Testing safety commitment in organizations through interpretations of safety artifacts

Problem

Safety culture relates to injuries and safety incidents in organizations, but is difficult to asses and measure. We describe a preliminary test of assessing an organization's safety culture by examining employee interpretations of organizational safety artifacts (safety signs).

Method

We collected data in three organizations using a new safety culture assessment tool that we label the Safety Artifact Interpretation (SAI) scale; we then crossed these data with safety climate and leadership evaluations.

Results

SAI were interpreted by employees in accordance with two conceptually distinct themes that are salient in the literature on organizational safety culture: safety compliance and commitment to safety. A significant correlation exists between SAI scores and the organizational safety climate. A similar (though insignificant) relationship was observed between SAI scores and leadership ratings.

Impact on industry

Employee perceptions and interpretations of safety artifacts can facilitate assessments of safety culture and can ultimately lead to understanding of and improvements in the level of organizational safety.     

Climatic design of vernacular housing in different provinces of China

For 2000 years, the inter-connexion between the specific structure of the Chinese eastern climates and the cultural background have produced remarkable vernacular housing types, both well adapted to the local conditions, and reflecting consistent values and knowledge. Stemming from a similar archetypal form, each house plan is translated through the specificity of the climate and resources of its site. One can think that the value and the diversity of this housing stock is due to the combination of the specific structure of the Chinese eastern climates, which creates the contrast of cold-dry winters and hot-humid summers, with the structure of the Ming t'ang, which contains the opposition of the yin and the yang. These two strong factors imprint a substantial cultural and conceptual unity upon all these housing types. Moreover, on the one hand, the geographical variations and, on the other hand, the local building materials generate a large diversity of housing types, of building techniques and of climatic devices which can be observed all around the country. These lessons could be valuable design guidelines from the past for the future.     

Beyond the conventional: Meeting the challenges of landscape governance within the European Landscape Convention?

Academics and policy makers seeking to deconstruct landscape face major challenges conceptually, methodologically and institutionally. The meaning(s), identity(ies) and management of landscape are controversial and contested. The European Landscape Convention provides an opportunity for action and change set within new governance agendas addressing interdisciplinarity and spatial planning. This paper critically reviews the complex web of conceptual and methodological frameworks that characterise landscape planning and management and then focuses on emerging landscape governance in Scotland within a mixed method approach involving policy analyses, semi-structured interviews and best practice case studies. Using Dower's (2008) criteria from the Articles of the European Landscape Convention, the results show that whilst some progress has been made in landscape policy and practice, largely through the actions of key individuals and champions, there are significant institutional hurdles and resource limitations to overcome. The need to mainstream positive landscape outcomes requires a significant culture change where a one-size-fits-all approach does not work.     

Quoting “the Environment”: Touchstones on Earth

Media influence public awareness through agenda setting and framing of news by selecting what is published, how frequently and through what frames. This content analysis compares portrayals of climate change based on political ideology of the media. It examines daily coverage of climate change in Santiago, Chile by the conservative, El Mercurio, newspaper, and the liberal, La Nación. Twenty percent of the 1,628 articles published in 2003, 2005, and 2007 which included the words “cambio climático” (climate change) or “calentamiento global” (global warming) were analyzed for frequency, content, images, and frames. The liberal newspaper published twice as many articles that were twice as long, with four times as many illustrations about climate change. They presented more thematic and diverse frames than the conservative newspaper. Government sources and conflict frames dominated both newspapers, reflecting some similar maturation processes of climate change coverage found in Europe, the United States, and elsewhere.     

论灾害“预防文化”

本文以现代灾害管理和系统工程的观点,论述了灾害预防文化的基础背景以及在我国建设灾害预防文化的内容。     

基于空间感知规律的城市旅游形象比较研究 --以南京市为例

根据空间感知规律，南京与同位于长江三角洲内、且均受吴越文化影响的上海、无锡、苏州和杭州均有可能产生城市旅游形象替代效应。为了分析南京城市旅游形象的独特性，将五座城市的城市旅游理念形象、视觉形象和行为形象分别进行比较，结果表明：(1)南京城市级别比上海低，但文化、自然遗产丰富；整体竞争力比无锡高；旅游基础不如苏州，但产品结构与体系较丰富；历史文化遗产保护和利用比杭州好等。(2)旅游视觉形象优势是文物古迹和民俗风情。(3)旅游服务形象评价较高，城市居民形象各具特点等。提出了南京城市旅游形象特色的构建对策。     

Effect of culture time on the growth curve and power performance in a microbial fuel cell at a fixed amount of liquid culture

The microbial fuel cell uses the microorganism biochemistry to carry on the energy conversion. Concerning the experimental precision, the colony culture would be replaced by a fixed amount of liquid culture for Microbial fuel cell of Escherichia coli. The anode and cathode chambers whose each volume is 100 mL were utilized, the effective surface area of proton exchange membrane Nafion-117 is about 9 cm². In addition, the electrode area of carbon cloth is 20 cm². Three kinds of Escherichia coli, named as BCRC No. 10322, 10675 and 51534, respectively, would be selected. Results show that the electricity performance of Escherichia coli of BCRC No.51534 is better than the other microorganism studied because of having a larger open circuit voltage of 1.01 V and limiting current 22 mA, the maximum power density of 1342 mW/m^2, and average working power density of 295 mW/m² would be produced. These results would be useful to improve the performance of microbial fuel cell.     

ACES的合成及其在军团菌培养上的应用

介绍了一种将氯乙酰胺和牛磺酸反应，一步法合成Ｎ－（２－乙酰胺基）－２－氨基乙烷磺酸的新方法，所得产物为白色结晶 ，产率为４５％－５５％，以此ＡＣＥＳ配制的ＢＣＹＥα培养基与进口的ＡＣＥＳ配制的增减基相比，两者在军团菌培养上效果十分接近。     

微生物絮凝剂

综述了微生物絮凝剂的产生和培养条件 ,同时讨论了微生物絮凝剂的絮凝反应条件 ,反应机理和在废水处理中的应用 ,提供了今后的研究方向。     

一株产微生物絮凝剂菌株的筛选及特性

从活性污泥及土壤中筛选出一株产絮凝剂的霉菌－黑曲霉，该菌所产絮凝剂对高岭土的絮凝活性可达90％以上，黑曲霉的培养实验表明，其适宜生长的碳源为葡萄糖或蔗糖，氮源为豆芽汁或马铃薯汁；适宜的初始pH值为6.0；生长与分泌絮凝剂的合适温度范围为30－34℃；受培养温度的影响，絮凝效果最好的时间在50－60h。絮凝实验表明，用培养液处理高岭土悬浊液时有明显的絮凝效果，当废水pH左右时，絮凝效果最好。