Professional Norms Research Articles

‘I don’t believe in the neutrality of research. OK?’ Mapping researchers’ attitudes toward values in science

ABSTRACT Background: Codes of conduct for research integrity provide ambivalent guidance on the role that the values of society as well as political and economic interests can or should play in scientific research. The development of clearer guidance on this matter in the future should consider the attitudes of researchers. Methods: We conducted 24 semi-structured interviews with holders of grants from the European Research Council and performed an inductive thematic analysis thereof. Results: We developed 4 themes reflecting 4 main attitudes of researchers toward the interactions between values and science: awareness, concern, confidence, and embracement. While interviewees recognized that science is not completely value-free (awareness), they still seemed to hold on to the so-called value-free ideal of science as a professional norm to minimize bias (concern, confidence). However, they showed awareness of the beneficial influence that values like diversity can have on research (embracement). Conclusions: Codes such as the European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity tend not to problematize the tensions that emerge from having the value-free ideal of science as a norm and being guided by the values of society. Our findings suggest the time might be ripe for research integrity codes to address more directly the value issues intrinsic to science.

Dis-continuity in Continuity-of-Care: a pathway for more equal access to mental health care services?

Abstract Background Access to healthcare is core to achieving universal health coverage. Reaching and obtaining appropriate health care services requires engagement by health care organizations and users. For people with mental illness, access emerges as a continuous process, reflecting oscillating health conditions. This challenges aspirations of continuity of care (COC), but we know little about the experiences of users. Methods We carried out observations of interactions between professionals and users (n = 18) and semi-structured interviews with users, professionals, and managers (n = 33) in the specialised mental health services in Central Denmark Region and FACT-inspired teams in three municipalities. We also conducted 3 focus groups with regional and municipal professionals from these teams. Data was analysed through a qualitative thematic analysis. Results From the perspective of users, COC builds on the acknowledgment of their entire life situation. For users, this is about making connections between their past, present and future lives. Past experience affect their present abilities to follow treatment and influence future hopes and expectations. The acknowledgment of these connections often translates into spaces of discontinuity in continuity, where users need occasional breaks from treatment but worry about being excluded from treatment. Crucially, the organization of the FACT-inspired teams allows for flexibility in the intensity of visits and treatment. The norms of professionals also support users’ perspectives on COC, as the norms focus on building trust in the relations between users and professionals. Conclusions One important step to achieve more equal access is to integrate the social world of users. This requires organizational and professional approaches that allow for user needs for dis-continuity in COC. Key messages • For mental health service users, continuity-of-care includes breaks from treatment (discontinuity). • More equal health access requires adapting continuity-of-care to needs as perceived by users.

The institutionalization of digital compliance

PurposeThis research paper investigates how companies incorporate digital compliance, particularly data security and protection, as a fundamental aspect of corporate digital responsibility (CDR). We address the gap in understanding the institutionalization of digital compliance as a part of CDR.Design/methodology/approachUsing institutional theory, we assess the impact of coercive, mimetic and normative forces on digital compliance. We used survey data from 162 predominantly large German companies and analyzed it through ordinary least squares (OLS) regressions.FindingsMimetic forces, driven by competitor knowledge, substantially affect digital compliance. Normative forces related to professional knowledge are also influential, while coercive forces exerted by customers have no significant impact on the adoption of digital compliance. In a supplemental analysis, the study highlights the moderating role of organizational agility.Research limitations/implicationsCDR is not limited to digital compliance. Future research should explore higher levels of CDR and consider stakeholders beyond customers. The focus on large German companies may limit generalizability.Practical implicationsThe findings stress the importance of understanding competitive landscapes and professional discourses. Managers should be aware of these institutional forces and incorporate them into strategic planning for digital compliance and CDR.Originality/valueThis research extends institutional theory to digital compliance, offering insights into CDR-related corporate behavior and strategy, emphasizing the importance of competitor awareness and professional norms to manage digital risks.

“Begging to be heard”: The Profession’s Exclusion and Marginalization of Neurodivergent Librarians

While libraries are increasingly implementing practices and services designed to serve neurodivergent patrons, such efforts have not yet been extended to neurodivergent library employees, resulting in a lack of research or best practices for workplace neuroinclusion. This research addresses that gap by investigating neuroinclusion in public and academic library workplaces and identifying barriers to and enablers of inclusion and empowerment. This work highlights the voices of neurodivergent librarians and their journey of negotiating identity and deploying embodied knowledge to navigate the barriers and enablers they encounter in their workplace and profession. This study will inform how libraries can alter their workplace environment, practices, and professional norms to improve the recruitment, retention, and advancement of neurodivergent librarians. Historically, neurodiversity research has been conducted on neurodivergent people from a medicalized perspective, focusing on diagnosis and characteristics of individuals and proposing interventions or changes to the individual or their behavior. This study instead centers neurodivergence by adopting a neurodiversity paradigm and critical disability approach to conducting research with and by neurodivergent people themselves, in accordance with their priorities and values. This study will expand library literature by attending to the various intersecting identities of neurodivergent people and analyzing the impact of professional norms and expectations on the workplace experiences of neurodivergent librarians. Through the development of this unique critical approach to ‘centering neurodivergence,’ this work will also contribute a new research paradigm for future research on neurodiversity. Furthermore, this dissertation will highlight neuroinclusive workplace practices that librarians can enact in their library workplaces.

