Search results

Medical and legal records of 64 inmates receiving mental health services at a maximum-security prison located in the Northeast United States were examined to look at whether prison adjustment is impacted by housing in a mental health residential treatment unit. Inmates in the residential treatment unit, the “treatment group” had a significant decrease in hospitalizations and disciplinary reports while housed in the residential treatment unit. Inmates with a mental health history housed in the general population, the “control group,” did not show a decrease in these behaviors during a similar time period. Results find that inmates referred to the residential treatment unit seem to have high numbers of hospitalizations and segregations while housed in the general population, which level off and become similar to the control group upon entry to the residential treatment unit. Implications for future research evaluating the impact of the residential treatment unit on the behavior of the inmate after he has left the unit are discussed.

Under IAS 24 a related party transaction (RPT) is a “transfer of resources, services or obligations between related parties, regardless of whether a price is charged” (IASB). The purpose of this paper is to consider the interest of the business group and the directing activity of the parent company for the interpretation of the RPT. Considering the interest of the group means to interpret the intra-group transactions not as isolated transactions, as usually done by the empirical studies, but in a wider perspective, that of the group.

This paper builds on explanatory multiple case studies in order to answer the following research questions: why the interest of the business group and the directing activity of the subsidiaries by the parent company are important in the interpretation of RPTs. How RPTs can be interpreted in the light of the directing activity of the holding company.

Dominant shareholder tends to demonstrate that the group it is not managed as a single economic entity and sometimes that subsidiaries are not really controlled. The case studies show that a regulation that imposes the transparency of the directing activity has at least two effects: the controlling shareholder finds it convenient to delegate the decision-making power and to not carry out RPTs among firms that do not present clear economic links. Thus, the transparency of the directing activity seems to be a disincentive to the establishment of a pyramidal group with expropriation purposes.

It is appropriate that the interpretation of the RPT take into account not only the disclosure of the RPT (e.g. type and nature), but also the following disclosure: the reason and the business purpose that lead to RPT; the interest of the company in engaging such transactions; and the procedures for their approval. The independence of subsidiaries directors is necessary to ensure the management autonomy of the boards, and in the case of directing activity they have to protect outsiders in the case of detrimental transactions ordered by the controlling and directing company that are not carried out in the interest of the group.

Unlike what has been done so far by the literature on RPT, this paper considers the interest of the group to interpret the intra-group transactions and the separation between control and direction. It means do not interpret RPT as isolated transactions, as usually done by the empirical studies, but in a wider perspective, that of the group.

Exercise training has been shown to be an effective and integral component of non-pharmacological intervention for the control of blood pressure. The purpose of this paper is to compare the effectiveness of a supervised modified exercise program of moderate-intensity exercise for one hour per week including the use of a pedometer, and with the use of a pedometer alone without additional exercise in reducing blood pressure.

The study was a randomized control trial, with an experimental group of 30 people and a control group of 26 people. Participants were males and females aged 30-65 years with pre- to mild hypertension, and who were not receiving any drugs for the treatment of hypertension. Participants of the experimental group were assigned to a fitness program with supervised exercise once a week at the Golden Jubilee Medical Fitness Center, given access to a pedometer, and provided with health education. Participants in the control group were assigned to use a pedometer only. All experimental and control group members participated in the study for three months, as well as a follow-up at the third and sixth month.

Comparison of the experimental and control groups at the first, third, and sixth month, using repeated measures analysis found that interaction effect groups and times were significantly different for mean systolic blood pressure (SBP), body mass index (BMI), hip circumference (HC), and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) (p<0.05). Mean SBP, diastolic blood pressure (DBP), BMI, waist circumference (WC), HC, and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) within groups were significantly different (p<0.05). Mean WC, cholesterol, LDL, and triglyceride between groups were significantly different (p<0.05). Both groups had SBP improved at the third and sixth month when compared with baseline data. Mean HDL increased in the experimental group and decreased in the control group. Multiple regression analysis showed that both groups were not statistically different after intervention, SBP was reduced in the experimental group when compared to the control group. However, at six months, members in the experimental group reported spending less time sitting or reclining on a typical day than members of the control group.

