Presumed to value diversity: why racially diverse organizations are perceived as more ethical

Series elastic actuators are increasingly adopted in wearable robots, due to superior sensing and actuating capabilities provided by the added internal compliance. However, when evaluating their performance in benchtop setups, the dynamics of the physical human–robot interface (i.e., external compliance) are usually overlooked despite it causing energy dissipation and delays in power transmission. This work closes the gap by emulating in a test bench the physical human–robot interaction dynamics and validating actuator performance against commonly used performance indices, including torque bandwidth, torque tracking, and transparency. The results show a significant impact of the interaction dynamics on the actuator performance. When interface dynamics is present, decreasing the actuator (internal) compliance has little to no effect on its bandwidth. When delivering a walking torque, decreasing internal (actuator) and external (interface) compliance has the same decreasing effect on the motor’s peak electrical power in the hip joint. Conversely, the motor peak electrical power decreases with an increase in internal (actuator) compliance but increases with an increase in external (interface) compliance in the knee joint. As such, this work demonstrates the importance of including interaction dynamics as a norm in designing and evaluating actuation units in wearable robots.

Despite the belief that racial diversity in organizations will attenuate racial discrimination in service interactions, the extant literature suggests that it may often exacerbate discrimination by generating intergroup conflict. In this paper, I propose that the influence of racial diversity on racial discrimination in service interactions will depend upon (a) the level of interdependence within an organization and (b) whether an increase in diversity consists of a larger representation of a minority’s own racial group. To test my predictions, I combine interaction-level data covering approximately 200,000 cite-and-release decisions where suspects are either given a summons to attend court at a later date or transported to jail following arrest with longitudinal organization-level data from 93 police departments across the United States. Consistent with prior research, I found that minority suspects were less likely to be cited and released for the same offense relative to White suspects. Racial diversity among sworn officers in a police department exacerbated discrimination in cite-and-release decisions unless officers’ work roles were highly interdependent due to the adoption of community-oriented policing. Focusing on Black and Hispanic suspects, I observed this pattern regardless of whether an increase in racial diversity in the department was characterized by a larger representation of a minority suspect’s own racial group or other minority racial groups. Taken together, the findings suggest that diverse organizations can mitigate the emergence of intergroup conflict that exacerbates racial discrimination in service interactions by fostering interdependencies. Supplemental Material: Data are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2021.1571 .

The alphabet of pharmacy challenges, solutions

Although organizations can benefit from being internally diverse, they may also face significant challenges arising from such diversity. The potential benefits include increased organizational innovation, legitimacy, and strategic capacity, while the challenges include threats to organizational stability, efficacy, and survival. In this paper, we analyze the dynamics of internal diversity within a field of politically oriented civic organizations. We find that “bridging cultural practices” serve as a key mechanism through which racially and socioeconomically diverse organizations navigate challenges generated by internal differences. Drawing on data from extended ethnographic fieldwork within one local faith-based community organizing coalition, we describe how particular prayer practices serve a bridging function within group settings marked by diversity. Furthermore, using data from a national study of all faith-based community organizing coalitions in the U.S., we find that a coalition’s prayer practices are associated with its objective level of racial and socioeconomic diversity and its subjective perception of challenges arising from such diversity. Taken together, our multi-method analysis supports the argument that diverse coalitions use bridging prayer practices to navigate organizational challenges arising from racial and socioeconomic diversity, and suggests more generally that bridging cultural practices may play a similar role within all diverse organizations.

Organizations can benefit from being internally diverse, but they may also face significant challenges arising from such diversity. Potential benefits include increased organizational innovation, legitimacy, and strategic capacity; challenges include threats to organizational stability, efficacy, and survival. In this article, we analyze the dynamics of internal diversity within a field of politically oriented civic organizations. We find that “bridging cultural practices” serve as a key mechanism through which racially and socioeconomically diverse organizations navigate challenges generated by internal differences. Drawing on data from extended ethnographic fieldwork within one local faith-based community organizing coalition, we describe how particular prayer practices are used to bridge differences within group settings marked by diversity. Furthermore, using data from a national study of all faith-based community organizing coalitions in the United States, we find that a coalition’s prayer practices are associated with its objective level of racial and socioeconomic diversity and its subjective perception of challenges arising from such diversity. Our multi-method analysis supports the argument that diverse coalitions use bridging prayer practices to navigate organizational challenges arising from racial and socioeconomic diversity, and we argue that bridging cultural practices may play a similar role within other kinds of diverse organizations.

Well-being, symptoms and the menopausal transition.

