Ambiguous Contexts Research Articles

Innovativeness to enlarge digital readiness - How to avoid digital inertia?

Technological developments go fast and are interrelated and multi-interpretable. As consumer needs change, the technological possibilities to meet those needs are constantly evolving and new technology providers introduce new disruptive business models. This makes it difficult to predict what the world of tomorrow will look like for an organization and that makes the risks for organizations substantial. In this context, it is difficult for organizations to determine what constitutes a good strategy to adopt digital developments. This paper describes a first step of a study with the objective to design a method for organizations to formulate a future-proof strategy in a rapidly changing, complex and ambiguous context. More specifically, this paper describes the results of a sequence of three focus groups that were held with a group of eight experts, with extensive experience as members of the decision making unit in organizations. The objectives of these sessions were to determine possible solutions for the outlined challenge in order to provide direction for continuation and scoping of the following research phases.

Social entrepreneurship as a collaborative practice: Literature review and research agenda

Purpose: The aim of this article is, firstly, to explore and structure the emerging research on collaboration in social entrepreneurship, and secondly to tackle the identified gaps in the literature with a research agenda based on the communities and networks of practice theory. Methodology: The article relies on a systematic literature review, which summarizes the existing evidence base and critically evaluates major theoretical approaches. The analytical focus is on ambiguity and scales of collaboration. Findings: Three main research strands have been identified: first, community and public sector collaboration focusing on the participatory initiation of services by local communities; second, collaboration for resources and employment focusing on power relations between established organizations; and third, network- and micro-level collaboration focusing on collaborative governance of complex networks. A vaguely contextualized and non-critical approach to social entrepreneurship remains prominent; however, recent studies on community and network collaboration present nuanced approaches to scalarity and ambiguity. Implications for theory and practice: Existing research could benefit from explicit and broader theorization of collaboration, the analysis of ambiguous experiences and contexts and attending to the interplay between daily practices and larger-scale institutional change. The paper presents a compiled reference base and gives directions about future research and practice re-thinking social enterprise as a collaborative endeavor. Originality and value: The article contributes to social entrepreneurship studies by structuring the field and enhancing critical theory on the topic.

Understanding Chilling Effects

With digital surveillance and censorship on the rise, the amount of data available online unprecedented, and corporate and governmental actors increasingly employing emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and facial recognition technology (FRT) for surveillance and data analytics, concerns about “chilling effects”, that is, the capacity for these activities “chill” or deter people from exercising their rights and freedoms have taken on greater urgency and importance. Yet, there remains a clear dearth in systematic theoretical and empirical work point. This has left significant gaps in understanding. This article has attempted to fill that void, synthesizing theoretical and empirical insights from law, privacy, and a range of social science fields toward a more comprehensive and unified understanding. I argue that conventional theories, based on fear of legal or privacy harm, are narrow, empirically weak, cannot predict or explain chilling effects in a range of different contexts, and neglect its productive dimensions—how chilling effects shape behavior. Drawing extensively on social science literature, I argue that chilling effects are best understood as a form of social conformity. Chilling effects arise out of contexts of ambiguity and uncertainty—like the ambiguity of public or private sector surveillance—but have deeper psychological foundations as well. In moments of situational uncertainty, people conform to, and comply with, the relevant social norm in that context. Sometimes this means self-censorship, but most often it means more socially conforming speech or conduct. A theory of chilling effects as social conformity has important normative, theoretical, and empirical advantages, including greater explanatory and predictive power, clarifying what chilling effects theory is for and what it produces, as well as providing a basis to navigate competing and differing chilling effect claims. It also has implications, I argue, for constitutional standing as well as the First Amendment chilling effects doctrine.

