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The purpose of this research is to examine the accounting output of the reformed financial accounting system of municipalities in Belgium, particularly in Flanders. For the first time ever in Belgian governments, an accounting reform transferred from business accounting was imposed. The research hypothesizes that the level of material comparability of the accounting output is very poor in spite of the strict accounting regulations. The empirical results indicate that the annual accounts are actually incomparable in many respects and that these problems cannot be explained away by a lack of experience.

Previous research shows differences between women and men in utilization of facilities of health care (FHC) across the general population in a number of countries. In this chapter, we focus on the capability to use FHC, because it refers to an individual freedom to choose between alternative FHC directed to restore or to improve own health in situations of health needs. Based on several empirical studies and on the insights of the capability approach, we propose that there are cross-national differences between women and men in the capability to use FHC, and that these differences are due to gender differences in the extent of educational skills, and due to differences in the extensiveness of social security policies across countries. The objective of this study was to question these propositions.

We tested the hypotheses using the data from the European Social Survey (in a sample of 38,992 respondents from 22 countries) which we analyzed performing multilevel analyses.

The findings show that in Central, North, West, and East European countries, women have more capabilities to use FHC than men. They suggest that the low-skilled women in Central, North, and West European countries have higher level of the capability to use FHC than women with more educational skills.

The findings do not specify which particular social program or policy is more effective in enhancing women’s capability to use FHC.

This chapter focuses on women’s freedom or the capability to use FHC.

The purpose of this paper is to present results from the EC funded project SHIFT (Smart High Integration Flex Technologies) on the embedding in and the assembly on flex substrates of ultrathin chips.

Methods to embed chips in flex include flip‐chip assembly and subsequent lamination, or the construction of a separate ultra‐thin chip package (UTCP) using spin‐on polyimides and thin‐film metallisation technology. Thinning and separation of the chips is done using a “dicing‐by‐thinning” method.

The feasibility of both chip embedding methods has been demonstrated, as well as that of the chip thinning method. Lamination of four layers of flex with ultrathin chips could be achieved without chip breakage. The UTCP technology results in a 60 μm package where also the 20 μm thick chip is bendable.

Further development work includes reliability testing, embedding of the UTCP in conventional flex, and construction of functional demonstrators using the developed technologies.

Thinning down silicon chips to thicknesses of 25 μm and lower is an innovative technology, as well as assembly and embedding of these chips in flexible substrates.

Ultra-thin chip packaging (UTCP) is one of the flexible assembly technologies, by which thinned dies are encapsulated inside spin-coated dielectric films. For sake of higher density integration and bending stress suppression, two UTCPs can be stacked vertically. The purpose of this paper is to present an improved UTCP process flow to embed thinned chip in a symmetric dielectric sandwich for a flat topography. The UTCP flat top surface is suitable for metallization and further 3D stacking.

In the new process, a central photosensitive polyimide film is introduced, in which a cavity is made for the embedded chip. The cavity is defined by lithography using the chip itself as a photo-mask. In this way, the cavity size and position is self-aligned to the chip. The chip thickness is compensated by the surrounding central layer, and a UTCP with flat topography (flat UTCP) is realized after top dielectric deposition.

A batch of daisy chain test vehicles was produced. The feasibility of the process flow is verified by optical and electrical measurements. The result shows 100 percent yield, which is much better than previous work. A thermal humidity test showed no significant degradation of the flat UTCPs after 1,000 hours.

High yield fabrication of flat UTCP is first shown. An innovative self-alignment lithography step is introduced to make a cavity in dielectric for chip thickness compensation by using the chip itself as a photo-mask.

This study aims to examine the direct relationship between work–family conflict and psychosomatic health complaints among female physicians in Egypt. The study also investigates the mediating role of the negative affect on this relationship.

Data were collected using a paper and pen questionnaire from 186 female physicians, and structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to analyze the data.

The study findings revealed that work–family conflict is associated with increased psychosomatic complaints among female physicians in Egypt. The study also found that negative affect partially mediates the relationship between work–family conflict and psychosomatic health complaints.

Because of the cross-sectional research design, causal interpretations could not be made. Further empirical evidence is also needed to ascertain the generalizability of the findings to other contexts.

Organizations need to support their employees in balancing their work and family roles. In addition, employees need to understand how work–family conflict could influence their affect and should try to find ways to cope.

The study addresses calls for research on the relationship between work–family conflict and health in developing countries. It also responds to calls for research on the mechanisms through which work–family conflict relates to employee health.

Public engagement in health technology assessment (HTA) is increasingly considered crucial for good decision making. Determining the “right” type of engagement activity is key in achieving the appropriate consideration of public values. Little is known about the factors that determine how HTA organizations (HTAOs) decide on their method of public engagement, and there are a number of possible factors that might shape these decisions. The purpose of this paper is to understand the potential drivers of public engagement from an organizational perspective.

