Cultural Feminism Essay

Feminism is a movement that is constituted of social, political and cultural perspective. Feminism per se has several forms in various disciplines that changed the facade of women in the western hemisphere, and the entire planet. Feminism roots to the oppression of women in different aspects of humanity. Basically the Feminist cause fights for equality of genders. Feminism Activists began to concern themselves in resolving social and domestic issues and throughout history, as society provided women with opportunities, it it broadened its scope and now tackles a variety of issues which includes gender matters , thus, Cultural Feminism was coined . Rationale Cultural Feminism, sometimes noted as Differential Feminism, is an orientation in Feminist Discipline whose aim is to address on women’s issues that were swept under the rug. This form of Feminism praises the positive qualities which a woman possess. The term Cultural Feminism tackles on the general and specific distinctions between man and woman, the theory also covers differences in the biological view (Balbert, 1989). Cultural Feminism’s intentions is to associate the application of women’s point of view in a world of male supremacy, which would likely lessen brutality in every sense. The core theoretics of Cultural Feminism is attributed to gendered Essentialism. Cultural Feminists tend to apply a non-progressive and Victorian approach, this disturbing take on issues urge the development between genders through the implications of a woman’s nature, tying up to the belief that the women’s methods are more efficient (Moore, 1952). In addition, Cultural Feminism claims that the world is obese of brute male power and needs diet via injection female perspectives. Cultural Feminism 2 Origin Cultural Feminism Jane Addams and Charlotte Perkins Gilman were credited as two of the earliest theorists in the dimensions of cultural Feminism. The two women are prominent to have Cultural Feminism in their literary works. These women suggested that state governance, cooperation, compassion and non-violence as a means to settle social disputes. They also insisted that women’s virtues were the beacon of hope in a divided society. Jane Addams, in her article â€Å"Cultural Feminism†, often utilized women as a source of her ideas and subject of her analysis. She altered the foundations of values and other moral principles of society in attempt to increase the diversity of womanly activities. Driven by the goal to generalize her approach, Addams examined prostitutes, market vendors, corporate women and the principles of non-violence. On the other hand, Charlotte Perkins Gilman voiced out her Cultural Feminist intentions in her book Herland. Gilman’s book contains fictitious approach to Cultural Feminism. The book expresses her ambition of a society of strong women under the guidance of pacifism and cooperation(Ritzer, 2006). Journalist, Critic and activist Margaret Fuller is also a major contributor of Cultural Feminism. Her article Woman in the 19th Century pioneered the Cultural Feminist Movement. Fuller contended that women should be independent and that inequalities in gender are uncalled for in societies of her time. Woman stressed the emotional, spontaneous side of knowledge and insinuated a person to person perspective on the aspects of life and the world which is in contrast with the progressive sense of men during that time. Cultural Feminism 3 Modern Cultural Feminism Modern Cultural Feminists believe that the conventional nature of a woman is concrete among humans and their views of the world in general. A nature that is capable of making changes if not amendments to demoralizing male orientation that consume the whole world. These women explain that the sexist matters of modern society lies in the manner of how men view women. On that statement, the term men is defined as a group of males, and the whole statement claims that how women are perceived by men who have varying opinion on women, which also incorporates fear and anguish towards women. The innovation of passive methods for conflict resolutions is still an on-going trend. Contemporary Cultural Feminists raise the argument on caring and attention become catalysts of woman’s consciousness and how it is based as a standard of ethical judgment. Modern conformists of Cultural Feminism also indict the idea of a woman’s grounds for various achievement motivation patterns, communication forms, the reception capacity to emotional concerns, sexuality and intimacy, less aggressive approaches and their principles of peaceful co-existence. All aspects are given convulsive approaches by their male counterparts. Modern Cultural Feminism is also concerned on the undying result of male dominance. Because of the masculine rule, the characteristics of woman and their femininity have been tinged and depreciated. According to them, the only effective way to correct this problem is the conveying a definition of the essence of a woman in a more legitimate, feminist way (Alcoff, 1988). This new definition that modern Cultural Feminism Conformists imply is a re-incarnation of a woman’s peacefulness through non-violence, their emotional nature as their means to foster, ability to assert herself well through subjectiveness. Furthermore, they contend that they did not re-invent the meaning of a woman and her essence, they are just teaching men the non-biased definition. Cultural Feminism 4 Cultural Criticism Modern Cultural Feminists are patiently making advancements in a gradual manner because of their knowledge that a huge metamorphosis on cultural inclination does not happen overnight. These modern conformist of the female advocation deny the claims that the difference between man and woman are merely biological. However, groups that adhere to men’s rights address Cultural Feminism as a propaganda and a political advocacy. These men’s rights’ sects claim that the woman’s way is as competent as a man’s. The male detractors state that the basis of Cultural Feminism is placed on an essentialist view of differences between genders and promotes independence and institutionalizing The masculine group adds that these Cultural Feminists’ fighting spirit have deteriorated since their political agenda is now a lifestyle. Other critics even integrate that Cultural Feminism is nothing than a twisted form of Radical Feminism(Autumn, 1993). There are certain social, cultural or historical events that surrounds Cultural Feminism, these essential differences between men and women are generated through the years. One great example is when dealing culturally about the views on women in the society. At some pint, gender issues are touched because at certain circumstances,Ridicule from older boys causes boys around the age of five to stop using woman talk and adopt a masculine language. While girls stick to the old language and are discourage from using masculine language. Because if we refuse to do such thing and does not want to speak and ladylike, we are ridiculed to the extent. Therefore the over all effect of woman’s talk is to submerge a woman’s personal identity and her ideas and to deny her access to positions of power. In some culture, understanding the communication between men and women is complicated. Crossing cultures in addition to communicating gender lines makes understanding each other correctly even more difficult, Hence making socialization more difficult. Some historical Cultural Feminism 5 events makes cultural feminism a hot topic because at some point women is set really different from men when it comes to leadership. Female species are always doubted in terms of leadership and hard work. Sexism and gender issues is really rampant throughout the history of the acculturation process of feminism. Talking about businesses and personal relationships, problem occurs when a woman grows old and still inclined socially with other people. Because here there’s a different phase talking about the manner of speaking. If they refuse to talk like ladies, they are ridiculed for being masculine, but they are also ridiculed when they use feminine language because they are seen as unable to speak forcefully. Male dominance in the society is there since childhood by using strong expressions while women have had to adapt depending on the environment whether it’s for business or personal. Women have little or no power in our society and that their language reflects their status in the society. The counterargument claims that women are group oriented and supportive of others. Their language reflects the values and attitudes of their culture and therefore is powerful and cooperative. The issue is not whether the language forms themselves are good or bad but whether we attach good or bad social values to them Historically speaking, unmasked assumptions that a history is determined by great wars and great men whereas feminists have demonstrated the extent to which male bias has determined the normative assumptions of the social, natural and behavioral sciences. In the arts, literary and artistic canons are no loner restricted to the work of men which allows females to excel and develop culturally. Cultural Feminism 6 Cultural Feminism Feminism’s relation to political liberation has always been an element of its self understanding, feminism through the years has been increasingly exposed as beholden to a pernicious set of assumptions about class,race, sexuality, ethnicity and nationality. Whatever its fragmentation, within those arenas where it has a relatively secure footing, feminism can be credited with effecting profound changes in the ideological construction of womanhood, not only in the US and Europe, but more globally. The issue of women’s autonomy in relation to reproduction and to work, and the issue of women’s health more generally, have found themselves on the global political and cultural stage. Feminism continues in its struggle to establish itself as the ground for women’s political, economic, and cultural ascendancy in the face of its own internal debates about the significance of differences among women. References Balbert, P. (1989). Lawrence and the Phallic Imagination. Hong Kong: The Macmillan P. Humm, M. (1990). The Dictionary of Feminist Theory. Great Britain: Ohio State UP. Ritzer, G. (2007). Contemporary Sociological Theory and Its Classical Roots. McGraw-Hill: New York Wilson, E. (1977)Margaret Fuller: Bluestocking, romantic, revolutionary. Farrah, Strauss and Giroux: New York

Immorality and Inhumanity in the Pictures from Abu Ghraib

One of the most serious blows to American society and reputation was the highly publicized scandal of maltreatment and abuse of prisoners in Iraq. These incidents, which were uncovered in 2004, happened in the Abu Ghraib prison complex and perpetrated by American personnel under the 372nd Military Police Company.The abuses came to public notice from the media, which was able to acquire extremely graphic images of the tortures taken by the soldiers involved in the incidents themselves. (Hersh, 2004) Following the incident, the United States Military charged those responsible for the crimes and demoted the officer in-charge of the U.S. prison system in Iraq.Until now, however, the American public and the world are still reeling from disappointment over the irrationality and immorality of such systematic acts of violence against the Iraqui prisoners which included various forms of physical, psychological, and sexual abuses. More disconcerting than the acts of the abuses, however, is the fact that the soldiers even took photographs of their crimes.The photographs show the prisoners in shameful conditions, either naked or forced to assume positions suggesting sexual acts with fellow prisoners. Undoubtedly, the photographs show not only violations of basic human rights according to the International Humanitarian Law but also disrespect to the Muslim culture and Islamic beliefs by the American soldiers involved.Among the most disturbing aspects of the photographs taken in the Abu Ghraib prison is the presence of a woman, Private Lynndie England, posing with her thumbs up while the prisoners are being subjected to inhuman treatment.In one photo she is shown posing with a fellow soldier while naked prisoners are made to form a human pyramid at the foreground. In another, she poses with the ubiquitous thumbs up sign while at the same time pointing to the genitals of hooded male prisoners lined up. Indeed, the gloating and happy image of Private England is a stark contras t to the cruelty and torment seen from the prisoners who are reduced to the state of animals.Thus, the pictures should provoke not only outrage from the public but should also lead to a reexamination of the kind of morality and basic sense of decency of military personnel such as England who could derive enjoyment from the clear suffering of her fellow human beings. It is an unfortunate incident that a woman, whom the public expects to be more sensitive to the feelings and emotions of her fellow human being, would be part of the ritual of dehumanization of the prisoners from the physical, emotional, and the psychological aspects of the torture.It is a disappointing fact that Private England, despite her gender, was able to tolerate highly sexualized abuses that were usually committed by men to show their dominance upon women: rape, brutality, and sodomy.Aside from being devoid of any sense of morality, the pictures violate public sensitivity and ethics. The purpose of the pictures a nd the intent of the people who took them therefore become questionable. These images where clearly not meant for an audience, but then, why take them in the first place? Did Private England and her cohorts need a remembrance of how they were once part of the violation and abuse of the Iraqui prisoners?Upon analysis, the pictures are not only proof of the lack of ethics and sensitivity of the soldiers but also signify a deeper perversion. The abuse of the prisoners, supposedly meant to prime them for interrogation by intelligence personnel, show the ugly characteristic of power play wherein the abusers took freedom upon their prisoners because of their perceived dominant position.Their main intent is to degrade the prisoners, to strip away their dignity as human beings, and to show them that they are powerless beneath the abusers’ hands. The pictures, then, are part of the ritual of abuse. By exposing the private parts of the prisoner and capturing the moment forever on film or on video, the perpetrators are breaking the person’s will, reducing him or her into an object.Unfortunately, the acts of the American soldiers reflect the corruption of the entire U.S. military. Hersh (2004) observes that the Abu Ghraib incidents occurred not only because of poor leadership from the direct commanding officer but because of the lack of accountability in the military’s chain of command.Moreover, the incidents are an indication not only of the failure of the United States Army but also of American ideals and society to instill respect for human rights and human dignity among its members. It is a great shame and a devastating blow for the world’s superpower and the supposed protector of Democracy, to be associated with blatant acts of human rights violations.It is in this aspect that the world will continue to be haunted by the images of prisoners from Abu Ghraib. For the people will always remember how Private England smiled and gave a thumbs up sign for the camera while other human beings were being treated as animals in the foreground. Indeed, the torture and abuse of Iraqui prisoners are symptoms of the breakdown of humanity; the images of the grinning the soldiers will therefore serve as a haunting reminder of the capacity of humans for boundless inhumanity.Works Cited:Hersh, Simon R. Torture at Abu Ghraib. 10 May 2004. The New Yorker. 31 March 2008. http:// www.newyorker.com/archive/2004/05/10/040510fa_fact