Textuality and Ambiguity of Forensic Texts Egyptian Supreme Court: A Model

Abstract Legal texts are a subfield of forensic linguistics involving the study of language and the law. This language is an arcane and often impenetrable category. The purpose of this present study is to identify the field of Legal Texts and distinguish their different aspects, moreover to discuss the distinctive field in homicide investigations in the Egyptian Supreme Court thoroughly. Therefore, this paper is supported by three cases from the Egyptian Supreme court. The paper analyzes the textuality with a focus on both the characteristics and criteria of forensic linguistics, linking text to context and types of ambiguity either lexical or structural features. Textuality integrated with ambiguity can constitute a totality of properties giving cohesion and coherence in any meaningful text. Textual analysis of these legal texts also involves understanding forensic language to gain information and providing cues to ways through which communication of social structures is understood. Textual analysis in legal studies operates at seven criteria of text. In addition to paying particular attention to specific lexical and structural ambiguity in forensic texts of cases under investigation. This paper aims to examine the textuality features and thematic structures embedded in the Egyptian Supreme legal texts, and to determine the most dominant causal factors of ambiguities in the Egyptian Supreme legal texts. All of these properties have consequences for research techniques to extrapolate the nature of legal texts and the relations involved between textuality and ambiguity.

'Ser teudo de responder' ou 'ter de responder': sobre a emergência de usos deônticos de 'ter de (que)' + INF em português

This proposal is part of an ongoing diachronic research on ter and haver (‘have’) in Portuguese, focusing in particular on the emergence of deontic constructions with ter. In this article I analyze data retrieved from a diachronic corpus and discuss the chronology and conditioning factors of the changes involved in both the disuse of ser teudo de [have-passive Prep] INF, a construction largely attested in Portuguese past stages, and the innovation ter de [have Prep] INF. Both constructions appear to have similar deontic readings, yet the datasuggest that they are not diachronically linked, the latter appearing only in a much later period. Following the presentation of theoretical and methodological issues, the retrieved data are described and discussed, the main conclusions being that: the obsolescence of ser teudo appears to be related to morphophonological factors (probably among others); the modal construction ter de INF emerged late in Portuguese and is probably a variant of ter que INF; ter que INF, the original deontic construction, emerged by reanalysis of structures where que was originally a relative pronoun (referring the object of ter), in ambiguous contexts which favored the new interpretation of the structure as a modal construction.

Managing Ambiguity When Caring for Women Who Experience Stillbirth

ObjectiveTo examine the interactions and social processes involved when nurses care for women who experience fetal demise and subsequent stillbirth. DesignQualitative design using grounded theory. SettingSingle-site urban medical center in New York City. ParticipantsTwenty registered nurses who worked in the labor and delivery department. MethodsI collected data via in-depth interviews and recorded, transcribed, and analyzed the data using constant comparative analysis. ResultsManaging Ambiguity emerged as the overarching preliminary theory to describe how nurses cared for women who experienced stillbirth. This preliminary theory included three themes: Experiencing a Spectrum of Emotions, Managing Patient Care in an Ambiguous Context, and Managing Institutional Ambiguity. These themes provided an overview of the creative/protective and avoidant/conflicted behaviors that nurses brought to their work with women whose fetuses died in utero and were stillborn. These interactions were complicated by institutional policies and additional factors, such as workload, that often denied nurses the resources needed to engage in the patient care processes required to address the trauma experienced by women and their families. ConclusionThe preliminary theory Managing Ambiguity provided a perspective on the experiences, behaviors, and social processes involved in caring for women who experience stillbirth. The absence of preparatory education, effective protocols, and institutional support contributed to the ambiguity inherent in caring for these women.

Leading in the certainty of uncertain times

This research focused on the potential for Christ-following leaders to develop a theological and missiological posture in response to the current volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) world context. This research looks at how the attitudes and actions of the corporate world have influenced those of Christian organisations and Christian leadership. The corporate world primarily focuses on strategies for overcoming the challenges of the VUCA environment, but this research explores how Christ-following leaders might benefit from looking more deeply at what VUCA represents, rather than merely accepting and reacting to it. The research used a literature review to develop the groundwork for an increased understanding of how God and VUCA relate and how Christ followers can develop a perspective in keeping with an understanding of God’s mission, their calling and the VUCA world mindset. Although some research has been done regarding spirituality as part of a response to the VUCA world, it has often focused on the outward expressions (morality, values, collaboration and service) with little attention to the Christ follower’s source of spiritual life, the trinitarian God. This research integrates recognition of the character of God, evaluation of VUCA realities and rhetoric, and the responsibilities and opportunities of leaders who desire to participate in God’s mission. In this process, the research explores strategy metaphors, missional thinking and leadership implications. Contribution: This research encourages greater theological and missiological exploration of the Christian leader’s posture and response to the VUCA world mindset. The research engages with corporate thinking regarding strategy and the implications of VUCA and with theological and missiological thinking regarding God’s role, the leader’s role and the nature of current contexts, both local and global.