The published HTA literature is reviewed alongside existing frameworks of public engagement in order to elucidate key factors influencing the choice of public engagement process undertaken by HTAOs. A conceptual framework is then developed to illustrate the factors identified from the literature that appear to influence public engagement choice.

Determining the type of public engagement undertaken in HTA is based on multiple factors, some of which are not always explicitly acknowledged. These factors included the: perceived complexity of the policy-making issue, perceived impact of the decision, transparency and opportunities for public involvement in governance, as well as time and resource constraints. The influences of these factors vary depending on the context, indicating that a one size fits all approach to public engagement may not be effective.

Awareness of the various factors that might influence the type of public engagement undertaken would enable decision makers to reflect on their choices and be more accountable and transparent about their choice of engagement process in eliciting public values and preferences in a HTAO.

Employees facing challenges in their careers – i.e. female, migrant, elderly and lower-educated employees – might expect job searches to have a low likelihood of success and might therefore more often stay in unsatisfactory positions. The goal of this study is to discover inequalities in job mobility for these employees.

We rely on a large sample of Dutch public sector employees (N = 30,709) and study whether employees with challenges in their careers are hampered in translating job dissatisfaction into job searches. Additionally, we assess whether this is due to their perceptions of labor market alternatives.

Findings show that non-Western migrant, elderly and lower-educated employees are less likely to act on job dissatisfaction than their advantaged counterparts, whereas women are more likely than men to do so. Additionally, we find that although they perceive labor market opportunities as limited, this does not affect their propensity to search for different jobs.

This paper is novel in discovering inequalities in job mobility by analyzing whether employees facing challenges in their careers are less likely to act on job dissatisfaction and therefore more likely to remain in unsatisfactory positions.

The aim of this study is to investigate the roles of psychiatric mental health nurses during their work experiences in inpatient clinical settings.

A focus group of 10 graduate psychiatric nurses with more than two years’ practice in inpatient psychiatric settings reflected on their last six months’ work placements and continuous employment. The transcripts and field notes were analyzed through thematic analysis of inductive data.

Two main themes emerged: management roles and clinical roles. The participants reflected on caring activities and obstacles encountered in fulfilling their professional roles.

Multiple practice issues emerged. The participants perceived that psychiatric nurse specialists are required to perform more caring functions than practicable in the inpatient setting due to an excess of noncaring duties, structural minimization of the caring role and inadequate training. They felt that many of the functions performed were not within their expectations of the caring role of a psychiatric nurse specialist and believed that changes in nurse education and attention to clarification of nurses’ roles might enhance the role they play in patient care.

Realizing the role of signals in the evaluation of teaching quality as well as the advantage of a set-theoretic approach to education research, the purpose of this paper is to employ a signaling framework and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to configure the roles of signal quality, including signal consistency, signal clarity, signal credibility and teaching investment in the teaching quality of Master of Business Administration (MBA) faculty members.

A sample of 342 MBA students in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam was surveyed to collect the data. fsQCA was employed to configure the conditions – signal consistency, signal clarity, signal credibility and teaching investment – for the occurrence of teaching quality, and structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to test the net effects of these conditions on teaching quality.

fsQCA findings reveal that teaching investment combines with signal clarity, signal consistency and signal credibility to form sufficient conditions for the occurrence of teaching quality. SEM results confirm the net effects of these conditions on teaching quality.

This study suggests that MBA faculty members should invest in their teaching and send clear, consistent and credible signals to their students in order to enhance their teaching quality perceived by their students.

The application of signaling theory to evaluate teaching quality, which has largely been ignored in prior research, and the use of fsQCA to better understand the complexity of necessary and sufficient conditions for teaching quality are two contributions of this study to the literature.

Taking into consideration the lively debate about recognition, measurement, and disclosure criteria for heritage assets (HA) in financial reporting, the purpose of this paper is to examine the comment letters submitted by governmental organizations regarding the consultation paper (CP) on HA in order to understand what is the position of the governmental organizations in relation to critical issues of the accounting and financial reporting of HA.

From a methodological point of view, a content analysis was performed. First, the responses were classified according to level of agreement with the 13 items included in the CP on HA; second, the arguments adduced by respondents in supporting or contradicting the proposed approaches and definitions have been investigated.

The majority of responses came from countries with relevant differences in culture, administrative traditions and accounting systems. Governmental organizations strongly agreed with the recognition of heritage items as “assets” in financial reporting, while conflicting positions on measuring bases were identified.

This study is one of the few studies based on the content of the comment letters received in response to the CP on HA. The present study can also give an idea of the content of the future IPSAS on HA. Moreover, it is the first study attempting to enrich the debate on governmental organizations’ participation to the IPSAS standard-setting process.