Apush Frq Outlines

Follow the directions on the opposite side of this assignment for FRQ Outlines. They are considered a TEST score, each question is worth 40 points (if there are 4 outlines, then it is a 160 point test). These outlines are due the first day of class. 1. Analyze the cultural and economic responses of TWO of the following groups to the Indians of North America before 1750. British French Spanish 2. Analyze the differences between the Spanish settlements in the Southwest and the English Colonies in New England in the 17th century in terms of TWO of the following: Politics Religion Economic Development 3. How did economic, geographic and social factors encourage the growth of slavery as an important part of the economy of the southern colonies between 1607 – 1775? 4. Compare the ways in which religion shaped the development of colonial society (to 1740) in TWO of the following regions: New England Chesapeake Middle Atlantic 5. Analyze the impact of the Atlantic Trade Routes established in the mid 1600’s on economic development in the British North American colonies. Consider the period 1650 – 1750. 6. Compare the ways in which TWO of the following reflected tensions in colonial society. Bacon’s Rebellion (1676) Pueblo Revolt (1680) Salem Witchcraft Trials (1692) Stono Rebellion (1739) 7. â€Å"Geography was the primary factor in shaping the development of the British colonies in North America. † Assess the validity of this statement. 8. Compare and contrast the culture and economy of the southern colonies with that of the New England Colonies. 9. Early encounters between American Indians and European colonists led to a variety of relationships among the different cultures. Analyze how the actions taken by BOTH American Indians and European colonists shaped those relationships in TWO of the following regions. Confine your answer to the 1600s. New EnglandSpanish Southwest ChesapeakeNew York and New France 10. In what ways did ideas and values held by Puritans influence the political, economic and social development of the New England colonies from 1630 through the 1660’s?

Critics of the World Bank Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Critics of the World Bank - Case Study Example Still there remain a lot of issues that point out at the loopholes. Though the World Bank in known for its achievements over the past few decades, it has been subject to various criticisms over the years for its policies, functions and activities. The World Bank is attack from all sides by critics on grounds that it is not efficient, not accountable or responsible, not democratic or legitimate, and most importantly that the World Bank is not relevant in a global economy which is presently subjugated by private capital, production and ideas. This paper focuses on the critics faced by the World Bank. Ever since its establishment, it has been subject to various criticisms. At this stage it will be useful to give a brief overview of how the world bank functions and what are the divisions of World Bank. The World Bank is the largest public development institution in the world. The World Bank lends about US$ 25 billion each year to developing countries or various developmental activities with the main purpose of reducing poverty. The main goals of the World Bank, as outlined in Article One of its Articles of Agreement, are: "to assist in the reconstruction and development of territories of members by facilitating the investment of capital for productive purposes" and "to promote the long-range balanced growth of international trade and the maintenance of equilibrium in balances of payments by encouraging international investment ... thereby assisting in raising the productivity, the standard of living and conditions of labour in their territories" (Bretton Woods Project, 2005a). The World Bank is a group of five closely associated international organizations responsible for providing finance and advice to countries for the purposes of economic development and eliminating poverty. Its five agencies are: International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD); International Finance Corporation (IFC); International Development Association (IDA); Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA); and International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). The World Bank's activities are particularly focused on economically backward developing countries. Each of these organizations has their own aims and objectives. The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) aims to reduce poverty in middle-income and creditworthy poorer countries by promoting sustainable development through loans, guarantees, risk management products, and analytical and advisory services. The IBRD and IDA provide loans at preferential rates to member countrie s, as well as grants to the poorest countries for developmental activities. The main activities of the IFC and MIGA include investment in the private sector and capitalizing insurance respectively (Wikipedia, 2007). In the recent years criticism of the World Bank and the IMF on various issues has been a cause of concern to the Bank. These criticism in general centre on the fear about the approaches adopted by the World Bank and the IMF in defining their policies. Especially the socioeconomic impact these policies have on the population of countries who benefit themselves of financial assistance from these two institutions. To be more specific it can be said

Jury Selection Process Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Jury Selection Process - Essay Example (Kressel & Kressel, 2002) Since then it has experienced a growth spurt since its inception in the early 1970s. It has also received substantial publicity in the news media, e.g., for its use by the defense in the O.J. Simpson criminal trial in 1995. This relatively new field is controversial: questions exist about its effectiveness, its fairness and the fact that it is virtually unregulated. Evidence from academia largely indicates that scientific jury selection does no good, yet the market for such services continues to flourish. What methods do jury selection experts employ What are the bases for the controversy surrounding this "hot" field What, if any, solutions have been suggested to alleviate these concerns In jury selection, social scientists gain prominence but jury consultancy remains controversial in both the legal and social scientific communities (Stolle, Robbenolt & Wiener, 1996). Trial consultants have relied on a variety of methods in jury selection, including "scientific statistical methodology, folklore, pops psychology [and] astrology" (Boudouris, 1993, p. 4). However, there is also the gut feel as remarked by O.J. Simpson's attorney Jo-Ellan Dimitrius. (Dimitrius & Mazzarella, 1998, p. xiii). Traditional jury selection in most jurisdictions consists of three stages. The first stage involves the creation of a list of citizens eligible for jury duty, followed by selection of a sample of those persons to be summoned to court. The third stage occurs in court. In a process called voir dire, potential jurors are questioned either individually or in a group, sometimes by attorneys but often by the presiding judge. When jury selection experts are called in to help, they use a variety of techniques to assist in the selection of the jury that will be most favorable to, or, usually, least biased against, their side The tools at a trial consultant's disposal include community surveys, focus groups, mock trials, pretrial investigations of prospective jurors, and voir dire assistance. The widespread use of these methods indicates that SJS experts rely to a greater extent on attitudes and values than on demographic predictors, such as race, ethnicity, age, gender, religion, socio-economic status and occupation, as predictors in jury decision-making (Penrod, 1990). Sophisticated statistical techniques, including factor analysis and multiple regressions, are often used to make predictions about jury decision-making from survey data. (Strier, 1999, p. 96). Trial consultants also frequently employ pretrial investigations of prospective jurors. This type of pretrial investigation takes two forms: community network modeling and surveillance. Community network modeling consists of contacting prospective jurors' coworkers or neighbors, or people in the community who are affiliated with the same school, church, or club as a prospective juror. Surveillance includes drive-by observations and photograph- taking of a prospective juro

Religion #4 African American Spirituals Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Religion #4 African American Spirituals - Essay Example The religious life included ring shouts spirituals and chanted sermons. The spirituals in particular resemble an amalgam of evangelical hymns, black traditional songs and black southern folk music. As the spirituals can not be attributed to any specific author, they represent the communal voice of the slaves who trust their faith in God. The call-and-response pattern followed in the spirituals, speaks that there is a dialogue between them and God. This indicates their innermost hopes for spiritual as well as physical freedom. The interpretational meaning of the spirituals is a decoded message for freedom from slavery. The author provides several examples to prove his argument, showing the Biblical connotations that most of the spirituals have. With the spirituals the African Americans are looking for awakening, to keep the faith both in God and in their hopes for freedom at last. In the article Harvey has listed several spirituals, illustrating the direct relationship between the slave who is singing and God. In the example of spirituals a double meaning can be felt. The word â€Å"home† can be interpreted as safe place, however it may also mean â€Å"Heaven†. He aven is the place where everyone is free, thus the meanings of the spirituals is converted to reinforce the dream for a free country. The African American spirituals can be related to other humanitarian course materials such as anthropological, ethnographical and sociological. The emergence of spiritual churches combines purely ethnographic description together with the song texts and other ritual, religious gestures. One of the general questions that anthropology seeks to answer is â€Å"Why people behave the way they do?† So we can relate this anthropological quest and why to explain why African Americans found shelter for their minds and souls in the spirituals. On another note, cultural anthropology studies the beliefs and cultural practices of people.

Health Care Professional Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Health Care Professional - Research Paper Example Their certainly exists a demographic aspect to the physician shortage in America (Dranove, 2001). Though with the onset of recession and the dwindling of stock markets has made some old physicians to set aside their retirement plans. Still, with the economy gradually picking up with time, more and more old physicians could be expected to go for retirement. Rising practice prices is one other big reason that is contributing to the shortage of physicians in the nation (Dranove, 2001). These rising prices include augmenting wage costs, skyrocketing costs of supplies and associated telecommunication and digital infrastructure, booming rents, increasing costs of salary benefits including the health coverage (Dranove, 2001). Hence, rising practice costs is one big reason that is discouraging the physicians from continuing with their profession. The financial debacle that the physician practice management firms had to face with the dwindling economy has also contributed its share to the sca rcity of physicians in the country (Dranove, 2001). The collapse of many salient physician practice management firms has left many of the esteemed physician practice groups in the United States in doldrums. In contrast, the physicians working for the not-for-profit hospitals are also not doing better considering the massive losses accrued by these health care facilities. The shortage of nurses in the health care system is not a new phenomenon, but has been an aspect of health care that has been existent since the past couple of decades (Quinn, 2002). However, it has only been in the last few years that the problem of nursing shortage started to evince a significant impact on the American health care system (Quinn, 2002). Varied factors are responsible for the shortage of nurses. Going by the rising proportion of the women in the work force and the ample stress

Using accelerometer and EMG signals to estimate arm motion Dissertation

Using accelerometer and EMG signals to estimate arm motion - Dissertation Example Using accelerometer and EMG signals to estimate arm motion This study investigates a means to overcome this degradation through use of EMG signals combined with accelerometer signals to measure the upper arm static and dynamic acceleration. Both EMG signal and accelerometer inputs are fed into an artificial neural network. The artificial neural network continuously predicts arm movement trajectories. An offline time-delay Artificial Neural network (TDANN) is employed to predict the movement trajectories of the arm. The accuracy of prediction was judged by using a set of goniometer readings which provides the changes in the angles of the upper limb. All data was processed in the Matlab environment. The TDANN deployed was developed in the neural network toolbox present within the Matlab environment. The developed neural network was optimized and trained with different sets of inputs, and the results for each of the trails was noted. The results obtained clearly demonstrated that accelerometers are able to enhance pattern recognition and thus p rovide better prosthesis control. Neural Network Optimization and Prediction Performance The neural network structure used for the study is the TDANN. TDANN is a neural network architecture whose primary purpose is to function on continuous data. The major advantage of using TDANN on continuous data is its ability to adapt the network’s weights and activation function online by use of back propagation error method. (Fougner, et al., 2011). The networks can be visualized as a feed forward neural network which is trained for time series prediction. The architecture has continuous inputs that are delayed and sent into the network. In this study, the inputs to this neural network architecture were delayed time series; that is the previous values of 10 channels for 4 for EMG and 6 channels for accelerometers. The measured goniometer signals served as desired output of the TDANN and also as the present state of the time series. The usage of one- layer time delay artificial neural n etwork which is a feed forward structure allow us to predict continuous trajectories which is advantageous for a coordinated and simultaneous control of multiple degrees of freedom in a natural manner. The use of delayed input signals enabled the neural network to capture dynamic input-output properties and account for the delay between the onset of the muscle activity and mechanical arm movement (the activation of the hardware motors in the prosthesis) (Fougner, et al., 2011). TDANN have also an advantage of rapid training time when compared to the dynamic neural networks with recurrent connections. We investigated using a TDANN to predict the elbow flexion degrees, wrist flexion degrees, wrist deviation degrees and forearm rotation degrees based on EMG information from the available intact muscles in transhumeral amputation patients. The EMG information was combined with the accelerometer information about the upper arm and the upper trunk orientations. A one layer time-delay arti ficial neural network (TDANN) was created using Matlab’s neural network toolbox; this network was used to capture the time-series data (EMG and accelerometer signals as an input with the goniometers and torsiometer signals as output). The size of the hidden layer was set by default to be 10 neurons and the network was trained then the hidden layer size was increased to 25 then to 35 and the performance of the network was monitored. TDANN with 35 neuron hidden layer size was then chosen. The network used 2 input delays to allow building a dynamic network, which has memory so