The Battle of Blair Mountain and the News Media: Professional Ideology and the Coverage of Bloodshed in West Virginia

In 1921, “labor trouble” was the euphemistic phrase used by newspapers to describe the often-bloody conflicts that took place between working miners and their bosses in West Virginia. The Battle of Blair Mountain was one such conflict, a well-known clash between striking miners and mine operators that was made famous because airplanes were used, however unsuccessfully, to drop bombs on the miners during the hostilities. This study examines the coverage of this event by the New York Times and Washington Post to understand the ideological assumptions of professional journalists at the time toward this brutal conflict. Using a historically informed analysis of newspaper content, this study shows how the professional norms of journalism culminated in a highly ideologically informed coverage of labor struggle, revealing upper and middle-class anxiety toward class conflict in early twentieth century America.

Frontline Worker Discretion in the For‐Profit Banking Industry: Lessons From Early Pandemic Relief Programming

ABSTRACTIn April and May 2020, the United States banking industry approved over $650 billion in federal relief funds as part of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). Since then, extensive evidence of discriminatory lending has been revealed by investigative journalism and academic studies. Our study is based on 41 interviews with frontline banking professionals conducted during the days and weeks of the PPP rollout. We find that under the crisis conditions of the pandemic, capped funds in the PPP and built‐in incentives that encouraged certain types of loans, banking employees relied upon the professional norms and logic of the for‐profit sector. We argue that these norms and logics threatened the integrity of the PPP as a public relief programme by applying profit‐oriented priorities to resources marked for universal and fair distribution. Our findings offer new directions for theorising sector‐level differences in street‐level bureaucratic discretion in the context of mixed‐sector collaboration on public service delivery, particularly under conditions of crisis and urgency.

Well said!: Professional norms and female justices' evaluation of lower court opinion text

AbstractSupreme Court justices' opinions shape the contours of case law binding throughout the United States. Importantly though, justices do not write their opinions de novo. Rather, they routinely draw on lower court judges' opinion language when crafting opinions. In doing so, justices stretch the substantive impact of lower court judges' reasoning beyond the boundaries of their circuits. However, justices do not draw equally on lower court opinions; while previous work often ties this to judges' professional qualifications, we draw on work stressing female supervisors are more likely to enforce professional norms on subordinates. We argue female justices are more likely to draw upon lower court opinions complying with professional norms because of greater implicit norm internalization over the course of their careers. We test this proposition with a quantitative textual analysis of the justices' opinions and lower court opinions. We find support for our argument. This raises normative concerns about the overall impact of greater judicial diversity.

Reinstating Impartiality over Taking a Stance: Repairing Journalism Amid Right-Wing Attacks

ABSTRACT Two incidents of disputed reporting rocked the US news media in January 2019, one on the Trump-Russia investigation and the other on a confrontation involving a group of Covington High School students. This study explored how the center-left and the right-wing media spheres contested with each other in establishing a meta-journalistic discourse. We found that a center-left media sphere, debating on a paradigm shift for morally-engaged journalism, was up against a belligerent right-wing media sphere with an explicit ideological commitment to undermining the legitimacy of mainstream journalism. The discourse of paradigm repair dominated the center-left media response while the discourse for moral principles to support social justice was marginalized. Despite journalists’ well-intentioned efforts to repair professional norms around objectivity, such discourse in fact fueled more right-wing vitriol and hardened the narrative of media bias.

The Interconnectedness of Interprofessional Education and Professional Identity Formation

Professional identity formation (PIF) is the transformative process by which an individual, “thinks, feels and acts” in accordance with professional norms. In the pharmacy academy, institutions are required to support students on this transformative journey, however the most efficient and effective way to do so has yet to be determined. Interprofessional Education (IPE) in pharmacy programs typically consist of activities and assessments across most of the professional years. These IPE activities designed in accordance with the Interprofessional Education Collaborative (IPEC) Core Competencies include key elements of PIF such as, individual growth opportunities, socialization and “pivotal” moments that can propel an individual’s professional identity development. In light of curricular overload and attempt for curricular efficiency, pharmacy programs might consider using already existing IPE programming to help augment student PIF.

International medical graduates and PAs: A history and update.