Handling uncertainty and ambiguity in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak is unprecedented. Yet some look to ready-made models to address it. This creates confusion about more adaptive responses that reflect an uncertain and ambiguous context. Those assessing associated mental health challenges must be wary of overdiagnosis. Handling the pandemic well, requires engaging the public as mature partners. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

НЕПРИСЪСТВЕНА ФОРМА НА ОБУЧЕНИЕ В УСЛОВИЯТА НА COVID-19

The present article outlines the results from several studies, conducted prior to and after the emergency related to COVID-19 in Bulgaria. They all aim at describing how different groups of volunteers – general population, teachers, school and university students – adapt to the new situation and what their attitudes towards online and blended forms of training are. Based on our research findings, designated to advocate the most adaptive framework for crisis management, has been proposed here. The general conclusion of our studies is that all participants in the survey, regardless of their age or gender, exhibit similar patterns of behaviour and reactions during the four month period of COVID-19 outbreak. This is a clear indication that a broad framework to support the whole community should be sought. One of the findings is that in an ambiguous and nonpredictable context, highly dependent on the global course of the pandemic, participants in the educational process feel secure when they know they can achieve their set educational short-term or mid-term goals, like for example, finish the school or university year. Another conclusion is that in order to feel secure and successful, participants need to have a sense of control over their own lives, which can be achieved and enhanced by a positive and supportive environment which can assure flexibility.

Decreased risk-taking and loss-chasing after subthalamic nucleus lesion in rats.

The subthalamic nucleus (STN) is known to play a role in the control of impulsivity of action and in impulsivity of choice under certain conditions. In order to assess its influence on decision-making under uncertainty, we have tested here the effects of bilateral STN lesions in rats performing a probability discounting task (PDT) and a "loss-chasing" task, both tasks assessing risky decision under uncertainty, but one in a positive context (probability to obtain a larger reward) and the other in a negative context (risk for a larger loss). The PDT measures the choice between a small certain and a large uncertain reward. Conversely, in the "loss-chasing" task, animals choose between accepting a small certain loss versus risking a larger but uncertain penalty. The results show that STN lesions reduce risk-taking in both the PDT and the loss-chasing task, suggesting that STN inactivation could decrease risky decision-making whatever the nature of the outcome in an ambiguous context. Interestingly, opposite results were found in a small number of animals for which the lesions extended to the area dorsal to the STN (in the zona incerta), such that these animals increased choice of the uncertain option in the PDT. These results confirm the specificity of STN involvement in these processes and may provide explanations for some side-effects reported in patients when STN manipulations extend to the Zona Incerta. They also support the choice of the STN as a target for the treatment of impulse control disorders in Parkinson's disease and in obsessive compulsive disorders.

Changes in the Sensitivity to Language-Specific Orthographic Patterns With Age.

How do bilingual readers of languages that have similar scripts identify a language switch? Recent behavioral and electroencephalographic results suggest that they rely on orthotactic cues to recognize the language of the words they read in ambiguous contexts. Previous research has shown that marked words with language-specific letter sequences (i.e., letter sequences that are illegal in one of the two languages) are recognized more easily and faster than unmarked words. The aim of this study was to investigate sensitivity to markedness throughout childhood and early adulthood by using a speeded language decision task with words and pseudowords. A large group of Spanish-Basque bilinguals of different ages (children, preteenagers, teenagers and adults) was tested. Results showed a markedness effect in the second language across all age groups that changed with age. However, sensitivity to markedness in the native language was negligible. We conclude that sensitivity to orthotactics does not follow parallel developmental trend in the first and second language.

Through the looking glass: the rabbit hole of reflective practice.

Reflective practice is a common feature of nurse education. Indeed, the development of nursing practice is associated with being a 'reflective practitioner'. However, how we see ourselves or interpret past events is often influenced by our own unconscious biases. While it is reasonable to hold favourable views of one's ability, biased or lack of self-insight might mean that one is actually unskilled and unaware of it. In the ambiguous clinical context where an act or omission can have potentially devastating consequences, the implications of this are significant. The questions of whether and how reflection addresses unconscious biases are relatively unexplored in the nursing literature. Given that accurate self-assessment is integral to reflective practice, this article attempts to explore the potential impact of unconscious bias on reflection. The authors conclude that while biases may limit our ability to learn from reflection, this is not a reason to dispense with reflective practice, but rather, is even more reason to critically engage with the process. Nurses of all levels must be encouraged to reflect on both their practice, and their reflection.