Samedaymay30 Peer Response DQ1AB and DQ2 NA8 Essay

Samedaymay30 Peer Response DQ1AB and DQ2 NA8 - Essay Example It is my opinion that decentralized companies are more effective and productive. The effectiveness of a centralized company is highly dependent on the skills and capabilities of the upper management team. Companies that use a centralized system typically coordinate the efforts of the company from its corporate headquarters (Lexisnexis, 2012). Your example about Ford Company was very informative and aligned with the course discussion. I agree with you that companies that want to consolidate power at the top utilize the centralized organization structure. A few years ago I worked at a company that used a centralized structure. This organization was very effective because the CEO was a charismatic leader. A charismatic leader is a person that is able to have a profound and extraordinary effect on followers due to his personal abilities (Schermerhorn, Hunt, Osborn, 2003). This CEO had great ideas and he utilized a tremendous strategic approach. The employees did not have power or responsibilities beyond their work duties, but most the employee were happy with the firm because the workers were respected and appreciated. An example of respect in the workplace is using people’s ideas to change or improve work (Heathfield, 2012). I have never worked in a U-form organization, but based on your description of this structure I believe that U-form organizations can be very effective in the business world. Lexisnexis.com (2012). Forms of organization: centralized vs. decentralized Retrieved May 25, 2012 from

Modern Retail Architecture Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 8000 words

Modern Retail Architecture - Coursework Example As like in yoga or any other method preferred for solemn meditations, it was believed that the creation and preservation of a preferred environment increases the sense of well being of a person. Be it health wise or business wise the main point is to put any behavioral effect in the people subjected to the certain complexities and patterns relevant to environmental architecture and psychology. It has been known that man's visual system is receptive to the patterns their indivualism or personal traits prefer to conceive or perceive either in terms of visual or auditory reception. Human mind seeks to organize data when faced with random unknown visual information, filters it and automates to switch to anticipating patterns. In effective advertising, the artist has to feel and travel the complexities and inadequacies of human nature by subduing several personalities and differing public opinions or comments regarding a certain art or architecture in order to promote whatever product one has to promote. In layman's terms, being in the shoes of the target market segment, analyzing their choices and neutralizing product quality and what it has to offer to the customers as well. In this present technology, advertising is much more complicated in form and in production. Tastes of the market differ as our flow of life alters the very need of our existence. That is the cost of having facilitated technological advances. Technology, architecture, psychological captivity will take its own run also to directions only an artist can define in his own imagination and scheme. II. Psychology in Architecture At this stage I would like to direct the readers to that point where psychology meets architecture. Psychology proves to be a very useful tool to capture the target market. It has been in practice with regards to the product designs and branding, imaging of a certain business from their uniforms down to their product lines systems and designs. Take it from the very logical competition of the mobile or cell phone market. It constructs its model from being functional to being convenient to being used as leisure or games gadgets. A theory turned into reality and the model is right there and being featured in US magazines and computer books right in front of our very own eyes. This human perceptual function works relatively in the Gestalt rule which seeks to explore the works of the human mind through form or shapes. In architecture, one gets to know to imagine and anticipate what the clients want and how the customers interact with their physical environments. The deal here is anticipation and captivity of the customer's inspirations with regards to effects in colors and design information. 1 It is a very good way of emerging the attributes of ones products and building or room that contains it that will prove to challenge the information architect. In design, we have to achieve maximum performance of our designs through the acceptance and base visual perception relating to mental associations from the eyes down to the brain among users and items /design interface. Note that our human memory is the primary

To What Extent Do You Think That Conditioning Essay Example for Free

To What Extent Do You Think That Conditioning Essay Both Pavlov and Skinner have proven that animals can be trained to expect a result coming from a type of condition due to past experiences. However, it may not be the same for human beings, as they have much more complex minds than any other species on Earth. Classical and Operant conditioning may work only on some humans but it may not work on some other humans. Operant conditioning is when a living being experiences punishment or any consequences when committing a particular act, it will often stop doing the same thing next time, as it doesnt want to experience the consequence again. However, some human beings are an exception to the laws of Operant conditioning. For instance, a teenager may continue stealing even though he/she has been caught and punished. The reason behind it is because it might be the only way to survive, or it could be a habit the teenager cannot get rid of, similar to smoking. In some more scarce occasions, the teenager might feel that it is right to steal, as if the world owes him/her, which motivates the teenager to continue committing his/her crime. Nonetheless, there are under some circumstances that fit into the criteria, such as if a person almost got crushed by a car when crossing a road, he/she would be much more careful in the future, as the person doesnt want to die. Classical conditioning is training a living being to respond to a specific stimulus, such as a dog salivating if a ringing bell is heard. This type of condition may work on more people than on Operant condition. The reason is because Classical conditioning is more on the persons advantage whereas Operant conditioning is mostly on consequences. Human beings tend to commit acts that at least benefit themselves before benefiting others; therefore Operant conditioning will sometimes not work because it might affect the persons benefit. It is only on some situations that Operant conditioning will work as it helps prevent consequences happening to the person again. Human nature is a very complex system that enables human beings to be different from the theories of response and stimulus. They will not just think if one thing happens, another result will follow. Some people will think of other possibilities, which makes the whole situation extremely complex. Classical and Operant conditioning may work on toddlers as they still have very simple thinking, but as humans grow older their minds will also become more advanced as well as complicated, making their thinking not as straightforward as the theories suggest. Classical and Operant conditioning may not be 100% efficient on analysing human behaviour, but if it is used on other animals or on human toddlers, it will be quite effective.

Death And Dying In Hinduism And Islam Religion Essay

Death And Dying In Hinduism And Islam Religion Essay Death and dying is equally important among all religions. Different religions have different values, beliefs, tradition, social customs and attitude regarding about death and dying. Among all of them, the most common experience is that a persons death always leaves the shadowy moment among all the relatives and the family members. Death is always connected with us and we are at the state of transition. Every living body has to die. However, religion occupies a significance space regarding about death and dying. The religion has its own norms and values to define the death. Among different religions, Hinduism and Islam define death as the period of sorrow even-though Hinduism believes in reincarnation but Islam does not. Hinduism views life as a wheel of salvation while life means a way to meet the almighty Allah in Islam. Thus, two different religions have two different perspectives of viewing life and death depending upon their religions. The Bhagvada Gita also tells about the moral of life and death. During the battle of Kurukshetra, the Pandava brother, Arjuna, has to kill his guru, Dronacharya who taught him the most powerful skill of bow and arrow. Nobody can defeat the Arjuna in archery. Since, Dronacharya belongs to the Kaurava, the Pandava brother Arjuna has to kill his own guru to win the battle of Mahabharata. The Lord Krishna chants poem about birth and living. He said to Arjuna that death in unavoidable to those who are born and birth is certain for those who had died. So, there is no reason to grieve if something in unavoidable. So, death is an inescapable. Death always stands upon its honor in the battle field. It is fair to illuminate the injustice and inequality to obtain the mokshya known as liberation. Thus, the saying of the Lord Krishna to Arjuna provides him a moral sense and knowledge of being born into this universe and reacts upon the essence of justice against immorality. Like in Bhagvada Gita, another holy scripture Ramayana also tells about the significance of death and dying. Bali and Sugriva are the brother of the same blood. Though Sugriva is younger than the Bali, Bali has treated him like a slave. However, Sugriva doesnt argue about the matter. He just wants to take care of him for the whole life. Despite the circumstance, Bali has received a terrific boon after his tough meditation for twelve years. He has a greed upon his bravery and courageous. He has captivated Sugrivas wife Tara for a long period of time. So, Sugriva is frustrated and asked about sharing of the Kiskindha kingdom. But, Bali refused it and threw him out of the kingdom. Sugriva doesnt know what to do. One day, his follower Hanuman found Rama and Arjuna wandering in the dense forest and became closer to each other. Then, Hanuman introduce Rama and Arjuna with Sugriva and Sugriva told the events about how he has to live in mountain despite having the kingdom. So, Rama told Sugr iva to call Bali upon the battle field. Sugriva did the same thing as Rama told to him. After a long battle between Sugriva and Bali, Rama killed Bali by using his archery. Upon his deathbed, Bali asked Rama about his crime. He asked what he has done to him. Who are you to kill him? Why you kill me like a terror? Why dont you show in-front of me? Then Rama replied to Bali that he has done injustice with his brother. Rama told that his father Dasaratha taught him about the moral of law and order and finally for his last question, he replied to him that the kings used to hunt deer by shading in some corners. As soon as the message spreaded over the kingdom, Tara came on the spot and cried and begged his husband back from Rama. Rama told Tara that why are you crying without thinking that the body is dead only not the soul. If you think that the dead body is your husband then why dont you think about his soul? You are on an illusion of body and soul. I respect his soul and he will be pl aced in a higher standard in the heaven. Tara realized that the body only decomposes not the soul. Even, if the person is dead, s/he will be highly recognized into the society for a long period of time. Swami Nikhilananda, the great disciple of Ramayana also said that human being should not worry about the contemporary cause and effect which is known to them. He also added that body can undergo certain metamorphism where the internal reality or the soul doesnt change rather than the illusion known as the Maya creates the desire and identifies as the self. We have to understand that the self in not the Brahmin. Following these two great scriptures, Hinduism is the religion about reincarnation. The state of being human being today is the outcome of the deeds that have been conducted in the past. After several reincarnations, we are human being now. The salvation occurs only by achieving Mokshya and Mokshya can be achieved by learning Karma yoga, Jnana Yoga, Bhakti yoga, taking the path of devotion and learning the Holy Scripture like Bhagvada Gita and the great epic Ramayana. The ultimate way of reaching the supreme goal is to unite with Brahman. Islam is one of the fastest growing religions in the world. While Hinduism believes in polytheism, Islam believes in monotheism. Islam means submission to the god. Literally, the meaning carries a greater detail. Islam or being a Muslim means high attitude of the self. Islam believes Muhammad as the messenger of the god. The god determines the lifespan of the person. It is the gods mercy to take the person in younger age or in the older age. The Muslim believes that god created them and they have to move according to the way that the god wants. Some Muslim believes that after death, two black faced angels with blue eyes known as Munkar and Nakir visit the graveyard and ask the deceased about his life when he was alive. Upon interrogation, the person has to tell the truth. Depending upon the saying of the deceased, the process of punishment and comfort will be justified. Like in Hinduism, Islam also believes in heaven and hell where heaven means full of beautiful nymphs and the enjoym ent with the spouse while hell means the place with thorns and evil souls. When the person is lying on the deathbed, the priestly people read some passages from the Quran to facilitate the dying body to release from the physical world. After death, washing of the dead body is done and purified by the Moullana, the holy priest. The body is covered with the white cloth. The main difference between the Christianity and the Muslim is that no coffins come between the body and the earth. Building other structures are not allowed in Islam and as well as writing on the stone. Some Muslim believes that the graveyard should be dig deep enough to the dead so that the dead body can be able to sit up during the period of the Last Judgment. The grave is laid in the direction of north to south rather than east to west. The main reason behind doing that is the holy Mosque lies towards east to west. So, the deceased face is pointed towards the Mecca. It is customary to say Allah Karim which means upon the mercy of god we came into this earth and upon the mercy of him, we sh all go. Muslim views their life as a mission into this earth. The main mission is to take care of the whole life seriously as per the commandment of the god. The people have to be physically and as well as mentally fit to take care of the whole life. Spiritually, the people have to keep faith on Allah and strictly obey his saying. According to the Islam, no older person would be the burden into the society. When older person get sick or being incapable of helping themselves, the younger one should take care of them and offer them nutritious foods. The family members of the dead have to fulfill any debts of the deceased person as soon as possible. Just like in Hinduism, Islam also allows offering charity and fasting on the name of the deceased person. The family member can visit the grave to maintain the strong attachment with the deceased and as well as to observe the day of the judgment. According to Islam, death should be properly understood because it is the part of the living. Sometimes, we feel scare of discussing about death and dying because we dont want to die. We are so afraid of it. But, for Muslims, this is not the right attitude against the Allah. The Prophet Muhammad said that you have to live in this world like a traveler. Once come never return back. The destination of the journey is to meet with the almighty Allah. Death is followed by the pain and suffering. Sometimes, people become agony on death and dying. They are pathetic. According to the Allah, pain and suffering is not the curse for the Islam people. It is taken as an assignment to see how people handle it, and how they response upon it. The Quran states that Allah takes the soul at the time of death and those who are in the verdict of dying, Allah come around them and give them the clean cheat letting them to know that its the time to take a journey with Allah. The living and dying process is taken as the action where there is reaction thereafter. The faith of all Islam people is that the body and spirit unite together. So, Islam views death as the process or resurrection. The prophet also stated that being a Muslim means to challenge each and every circumstance that comes into the life. One should be capable of dealing with adversity and success. Whatever happens in life is already fixed and should take a high spirit and calmness to meet with Allah. The prophet also stated that the path towards the heaven is filled with obstacles and difficulties while the path towards the hell is filled with desire. Its up to the people to choose the path of difficulty or the path of the desire. The path of difficulty is filled wi th knowledge, sacrifice, and purity while the path of desire is filled with anger, suffocation, and greed. Molloy, Michael. Experiencing the Worlds Religions: Tradition, Challenge, and Change. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. Print. DeSpelder, Lynne Ann, and Albert Lee. Strickland. The Last Dance: Encountering Death and Dying. Boston: McGraw Hill Higher Education, 2009. Print. Death and Dying. KhutbahBank. Web. 15 Apr. 2011. . http://civic.bev.net/icb/pdf/i43_lad.pdf http://khutbahbank.org.uk/2009/06/death-and-dying-inspirational-khutbah/

