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Lays the groundwork for a conceptual framework that might be used to study fanatical consumers and consumption. We review literature on fanatics produced by psychologists, sociologists, cultural theorists, political scientists, theologists and marketers and then place their multidisciplinary insights into a consumption context. We identify two familiar features of fanatics – intensity and intolerance – but suggest a third feature – incoherence among thinking, behaviour and goals caused by intensity and/or intolerance might be the conceptual key to understanding fanatical consumers, measuring their fanaticism and interpreting their consumption experiences.

This chapter provides an overview of the Department of Defense (DoD) laboratory structure to help equipment designers, modelers, and manufacturers determine where research, testing programs, or relevant findings can be found. The chapter includes a discussion of the performance measures and metrics typically used in DoD laboratories and concludes by considering the current state-of-the-art as well as the state-of-the-possible for human performance measurement.

This chapter explores the development and the role of accounting for research quality in Australia’s Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) assessment exercise. It tracks the progress of performance measurement systems from quantitative to qualitative measurement within the Australian higher education sector since 1970, leading up to the implementation of a formal ERA in 2010, and its subsequent iterations in 2012, 2015, and 2018. Although only a part of the ERA submissions, now certain published research outputs provide the primary evidence for research quality to most ERA panels and are a significant driver of the final rating awarded. Before the authors assess the 2018 exercise, they will examine the ever-changing role of journal publications as a vehicle for academic research output.

Human performance, particularly that of the warfighter, has been the subject of a large amount of research during the past few decades. For example, in the Medline database of medical and psychological research, 1,061 papers had been published on the topic of “military performance” as of October 2003. Because warfighters are often pushed to physiological and mental extremes, a study of their performance provides a unique glimpse of the interplay of a wide variety of intrinsic and extrinsic factors on the functioning of the human brain and body. Unfortunately, it has proven very difficult to build performance models that can adequately incorporate the myriad of physiological, medical, social, and cognitive factors that influence behavior in extreme conditions. The chief purpose of this chapter is to provide a neurobiological (neurochemical) framework for building and integrating warfighter performance models in the physiological, medical, social, and cognitive areas. This framework should be relevant to all other professionals who routinely operate in extreme environments. The secondary purpose of this chapter is to recommend various performance metrics that can be linked to specific neurochemical states and can accordingly strengthen and extend the scope of the neurochemical model.

The history of simulated warfare is nearly as old as warfare itself, dating back at least 5000 years to the Chinese war game known as Wei-Hai. Also the game we now know as chess evolved from a war game originally played in India as early as 500AD (see also Smith, 1998). Throughout military history, the art of warfare has been trained and practiced through the use of artificial tabletop landscapes, miniaturized soldiers, and tactical and strategic gaming rules designed to challenge the minds of military leaders.

The fundamental challenge for project management is dealing with people and their feelings. While there has been sporadic attention to the importance of emotions in project work, project management practices tend to neglect the role of emotions and emotional reflexivity. The authors use a symbolic interaction framework to present an in-depth exploration of emotions and emotional reflexivity in projects.

Empirical data was gathered in 19 semi-structured interviews with diverse project managers to assess their experience of emotion (15 male, 4 female, early 20s to late 50s, 3–38 years of expertise). Transcribed interviews were thematically analysed using a sociology of emotions informed, grounded theory, interactional framework.

The data revealed that emotional states are framed by factors specific to project management, including organisational change, project constraints and dealing with stakeholders. Explicitly managing emotions improved team engagement and project performance by acting as a catalyst for engaging in reflective practice and intuitive decision making.

Given the widely held misconceptions of emotion as maladaptive, project management education must focus on empathy in communication and leadership if practitioners are to master valuable soft skills. Techniques for emotional reflection and learning feeling lessons must be incorporated into practice.

The authors contribute to the emerging understanding that emotions matter in project management. The authors demonstrate the centrality of emotions in projects and the substantial impact they have on the wellbeing of practitioners and staff. Emotional reflexivity in practice, which is widely acknowledged yet tends to be ignored, is an essential part of the project manager's toolkit.

Donna L. Van Raaphorst provides a detailed statistical analysis of a large sample of Alcatraz Prison inmates using the Social Science Statistical Package. The data, drawn directly from the inmate files, is compared whenever possible with similar data provided by the Bureau of Prisons in order to determine if Alcatraz, often regarded as America's Devil's Island, really incarcerated the so-called “Worst of the Worst” in its time. The results would seem to indicate that Alcatraz inmates were, in fact, not remarkably different from those in any other Federal prison in the system.