Does racial diversity make forming a union harder? Case studies offer conflicting answers, and little large-scale research on the question exists. Most quantitative research on race and unionization has studied trends in membership rather than the outcome of specific organizing drives and has assumed that the main problem is mistrust between workers and unions, paying less attention, for example, to the role of employers. The author explores the role of racial and ethnic diversity in the outcomes of nearly 7,000 organizing drives launched between 1999 and 2008. By matching the National Labor Relations Board’s information on union activity with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s surveys of large establishments, the author reconstructs the demographic composition of the work groups involved in each mobilization. The study finds that more diverse establishments are less likely to see successful organizing attempts. Little evidence is found, however, that this is because workers are less interested in voting for unions. Instead, the organizers of more diverse units are more likely to give up before such elections are held. Furthermore, this higher quit rate can be explained best by considering the other organizations involved in the organizing drive. In particular, employers are more likely to be charged with unfair labor practices when the unit in question is more racially diverse. This effect persists when the study controls for heterogeneity among industries, unions, and regions.

Diversity in gastroenterology in the United States: Where are we now? Where should we go?

Compliance compensation of the Narkomed 6000 explained.

The International Affective Picture System (IAPS) is widely used in emotion and attention research. Currently, there is neither a standard database of affective images for use in research with Indian population nor data on the way people from India respond to emotional pictures in terms of different dimensions. In the present study, we investigated whether self-reported Indian ratings are comparable to the original normative ratings (based on a North American sample) to evaluate its usability in Indian research context. The ratings were obtained from a sample of eighty Indian participants (age range = 18 to 29 years, M age = 23.7, SD = 2.67, 45 % females) on a stratified representative sample of 100 IAPS pictures. Similar to the normative data collected from the North American sample in the original IAPS database, the ratings were collected across three dimensions – valence (how pleasant/attractive or unpleasant/aversive), arousal (how calm or excited was the intensity of activation), and dominance (how controlling). Our results indicate similarities in valence ratings, but differences in arousal and dominance ratings between the Indian and the North American samples. The relationship between arousal and valence showed a similar (but less curved) boomerang shaped distribution seen with the North American sample. Unlike the North American sample, slopes were higher and intercepts were different for the Indian sample. However, the Indian sample also showed positivity offset and negative bias like the North American sample. These affective ratings show a fair amount of similarity but care is needed especially with arousal values in using these pictures for research with Indian population. While there are subtle differences in the relationship between different affective dimensions, there are also major similarities across cultures in affective judgments.

We investigate how racial diversity at different levels within organizations as well the firm’s similarity of diversity across hierarchical levels affect firm performance. From a panel sample drawn from the 200 largest U.S. law firms, we find strong evidence that greater racial diversity at each level within the organization and greater symmetry of diversity across levels is positively associated with firm performance. However, we also show that racial diversity is negatively associated with performance at the executive committee level. Our paper provides clear evidence of the benefits of diversity, and symmetry of diversity, but it also warns us about the possible negative performance implications of diversity at the top level of organizations due to tokenism.

The present study investigated reported fear of snakes, spiders and mutilation in an Australian sample (N=235). Standardized questionnaires were used, and scores from the Australian sample were compared with those obtained by other authors from North American and Swedish samples. The psychometric characteristics of test scores from the Australian sample were similar to those from the North American and Swedish samples. Although there were no differences in reported fear of snakes between the three samples, both the Australian and North American samples reported greater fear of spiders than did the Swedish sample. Females scored higher on all scales than did males, and Australian and North American females reported greater fear of mutilation than did Swedish females. Test‐retest reliability in a non‐clinical Australian subsample (n=48) was low for all scales. The results are discussed in terms of the adaptation/habituation hypothesis and the preparedness account of the acquisition of fear.

This article builds on examinations of whiteness in organizations by considering how white normativity—or the often unconscious and invisible ideas and practices that make whiteness appear natural and right—is sustained even in organizations that are attentive to structural factors. Based on two years of ethnographic fieldwork, this article critically examines the racial identity and culture of the Center, a Los Angeles lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) organization with a national reputation for multiculturalism, a visible presence of people of color in leadership, and a staff of more than 50 percent people of color. Despite these indicators of racial diversity, the organization also maintained a local reputation among queer people of color as the white LGBT organization in Los Angeles. The author demonstrates that the Center's formal and public attempts to build and proclaim a racially diverse collective identity, along with its reliance on mainstream diversity frames available in the broader environment, became the very practices that employees of color identified as evidence of the white normative culture of the organization.

Eco-innovation and its role for performance improvement among Chinese small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises

Diversity in gender and age, but not in race, enhances food purchase intentions in Japan