Current Research Paradigms Research Articles

Horizontes de posibilidad: sociologías para el siglo XXI

La sociología, como disciplina, tiene mucho que aportar a la conciencia pública crítica sobre los cambiantes panoramas globales. Exactamente, qué somos capaces de aportar -y lo útiles que pueden ser esas contribuciones- dependerá de cómo (re)conceptualicemos la disciplina en relación con el discurso de la ciencia. Mientras que muchos sociólogos argumentan para anclar más fuerte y consistentemente nuestros marcos de referencia respecto a las ciencias físicas, este artículo responde que, al comienzo del siglo veintiuno, la disciplina necesita dar un paso hacia delante a la par de la evolución de las epistemologías sociales, no dar un paso atrás hacia viejos modelos científicos. Este artículo comienza con ejemplos sobre las limitaciones que tienen los paradigmas de investigación actuales y aboga por el desarrollo y uso de las epistemologías sociales que rompen con el paradigma cartesiano. De este modo se resalta el valor de los estudios sociológicos del lenguaje para comprender las complejidades sociales del siglo veintiuno.

Designing Biomaterials Systems for the Disc Pathology

Biomaterials are no longer considered innate structures and using functionalisation strategies to modulate a desired response whether it is a host or implant is currently an important focus in current research paradigms. Fundamentally, a thorough understanding the host response will enable to design propoer functionalisation strategies. Using functionalisation strategies such as enzymatic and hyperbranched linking systems, we have been able to link biomolecules to different structural moieties. The programmed assembly of biomolecules into higher-order self-organized systems is central to innumerable biological processes and development of the next generation of functionalized scaffolds. Recent design efforts have utilized a bottom-up approach toward both understanding and engineering supramolecular protein assemblies. These include functionalisation of micro and nanoparticles with biomolecules that include designed peptide motifs, growth factors and a multitude of gene vector systems. Structural moieties have taken a variety of different forms such as nanofibers and nanoparticulate. The talk will elucidate some of these ongoing strategies in our laboratory. Disclosures: None

科学研究视角下的社会排斥

随着社会排斥概念的发展，越来越多的研究者开始从事这方面的研究工作。本文试图从社会排斥的概念及其分类、当前应用情况、研究范式、研究工具等方面来探讨这一概念当前的发展情况，以期得到一些启发。 With the development of the concept of social exclusion, more and more researchers began to be engaged in the work of this research field. This article attempts, from the concept of social exclusion and its classification, the current application situation, research paradigm and research tools, to explore the development of the concept in current situation, in order to get some inspiration.

Studying the lay of the land: views and experiences of professionals in the translational pluripotent stem cell field.

The inherent uncertainty of first-in-human trials, combined with the technical complexity of pluripotent stem cells (PSCs), makes early phase PSC studies ethically challenging. Conducting parallel bioethics research based on experiences and views of professionals in the stem cell field is therefore important. We conducted semistructured interviews with various stakeholders to get a lay of the land of ethical issues professionals find relevant to the translation of PSCs. We identified four themes in the interviews: the uniqueness of PSCs, the suitability of the current research paradigm, the justification for early phase PSC studies and the involvement of patients and research participants. We conclude that a debate should take place discussing the suitability of the current research paradigm for translational PSC studies.

Managerial Response to Online Reviews: Is It Always Good?

The current research paradigm of social influence in customer satisfaction in the digital age focuses on peer effects in the expectation formation stage. We propose that the broad class of publicly observable service interactions can also have satisfaction externalities for customers who observe these interactions. We test the social influence of observable peer service interactions in the context of managers’ response to online reviews. At the time of writing her review, a focal customer has already purchased and experienced the product or service. Even so, managers can still influence focal customers post-consumption satisfaction through their responses to other customers’ reviews. Through a novel natural-experiment, we find empirical evidence using a dataset of more than 17 million hotel reviews that publicly stated satisfaction is positively (negatively) influenced by managers’ responses to negative (positive) reviews of previous customers. In addition, we apply latent Dirichlet allocation methods to model the tailoring of manager response to customer reviews. We find that response tailoring to negative (positive) reviews enhances (exacerbates) the positive (negative) effect on subsequent opinion.