Advantages Disadvantages Of Internet For Research Purposes Information Technology Essay

Advantages Disadvantages Of Internet For Research Purposes Information Technology Essay The Internet is a very powerful worldwide instrument, which serves as a good source for research work and learning. It generates current information, facts-finding, and is the most outstanding invention in the area of communication in the history of human race. The Internet has been very useful to mankind in the aspect of learning and research development. In due course, this essay emphasizes on details of advantages and disadvantages of the Internet in relation to research work. Advantages: Easy Communication: The Internet eases of communication to the researchers; because it serves as a guidance and original source of information. It is very easy to access and at the same time saves time thereby allowing an individual to manager his/her resources better and effectively. Additionally, the Internet is very convenient because an individual can easily carry out a research work at home with much comfort and convenience. The internet is a valuable search tool and has been informative for academic research, as it helps significantly to improve research skills, and makes learning visual and easy to follow.  [1]   Comparatively Inexpensive and Quick Dispersion of Information: The Internet creates a comparatively inexpensive avenue for releasing information and articles. Subsequently, several organizations and individuals can now circulate information to millions of users. In due course, researchers could assess and make use of this circulated information and articles for their work, thereby giving them a broader idea and knowledge in their work. Additionally, there is a spontaneous dispersion of information to various users of the internet when such information is being added to a web site. As regards this, millions of users including researchers would browse through these information and subsequently use them for their work. Hence the web is then regarded as a paragon medium for disseminating information because it removes the time wasting in between publishing content and making it available to users. Wealth of Information: Furthermore, the Internet is a wealth of information and very advantageous in various reasons; students delve into the Internet to gather lots of very useful academic information for research purposes; and the information contained on the Internet can be useful for academic research. It is a potential research tool and opens up a new and comprehensive source of information. In another development, information is probably the biggest advantage internet is offering to the users. The Internet is an apparent treasure trove of information. Any kind of information on any topic under the sun is available on the Internet. Sending E-mail Messages and Receiving Feedbacks: With the help of the Internet the user could send e-mails to colleagues, friends, co-workers etc, either to get more information from them or pass on the acquired information to them. In view of this the Internet could be regarded as a powerful content publishing tool because there are some application software embedded in the Internet that enable such transmission and transfer of information from one user to another. Consequently, these applications will allow and assist the researcher to develop content for the World Wide Web by simply saving as an HTML file. Disadvantages: Having discussed the advantages of the Internet for academic research it is worthy to mention some of its disadvantages. One of the disadvantages of the Internet is that it provides a huge amount of information thereby causing information overload. In due course, one can easily get confused with this infinite amount of titles, texts and abstracts. And because of the overwhelming information available on the Internet, one must be cautious about information obtained. Ziltrain points out that, an access provider with much less emphasis on specific content and services, retaining customers will become harder and this will adversely affect the systems utility for others.  [2]   There are no standards, that is, no process to check information accurately. Most information in the Internet does not go through a review process. Anyone can publish on the web, without passing the content through an editor. Pages might be written by an expert on the topic, or even a child, or a disgruntled contributor. Therefore, getting information from book or from various other printed sources in the library can guarantee that it is of high standard and peer reviewed. Additionally, it can be observed that with a large amount of information freely available on the internet, theft of personal information and misuse of this information is in abundance. In this regard from time to time people use someones information and research materials and pass it off as their own work. Also, Spamming, which is the process of sending unwanted or junk e-mails in bulk, which provide no purpose and consequently hinder the entire system. This in due course is regarded as an illegal activity resulting to frustrate people. As regards this, a researcher could check his e-mail to obtain some materials for his work; only to get disappointed when noticed that the e-mail was a junk. The issue of spamming extends to commercial advertising, frequently for dubious products, get-rich-quick, or semi-legal services. In due course spamming costs less to the sender but more to the receiver. In any case, spam can be prevented or stopped by installing spam filter software such as Mail washer, McAfee anti-spam software, as well as firewall. Furthermore, another disadvantage of the Internet is virus threat. In this regard, Virus is a program that interrupts the normal functioning of the computer systems. Computers that are attached to internet are more likely to be attacked by virus. In due course, this attack could result to hard disk crashing, thereby causing a big disaster on the computer. On the other hand, some unprincipled individuals have been successful in creating viruses and links that once clicked can automatically transmit ones personal e-mail addresses and other details to certain parties and even the persons bank account details in some extreme cases. Additionally, another disadvantage of the Internet for academic research is that, it is not arranged according to system and no index format. Information on the Internet is not organised; for example too many web pages for any single directory services and fees are often charged for access to specialised information. Hence, Robling indicates that focusing strictly on tight access controls, whether through strict limitations on the number of users or through the imposition of per access fees that could effectively exclude the majority of users, for example students who cannot afford it, without considering the purposes of education and research.  [3]   Conclusion: In conclusion, irrespective of the fact that the Internet has some numerous disadvantages, it can be understood that it is still very useful to mankind as in helps in medical research works and subsequent inventions, as well as produce some good interactive entertainment and multimedia. Hence, man needs the Internet to keep life going. Man asserts that, the Internet is considered not simply as a technological tool, but as a wholly new constructed environment with its own codes of practice.  [4]  

Kids Baseball, A Great American Tradition :: Art

Kids Baseball, A Great American Tradition Kids’ baseball is a really great American tradition. Fathers can relate to their kids who play Little League because male adults remember the experience as something vital that taught them life-skills and socialization during their youth. Little League is as American as apple pie and now the rest of the world is finally wonderfully acclimated to enjoying everything American including baseball. Even an institution as wonderful as Little League has its critics. Some complain that it emphasizes competition too much and that the lesser skilled kids ought to get more playing time. Others cite that the risk of injury is all too real. I believe that Little League is a terrific â€Å"coming of age† growth experience. It teaches kids organizational skills, division of labor, cooperation and competition. By organization I mean nine kids have to function like one unit working under one main coach. In division of labor those same nine kids must perform different tasks and responsibilities. They must cooperate with each other in order to defeat the opposing team in competition. Varga’s Drugstore versus Kiwanis is a small-scale version of Compaq going up against IBM or General Motors taking on Ford. That’s what makes Little League so uniquely American and why it helps to perpetuate this country’s unparalleled â€Å"free enterprise† value system. For those critics who claim LL is dangerous, there is danger and risk everywhere. If every young boy or girl lived in a protective bubble, no kids would ever interact. Those vocal LL critics should not cross streets, should not walk down crowded aisles in Wal-Mart and should not mow their lawns or drive to Wildwood on summer vacation because something threatening might unexpectedly happen. Dangers are all around us, and in Little League competition, injuries happen by accident and they are not deliberately or maliciously inflicted. I guess that’s one particular reason I absolutely love Little League’ baseball. I have always been quite fascinated by physical danger and by competition, especially in sports. In 1953 I played Hammonton Little League ball for the town Exchange Club. My coach was Mr. Reid, and his son Bruce was also on the team. Frank Reid would come to the practices and help his dad work with the players, and ironically, Frank’s son Scott wound-up working for me in my boardwalk arcade in Ocean City, Maryland two decades later. From my own life experience, there’s no doubt in my mind that LL promotes an appreciation of the American free-enterprise economic system.

Paideia, Prejudice and the Promise of the Practical Essay -- Philosoph

Paideia, Prejudice and the Promise of the Practical In an age of radical pluralism it is increasingly difficult to affirm and sustain the educational aspirations of Greek paideia (Latin humanitas). The most challenging attacks on these aspirations come from standpoints which share a postmodern attitude of opposition towards inherited cultural ideals, especially those which claim universality. This paper first examines optimistic and pessimistic prospects for the educational heritage of humanitas, concluding that, in the face of cultural disparateness which is increasingly evident in post-Enlightenment cultures, the pessimistic case seems to be more convincing. Recognizing that this gives added impetus to postmodernist standpoints, the second section examines some key features of these, taking as its examples arguments of Lyotard, Foucault and Rorty. I show that the prejudices of the postmodernist arguments are as invidious as the discriminatory assumptions and the neglect of the quality of educational practice in the Western cultural inheritance. Recalling some insights which can be gleaned from the educational practices of Socrates, the last section joins these with findings of contemporary philosophers on the pre-judgements and partiality which are inescapable features of human understanding. This is a reclamation and elucidation of a practical and promising humanitas which does justice to the claims of diversity and universality. Introduction: Hard Times for Paideia To many it may seem quaint or quixotic to make the ancient notion of paideia the theme of a world conference of philosophy in cultural circumstances which are variously described as post-industrial, post-Marxist, post-Christian, post-religious, or post-mod... ..." in R. Hollinger (ed.) Hermeneutics and Praxis (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame, 1985). (16) Richard Rorty, "Private Irony and Liberal Hope" in his Contingency, irony, and solidarity (henceforth CIS) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989). (17) Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (henceforth PMN) (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1980) pp.357-365. (18) Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method (T&M) translation of Wahrheit und Methode (W&M) by G. Barden & J. Cumming (New York: Seabury Press, 1975). (19) T&M, pp.10-11; W&M, pp.6-7. (20) PMN pp.358-359. (21) PMN p.351. (22) CIS, p.73. (23) CIS, pp.74-75. (24) Heraclitus, Fragment 45, quoted by Jaeger in Paideia, Bk.1, p.179. (25) These earlier Dialogues include Gorgias, Protagoras, Euthyphro, Apology, Crito and Bk.1 of Republic. (26) Plato, Apology, 23. (27) D&P, p.27.

The Poetic Style of Henry Charles Bukowski Essay -- essays research pa

Henry Charles Bukowski Poetry is the art of rhythmical composition written or spoken for exciting pleasure by beauty imaginative or elevated thought. It is also literary work in metrical form. By definition, a poet is a person how composes poetry. The relationship between poetry and the late Henry Charles Bukowski is equivalent to that of a professional ice skater and the ice that he skates on . By the same token, it compared to something a bit less governed, although a pro ice skater is free to graze the ice at his own expense, the root of professional ice skating is indeed restricted. For example, judges, rules, regulations, agreements, terms, and contracts that can't be waived, which controls the skater. Compared to a bird in the sky, the previous example falls short of my perception of freedom when relating it to poetry and Bukowski. A bird in the sky greatly broadens the very core of my argument, at the exact same time contradicting the argument -for those with the keen eye. Buk owski's writing define...

