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1 – 10 of 144Martin Ihle, Steffen Ziesche, Paul Gierth, Andreas Tuor, Jonathan Tigelaar and Oliver Hirsch
The purpose of this paper is to analyze a presentation of eddy current sensing coils for the turbo charger speed measurement, which were manufactured with the low temperature…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyze a presentation of eddy current sensing coils for the turbo charger speed measurement, which were manufactured with the low temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) technology. The goal is to be able to manufacture small robust coils with complex geometries and improved signal output.
Design/methodology/approach
A crucial element for its performance is the quality factor of the embedded coil. Thanks to the use of the developed LTCC manufacturing processes, the lateral wounding distance of the printed coils can be reduced to 30 µm, and simultaneously, the aspect ratio should be enlarged compared to standard LTCC technologies. By the use of a novel printed double-D coil design, the overall sensor characteristics will be improved.
Findings
The metallization thickness can be simultaneously enhanced that results in the internal resistance being reduced. Thus, the inductivity and the ohmic resistance achieve an obvious optimization that results in significant improvement of the quality factor of the novel coils when compared to standard technologies. Embedded micro coils have a sintered metallization aspect ratio of more than one and thus an optimal performance differing clearly from prior art. Their reliability was proven through temperature cycle tests of over more than 1,300 h.
Research limitations/implications
The developed LTCC coil technology will be introduced in the JAQUET sensor portfolio of TE Connectivity for the measurement of turbocharger speed on both passenger cars and trucks. The measurement and control of turbochargers speed enables the optimal regulation of airflow into the engine thereby improving the fuel economy and leading to a reduction of engine emissions.
Originality/value
This paper shows fabrication and performance of the original manufactured LTCC coil for turbocharger speed sensors and its optimized signal output by the novel design.
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Viktoria Bachmann, Katharina Teigeler, Oliver Hirsch, Stefan Bösner and Norbert Donner-Banzhoff
About three million Russian-speaking immigrants from the former Soviet Union live in Germany. However, little is known about their health status. The purpose of this paper is to…
Abstract
Purpose
About three million Russian-speaking immigrants from the former Soviet Union live in Germany. However, little is known about their health status. The purpose of this paper is to investigate mental and physical complaints among this immigrant group through German primary care compared with native-born Germans and Russians.
Design/methodology/approach
In the context of the quantitative part of our mixed-methods study Russian-speaking immigrants, native-born Germans and Russians completed self-rating questionnaires in their native languages comprising indicators of mental and somatic health. Included were two modules of the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9, PHQ-15), and the Hamburg Self-Care Questionnaire.
Findings
No differences were found between the three groups regarding depressive and somatic symptoms. Germans had higher ratings of general health status compared to immigrants and native-born Russians and were more satisfied with their physical health than immigrants. Germans were more convinced that they can actively contribute to their health than immigrants and Russians. Germans and Russians have higher scores of self-care than immigrants. Immigrants have more subjective physical health-related complaints than non-immigrants. There are different health beliefs in the three groups which could differentially affect global well-being.
Originality/value
As minorities are double socialized in the origin and host country, a minimum of three groups have to be compared to receive a reliable statement about migration- and culture-specific differences in health related aspects. These requirements of comparative cultural psychology are satisfied by our work.