BMP-7 Signaling and its Critical Roles in Kidney Development, the Responses to Renal Injury, and Chronic Kidney Disease.

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a significant health problem that most commonly results from congenital abnormalities in children and chronic renal injury in adults. The therapeutic potential of BMP-7 was first recognized nearly two decades ago with studies demonstrating its requirement for kidney development and ability to inhibit the pathogenesis of renal injury in models of CKD. Since this time, our understanding of CKD has advanced considerably and treatment strategies have evolved with the identification of many additional signaling pathways, cell types, and pathologic processes that contribute to disease progression. The purpose of this review is to revisit the seminal studies that initially established the importance of BMP-7, highlight recent advances in BMP-7 research, and then integrate this knowledge with current research paradigms. We will provide an overview of the evolutionarily conserved roles of BMP proteins and the features that allow BMP signaling pathways to function as critical signaling nodes for controlling biological processes, including those related to CKD. We will discuss the multifaceted functions of BMP-7 during kidney development and the potential for alterations in BMP-7 signaling to result in congenital abnormalities and pediatric kidney disease. We will summarize the renal protective effects of recombinant BMP-7 in experimental models of CKD and then propose a model to describe the potential physiological role of endogenous BMP-7 in the innate repair mechanisms of the kidneys that respond to renal injury. Finally, we will highlight emerging clinical approaches for applying our knowledge of BMP-7 toward improving the treatment of patients with CKD.

Improving Performance of Clinical Research: Development and Interest of Electronic Health Records.

Collecting health information from patients is probably one of the most ancient medical acts. The Hippocratic Corpus was a compendium of medical records from Ancient Greece and one of the first attempts to classify diseases according to symptoms and observations.

Person-centred health care: a critical assessment of current and emerging research approaches.

Person-centred health care is prominent in international health care reforms. A shift to understanding and improving personal care at the point of delivery has generated debates about the nature of the person-centred research agenda. This paper purviews research paradigms that influence current person-centred research approaches and traditions that influence knowledge foundations in the field. It presents a synthesis of the emergent approaches and methodologies and highlights gaps between static academic research and the increasing accessibility of evaluation, informatics and big data from health information systems. Paradigms in health services research range from theoretical to atheoretical, including positivist, interpretive, postmodern and pragmatic. Interpretivist (subjective) and positivist (objectivist) paradigms have been historically polarized. Yet, integrative and pragmatic approaches have emerged. Nevertheless, there is a tendency to reductionism, and to reduce personal experiences to metrics in the positivist paradigm. Integrating personalized information into clinical systems is increasingly driven by the pervasive health information technology, which raises many issues about the asymmetry and uncertainty in the flow of information to support personal health journeys. The flux and uncertainty of knowledge between and within paradigmatic or pragmatic approaches highlights the uncertainty and the 'unorder and disorder' in what is known and what it means. Transdisciplinary, complex adaptive systems theory with multi-ontology sense making provides an overarching framework for making sense of the complex dynamics in research progress. A major challenge to current research paradigms is focus on the individualizing of care and enhancing experiences of persons in health settings. There is an urgent need for person-centred research to address this complex process. A transdisciplinary and complex systems approach provides a sense-making framework.

Conversive disorders among children and adolescents: Towards new “complementarist” paradigms?

