Societal individualism–collectivism and uncertainty avoidance as cultural moderators of relationships between job resources and strain

The job demands–resources model is a dominant theoretical framework that describes the influence of job demands and job resources on employee strain. Recent research has highlighted that the effects of job demands on strain vary across cultures, but similar work has not explored whether this is true for job resources. Given that societal characteristics can influence individuals' cognitive structures and, to a lesser extent, values in a culture, we address this gap in the literature and argue that individuals' strain in reaction to job resources may differ across cultures. Specifically, we theorize that the societal cultural dimensions of individualism–collectivism and uncertainty avoidance shape individual‐level job resource–strain relationships, as they dictate which types of resources (i.e., individual vs. group preference‐oriented and uncertainty‐reducing vs. not) are more likely to be valued, used, or effective in combating strain within a culture. Results revealed that societal individualism–collectivism and uncertainty avoidance independently moderated the relationships between certain job resources (i.e., job control, participation in decision making, and clear goals and performance feedback) and strain (i.e., job satisfaction and turnover intentions). This study expands our understanding of the cross‐cultural specificity versus generalizability of the job demands–resources model.     

微生物絮凝剂产生菌的筛选及其培养条件优化的研究

采用常规的细菌分离纯化方法从土壤中分离出絮凝剂产生菌菌株,经过驯化培养后,以发酵液对高岭土混悬液的絮凝效果为指标,筛选出2株高效絮凝剂产生菌.采用单因素试验方法和正交试验设计方法,分析了影响絮凝效果的主要因素,对2个菌株的最佳培养条件进行了优化研究.结果表明:菌株S3产絮凝剂的最佳培养条件是碳源为葡萄糖(20g/L),氮源为酵母膏(2.5 g/L),培养温度为28℃,初始pH值为8,通气量为50 r/min;菌株S21产絮凝剂的最佳培养条件是乙醇(15 g/L),氮源为复合氮源(酵母膏 脲 硫酸铵)(1.6 g/L),培养温度为28℃,初始pH值为9,通气量为200r/min.     

Quantifying current and potential contributions of Australian indigenous peoples to threatened species management

Formal engagement of indigenous peoples in conservation is increasing globally and leads to multiple benefits to communities while contributing to national and international biodiversity goals and obligations. This and ongoing declines in biodiversity have led to calls to increase opportunities for indigenous people to engage in managing their estates. However, there is no overarching understanding of indigenous peoples’ involvement in conservation, which limits the identification of new opportunities. We amalgamated information across governments and large nongovernmental organizations in the megadiverse country of Australia to quantify the involvement of indigenous people in management of threatened species. We identified 153 Australian‐based projects undertaken by different indigenous groups around the nation in 2015 and 2016 that included explicit funds for management of threatened species or threatened ecosystems. Most were in remote parts of western and northern Australia. Almost one‐quarter of all threatened animals and 2% of threatened plants were the subject of some formal conservation action by indigenous people. Occurrence records for 1574 threatened species showed that 823 (89.2%) of 923 species recorded on indigenous peoples’ lands were not listed in management projects. This gap may represent new opportunities for conservation initiatives. Because at least 59.5% of Australia's threatened species occur on indigenous peoples’ lands, efforts to build appropriate and effective indigenous conservation alliances are vital. However, it is also important to recognize that threatened species are part of complex social, ecological, economic and cultural systems, and to achieve successful outcomes requires consideration of indigenous peoples’ priorities, rights, and obligations and relationships with their traditionally owned land and sea.     

Team creativity/innovation in culturally diverse teams: A meta‐analysis

This meta‐analysis investigates the direction and strength of the relationship between diversity in culturally diverse teams and team creativity/innovation. We distinguish the effects of two diversity levels (i.e., surface level vs. deep level) in culturally diverse teams and examine the moderators suggested by the socio‐technical systems framework (i.e., team virtuality and task characteristics in terms of task interdependence, complexity, and intellectiveness). Surface‐level diversity in culturally diverse teams is not related to team creativity/innovation, whereas deep‐level diversity in culturally diverse teams is positively related to team creativity/innovation. Moreover, surface‐level diversity in culturally diverse teams and team creativity/innovation are negatively related for simple tasks but unrelated for complex tasks. Deep‐level diversity in culturally diverse teams and team creativity/innovation is positively related for collocated teams and interdependent tasks but unrelated for noncollocated teams and independent tasks. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications.     

A novel application of cultural consensus models to evaluate conservation education programs

Conservation professionals recognize the need to evaluate education initiatives with a flexible approach that is culturally appropriate. Cultural‐consensus theory (CCT) provides a framework for measuring the extent to which beliefs are communally held and has long been applied by social scientists. In a conservation‐education context, we applied CCT and used free lists (i.e., a list of items on a topic stated in order of cultural importance) and domain analysis (analysis of how free lists go together within a cultural group) to evaluate a conservation education program in which we used a children's picture book to increase knowledge about and empathy for a critically endangered mammal, the Javan slow loris (Nycticebus javanicus). We extracted free lists of keywords generated by students (n = 580 in 18 schools) from essays they wrote before and after the education program. In 2 classroom sessions conducted approximately 18 weeks apart, we asked students to write an essay about their knowledge of the target species and then presented a book and several activities about slow loris ecology. Prior to the second session, we asked students to write a second essay. We generated free lists from both essays, quantified salience of terms used, and conducted minimal residuals factor analysis to determine presence of cultural domains surrounding slow lorises in each session. Students increased their use of words accurately associated with slow loris ecology and conservation from 43% in initial essays to 76% in final essays. Domain coherence increased from 22% to 47% across schools. Fifteen factors contributed to the domain slow loris. Between the first and second essays, factors that showed the greatest change were feeding ecology and slow loris as a forest protector, which increased 7‐fold, and the humancentric factor, which decreased 5‐fold. As demonstrated by knowledge retention and creation of unique stories and conservation opinions, children achieved all six levels of Bloom's taxonomy of learning domains. Free from the constraints of questionnaires and surveys, CCT methods provide a promising avenue to evaluate conservation education programs.     