Studies Related To Teaching Competency Education Essay

Aggarwal ( 1969 ) conducted a survey on measuring of competency of instructors of primary schools of M.P. the survey revealed ( I ) more than 53 % of instructors were non intelligent plenty to be instructors and intelligence was significantly and positively related to capable cognition ( r= 0.42 ) ( two ) out of entire primary instructors 52.6 % did non like learning profession and their attitude was significantly related to competences of schoolroom instruction and ( three ) 70 % of the instructors passed in the 3rd division and about 50 % instructors did non possess equal cognition of topic to be able to learn competent. George and Anand ( 1980 ) studied the consequence of microteaching on learning self- construct and learning competency of pupil instructors. The chief findings of the survey were ( I ) There was important difference between the pre- trial and post- trial mean learning self concept tonss of the control group of pupil instructors. ( two ) There was important difference between the pre- trial and post- trial mean learning self concept tonss of the experimental group of pupil instructors. ( three ) There was important difference between the average addition tonss in learning competency of the control group and experimental group of pupil instructors. ( four ) Micro- instruction facilitated the sweetening of the learning ego construct of pupil instructors. ( V ) Micro learning proved effectual in bettering the learning competency of pupil instructors. ( six ) Micro- instruction intervention followed by summated scheme of integrating of learning accomplishments was found superior to micro learning intervention based on independent learning accomplishments in bettering the learning competency of pupil instructors. Passi and Sharma ( 1982 ) studied learning competences of secondary school instructors in Indore. The findings of survey showed that ( I ) the competences identified were- giving assignments, loud reading, utilizing chalkboard, utilizing support, tempo, avoiding repeat, consolidating the lesson, covering with pupil responses, bettering students ‘ behaviour, audibleness, utilizing secondary support, acknowledging students ‘ go toing behaviour, showing verbal manner and switching centripetal channel. ( two ) male and female instructors did non differ in competence. There was a important negative correlativity between the self perceptual experience of linguistic communication instructors and learning competence. ( three ) there was a important positive relationship between instructors ‘ instruction competence and liking of their students of their instruction behavior. Patel ( 1984 ) found that interactions with co-workers could better learning competence. His survey involved eight scientific discipline instructors spread over a period of six months and noted that the treatments and counsel from co-workers resulted in 11 % addition in the capacity for presentation and capacity for co- ordination of different learning accomplishments, in ability and wont of utilizing audio- ocular AIDSs for effectual instruction and addition in involvement in practical and written work of the student, and a 10 % addition in cognition of content. Prakasham ( 1988 ) studied the instructor effectivity as a map of school organisational clime and instruction competence and found that ( I ) The unfastened school organisational clime positively affected both the instruction competence every bit good as instructor effectivity. ( two ) Teachers of urban schools significantly excelled over instructors employed either in semi- urban and rural schools or schools located in industrial countries on both learning competence and instructor effectivity. ( three ) Females scored constantly higher with and undistinguished difference in all types of schools ; categorizes in footings of district, direction type and organisational clime. ( four ) There existed a important relationship between learning competence and instructor effectivity. Rajguru ( 1988 ) conducted a survey of the function of schoolmasters of cardinal schools and primary corporation schools to propose redresss to better their competences. He found that ( I ) 64.5 % instructors were cognizant of their functions. ( two ) 28 schoolmasters said that they observed 90.3 % of lesson and arranged theoretical account lessons besides. ( three ) Central schools schoolmasters guided the primary school schoolmasters in their work and besides visited them on a regular basis. ( four ) They besides arranged seminars and workshops. However, they were non satisfied with the lesson observation work. This work was evaluated by the supervisor but there was no cooperation between them. ( V ) Each cardinal school schoolmasters had to work for 45 hours in a hebdomad. Teaching was for 12 hours, lesson observation for 18 hours and 25 hours for other activities. Choudhary ( 1990 ) investigated the relationship of the learning competences of 178 secondary school instructors with the student accomplishment. Teachers ‘ manner of structuring inquiries was of import in act uponing students ‘ wishing for instructors. Their instruction was observed on at least four separate occasions during 3 months of learning in schools. No important positive relationship was found between the positive attitude towards general pedagogical principals and any of the instruction competence. A hebdomad negative relationship was obtained between instructors ‘ attitude and relationship with kids. It was suggested that the fosterage of positive attitudes in pre- service instruction, pupil instructors towards general pedagogical rules, on the footing of patterns aimed at heightening students ‘ academic accomplishment might consequences in lower quality instruction because of its inauspicious consequence on pupil- instructors relationship. Bassi and Kaur ( 1991 ) conducted a survey of the learning competence of linguistic communication instructors in relation to their job- satisfaction, venue of control and professional burnout. He found that ( I ) Language instructors had a moderate sense of personal achievement and success, and so they did non see any professional burnout. ( two ) There was no difference between the instruction competence and occupation satisfaction of the instructors on the footing of venue of control. ( three ) Female instructors, urban school linguistic communication instructors were found more externally controlled and satisfied with their occupations than the rural and high school linguistic communication instructors. ( four ) There existed a positive correlativity between the step of occupation satisfaction and the standard steps of learning competence, professional burnout variables and standard steps of learning competence. Thiagarajan et. Al. ( 1995 ) studied the relationship between instructor competence as perceived by pupils and accomplishment in Economics as a map of sex. Findingss revealed a important correlativity between learning competence and accomplishment. The magnitude of correlativity was different in male childs and misss. Kaushal ( 2001 ) while analyzing the effectivity of schoolroom oppugning behavior preparation on a sample of 40 pupil instructors which every bit measured in footings of alteration in the schoolroom oppugning behaviour of pupil instructors and sweetening in learning competency reported that CQBT helps in heightening the learning competence of pupil instructors of experimental group as compared to command group of pupil instructors. Farah ( 2002 ) studied in his comparative survey of learning competences of the instructors trained through the formal system of instruction and those through the distance instruction system. The findings indicate that there is no important difference between the cognition and attitudes of instructors trained through distance manner and those trained through the formal system terminal there is a important relationship between the attitudes and accomplishments of instructors. Pushpam and Sourdarajan ( 2004 ) conducted a survey of learning competence of secondary school instructors and found that ( I ) instructors working in assisted and matriculation schools have better learning competence than instructors working in govt. and corporation schools. ( two ) The learning competence of more experient instructors is better than the teaching competence of less experient. ( three ) Aged and high income govt. instructors have better instruction competence. ( four ) Private unaided school instructors have better instruction competence and station alumnus have better learning competence than the alumnus instructors. ( V ) Permanent instructors show better learning competence than impermanent instructors. ( six ) Teachers with high income have better learning competence than instructors with low income. ( seven ) No difference was found between rural and urban school instructors sing their instruction competence. ( eight ) Positive attitude of instructors towards le arning profession, occupation satisfaction of instructors and intelligence of pupils increase the learning competences of secondary school instructors. Shokeen ( 2006 ) studied the consequence of schoolroom oppugning behavior preparation on learning competence of pupil instructors and their ego construct and found that the experimental group pupil instructors asked more inquiries in their schoolroom as compared to the control group. The CQBT was found to be a better scheme than the conventional programme, of pupil instruction as learning competence of pupil instructors was enhanced after CQBT. It was besides found that CQBT was non merely effectual in bettering the schoolroom oppugning behaviour of pupil instructors, but it besides helps in bettering their ego construct. The overall appraisal points towards the ultimate effectivity of CQBT and it provides a theoretical account for proof of instructor. Smriti ( 2008 ) conducted a survey of creativeness in relation to learning competence of B.Ed. pupils and found that ( I ) There is no important difference between the creativeness of B.Ed. pupils belonging to rural and urban background. Therefore it is concluded that creativeness is non being affected by country or part. ( two ) There is no important difference between the creativeness of male and female B.Ed. pupils. Hence creativeness is non being affected by gender. ( three ) There is no important difference between the creativeness of B.Ed. pupils belonging to scientific discipline and humanistic disciplines watercourse. Therefore it is concluded that creativeness is non being affected by topics studied by pupils. ( four ) There is positive correlativity between creativeness and learning competence of B.Ed. pupils. Augustine, J. ( 2010 ) studied the ‘Teaching Aptitude, Competency, Academic background and Achievement in Educational Psychology of Student- instructors in the college of instruction. ‘ A sample of 200 pupil instructors selected from 5 colleges of instruction in Kottayam Revenue territory of Kerala was used. The findings of the survey showed that ( I ) There is important positive relationship between learning competence and learning aptitude of pupil instructors. ( two ) There is no consistent positive relationship between academic background and learning aptitude of pupil instructors. ( three ) There is no important positive relationship between learning aptitude and accomplishment in educational psychological science. Khatoon, Azeem and Akhtar ( 2011 ) studied the impact of different factors on learning competences at secondary degree in Pakistan. The survey investigated in to a descriptive research to critically reexamine of the impact of different factors on learning competences at secondary degree. The survey has defined female school instructor ‘s socio cultural jobs and environmental jobs.The chief aims of the survey were to happen out the female school instructors, socio cultural jobs, and Environment jobs and to mensurate the instruction competence of instructors by relationship between instructors and pupils. The undermentioned consequences were drawn by the research worker in the visible radiation of the analysis of the information. The largely households are in favours of female instructor ‘s occupation. The consequence proves that the female save the clip for domestic work due to hold half twenty-four hours occupation. The consequence proves that professional green-eyed mons ter is everyplace and largely it effects on their instruction competence. Kavita ( 2011 ) studied the consequence