This paper aims to describe current questions concerning conversive disorders among children and adolescents. We first describe prevalence and clinical characteristics of these. Many unresolved questions remain. Why do patients show excess, or loss of function? Attachment theory offers a relevant framework to answer this question. Does neurobiology of conversion disorders shed light on conversive processes? Current neurobiological research paradigms focus on the symptom, trying to infer processes, instead of proposing paradigms that test theoretical hypotheses. The most convincing theoretical framework that has already proposed a coherent theory of conversion is a psychodynamic one, which has not yet been tested with neurobiological paradigms. The interest of studying child and adolescent conversive disorders is to provide a means to more deeply investigate the two challenges we face: theoretical, and clinical ones. It provides the opportunity to access a pathopsychological process at its roots, not yet hidden by many defensive, rationalizing attitudes, and to better explore environmental features. We propose a "complementarist" model, which allows the combination of different approaches (neural, cognitive, environmental, attachment, intra-psychic) and permits proposal of different levels of therapeutic targets and means.

Aggression in Schizophrenia and its Relationship to Neural Circuitry of Urgency

Aggression in Schizophrenia and its Relationship to Neural Circuitry of Urgency

An Analysis of Current Research Paradigm for Service Design in Korea

An Analysis of Current Research Paradigm for Service Design in Korea

Would the elimination of the capacity to suffer solve ethical dilemmas in experimental animal research?

The use of genetic engineering to enhance the welfare of laboratory animals can reduce the amount of suffering in current neuroscience research paradigms. In particular, for some forms of basic research, we can use welfare-enhanced animals to reduce harms to animals without sacrificing any of the scientific validity. In another group of experiments, we can use welfare-enhanced animals to dramatically reduce the number of unprotected animals enduring aversive procedures. Many of the objections to using welfare-enhanced animals for food production do not apply to their use in research, since genetic knockout techniques are already used routinely in research for human ends and since there is no risk for human health. Furthermore, examples of recent knockout experiments suggest that we already have, or are very close to having, the capacity to reduce suffering in laboratories via genetic engineering. If we are truly committed to balancing the advancement of science with the welfare of animals, this option should be further explored.

광고효과모형에 관한 문헌연구: 모형의 검토와 제언

본 연구는 주요 광고효과모형을 검토하여 광고효과의 발생과정에 대한 광고계의 주류적 인식을 살펴보고, 이를 통하여 광고효과 연구의 한계점과 해결방안을 제시하고자 한다. 문헌연구 결과, 기존의 광고효과 연구는 설득커뮤니케이션의 패러다임 안에서 브랜드태도의 변화에 초점을 맞추어 왔으며 광고효과의 다른 측면은 심도 있게 논의하지 못하였다는 점을 밝혔다. 저자는 급변하는 광고매체환경 속에서 브랜드태도 변화와는 구별되는 새로운 광고효과 연구의 필요성을 제시하고 특히 저관여모형에서 강조하는 브랜드 인식의 틀 제공, 브랜드친숙성, 브랜드현저성의 제고와 같은 보다 다양한 변인에 대한 학문적 관심이 필요하다는 점을 주장하였다. With reviewing major advertising effect models, this research aimed to describe the accepted view of how advertising works, to discover the limits of current advertising effects research paradigm and to suggest the solutions. The results show that current advertising research has been mainly focused on brand attitude but other advertising effects have been neglected. Due to radically changing advertising media, the author proposes that new perspectives on the advertising effect are needed such as brand perception, brand familiarity and brand salience.

Directed Migration in Neural Tissue Engineering

Directed cell migration is particularly important in neural tissue engineering, where the goal is to direct neurons and support cells across injured nerve gaps. Investigation of the gradients present in the body during development provides an approach to guiding cells in peripheral and central nervous system tissue, but many different types of gradients and patterns can accomplish directed migration. The focus of this review is to describe current research paradigms in neural tissue gradients and review their effectiveness for directed migration. The review explores directed migration achieved through the use of chemical, adhesive, mechanical, topographical, and electrical types of gradients. Few studies investigate combined gradients, though it is known that a combination of therapies is necessary for reconnection of neuronal circuitry. To date, there has been no systematic review of gradient approaches to neural tissue engineering. By looking at effectiveness of various scaffold cue presentation and methods to combine these strategies, the potential for nerve repair is increased.

