Archive for January, 2009

Oklahoma’s Approach to Sex Offenders

Saturday, January 24th, 2009

Despite the fact that America boasts of one of the most effective judicial and criminal systems in the world, we still struggle mightily with the problem of dealing with sex offenders who prey on innocent victims. American society has yet to find an ideal approach to dealing with this social problem.

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Culture Shock

Saturday, January 24th, 2009

With the rapid changes in society these days, behavioral scientists have put an increasing emphasis on the diagnosis and treatment of culture shock, those feeing of anxiety and disorientation that affect people who have to suddenly function within a new and different social environment. Culture shock affects individuals who move to another country or sometimes to a different state, for example, from rural North Carolina to urban Southern California. In the case of moving from one country to another, culture shock oftentimes takes on a severe form.

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Dimensions of Job Satisfaction

Saturday, January 24th, 2009

There is some doubt whether job satisfaction consists of a single dimension or a number of separate ones. Some workers may be satisfied with some aspects of their work and dissatisfied with others. There does, however, appear to be a positive correlation between satisfaction levels in different areas of work. This suggests a single overall factor of job satisfaction. However, it seems there is no one, general, comprehensive theory which explains job satisfaction.

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Job Performance and Satisfaction

Saturday, January 24th, 2009

Attempting to understand the nature of job satisfaction and its effects on work performance is not easy. For at least 50 years industrial/organizational psychologists have been wrestling with the question of the relationship between job satisfaction and job performance. Researchers have put a considerable amount of effort into attempts to demonstrate that the two are positively related in a particular fashion: a happy worker is a good worker. Although this sounds like a very appealing idea, the results of empirical literature are too mixed to support the hypothesis that job satisfaction leads to better performance or even that there is a reliable positive correlation between these two variables. On the other hand some researchers argue that the results are equally inconclusive with respect to the hypothesis that there is no such relationship. As a result of this ambiguity, this relationship continues to stimulate research and re-examination of previous attempts. This paper strives to describe the relation of job satisfaction and performance, keeping in mind the value this relation has for organizations.

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Madonna the Idol

Saturday, January 24th, 2009

It's been said that you achieve true fame if the world knows you by just one name. Madonna Louise Cicccone, or else Madonna, kept just one name but reinvented her image countless times, becoming one of the most successful performers of all times. Educated in Catholic schools as a child, Madonna danced her way to a four year scholarship at the University of Michigan and then New York's Alvin Ailey School. After recording her debut album in 1983, her rise was meteoric, aided by the popularity of MTV, as she shocked and dared the public with her visible black lacy brassieres, bare midriff, outspokenness about virginity, abortion and out-of-wedlock births.

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Building Groups into Teams

Saturday, January 24th, 2009

People working on teams such as quality circles, project groups, or autonomous production teals accomplish the majority of an organization's work. However, some groups work like a dream team, appearing to accomplish miracles, while others generate nightmares. What makes the difference? The answer lies in appropriate group membership, structures, processes and training. If group members with appropriate skills and attitudes are trained to understand their own and other' role requirements, they can develop to collaborate without dysfunctional conflicts to achieve common objectives. However, firms have several paradoxes to manage.

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The Ribbon Story

Saturday, January 24th, 2009

Used primarily for binding and tying, ribbons are thin bands of flexible materials, preferably made out of cloths, but also plastic, which people use to wrap presents or create hand-made projects. Commonly used to embellish garments, and hair, or as ornaments on objects, ribbons have become a famous material for fashion as well as for decoration purposes.

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Stress at Work and Satisfaction

Saturday, January 24th, 2009

There appears little doubt that one of the major adverse influences on job satisfaction, work performance, absenteeism, turnover and productivity, is the incidence of stress at work. Stress is a source of tension and frustration that may arise through a number of interrelated influences on behavior, including the individual, group, organizational and environmental factors. In a recent survey into attitudes to work, when a random sample of 1,000 workers was asked to specify the biggest problem at work, the second most common response (after poor pay - 18%) was stress at 17%. This would seem to support the contention that stress is a problem of the nineties.

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