A supervised one-time per week fitness program combined with pedometer and pedometer alone were not different in reducing blood pressure, as both groups showed decreases in blood pressure. However, the group with the supervised exercise program tended to change sedentary behaviors in the longer term compared to those who used the pedometer alone.

This study was conducted to find out the association between estrogen exposure and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) in Bangladeshi women.

A case-control study was carried out from January to December 2015 among 128 intervention cases and 128 age-matched control group participants to find out the association with estrogen exposure and development of SLE.

Case group participants were five times (OR 5.14, 95% CI 2.14–12.33), three times (OR 3.40, 95% CI 1.25–9.21) and four times (OR 4.00, 95% CI 1.45–11.00) more likely to receive different higher levels of education compared to the control group. Exposure to estrogen showed a positive association with the development of SLE. The case group (12.63 ± 1.61 years) had a lower age at menarche than that of the control group (13.31 ± 1.47 years; p < 0.001) and their proportion (62.6%) of using oral contraceptive pills were more than that of the control group (45.6%; p < 0.01). After controlling the effect of the positively associated variables, SLE patients were found two times (adjusted OR 2.26; 95% CI 1.29–3.95) more likely to use oral contraceptive pills than the control group. The case group was more (adjusted OR 0.771; 95% CI 0.642–0.927) prone to have an earlier age at menarche compared to the control group.

This study identified the association between estrogen exposure and SLE. Contraceptive pills should be used cautiously and both consumers and service providers need to be aware of their effects.

The Nature of Business Policy Business policy — or general management — is concerned with the following six major functions:

The study examines the change in n Achievement and Locus of Control of individuals in an 9 months entrepreneurship programme. The experiment comprised of two experimental groups (n = 10 and n = 9), and two control groups (n = 19 and n = 32). All groups consisted of male and female students. All groups were at similar educational levels, age, and area of study. All participants had finished high school or an equivalent level of education. Need for Achievement was measured with Thematic Apperception Test consisting of six pictures. Locus of Control was measured with Rotter’s Internal‐External test. A pretest was carried out in the beginning of the experimental and control groups education, the posttest after 7 months. A statistically significant increase in n Achievement (t = ‐3.33, p < 0.005) and in internal Locus of Control (t = 3.63, p = 0.001) were obtained as a result of participating in entrepreneurship education, while the control group showed no change. The result supports the hypothesis that participating in an entrepreneurship programme should increase Need for Achievement and internal Locus of Control of Reinforcement.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship of the post-publication peer review (PPPR) polarity of a paper to that paper's citation count.

Papers with PPPRs from Publons.com as the experimental groups were manually matched 1:2 with the related papers without PPPR as the control group, by the same journal, the same issue (volume), the same access status (gold open access or not) and the same document type. None of the papers in the experimental group or control group received any comments or recommendations from ResearchGate, PubPeer or F1000. The polarity of the PPPRs was coded by using content analysis. A negative binomial regression analysis was conducted to examine the data by controlling the characteristics of papers.

The four experimental groups and their corresponding control groups were generated as follows: papers with neutral PPPRs, papers with both negative and positive PPPRs, papers with negative PPPRs and papers with positive PPPRs as well as four corresponding control groups (papers without PPPRs). The results are as follows: while holding the other variables (such as page count, number of authors, etc.) constant in the model, papers that received neutral PPPRs, those that received negative PPPRs and those that received both negative and positive PPPRs had no significant differences in citation count when compared to their corresponding control pairs (papers without PPPRs). Papers that received positive PPPRs had significantly greater citation count than their corresponding control pairs (papers without PPPRs) while holding the other variables (such as page count, number of authors, etc.) constant in the model.

Based on a broader range of PPPR sentiments, by controlling many of the confounding factors (including the characteristics of the papers and the effects of the other PPPR platforms), this study analyzed the relationship of various polarities of PPPRs to citation count.