An Invisible Knowledge Network of Strategic Management Studies: Scientometrics and Tag Cloud Analysis

The purpose of this study is to identify the evolution of the intellectual structure of strategic management studies and to propose a theory of an invisible network of knowledge. By analyzing 303,402 citations of 4,616 articles published in SCI and SSCI journals in the strategic management field from year 2003 to year 2012, this study maps the intellectual structure of strategic management studies. This article dwells upon the wide spreading social tags of website applications. By so called crowd wisdom, the tag cloud analysis reveals the preliminary investigation from a social network viewpoint, provides researchers with profiles of strategic management related subjects and theories, and sheds light on future directions of studies. The contribution of this study is to provide important insights and implications of current and future research paradigms for both management scholars and practitioners. Index Terms—C o-citation

Evolutionary Adaptation of the Amino Acid and Codon Usage of the Mosquito Sodium Channel following Insecticide Selection in the Field Mosquitoes

Target site insensitivity resulting from point mutations within the voltage-gated sodium channel of the insect nervous system is known to be of primary importance in the development of resistance to pyrethroid insecticides. This study shifts current research paradigms by conducting, for the first time, a global analysis of all the naturally occurring mutations, both nonsynonymous and synonymous mutations, as well as mutation combinations in the entire mosquito sodium channel of Culex quinquefasciatus and analyzing their evolutionary and heritable feature and roles in insecticide resistance. Through a systematic analysis of comparing nucleotide polymorphisms in the entire sodium channel cDNAs of individuals between susceptible and resistant mosquito strains, between field parental mosquitoes and their permethrin selected offspring, and among different mosquito groups categorized by their levels of tolerance to specific permethrin concentrations within and among the mosquito strains of the field parental strains and their permethrin selected offspring, 3 nonsynonymous (A109S, L982F, and W1573R) and 6 synonymous (L852, G891, A1241, D1245, P1249, and G1733) mutations were identified. The co-existence of all 9 mutations, both nonsynonymous and synonymous, and their homozygousity were found to be important factors for high levels of resistance. Our study, for the first time, provide a strong case demonstrating the co-existence of both nonsynonymous and synonymous mutations in the sodium channel of resistant mosquitoes in response to insecticide resistance and the inheritance of these mutations in the offspring of field mosquito strains following insecticide selection.

Fundamental concepts of epigenetics for consideration in anesthesiology

Epigenetics dictate how the genetic blueprint is ultimately expressed and, therefore, is fundamental to our understanding of disease etiology and cellular responses and consequences to exposure of stimuli, such as anesthetics and perioperative stress. The goal of this review is to provide a concise overview of the fundamental concepts in epigenetics and discuss how epigenetics may be incorporated into research studies in anesthesiology. Chemical modifications of DNA and core histone proteins are epigenetic marks that constitute the functional genome and are key to generating diverse cellular phenotypes from the same genotype. These modifications and the cellular machineries that regulate them are essential for maintaining tissue-specific and timing-specific expression profiles for normal functioning and can be altered in disease contexts, thus providing the molecular basis for the abnormalities. Similar to determining cellular identity within a person, epigenetic differences between individuals, including monozygotic twins, can account for disparate phenotypes in the absence of genetic variation in the genes of interest. Furthermore, epigenetic modifications are dynamic but heritable and, thus, are fitting for reinforcing adaptive phenotypes in response to external stimuli. Epigenetic mechanisms underlie many human pathological conditions and impact clinical management in a variety of contexts. Although epigenetic research related to anesthesiology is sparse at the present, the full understanding of the mechanism of action of analgesics, interindividual variations in responses to anesthetics and consequences of exposure to anesthetic drugs will likely require the evaluation and integration of epigenetic information into current research paradigms.