of schoolroom oppugning behavior preparation on learning competence of pupil instructors, attitude towards learning and their ego construct. A close analysis of the consequences indicates that the CQBT was found to be better scheme, than the conventional programme, of pupil instruction as learning competency of pupil instructors was enhanced after CQBT. It was besides found that CQBT was non merely effectual in bettering the schoolroom inquiring of pupil instructors, but it besides helps in bettering their ego construct. The overall appraisal points towards the ultimate effectivity of CQBT and it provides a theoretical account for proof of instructor. Pawar, I.A. ( 2011 ) studied the ‘Impact of Teacher Training on Teacher Competencies ‘ . The findings of the survey showed that ( I ) There is no important difference between the average tonss on instructor competences graduated table of instructors who have trained through conventional and that of those instructors who have done instructor preparation through distance instruction manner in footings of their cognition and attitude. ( two ) There is no important difference between the average tonss on instructor competences graduated table of male and female instructors who have trained through conventional every bit good as distance manner.Surveies related to Psychological Capital:Luthans and Youssef ( 2004 ) found that Authentic leaders ‘ assurance, hope and optimism roots from their strong beliefs in themselves, in their positive psychological capital and in doing clear to associates precisely what they need from them in order to accomplish sustainable growing and public presentation at single, squad, and/or organisational degrees. Such leaders besides recognize that they have failings, which they work to suit by environing themselves with highly capable followings and constructing an inclusive and engaged positive organisational context. Such contexts support followings for being actively involved in executing their occupation functions and duties, every bit good as in lending to the leader ‘s ain development. Lifeng, Z. ( 2007 ) studied the ‘Effects of Psychological Capital on Emplyoees ‘ occupation public presentation, organizational committedness and organisational citizenship behaviour. ‘ The consequence of the survey showed that after commanding for the demographic variables ( gender and age ) , emplyoees ‘ hope, optimism and resilience individually had positive impacts on their occupation public presentation, organisational committedness and organisational behaviour. Employees ‘ psychological capital ( a combined concept of hope, optimism and resilience ) had positive impacts on their occupation public presentation, organisational committedness and organisational citizenship behaviour. To sum up, this survey through empirical observation tested the positive relationship between psychological capital employees ‘ results. The research consequences indicated psychological capital had positive impacts on employees ‘ public presentation. Luthans, Norman, Avolio, et.al. , ( 2008 ) conducted a survey on ‘ The mediating function of psychoogical capital in the supportive organisational climate- employee public presentation relationship. ‘ The survey investigates whether the late emerging nucleus concept of positive psychological capital ( dwelling os hope, resiliency, optimism and efficaciousness ) plays s function in interceding the effects of a supportive organisational clime with employee results. Using 3 diverse samples, consequences shows that employees ‘ psychological capital is positively related to their public presentation, satisfaction, committedness and a supportive clime is related to employees ‘ satisfaction and committedness. Avey, Luthans and Youssef ( 2008 ) studied ‘The Additive Value of Positive Psychological Capital in Predicting Work Attitudes and Behaviors ‘ . This survey of a sample of employees ( N=336 ) from a wide cross subdivision of organisations and occupations found that their state-like psychological capital is positively related to desired extra-role organisational citizenship behaviours ( OCBs ) and negatively with unsought organisational cynicism, purposes to discontinue and counterproductive workplace behaviours. Except for single OCBs, their psychological capital besides predicted alone discrepancy in the same attitudinal and behavioural results beyond their demographics, nucleus self-evaluation, and personality traits, and person-organization tantrum and person-job tantrum. Avey, Luthans and Jensen ( 2009 ) studied the Psychological Capital: A Positive Resource for Combating Employees Stress and Turnover. The findings of the survey were ( I ) There was negative relationship between positive psychological capital and emphasis symptoms. ( two ) There was negative relationship between psychological capital and purposes to discontinue and occupation hunt behaviours severally. ( three ) Symptoms of emphasis would partly intercede the relationship between the psychological capital and both purposes to discontinue and occupation hunt behaviours. Mathur and Tiwari ( 2011 ) studied the Positive Psychology Capital, E.Q. , and S.Q. as determiner of subjective well-being in executive adult females and found that subjective well being is every bit and strongly influenced by several factors but the major 1s include positive psychological capital, E.Q. and S.Q. It is apprehensible that individuals who have properties of positive psychological capital, E.Q. and S.Q. can successfully get by with emphasiss of life and such emphasiss are perceived as chances instead than challenges. Based on these observations, it can be concluded that Psychological Capital, Emotional and Spiritual Intelligence play a important function in the care of Subjective Well Being in executive adult females. It can be indirectly assumed that these adult females must besides be really high on self- efficaciousness, resiliency, optimism and hope. Ravindranath ( 2011 ) explained the Life accomplishments as an attack in psychological capital in life and work scenes. He discussed that an intercession like life accomplishment s preparation are comprehensive including assorted countries like thought, behaviour and emotions. The concluding marks being self- consciousness, self- regard and accepting of others. In an person, life accomplishments develop over the old ages continuously in an active mode. There are many accomplishments, which are needed to successfully negociate each and every interaction. Expected learning results include a combination of cognition, values, attitudes and accomplishments with a peculiar accent on those accomplishments that are related to critical thought, and job resolution, self direction and communicating and inter- personal accomplishments. Further more life accomplishments evolved as a consequence of mental well being and wellness, so life accomplishments can be considered as an intercession scheme in positive psychological science and wellness. Kaur ( 2012 ) studied the occupation satisfaction of secondary school instructors in relation to psychological capital. She found that ( I ) there was negative negligible relationship between occupation satisfaction and psychological capital of secondary school instructors. ( two ) There was negative negligible relationship between occupation satisfaction and psychological capital of govt. secondary school instructors. ( three ) There was negative negligible relationship between occupation satisfaction and psychological capital of private secondary school instructors. ( four ) There was negative negligible relationship between occupation satisfaction and psychological capital of male secondary school instructors. ( V ) There was negative negligible relationship between occupation satisfaction and psychological capital of female secondary school instructors.Surveies Related to Religious Intelligence:Vaughan ( 2002 ) discussed that Spiritual intelligence is concerned with the interior life of head and spirit and its relationship with being in the universe. Religious intelligence implies a capacity for a deep apprehension of experiential inquiries and an penetration into multiple degrees of consciousness. Religious intelligence besides implies consciousness of spirit as the land of being or as the originative life force of development. If the development of life from stardust to mineral, veggie, animate being, and human being implies some signifier of intelligence instead than being a strictly random procedure, it might be called religious. Religious intelligence emerges as consciousness evolves into an ever-deepening consciousness of affair, life, organic structure, head, psyche, and spirit. Religious intelligence, so, is more than single mental ability. It appears to link the personal to the transpersonal and the ego to spirit. It goes beyond conventional psychological development. In add-on to self-awareness, it implies consciousness of our relationship to the transcendent, to each other, to the Earth and all existences. As a clinical psychologist, he farther explains that †spiritual intelligence opens the bosom, illuminates the head, and inspires the psyche, linking the single human mind to the underlying land of being. Religious intelligence can be developed with pattern and can assist a individual distinguish world from semblance. It may be expressed in any civilization as love, wisdom, and service. † Mahajan ( 2011 ) studied the Academic Achievement in relation to Emotional Intelligence and Spiritual Intelligence. A sample of 140 pupils analyzing in category Eleven from four schools of Hoshiarpur was taken for the aggregation of informations. The technique employed was multistage randomisation of bunchs at school and subdivision degree. B- Variate coefficients and t- ratios were used to analyze the information. The findings were- ( I ) There exists no important difference between the emotional intelligence of male childs and misss. ( two ) There exists no important difference between the religious intelligence of male childs and misss. ( three ) There exists positive and important relationship between academic accomplishment and emotional intelligence of male childs and misss. Besides the relationship was found positive and important for male childs and misss individually. ( four ) There exists positive and important relationship between academic accomplishment and Religious Inte lligence of male childs and misss. Besides the relationship was found positive and important for male childs and misss individually. ( V ) There exists positive and important relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Spiritual Intelligence of male childs and misss. Jeloudar and Goodarzi ( 2012 ) examined the relationship between instructors religious intelligent and their occupation satisfaction index at senior secondary schools degree. Participants were 177 pedagogues who completed the religious Intelligence Scale ( ECI ) , and a version of the Job Descriptive Index is a graduated table used to mensurate six major factors associated with occupation satisfaction based on a selected demographic variable. The findings of the survey showed that there were important relationship between instructors ‘ religious intelligence and their occupation satisfaction. The survey besides revealed that there was important difference found between instructors ‘ religious intelligence and their academic degrees. Further there were important relationship was found between instructors ‘ religious intelligence and five factors of occupation satisfaction: ( nature of the work itself, attitudes towards supervisors, dealingss with colleagues, chances for publicity, work status in the present environment ) , but no important relationship with one factor ( salary and benefit ) of occupation satisfaction. Rastgar, Davoudi and Oraji ( 2012 ) conducted a survey in Mazandaran, a state in North of Iran, and aimed to analyse the function of emplyoees ‘ religious intelligence in perceptual experience of organisational justness. There were 1100 forces in Mellat bank. A sum of 366 questionnaire were distributed among the bank forces and 288 filled questionnaires were returned. The factor analysis and findings show that emplyoees ‘ religious intelligence has a important positive influence on perceptual experience of organisational justness. This determination implied that the higher the degree of emplyoees ‘ religious intelligence, tended to increase the degree of employees ; perceptual experience of organisational justness.