Honest mistake or perhaps not: The role of descriptive and injunctive norms on the magnitude of dishonesty

AbstractTrivial acts of dishonesty are very prevalent in everyday life and have severe economic and societal consequences. The present study aims to examine the role of descriptive and injunctive norms in minor and major dishonesty under ambiguity. We devised a novel experimental design in which rule violations can be the result of honest mistakes or various dishonest processes. In this ambiguous context, we observed a high prevalence of minor rule violations at baseline. In two experiments, exposure to increased peer cheating (i.e., negative descriptive norms) promoted major rule violations, whereas the presence of explicit or subtle rule reminders (i.e., injunctive norms) marginally reduced minor rule violations but had no impact on major rule violations. We interpret these findings within the framework of social norm theory, self‐maintenance theory, and bounded ethicality. Implications regarding policies that target ordinary unethical behavior are discussed.

Entrepreneurial fear of failure: Scale development and validation

Fear of failure is an important part of the experience of entrepreneurship. Yet past research has mainly investigated fear of failure in entrepreneurship among non entrepreneurs or nascent entrepreneurs and has done so by asking for reactions to hypothetical future failure. This approach to operationalizing the construct limits our capacity for understanding how entrepreneurs actually experience fear of failure while practicing entrepreneurship. In this paper, we conceptualize entrepreneurial fear of failure as a negative affective reaction based in cognitive appraisals of the potential for failure in the uncertain and ambiguous context of entrepreneurship. We use multiple samples to develop and validate a multidimensional, formative measure to assess entrepreneurial fear of failure as a state that is both cognitive and affective in nature. In addition to evidence of the psychometric properties of the new scale across multiple studies, we present a nomological network analysis with respect to measures of theoretically derived psychological outcomes and perceived behavioral tendencies of entrepreneurial fear of failure. We then discuss the theoretical, methodological, and empirical implications of this new measure of entrepreneurial fear of failure with an eye towards use of this scale in future research.

The Active Sensing of Control Difference.

SummaryIn everyday life, people control objects in the world around them to varying degrees. The processes people actively use to establish their control, while interacting with an environment containing large ambiguity, remain unknown. This study examines how people explore their control over the environment and how they detect small differences in control among objects. In the experimental task, participants moved three dots on a screen and identified one dot over which the level of control is different from that of the other two. The results support a two-step behavior mechanism underlying the sensing of control difference: People first explore their overall control in the environment, and then the results of the initial exploration are used to selectively tune the direction (i.e., either more or less) of the detected control difference, ensuring efficient and rapid detection of the type of control difference that is potentially important for further action selections.

Is a letterbox always a letterbox? The role of affordances in guiding perceptual categorization.

Classically investigated in the context of judgment tasks about achievable actions, affordances have also been investigated in the context of the stimulus-response compatibility paradigm. Earlier work showed that perceptual categorization performance is significantly faster and more accurate when the orientation of the graspable part of a presented object, and the orientation of the participant's response are compatible, suggesting that the main function of affordances is restricted to action preparation. Here, we investigate the potential role of affordances in the categorization of ambiguous stimuli through a stimulus-response compatibility paradigm. In other words, we investigate if in ambiguous situations, such as ones in which a stimulus may give rise to two percepts, affordances would stabilize perception on one of these two and, therefore, helps in the subsequent categorizations. Two experiments were run, based on the forced-choice stimulus-response compatibility (SRC) paradigm, with a progressive series of ambiguous (bistable) lateral-graspable objects. In Experiment 1, subjects responded by pressing horizontally opposite keyboard keys, while in Experiment 2, the keyboard keys were vertically separated. Experiment 1 found that subjects perceived the initial object in a bistable series for longer, and exhibited greater response stability in compatible than incompatible situations. In Experiment 2, none of these modulations were significant. Overall, our results show that affordances operationalized through a SRC paradigm modulated how subjects categorized ambiguous stimuli. We argue that affordances may play a substantial role in ambiguous contexts by reducing the uncertainty of such situations.