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Hanna Christiansen, Oliver Hirsch, Anika König, Ricarda Steinmayr and Bernd Roehrle
Early onset of behavioral disorders is predictive of long term adverse outcomes. There are some indicated and selective early prevention programs for attention…
Abstract
Purpose
Early onset of behavioral disorders is predictive of long term adverse outcomes. There are some indicated and selective early prevention programs for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), one of the most common behavioral disorders in childhood and adolescence. The purpose of this paper is to present a universal preschool program for preventing the development of ADHD related symptoms for children aged three to six.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 413 preschool children (experimental group (EG)=193; control group (CG)=220), and their teachers participated in the study. Children in the EG were randomized to two conditions: universal intervention (behavior modification (BM)=99) vs additional ADHD specific elements (BM+attention training; BM+AT=94) to evaluate effects of a universal intervention vs additional ADHD specific elements. The universal intervention trained general behavior modification (BM) techniques to enhance start behavior (i.e. following color based rules, positive participation in activities, enhancement of skills related to attentional function), and to extinguish stop behavior (i.e. hyperactive behavior such as uncontrolled running around, disturbing others, quarreling, etc.). These techniques were based on published intervention programs (Phelan and Schonour, 2004). The AT consisted of thirteen teacher led 45 minute based sessions in a small group format with an introductory play activity, 15 minutes picture based AT tasks (task analysis, action planning, action, reappraisal), a social interaction game, and a game to enhance perception of visual, auditory, olfactory, haptic, and gustatory senses. To determine effects, the Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and the Behavior Rating for Preschoolers (VBV) were used. A high risk group with high scores on those measures was analyzed separately.
Findings
Children in all three groups did not differ significantly at baseline in all relevant variables (ADHD symptoms measured with the SDQ and VBV, socio-economic status (SES), gender, age: MANCOVA: F 10,796=1.732, p=0.07) and none of the children had a diagnosis of ADHD. After training participation, children in the EG showed significantly less ADHD related problem behavior compared to children in the CG (F 8,1,506=2.717, p=0.006); this was especially so for the high risk group (F 4,754=2.60, p=0.035). Multi-level analyses revealed significant influences of age, gender, and SES on post-training symptom ratings (SDQ: t-statistic=3.03, p=0.003; VBV 3-6: t-statistic=4.151, p < 0.001).
Research limitations/implications
This is a quasi-experimental study, since due to time restriction half the preschools did not want to participate in the experimental study. Thus, participating children were not randomly assigned to the experimental and control conditions, though children were randomly assigned to two different treatments within the intervention group (EG1/EG2). Due to the design of the study and to ensure high participation rates, only preschool teachers rated children’s behavior, though the predictive value of teacher ADHD symptoms exceeds parental ones. Finally, inclusion of parent training elements would most probably enhance effects.
Practical implications
General BM techniques are easily taught and seem to positively influence children’s ADHD related symptoms while not harming children without such symptoms. Since studies showed that after a bogus instruction teacher expected children to exhibit ADHD symptoms and rated them as more disturbed (Rosenthal effect), a universal approach is less stigmatizing and possibly more effective, especially when interventions start early in life before symptoms result in full diagnoses.
Social implications
This study established positive universal effects, and moderate to large effects for the subgroup of high risk children with ADHD related symptoms. General behavior management in preschools might thus be a possible strategy for preventive interventions of ADHD related symptoms.
Originality/value
The is one of the first studies on a preventive ADHD preschool program. General BM techniques of this study were easily taught and implemented, and showed positive effects. Since selective and indicated interventions depend on high program fidelity, are harder to implement, and related to higher costs, general BM techniques as introduced in this study, might be an option for universal prevention strategies for ADHD related symptoms in preschool settings.
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Celina Gisch, Bernhard Hirsch and David Lindermüller
Conflicting institutional logics are thought to be factors that hinder organizational changes in public institutions. Thus, this study explores the different strategies of public…
Abstract
Purpose
Conflicting institutional logics are thought to be factors that hinder organizational changes in public institutions. Thus, this study explores the different strategies of public sector organizations to handle tensions from conflicting institutional logics in their day-to-day activities.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors argue that strategies for handling conflicting logics should not be treated separately. Rather, the authors show that within organizations, different strategies could be interconnected and depend on each other. The empirical insights come from a case study of a large German federal authority, in which management reporting was introduced with the intent to effect change in the organization.
Findings
The authors show how, over time, organization members confront the practice of management reporting with different approaches to address conflicting institutional demands and to find ways to create management reports that would be accepted by different addressees.