Validity and Reliability of the Job Content Questionnaire

52 SJWEH Suppl 2008, no 6 Validity and reliability of the job content questionnaire in formal and informal jobs in Brazil by Tania Maria de Araujo, PhD,1 Robert Karasek, PhD 2 de Araujo TM, Karasek R. Validity and reliability of the job content questionnaire in formal and informal jobs in Brazil. SJWEH Suppl. 2008;(6):52–59. Objectives This study evaluated the job content questionnaire (JCQ) in measuring work psychology aspects with respect to formal and informal jobs in Brazilian occupational groups.Methods A cross-sectional study was carried out in a random sample of 1311 ? 15-year-old residents in the urban area of the city of Feira de Santana, Bahia, Brazil. The Portuguese JCQ version included the recommended 49-item of the original version. The JCQ performance evaluation included descriptive analysis, discriminant analysis, internal consistency, and construct validity. Results Averages of the JCQ scales were similar for the formal and informal workers, except for decision authority (formal job: c=31. ; informal jobs: c=34. 5). The averages of the Portuguese JCQ scales did not differ substantially from those obtained in other European, North American, and Japanese studies, albeit they were slightly lower in the Brazilian case. In general, Cronbach’s alpha coefficients revealed performance similar to other large-sample studies, showing acceptable internal consistency. The coefficients were relatively similar for formal and informal jobs. Factor analysis revealed high consistency with the theoretical model.Conclusions This is the first study to evaluate JCQ performance comparing formal and informal jobs in a developing country. The job content questionnaire presented a good global performance, and it did not differ substantially from those observed in other studies. These findings suggest that the job content questionnaire can be used in studies carried out in developing countries and in situations in which informal jobs are common. Key terms de cision latitude; demand–control model; occupational stress; psychological demand; psychological distress. Health Department, State University of Feira de Santana, Bahia, Brazil. 2 Department of Work Environment, University of Massachusetts at Lowell, Lowell, Massachusetts, United States. Reprint requests to: Dr TM de Araujo, KM 03, BR 116 Campus Universitario, Feira de Santana, BA, Brazil, 40110 180. [E-mail: araujo. [email  protected] br ] There is a significant amount of scientific literature on the psychosocial aspects of work in developed countries. However, research addressing the measurement of these aspects in developing countries is recent and scarce.In developing countries, work organization aspects are usually considered to be a less relevant problem than other crucial problems, such as unemployment, accidents, and other occupational hazards that threaten life and put worker’s physical health at risk. Moreover, there is an assumption that instruments used t o measure psychosocial aspects in developed countries are not applicable in developing countries because of different cultural contexts. However, these arguments have been criticized because f, at least, the following three factors: (i) the globalization process—many multinational companies have been operating in developing countries under job standards and technologies that are similar to those used in developed countries (1), (ii) social and economic structural heterogeneity in developing societies—which include, in the same region, areas with a high level of development (industrialized areas) and very poor areas, and (iii) the increasing rates of occupational diseases and disabilities related to work organization conditions shown by some developing countries.These three processes, acting together, reveal that psychosocial aspects at work are a relevant problem in different social and economic contexts. The impacts on mental and physical health are already visible in developing contexts (2, 3), and they indicate the importance of investigating work psychology aspects in both developed and developing countries. Some models have aimed at evaluating psychosocial characteristics at work and their effects on worker health.The demand–control model has worldwide use and is a strong influence on this research field (4, 5). It focuses on two crucial work dimensions, decision latitude and psychological demands. Decision latitude SJWEH Suppl 2008;(6):52–59 SJWEH Suppl 2008, no 6 53 de Araujo & Karasek refers to the ability to make decisions about one’s work and the possibility of being creative and using or developing new skills. It includes two dimensions, skill discretion (opportunity to use skills) and decision authority (opportunity to make decisions).Psychological demand refers to workload, mental requirements, organizational constraints put on the worker, and conflicting demands. The job content questionnaire (JCQ) is a standard ized instrument proposed to measure the dimensions of the demand–control model (6). In the last two decades, the job content questionnaire has been intensively used in developed countries, and its performance has been tested in populations from these countries (7–15). However, performance on the job content questionnaire in developing countries remains a less studied issue.In our literature review we identified only three studies conducted in â€Å"developing† countries to evaluate performance on the job content questionnaire, carried out in Mexico (16), Taiwan (17) and China (18). Specific occupational groups were studied: in Taiwan, workers from four companies, including men and women; in Mexico only women from two maquiladora microelectronic plants; in China, male and female health care workers. In Brazil, the Swedish version of the job content questionnaire (17 questions) was tested in a sample of the technical and administrative staff of a Brazilian univers ity.The global performance of the scales for decision latitude, psychological demand, and social support was good (3). The main objective of this study was to assess the validity and reliability of the job content questionnaire in measuring work psychosocial characteristics for workers in formal and informal jobs in Brazil. Study population and methods Study design A cross-sectional study was carried out in a random sample of workers 15 years or older from the city of Feira de Santana in 2002.It is the second largest city in the State of Bahia, in the northeast region of Brazil, with around half a million inhabitants. Definition of formal and informal jobs In Brazil, the Labor Ministry has adopted an instrument to define formal and informal jobs: the Job Card (â€Å"Carteira de Trabalho†). This card establishes the job contract between employees and employers. It is regulated by national laws and provides all kinds of benefits, including placing the worker in a social securit y system. The job card establishes a formal job for the worker.Informal jobs are not regulated by law; there is no social security system, nor any other kind of social or economic rights. Among different kinds of informal jobs, selling products in the street is the most common type. Another type that has increased, as a result of the unemployment situation, is the family store (stores that are constructed in the living room of a person’s own home). Study population The study areas were selected using random procedures, based on population data from the national census.The sampling procedures were conducted using the following steps: (i) selection of the sectors within each subdistrict, by a random procedure, (ii) random selection of streets within each selected sector, (iii) visitation of all houses on the selected streets, and (iv) interview of all people 15 years or older by well-trained interviewers using standard procedures. The use of a field manual helped to standardize procedures in the interview and avoid biases in the data collection. Up to three visits were made to a person’s residence, in an effort to perform an interview.We visited 1479 residences and interviewed 3190 people. To evaluate JCQ performance, we analyzed information only from people who were working at the time of the interview. Altogether 1311 workers were included in this study. Sixty-six percent of the target population worked in an informal job. The percentage of formal and informal jobs was similar according to gender (49. 1% for the women and 50. 4% for the men). No relevant differences were found across the age groups in the informal jobs.However, in the formal jobs, the proportion of workers increased from the beginning of worklife to the middle of it, but it decreased sharply after 40 years of age (from 46. 7% among the workers 26–34 years of age to 25. 5% among the workers ? 41 years of age). The workers in formal jobs had a higher education than those in informal jobs. Workers at the graduate level were 3. 1 times more likely to be in formal jobs than in informal jobs. Commercial activity (retail sales) employed the highest number of workers (38. 8%), followed by services in general (27. %), private household services (11. 2%), education (6. 9%), manufacturing (6. 6%), transportation (4. 3%), and construction (4. 1%). The composition according to formal and informal jobs showed clear job insecurity in some specific sectors. Among the workers employed in the construction sector, 87. 0% had an informal job; for private household services the proportion was 86. 5%; and it was 70% for commercial activity, 64. 2% for transportation workers, and 62% for the workers in general services. On the other hand, 67. % of the people working in education and 57. 1% of those in manufacturing had formal jobs. 54 SJWEH Suppl 2008, no 6 Job content questionnaire in jobs in Brazil Considering the place where people worked, we observed more variety for i nformal jobs. The highest proportion of informal workers was found for working on the street (23. 6%), followed by company (22. 8%), another person’s home (20. 8%), and in their own house (18. 3%). Among the formal workers, 66. 8% worked in companies (private enterprise), and 21. 9% were employed in public buildings.Portuguese translation process for the job content questionnaire The translation process took into account aspects like conceptual equivalence, item equivalence, semantic equivalence, operational equivalence, measurement equivalence, and functional equivalence (19) . The recommended procedures to build a cross-cultural translation of the job content questionnaire were followed. First, the questionnaire was translated independently into Portuguese by two Brazilian translators. Specific instructions were clarified to guide the translation process.According to these instructions, the emphasis in the translation was given to the meaning of the terms rather than to lit eral translation, reinforcing the item meaning in the Brazilian occupational context. The translation, produced in this first step, was discussed in meetings with the research team and translators until a consensual version was drawn up. This consensual Portuguese version was translated back into English (back translation) by two other translators, who were native English speakers and also fluent in Portuguese. The Portuguese version of the job content questionnaire and the back translation ere sent to the JCQ Center to be evaluated by the Center researchers. After this evaluation, some modifications were suggested for the first translation, and they were promptly accounted for. A pretest was conducted to test the clarity of question formulation, problems found in answering specific questions, and conceptual equivalence between both languages (English and Portuguese). Based on the pretest results, a new version was clarified (including a new back translation). The JCQ Center approve d the final version in December 2001. Scales and subscales of the job content questionnaireThe Portuguese version of the job content questionnaire included the following recommended format (6): 49 questions (scales of decision latitude—skill discretion and decision authority, psychological demand, physical demand, social support—supervisor and coworker support, and job insecurity). In order to build indicators, for each scale of the questionnaire, a sum of the weighted item score was calculated according to the user’s guide of the job content questionnaire (6). Statistical analysis All of the analyses were conducted separately for the formal and informal workers.Mean values and standard deviations were calculated for each scale and subscale. The performance analysis included a discriminant analysis, internal consistency (reliability indicators), and construct validity (factor analysis). Discriminant analysis. This study included workers from different job sector s. Discriminant validity was analyzed by comparing the means of the scales and subscales of the job content questionnaires gathered from workers in each sector. An analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed to compare the observed differences. Internal consistency.Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was calculated to assess the internal consistency or homogeneity of the questions aimed at measuring the same construct. Alpha values above 0. 65 were considered acceptable (12, 14). Construct validity (factor analysis). The analysis was developed in three steps. First, an exploratory analysis using a correlation matrix for all of the variables was computed. In the second step, a principal component method was used to extract the factors (eigenvalues ? 1 criterion). A rotation varimax (orthogonal) was conducted to make the factors more interpretable (20).Factors loading values of >40 were considered indicators of significant factorial contribution (10). Measurement of mental health outco me. To evaluate performance on the job content questionnaire in identifying work conditions involving a risk to mental health, we evaluated the prevalence of psychological distress according to the demand–control model. The self-reporting questionnaire (SRQ-20), a structured instrument designed by the World Health Organization to measure psychological distress in developing countries, was used. The scales for decision latitude and psychological demand were dichotomized.The mean values were used to dichotomize both scales. Based on the combination between the levels of demand and control, four categories were established for the demand–control model. A multiple logistic regression was performed to adjust for potential confounders. Results The means and standard deviations of the scales of the job content questionnaire were similar for the formal and SJWEH Suppl 2008, no 6 55 de Araujo & Karasek informal jobs (table 1). The most important difference was observed for â₠¬Å"decision authority† in that there was a higher mean for informal jobs (34. 6) than for formal jobs (31. 99). The Cronbach’s alpha coefficients were relatively similar for the formal and informal jobs, even though the coefficients were higher for the formal jobs—the coefficients ranged from 0. 65 to 0. 79. The internal consistency for psychological demand was low for the informal jobs (0. 55). The subscale â€Å"conflicting demands† presented poor consistency with the other subscales; its correlation coefficient was lower than 0. 10. For skill discretion, the internal consistency was also relatively low for informal jobs (0. 6029).The subscale â€Å"variety† showed low consistency with the other subscales, the correlation coefficient with the other items being 0. 19. For the job insecurity scale, the performance was poor for both types of jobs (but better for informal jobs). The analysis of the means of the scales of the job content questionnaire according to sector of activity showed some significant differences. Table 2 shows the subscale means of the questionnaire according to sectors. The mean for skill discretion was lower for private household services (formal jobs: c=29. 18; informal jobs: c=32. 12) than for education (formal jobs: c=35. 3; informal jobs: c=34. 08). Similar differences were observed for decision authority (note the high means for education for both formal and informal jobs). Psychological demand revealed a similar pattern across all of the sectors. The means for physical demand were higher for construction (formal jobs: c=12. 50; informal jobs: c=14. 30) and manufacturing (formal jobs: c=13. 45; informal jobs: c=12. 66) and lower for education (formal jobs: c=11. 84; informal jobs: c=11. 71), as expected. The highest job insecurity means were observed for the construction sector (formal jobs: c=7. 0; informal jobs: c=9. 78). Correlation coefficient by sector No correlation was found between decision l atitude and psychological demand (formal workers: 0. 057; informal workers: 0. 010). This finding supports the hypothesis of relative independence between these two factors, as theoretically postulated. For almost all of the scales of the job content questionnaire, the correlation coefficients showed a similar pattern for the sectors. The pattern was similar by sector with respect to the formal and informal jobs, following the predicted direction, as proposed by Karasek’s demand–control model.Some small differences were observed in the coefficient magnitude, but not in the direction of the coefficients. However, a substantial difference was observed between the two dimensions of decision latitude. In the sectors of education, manufacturing, private household services, construction, and general services, a positive correlation between skill discretion (SD) and decision authority (DA) was observed—as expected. For the sectors of commercial activity and transportat ion, we observed no correlation between skill discretion and decision authority, 0. 068 and 0. 077, respectively.Construct validity The factor analysis loaded eight factors for formal and informal jobs (tables 3 and 4). Similar patterns were observed for both types of jobs. There was high Table 1. Means, standard deviations (SD), and Cronbach’s alpha reliability coefficients for the scales and subscales of the job content questionnaire according to formal and informal jobs. Scales Range Formal jobs Informal jobs Mean SD a Mean SD a Decision latitude 24–96 64. 76 8. 44 0. 6576 65. 91 7. 84 0. 6211 Skill discretion 12–48 32. 76 4. 25 0. 6500 31. 39 4. 06 0. 6029 Decision authority 12–48 31. 9 6. 20 0. 6869 34. 46 6. 01 0. 7194 Psychological demand 12–48 30. 07 3. 63 0. 6627 29. 89 3. 29 0. 5588 Social support 8–32 23. 07 2. 09 0. 7103 23. 20 2. 01 0. 6588 Coworker support 4–16 11. 75 1. 16 0. 6901 11. 97 1. 25 0. 7009 Supervisory suppor t 4–16 11. 28 1. 47 0. 7900 11. 38 1. 