Are Quantum Dots Toxic? Exploring the Discrepancy Between Cell Culture and Animal Studies

Despite significant interest in developing quantum dots (QDs) for biomedical applications, many researchers are convinced that QDs will never be used for treating patients because of their potential toxicity. The perception that QDs are toxic is rooted in two assumptions. Cadmium-containing QDs can kill cells in culture. Many researchers then assume that because QDs are toxic to cells, they must be toxic to humans. In addition, many researchers classify QDs as a homogeneous group of materials. Therefore, if CdSe QDs are harmful, they extrapolate this result to all QDs. Though unsubstantiated, these assumptions continue to drive QD research. When dosing is physiologically appropriate, QD toxicity has not been demonstrated in animal models. In addition, QDs are not uniform: each design is a unique combination of physicochemical properties that influence biological activity and toxicity. In this Account, we summarize key findings from in vitro and in vivo studies, explore the causes of the discrepancy in QD toxicological data, and provide our view of the future direction of the field. In vitro and in vivo QD studies have advanced our knowledge of cellular transport kinetics, mechanisms of QD toxicity, and biodistribution following animal injection. Cell culture experiments have shown that QDs undergo design-dependent intracellular localization and they can cause cytotoxicity by releasing free cadmium into solution and by generating free radical species. In animal experiments, QDs preferentially enter the liver and spleen following intravascular injection, undergo minimal excretion if larger than 6 nm, and appear to be safe to the animal. In vitro and in vivo studies show an apparent discrepancy with regard to toxicity. Dosing provides one explanation for these findings. Under culture conditions, a cell experiences a constant QD dose, but the in vivo QD concentration can vary, and the organ-specific dose may not be high enough to induce detectable toxicity. Because QDs are retained within animals, long-term toxicity may be a problem but has not been established. Future QD toxicity studies should be standardized and systematized because methodological variability in the current body of literature makes it difficult to compare and contrast results. We advocate the following steps for consistent, comparable toxicology data: (a) standardize dose metrics, (b) characterize QD uptake concentration, (c) identify in vitro models that reflect the cells QDs interact with in vivo, and (d) use multiple assays to determine sublethal toxicity and biocompatibility. Finally, we should ask more specific toxicological questions. For example: "At what dose are 5 nm CdSe QDs that are stabilized with mercaptoacetic acid and conjugated to the antibody herceptin toxic to HeLa cells?" rather than "Are QDs toxic?" QDs are still a long way from realizing their potential as a medical technology. Modifying the current QD toxicological research paradigm, investigating toxicity in a case-by-case manner, and improving study quality are important steps in identifying a QD formulation that is safe for human use.

Most cited business ethics publications: mapping the intellectual structure of business ethics studies in 2001–2008

This study explores the research paradigms of contemporary business ethics research in 2001–2008. With citation data from the top two business ethics journals included in the Social Sciences Citation Index, this study conducts citation and co‐citation analysis to identify the most important publications, scholars, and research themes in the business ethics area and then maps the intellectual structure of business ethics studies between 2001 and 2008. The results show that current business ethics studies cluster around four major research themes, including morality and social contract theory, ethical decision making, corporate social responsibility, and stakeholder theory. This study helps profile the invisible network of knowledge production in business ethics and provides important insights on current research paradigms of business ethics studies.

Struggle for life, struggle for love and recognition: the neglected self in social cognitive neuroscience

In the following article we present a view that social cognition and social neuroscience, as shaped by the current research paradigms, are not sufficient to improve our understanding of psychopathological phenomena. We hold that the self, self-awareness, and inter-subjectivity are integral to social perception and actions. In addition, we emphasize that the self and self-awareness are, by their very nature and function, involved over the entire lifespan with the way the individual is perceived in the social environment. Likewise, the modes of operation and identification of the self and self-awareness receive strong developmental contributions from social interactions with parental figures, siblings, peers, and significant others. These contributions are framed by a competitive and cooperative struggle for love and recognition. We suggest that in humans social cognitive neuroscience should be informed by a thoughtful appreciation of the equal significance of the struggle for "life" and that for love and recognition. In order to be better positioned to improve the research agenda and practice of clinical psychiatry, we propose that cognitive and social neurosciences explicitly incorporate in their models phenomena relative to the self, self-awareness, and inter-subjectivity.