Originality/value
The study documents three states of responds to conflicting institutional logics: decoupling, compromising and hybridization. The authors highlight the power dynamics between the corresponding actors and the consequences for using management reports in these different states. Accordingly, the authors aim to provide profound insights into the microdynamics in the context of conflicting institutional logics.
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Kyle Bruce and Peter von Staden
Given managerial choices and the sociocultural context in which they are made are at the heart of management history, then an understanding of both is critical. This paper argues…
Abstract
Purpose
Given managerial choices and the sociocultural context in which they are made are at the heart of management history, then an understanding of both is critical. This paper argues that the “late” North (2005) provides such an understanding.
Design/methodology/approach
This study is a research review synthesizing much disparate but cognate literature across the new institutionalism in organizational sociology/studies and in economics.
Findings
“Late” North (2005) provides an important ontological frame for dealing with the so-called “paradox of embedded agency”, an approach that may afford management historians a more thorough account of how institutions are formed and change over time. North has always maintained that institutional change is the outcome of deliberate or intentional choices made by actors. However, and unlike his earlier work which ignores how humans come to make the said choices, North (2005) explicates the sociocognitive process by which intentionality emerges with expanded consciousness, as humans construct ideas and beliefs about reality, beliefs that shape decisions to alter the said reality via the process of institutional change.
Originality/value
It is rather curious that despite North’s status as a “historian”, management historians – or at least those publishing in this journal from its founding in 1995 – do not seem to be terribly interested in North’s work. Although North rates a mention in rival journals, other than Dagnino and Quattrone’s (2006) study, papers in this journal invoking institutional theory align with the new institutionalism in organizational sociology/studies (NIOS) rather than North’s new institutional economics (NIE). Even in the related sub-discipline of business history, those professing an interest in institutions are more interested in the NIE of non-historians Coase and Oliver Williamson than they are in North’s NIE. And, in recent work analysing the place and significance of institutional theory in historical research, the foundations are unmistakeably NIOS rather than North’s NIE.
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Sujeewa Damayanthi Doluwarawaththa Gamage and Tharusha Gooneratne
The purpose of this paper is to explore how management controls in an organization take shape amidst the tensions between external institutional forces and the internal dynamics…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore how management controls in an organization take shape amidst the tensions between external institutional forces and the internal dynamics arising from the different powers and interests of managers as well as from intra-organizational norms, rules and taken-for-granted assumptions.
Design/methodology/approach
Adopting an interpretivist stance, this study employs the embedded (nested) case study approach drawing evidence from an apparel group which consists of a head office and four clusters. Theoretically, the paper is informed by institutional theory, and particularly draws on concepts such as organizational field, ceremonials, rational myths, isomorphism, institutional logics and loose coupling. It is further complemented by strategic responses of Oliver (1991), as well as materials and discursive elements in elaborating how external pressures influence control practices of an organization, and how internal actors strategically respond to those pressures in balancing external legitimacy and internal efficiency requirements.
Findings
The field-study findings reveal that management controls of the case-study organization have taken shape amidst external pressures, specifically from customers and internal dynamics such as interests of key actors, who strategically respond to external pressures and head -office specifications.
Research limitations/implications
Situating management controls within external pressures and internal dynamics, the findings of this study have implications for research on organizational heterogeneity, and it offers learning points for managers in formulating management controls by balancing conflicting internal and external pressures.
Practical implications
In reality, practicing managers are faced with conflicting logics arising from external pressures and internal dynamics stemming from different power- and interest-holding managers as well as intra-organizational norms, rules and taken-for-granted assumptions in their everyday encounters in organizations. This study provides some pointers for such practicing managers in designing and implementing management control systems by effectively balancing these opposing influences and formulating systems suited to the circumstances of a particular organization.
Originality/value
Moving beyond the widely held narrow conceptualization of institutional theory akin to (external) isomorphism and organizational conformity, this paper brings out organizational heterogeneity through the active agency of actors in terms of their power, interest and proclivities as well as their use of organizational norms and rules in responding to such external institutions.