Distinct Dorsal and Ventral Hippocampal CA3 Outputs Govern Contextual Fear Discrimination

SUMMARYConsiderable work emphasizes a role for hippocampal circuits in governing contextual fear discrimination. However· the intra- and extrahippocampal pathways that route contextual information to cortical and subcortical circuits to guide adaptive behavioral responses are poorly understood. Using terminal-specific optogenetic silencing in a contextual fear discrimination learning paradigm· we identify opposing roles for dorsal CA3-CA1 (dCA3-dCA1) projections and dorsal CA3-dorsolateral septum (dCA3-DLS) projections in calibrating fear responses to certain and ambiguous contextual threats· respectively. Ventral CA3-DLS (vCA3-DLS) projections suppress fear responses in both certain and ambiguous contexts· whereas ventral CA3-CA1 (vCA3-vCA1) projections promote fear responses in both these contexts. Lastly· using retrograde monosynaptic tracing· ex vivo electrophysiological recordings· and optogenetics,· we identify a sparse population of DLS parvalbumin (PV) neurons as putative relays of dCA3-DLS projections to diverse subcortical circuits. Taken together· these studies illuminate how distinct dCA3 and vCA3 outputs calibrate contextual fear discrimination.

Mobilizing in a hybrid political system: the Artvin case in Turkey

ABSTRACT Hybrid political systems, which are neither rigorously liberal nor authoritarian, create ambiguous political environments for protests and social movements. We argue in this study that the power-resistance dynamics become more sophisticated within the ambiguous context of hybrid systems, such as the one in Turkey, where democratic channels are not totally suspended, but significantly weakened. Examining an episode of contention between an anti-mining movement and the Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi, AKP) government on the issue of gold mining in Artvin, a city in the Northeastern Black Sea region, we demonstrate that in the electoral authoritarian context of Turkey the anti-mining movement gained a political role and significance well beyond its original specific aims, transforming into a conflict between those discontented with the authoritarian features of the existing system and the incumbents of that very system. Our study implies that social movements in hybrid political systems may turn into broader struggles not only because they open up political avenues for various groups to express their resentment with the prevailing undemocratic system, but also because the hegemonic forces attempt to consolidate the existing regime by mobilizing a popular support for the repression of these mobilizations.

Policy analysis in uncertain and ambiguous context: Agenda for methodological pluralism

In this article we demonstrate why and how in the Western science of policymaking a challenge posited by empirical behaviouralism aimed at reforming the over-politicised plicy process along the analytical-rational lines in 1950s did not succeeded. However, it produced a meaningful shift in understanding the policy process and it formed by the 1970s a completely new conceptual context and discourse on the policy process. As a result, by the new millennium the positivist and constructivists perspectives, that are located at the opposite ends of the continuum of methodological presumptions, started to complement each other and even to intermingle at the level of providing practical policy solutions. In the first part we analyse how the cognitive limits and uncertainty of the context forces to re-focus policy analysis from substantive issues to the policy arena design, and to work out conceptions of interactive policymaking. Simultaneously several concepts of constructivist social science (frames, learning, narratives) were applied and adapted in the positivist perspective. We demonstrate why constructivist-interpretivist policy analysis could not for a long time get to the forefront of practical policy analysis. We demonstrate how the application of the pragmatist approach made it possible to develop the conception of design rationality. Overall, we explore the framework in which different methodologies would complement each other in providing policy advice and analysis from different practical angles.

Contextual Healing: Privacy through Interpretation Management

Contextual privacy is an essential concept in social software communication. Managing privacy of data disclosed in social software dependence strongly on the context the data is disclosed in. The sheer amount of posts and audiences may lead to context ambiguity. Ambiguity can affect contextual privacy management and effective communication. Current contextual privacy management approaches can be either too complex to use, or too simple to offer fine-grained control. In many cases, it is challenging to strike a balance between effective control and ease-of-use. In this article, we analyse contextual privacy by in relation to context and communication. We examine a relevant contextual privacy management framework based on the maintenance of the interpretation of data. We propose an architecture based on the utilisation of intelligent mechanisms. We conceptually analyse the usability aspect of the proposed architecture. We conclude by arguing how our conceptual framework can enhance communication and privacy in private and public spaces.