Conserving the abundance of nonthreatened species

Human modification of the environment is driving declines in population size and distributional extent of much of the world's biota. These declines extend to many of the most abundant and widespread species, for which proportionally small declines can result in the loss of vast numbers of individuals, biomass, and interactions. These losses could have major localized effects on ecological and cultural processes and services without elevating a species’ global extinction risk. Although most conservation effort is directed at species threatened with extinction in the very near term, the value of retaining abundance regardless of global extinction risk is justifiable based on many biodiversity or ecosystem service metrics, including cultural services, at scales from local to global. The challenges of identifying conservation priorities for widespread and abundant species include quantifying the effects of species’ abundance on services and understanding how these effects are realized as populations decline. Negative effects of population declines may be disconnected from the threat processes driving declines because of species movements and environment flows (e.g., hydrology). Conservation prioritization for these species shares greater similarity with invasive species risk assessments than extinction risk assessments because of the importance of local context and per capita effects of abundance on other species. Because conservation priorities usually focus on preventing the extinction of threatened species, the rationale and objectives for incorporating declines of nonthreatened species must be clearly articulated, going beyond extinction risk to encompass the range of likely harmful effects (e.g., secondary extinctions, loss of ecosystem services) if declines persist or are not reversed. Research should focus on characterizing the effects of local declines in species that are not threatened globally across a range of ecosystem services and quantifying the spatial distribution of these effects through the distribution of abundance. The case for conserving abundance in nonthreatened species can be made most powerfully when the costs of losing this abundance are better understood.     

Effects of learning and adaptation on population viability

Cultural adaptation is one means by which conservationists may help populations adapt to threats. A learned behavior may protect an individual from a threat, and the behavior can be transmitted horizontally (within generations) and vertically (between generations), rapidly conferring population-level protection. Although possible in theory, it remains unclear whether such manipulations work in a conservation setting; what conditions are required for them to work; and how they might affect the evolutionary process. We examined models in which a population can adapt through both genetic and cultural mechanisms. Our work was motivated by the invasion of highly toxic cane toads (Rhinella marina) across northern Australia and the resultant declines of endangered northern quolls (Dasyurus hallucatus), which attack and are fatally poisoned by the toxic toads. We examined whether a novel management strategy in which wild quolls are trained to avoid toads can reduce extinction probability. We used a simulation model tailored to quoll life history. Within simulations, individuals were trained and a continuous evolving trait determined innate tendency to attack toads. We applied this model in a population viability setting. The strategy reduced extinction probability only when heritability of innate aversion was low (<20%) and when trained mothers trained >70% of their young to avoid toads. When these conditions were met, genetic adaptation was slower, but rapid cultural adaptation kept the population extant while genetic adaptation was completed. To gain insight into the evolutionary dynamics (in which we saw a transitory peak in cultural adaptation over time), we also developed a simple analytical model of evolutionary dynamics. This model showed that the strength of natural selection declined as the cultural transmission rate increased and that adaptation proceeded only when the rate of cultural transmission was below a critical value determined by the relative levels of protection conferred by genetic versus cultural mechanisms. Together, our models showed that cultural adaptation can play a powerful role in preventing extinction, but that rates of cultural transmission need to be high for this to occur.     

Using the 'protective environment' framework to analyse children's protection needs in Darfur

A major humanitarian concern during the continuing crisis in Darfur, Sudan, has been the protection of children, although there has been little in the way of comprehensive analysis to guide intervention. Founded on a situational analysis conducted between October 2005 and March 2006, this paper documents the significant threats to children's well-being directly linked to the political conflict. It demonstrates the role of non-conflict factors in exacerbating these dangers and in promoting additional protection violations, and it uses the 'protective environment' framework (UNICEF Sudan, 2006a) to identify systematic features of the current environment that put children at risk. This framework is shown to provide a coherent basis for assessment and planning, prompting broad, multidisciplinary analysis, concentrating on preventive and protective action, and fostering a systemic approach (rather than placing an undue focus on the discrete needs of 'vulnerable groups'). Constraints on its present utility in emergency settings are also noted.     

论公共文化环境建设的资源管理机制

通过对相关文献资料的梳理和分析,以安徽省财政支持公共文化服务体系建设为例,运用定量和定性研究相结合的方法,在充分的问卷调查及实地调研的基础上,总结了我国公共文化建设资源投入机制的实践与制度经验,指出了公共文化建设在资源投入及管理方面所存在的主要问题:财政投入的实际效益低下、资源保障机制不科学、公共文化服务软件投入不足、公共文化服务资源管理体制的结构性矛盾等.有鉴于此,文章分别从宏观与微观层面探讨了如何构建公共文化服务良性运行的资源管理机制,基于宏观政策与制度设计层面提出:创新公共文化建设资源管理的政策支持方式,建立基层公共文化服务的长效机制,构筑公共文化环境建设的资源分级保障机制,完善公共文化建设的人才环境,创设公共文化环境建设的资源整合机制,实施公共文化服务的运行评估与绩效评价机制.基于微观对策与措施层面提出:科学地确定现阶段公共文化建设的资源保障重点并明确各级财政的投入范围和基本保障的支出责任,转变公共文化财政资金的投入方式,改变公共文化环境建设的资源投入结构,完善公共文化建设的资金管理方式,等等.