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Celina Gisch, Bernhard Hirsch and David Lindermüller
This study aims to understand how reporting practices act as drivers of change in situations of conflicting institutional logics in a public sector organisation.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to understand how reporting practices act as drivers of change in situations of conflicting institutional logics in a public sector organisation.
Design/methodology/approach
The findings are based on a case study of a German federal authority, where management accounting reports were introduced as part of a “new” managerial logic of control.
Findings
In the case organisation, management accounting reports were intended to change the behaviour of executives but were still guided by an “old” logic of justification. Nevertheless, over time, the addressees of the reports used the reports and reconciled different logics. This documents a process from decoupling to compromising and, finally, reconciling different institutional logics.
Originality/value
By examining the practices of management accounting reporting, this study elaborates the tensions placed on individuals by conflicting institutional logics and provides insights into how organisational practices are used to handle and reconcile conflicting logics in a public sector organisation. Therefore, this paper contributes to the discussion on how organisational practices act as drivers of organisational change.
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The current crisis of sociological theory is due to our failure to do sociology as a positive science‐our failure to accept both explanation and prediction as the goal of…
Abstract
The current crisis of sociological theory is due to our failure to do sociology as a positive science‐our failure to accept both explanation and prediction as the goal of theorizing, and to use predictive power as the primary criterion for assessing theories. It is argued that sociology as a positive science can advance sociological theory. It is also argued that a positive science of sociology is possible by correcting four major fallacies‐i.e., fallacies concerning controlled experiments, realism of assumptions, subjectivity, and complexity.
Gives a bibliographical review of the finite element methods (FEMs) applied for the linear and nonlinear, static and dynamic analyses of basic structural elements from the…
Abstract
Gives a bibliographical review of the finite element methods (FEMs) applied for the linear and nonlinear, static and dynamic analyses of basic structural elements from the theoretical as well as practical points of view. The range of applications of FEMs in this area is wide and cannot be presented in a single paper; therefore aims to give the reader an encyclopaedic view on the subject. The bibliography at the end of the paper contains 2,025 references to papers, conference proceedings and theses/dissertations dealing with the analysis of beams, columns, rods, bars, cables, discs, blades, shafts, membranes, plates and shells that were published in 1992‐1995.
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Firms need to develop absorptive capacities to effectively source and exploit knowledge relevant to environmental behaviour for their own innovation activity. Business-to-business…
Abstract
Purpose
Firms need to develop absorptive capacities to effectively source and exploit knowledge relevant to environmental behaviour for their own innovation activity. Business-to-business interactions can represent a significant route through which knowledge and resources about environmental innovations are transferred along the supply chain. The purpose of this paper is to explore how firms exploit business partnerships in order to build capacity for environmental innovation. In order to do so, it investigates two elements of B2B interactions – partner alignment and compatibility – and their influence on absorptive capacity-building.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper is based on a qualitative interview study of knowledge intensive business services (KIBS) operating in the environmental goods and services sector and their clients involved in adopting environmental innovations. Matched pairs of engineering consulting firms and their clients – tourism accommodation establishments – were selected as a sampling frame in order to study the influence of partner alignment and compatibility on the exchange of environmentally relevant knowledge and competencies.
Findings
The findings show that the synergistic attributes of business partners influence absorptive capacity-building and give rise to different patterns of interaction of KIBS with their client. The B2B interactions investigated are characterised by alignment along multiple objectives about the relevance of environmental behaviour. Furthermore, the compatibility of the partners’ competences is a key determinant of environmental innovation outcome.
Practical implications
The study highlights the role of managers in identifying and selecting those business partnerships that accrue greater potential benefit for accessing resources and competencies for eco-innovation.
Originality/value
The study contributes to the literature on absorptive capacity and innovation by demonstrating how B2B interactions – in this study, the interaction of KIBS with their clients – influence the capacity of firms to adopt environmental innovations which is an area of study that deserves further attention.
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