The smoking rate of male high school students continues to increase. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of a smoking cessation program on self-esteem, attitude, perception and practice regarding smoking behavioral control among male high school students in Ubon Ratchathani Province, Thailand.

The effectiveness of the smoking cessation program was tested by a quasi-experimental pre-posttest and follow-up with a 24-week design. Multistage sampling was used to recruit 70 male high school students, including 35 male students in the intervention group and 35 male students in the control group. The intervention group received a 12-week smoking cessation program based on information-motivation-behavioral skills and stages of change models and follow-up at 12 weeks, whereas the control group did not. A self-administered questionnaire was used to assess the improvement of subjects’ self-esteem, attitude toward smoking, perceived control over smoking, number of cigarettes per day and urine cotinine test. The descriptive statistics, generalized estimating equation and proportion test were used for data analysis.

After the program, there were statistically significant differences in mean scores between the group and control groups; the difference of self-esteem was 4.15 (95% CI: 1.95, 6.36), attitude toward smoking was 3.30 (95% CI: 1.89, 5.52) and perceived control over smoking was 6.99 (95% CI: 4.04, 9.94). Thus, all differences in the intervention group were significantly higher than in the control group. The proportion of non-smokers, measured by the urine cotinine test at follow-up, was 25 percent (95% CI: 0.03, 0.48) significantly higher (p-value = 0.015), in the intervention group. Therefore, the smoking cessation program in this study was effective at changing the behavior of male high school student smokers.

This smoking cessation program increased self-esteem, attitude toward smoking, perceived control over smoking and decreased smoking per day among male high school students. Therefore, schools and parents should focus on developing these factors to encourage students to quit smoking.

This paper aims to show that the business group – i.e. the set of firms under common ownership and control – is the most appropriate unit to study the behavior and organization of firms and define their boundaries. Particular emphasis is given to notions such as unitary direction – i.e. the influence over strategic decisions – and administrative co‐ordination which allow owners to exercise supervision and authority over the controlled companies.

Given these aims the paper adopts an interdisciplinary perspective that relies on economics, management and law. This multidisciplinary approach is necessary for analyzing the different aspects characterizing business groups in terms of ownership, control, economic synergies between firms and internal organizational mechanisms. To support the propositions, data and information from various sources are used, ranging from official statistics on the firm's population, to sample surveys, case studies and juridical evidence. The use of different sources is justified not only by the interdisciplinary nature of the problem but also by the lack of systematic statistical evidence on the phenomenon of business groups.

The authors suggest that when a company is part of a group, the business group rather than the individual company is the most appropriate “unit” for analyzing the organization and behavior of firms. This does not deny that in some cases it can be worthwhile using the legal boundary as the appropriate unit; however, most of the empirical analyses about firms consider the legal boundary without considering whether companies are independent or part of a business group.

The authors show that forms of unitary direction and administrative co‐ordination are common in business groups; these forms can be assimilated to the internal organization of firms. For this reason they propose that the group rather than the individual company is the appropriate unit to delimit the boundary of the firm. In this sense, their main conclusion is that not considering the business group underestimates the actual firm boundaries.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of online self-leadership training (OSLT) in promoting leaders’ self-leadership skills and recovery experiences.

A non-randomized controlled trial was conducted under two conditions: a standardized seven-week OSLT (N = 43) and a control without any intervention (N = 42). All participants (N = 85) completed standardized questionnaires measuring self-reported self-leadership skills and recovery experiences. Additionally, participants in the intervention group were assigned to invite one team member each (N = 26) to assess their leaders’ pre-post self-leadership skills and pre-post leader–member exchange.

Significant interaction effects of time and group and increases in the OSLT group (t1 vs t2) in self-leadership skills (cognitive and natural reward strategies) and recovery experiences (detachment and relaxation) indicated the effectiveness of OSLT training. Significant improvements in self-leadership skills and leader–member exchange were reported by team members of leaders in the OSLT group.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study was the first to examine the effectiveness of OSLT for leaders in business contexts in a controlled before-after intervention design. The findings of this study revealed improvements in self-leadership skills and recovery experience because of OSLT.