30 0. 6515 Physical demand 5–20 12. 30 2. 14 0. 7584 12. 53 2. 25 0. 7615 Job insecurity a 3–12 5. 25 1. 15 0. 3613 5. 90 1. 83 0. 5540 Age 15–82 33. 93 11. 59 – 34. 94 13. 93 – a Means for job insecurity (4 items): formal jobs: 6. 47 (SD 1. 44); informal jobs: 7. 44 (SD 2. 47). Table 2.Means of the subscales of the job content questionnaire according to sector of activity for the formal and informal jobs. (SD = skill discretion, DA = decision authority, DL = decision latitude, PD = psychological demand, PhyD = physical demand, JI = job insecurity) Sector SD DA DL PD PhyD JI Formal jobs Construction 31. 67 33. 84 65. 71 28. 67 12. 50 7. 00 Manufacturing 33. 09 31. 91 65. 07 31. 45 13. 45 6. 32 Commerce (retail activity) 32. 80 31. 54 64. 28 30. 47 12. 45 6. 23 Transportation 31. 78 29. 68 61. 33 29. 28 12. 74 6. 20 Education 35. 06 35. 33 70. 56 30. 02 11. 4 4. 87 General services 32. 13 32. 44 64. 79 30 . 11 12. 29 5. 44 Private household services 30. 47 29. 18 59. 65 29. 50 12. 13 5. 50 Informal jobs Construction 31. 40 32. 41 63. 95 30. 78 14. 30 9. 78 Manufacturing 33. 10 33. 25 66. 26 31. 03 12. 66 7. 61 Commerce (retail activity) 31. 40 35. 66 67. 13 30. 01 12. 36 7. 00 Transportation 30. 94 36. 25 67. 25 31. 03 13. 35 6. 38 Education 35. 28 34. 08 69. 36 29. 44 11. 71 6. 30 General Services 31. 94 34. 60 66. 64 29. 66 12. 50 7. 07 Private household services 29. 12 32. 12 61. 34 28. 98 12. 07 6. 58 56 SJWEH Suppl 2008, no 6Job content questionnaire in jobs in Brazil consistency with the theoretical model for the scales for supervisory support, coworker support, skill discretion, decision authority, and physical demand. The subscales related to psychological demand loaded on different factors. The subscale â€Å"conflicting demands† did not load on the psychological demand scale, as expected. For both the formal and informal jobs, it loaded on one separate factor (factor 8). For the skill discretion scale, the subscale â€Å"variety† loaded on the factor related to the psychological demand Table 4.Factor (F) analysis using the principal component extraction method and varimax rotation with the informal jobs. Scale Informal job (N=780) F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8 Skill discretion Learn new things  ·  ·  · 0. 661  ·  ·  ·  · Repetitive work a  ·  ·  · 0. 480  ·  ·  ·  · Requires creativity  ·  ·  · 0. 587  ·  ·  ·  · High skill level  ·  ·  · 0. 644  ·  ·  ·  · Variety  ·  ·  · b 0. 502 Develop own abilities 0. 724  ·  ·  ·  · Decision authority Allows own decisions  ·  · 0. 809  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Little decision freedom a  ·  · 0. 822  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Opinions influential  ·  · 0. 690  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Psychological demand Work fast  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 430  ·  ·Work hard  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 479  ·  · Excessive work a  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 686  ·  · Insufficient time a  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 599  ·  · Conflicting demands a  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 774 Social support Supervisor is concerned  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 760  ·  ·  · Supervisor pays attention  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 718  ·  ·  · Helpful supervisor  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 417  ·  ·  · Supervisor good organizer  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 774  ·  ·  · Coworker support Coworkers competent 0. 722  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Coworker interest in me 0. 710  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Friendly coworkers 0. 652  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Coworkers helpful 0. 714  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Physical demand Much physical effort  · 0. 706  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Lift heavy loads  · 0. 59  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Rapid physical activity  · 0. 756  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Awkward body position  · b  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 874  · Awkward arm–head p osition  · b  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 855  · Variance explained (after rotation) (%) 12. 3 10. 3 7. 39 7. 06 6. 17 4. 90 4. 23 3. 89 Total variance explained (%) 56. 3  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · a Item formulated in a negative direction; the score was reversed before the factor analysis. b Item loaded on a different factor. Table 3. Factor (F) analysis using the principal component extraction method and varimax rotation with the formal jobs. Scale Formal job (N=403) F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8 Skill discretionLearn new things  ·  · 0. 639  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Repetitive work a  ·  · b –0. 481 Requires creativity  ·  · 0. 687  ·  ·  ·  ·  · High skill level  ·  · 0. 650  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Variety  · 0. 577 b  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Develop own abilities 0. 653  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Decision authority Allows own decisions  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 780 Little decision freedom a  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 674 Opinions i nfluential  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 737 Psychological demand Work fast  · 0. 477  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Work hard  · 0. 687  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Excessive work a  · 0. 614  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Insufficient time a  · 0. 673  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Conflicting demands a  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 802 Social support Supervisor is concerned 0. 16  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Supervisor pays attention 0. 674  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Helpful supervisor 0. 744  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Supervisor good organizer 0. 717  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · Coworker support Coworkers competent  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 432  ·  ·  · Coworker interest in me  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 757  ·  ·  · Friendly coworkers  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 746  ·  ·  · Coworkers helpful  ·  ·  ·  · 0. 730  ·  ·  · Physical demand Much physical effort  ·  ·  · 0. 747  ·  ·  ·  · Lift heavy loads  ·  ·  · 0. 482  ·  ·  ·  · Rapid physical activity  ·  ·  · 0. 837  ·  ·  ·  · Awkward body position  ·  ·  · b  · 0. 891  ·  · Awkward arm–head position  ·  ·  · b  · 0. 881  ·  · Variance explained (after rotation)(%) 8. 43 8. 19 7. 1 7. 79 7. 54 6. 96 6. 37 4. 48 Total variance explained (%) 62. 4  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  ·  · a Item formulated in a negative direction; the score was reversed before the factor analysis. b Item loaded on a different factor. SJWEH Suppl 2008, no 6 57 de Araujo & Karasek scale, and it was not related to the scale for skill discretion, as expected. Physical demand loaded on two different factors, revealing two different types of physical workloads, type 1 including â€Å"much physical effort†, â€Å"lift heavy loads†, and â€Å"rapid physical activity† and type 2 including â€Å"awkward body position† and â€Å"awkward arm and head positions†.Capability of the job content questionnaire to identify different work situations as risks to mental health Relevant differences in the prevalence of psychological distress were observed according to the job strain quadrants. The high-strain quadrant had the highest psychological distress prevalence (table 5). Similar results were found for the formal and informal jobs. The low-strain situation had the lowest psychological distress prevalence. A difference was found in the quadrants of diagonal B (passive and active). In formal jobs, the prevalence of psychological distress was higher for the active job quadrant.For the informal jobs, the prevalence of psychological distress was higher in the passive job quadrant (1. 4 higher than in the low-strain situation). Discussion This is the first study to evaluate performance of the job content questionnaire by comparing formal and informal jobs in a developing country. Performance of the questionnaire was tested in a poor region of northeast Brazil, where general living conditions are precarious and the educational level is low; the worker’s qualification levels were, in general, very low. Despite the cultural nd economic differences from developed country contexts, the job content questionnaire has good global performance. Our means and standard deviations were similar to results from the job stress absenteeism and coronary heart disease European cooperative study (the JACE study) (9), including eight samples from five European countries. Some differences occurred as expected, such as higher means for physical demand and job insecurity in our study (formal and informal jobs) and higher decision latitude for the JACE study. It is notable that, for decision authority, the means for the informal jobs and the JACE study were similar.This similarity indicates a significant freedom for the workers to decide how to do their own work in informal jobs but also pointed out that, among these workers, the possibility to make decis ions was not combined with the use or development of skills. For example, in the sectors of commercial activity and transportation, the workers seemed to be free to decide how to do their work, but the same did not apply to the development of new skills and abilities. The means for decision authority were higher than the means for skill discretion in these sectors.Within these sectors, the proportion of people working on the streets was high, a fact that could partially explain this result In general, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficients revealed a performance similar to that found with other large-sample studies, conducted in developed countries, even though they were slightly lower in our study. The estimated coefficients indicated acceptable levels of internal consistency for almost all of the scales of the job content questionnaire. The psychological demand scale, with five questions, showed poor internal consistency.The reliability was acceptable for the formal jobs but low for the informal jobs. This finding has been observed also in other studies. For example, in the JACE study, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was relatively low for the men (Netherlands 0. 57, Canada–Quebec 0. 59, Japan 0. 61) and for the women (Netherlands 0. 51 and US–QES 0. 62). These results revealed a general imprecision of the job content questionnaire in measuring psychological demand. Karasek et al (9) have argued that different meanings of psychological demand by population groups could explain part of these results.These differences in meaning are related to the actual stage of area development. Until now, there has been no agreement about the exact meaning of psychological Table 5. Prevalence rates for psychological distress—the prevalence ratio (PR) and the respective confidence intervals (95% CI) according to the job strain model for formal and informal jobs adjusted for age, educational level, gender, social support, time in this position ( results from the multiple logistic regression analysis). Job strain model a Prevalence PR b 95% CI (%) Formal jobs Low strain (^ decision latitude v psychological demand) 11. 5 – –Passive job (v decision latitude v psychological demand) 15. 5 1. 35 0. 64–2. 84 Active job (^ decision latitude ^ psychological demand) 23. 8 2. 07 1. 05–4. 08 High strain (^ decision latitude ^ psychological demand) 26. 7 2. 32 1. 18–4. 56 Informal jobs Low strain (^ decision latitude v psychological demand) 20. 0 – Passive job (v decision latitude v psychological demand) 24. 5 1. 23 0. 91–1. 66 Active job (^ decision latitude ^ psychological demand) 24. 1 1. 20 0. 90–1. 61 High strain (v decision latitude ^ psychological demand) 33. 1 1. 65 1. 26–2. 18 a Reference group: decision latitude and psychological demand. The delta method was used to convert odds ratios to prevalence ratios. 58 SJWEH Suppl 2008, no 6 Job content questionnaire in job s in Brazil demand in our social and cultural contexts. It remains an important question for future studies. In addition, to make this concept and correspondent scale more reliable, a clear distinction between â€Å"qualitative† and â€Å"quantitative† psychological demands has been proposed. Suggestions to include emotional demand as a job dimension has also been noted in the literature (21). High internal consistency was observed for decision authority among the formal and informal workers.The items used to evaluate the measure of worker opportunity to make decisions in both highly structured and unstructured settings performed well, as indicated by Cronbach’s alpha. It is important to note that, when these two job-control subscales are taken as a single scale—decision latitude—the reliability is acceptable for both formal and informal jobs. The subscales for coworker support and supervisory support showed the highest consistency with the demandà ¢â‚¬â€œcontrol model theory. The high consistency of these scales had been observed earlier in other studies of the validity and reliability of the job content questionnaire (14, 17) .The physical demand scale also showed good reliability for groups in formal and informal jobs. This scale has also been observed to perform well in other studies (9, 12). The factor analysis showed a structure that is consistent with the theoretical presumptions of the job strain model. Our study produced eight factors, almost all of them in an expected way. The scales for decision authority, supervisory support, coworker support, physical demand, and skill discretion were consistent with the proposed scales of the job content questionnaire, as observed in other studies (22).However, some findings of our study need to be more carefully analyzed. For example, aspects related to the physical demand scale loaded on two types of factors, showing that the job content questionnaire measured two different phy sical workloads. Although the questionnaire establishes only a scale for physical demand, Karasek & Theorell (23) assumed that two specific types of physical demand were involved in job tasks (physical exertion and physical isometric load). In fact, it is acceptable that the questionnaire includes at least two different kinds of physical demands, as observed in our study.Indeed, this result reinforces the ability of the questionnaire to measure and identify specific characteristics of the work environment. With this perspective, future improvements in the questionnaire should consider the evaluation of these two dimensions separately, instead of only one, as currently suggested. One item of the skill discretion scale was also critical. The subscale â€Å"variety† (â€Å"I get to do a variety of different things in my job†), in both the formal and informal groups, was more related to psychological demand aspects than to the skill discretion scale, as expected.The data s uggested that doing different things was not related to job enrichment in the studied population in Brazil. In fact, it represents an increase in workload. Moreover, translation difficulties could be considered a potential explanation for these specific results (cultural differences). One item related to psychological demand, â€Å"conflicting demands†, loaded on a separate factor for both the formal and informal jobs. It revealed a low correlation of this subscale with other subscales related to psychological demand, which duplicated rather precisely a problem found in studies in other countries (8, 9, 12) for this question.Our results also showed relevant problems with this subscale, reinforcing the hypothesis that changes in this item structure are needed to improve the performance of the psychological demand measurement. For the formal jobs, the item â€Å"repetitive work† did not load on the skill discretion factor, as expected. Similar results were found in studi es in other countries (7, 12, 24, 25). The low consistency of this item with the skill discretion subscale could be related to a nonnormal distribution of this aspect. Usually, repetitive work is much more frequent for the lowest skill (9) . The Portuguese version of the job content questionnaire howed a high capability to identify risk to mental health. As predicted by the control–demand model, work with high strain consistently has the highest negative effect on mental health for both formal and informal jobs, albeit more strongly for formal jobs. It supports an association between psychological distress and job strain, as pointed out in other studies on mental health (25). In conclusion, the validity and reliability of the Portuguese version of the job content questionnaire is good, and it is performed similarly among workers with formal or informal jobs in Brazil. Future research should address a detailed evaluation f the decision-latitude dimensions in informal jobs, esp ecially in relation to skill discretion, which performed regularly among informal workers and in new investigations of psychological demand indicators and their performance. Gender differences form another important aspect to be explored in future studies. Acknowledgments This study was funded by CAPES—Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel, Brazil, and partially supported by grant D43TW005749, â€Å"Work and Health in Brazil and Mexico† from the John E Fogarty Internationl Center of the US National Institutes of Health.SJWEH Suppl 2008, no 6 59 de Araujo & Karasek References 1. Siqueira E. Depend convergence—the struggle to control petrochemical hazards in Brazil and the United States. New York (NY): Baywood; 2003. 2. Araujo TM, Aquino E, Menezes G, Santos CO, Aguiar L. Work psychosocial aspects and psychological distress among nurses Rev Saude Publica. 2003;37:424–33. 3. Alves MGM, Chor D, Faerstein E, Lopes CS, Werneck GL. Short version of the â€Å"Job Stress Scale: Portuguese-language adaptation. Rev Saude Publica. 2004;38:164–71. 4. Karasek R. Job demand, job decision latitude, and mental strain: implications for job redesign.Adm Sci Q. 1979;24:285–308. 5. Rick J, Briner RB, Daniels K, Perryman S, Guppy A. 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