our social group makes friends with someone from another background, the chances are that our own prejudices will break down, according to new ESRC-funded research.
A study led by Dr. Adam Rutland, of the University of Kent, backs claims that the more we learn about others, the better we are likely to get on with them.
It found that what is termed the ‘extended contact’ approach, could effectively change children’s attitudes and intended behaviour towards r
Having the right kind of neighbors can help prevent teens from having sex at an early age, according to new research.
A study in Chicago found that some teens were more likely to delay having sex if they lived in neighborhoods where the adults kept a close eye on area children.
The teens who benefited from living in these close-knit neighborhoods were those who had the least parental supervision, such as might occur when both parents work outside the home.
T
Researchers from Bradford and London have been awarded a grant to examine emerging new forms of the traditional family unit and how people value a commitment to them.
Professor Simon Duncan, from the University of Bradford’s department of Social Sciences and Humanities, has been given a research grant from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) to work with Miranda Phillips from the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen) in London.
Their research, entitled
Reflecting on meaningful values provides biological and psychological protection from the adverse effects of stress, UCLA psychologists report in the November issue of the journal Psychological Science.
“Our study shows that reflection on personal values can buffer people from the effects of stress, but the implications are broader than that,” said Shelley E. Taylor, UCLA distinguished professor of psychology, and an expert in the field of stress and health. “Any positive self-affi
Feedback