During the 1980s and 1990s, international medical graduates (IMGs) sought legal and educational measures aimed at obtaining licensure as physician associates/assistants (PAs). Proponents of IMGs asserted that their ethnic backgrounds and identification with their respective communities could increase access to care for some segments of the population and therefore should be permitted pathways to qualify as PAs. A variety of legal measures were introduced into state legislatures in at least five states and were firmly opposed and defeated by the PA profession. Recent attempts by IMGs to obtain licensure as PAs have occurred in Puerto Rico and Arizona. In their haste to address healthcare access and satisfy various constituencies, state legislators and regulatory boards fail to recognize established professional norms. This is occurring as medical organizations are examining alternative pathways for state licensure of physicians who have completed training and/or practiced outside of the United States. PA organizations, particularly state chapters, must be vigilant in upholding qualifications for practice and licensure standards, and state PA organizations must work to convince legislators to avoid using PA professional regulations to solve a workforce issue that is essentially an issue of physician medical education remediation.

Taxing experiences: theorizing negative incidents at the frontlines

ABSTRACT Negative interactions with citizens can leave frontline workers stressed, anxious, and traumatized. Here, we construct a theoretically interdisciplinary framework for understanding frontline negative incidents that was thus far lacking. Drawing from 1302 descriptions of Dutch and Belgian frontline tax officials’ most negative experience with citizens, we identify four overarching categories: citizen aggression, facing tragedy, violations of professional norms, and absence of support. We show the importance of non-aggression incidents and reveal how the nature, direction, and impact of these incidents differ and depend on workers’ sense-making processes. We outline consequences for the study of frontline encounters and for public agencies.

Media and Citizenship in India: Heteronomy and Autonomy in the Indian Journalistic Field

ABSTRACT Since 2014, India has experienced a shift towards a new phase of democracy, often described as an “ethnic democracy.” Political theorists argue that this phase promotes a Hindu conception of the nation, contrasting with the secularism embedded in the Indian Constitution, and is marked by attacks on ethnic and religious minorities, particularly Muslims. Some media scholars suggest that controlling mass media has been a crucial strategy in generating public consent for hegemonic Hindu nationalism and contend that the media’s subservience to political elites extends beyond the current government to previous political elites, such as the Gandhi dynasty. They challenge Bourdieu’s idea of a field governed by its own rules, asserting that in India, political and economic forces often align to impose conformity, indicating weak rational-legal authority. However, this paper argues that such views overstate media subservience and homogeneity. Instead, this paper provides evidence of diverse representations within mainstream media, demonstrating that there is scope for ideological contestation and adherence to professional norms. This study employs content analysis to examine media portrayals of the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests, using frame analysis as the theoretical framework.

The Effect of Professional Social Norms on Corporate Environmental Compliance

While previous studies demonstrate the importance of social norms for explaining the pro-environmental behavior of individual consumers, very few studies examine the role of social norms in the context of businesses’ pro-environmental decisions. This study contributes to the rich social norm literature by exploring whether professional social norms influence the compliance decisions of regulated chemical manufacturing facilities. To this end, the empirical analysis uses data on major facilities regulated under the U.S. Clean Water Act to estimate the link from the compliance history of other major chemical manufacturing facilities operating in the same state to an individual facility’s current compliance decision. Using a fixed-effects model that includes a large set of confounding factors, we find a significant positive effect of other facilities’ compliance history: improvement in the average compliance history prompts the individual facility to increase its own performance. By controlling for other plausible channels that link facility’s compliance decisions, we interpret this relationship as reflecting descriptive professional norms. The relationship proves stronger for facilities that are either geographically or sectorally closer.

Being, becoming, and belonging: reconceptualizing professional identity formation in medicine.

Over the last decade, there has been a drive to emphasize professional identity formation in medical education. This shift has had important and positive implications for the education of physicians. However, the increasing recognition of longstanding structural inequalities within society and the profession has highlighted how conceptualizations of professional identity formation have also had unintended harmful consequences. These include experiences of identity threat and exclusion, and the promotion of norms and values that over-emphasize the preferences of culturally dominant groups. In this paper, the authors put forth a reconceptualization of the process of professional identity formation in medicine through the elaboration of 3 schematic representations. Evolutions in the understandings of professional identity formation, as described in this paper, include re-defining socialization as an active process involving critical engagement with professional norms, emphasizing the role of agency, and recognizing the importance of belonging or exclusion on one's sense of professional self. The authors have framed their analysis as an evidence-informed educational guide with the aim of supporting the development of identities which embrace diverse ways of being, becoming, and belonging within the profession, while simultaneously upholding the standards required for the profession to meet its obligations to patients and society.

Moral Purpose in Performative Times: Do School leaders’ Values Matter?

ABSTRACT School leaders are expected to act with integrity, but values are always contested: one person’s ‘moral purpose’ is not the same as another’s. Researchers have explored these issues from different angles. One approach focusses on individual leaders, seeking to understand how their values inform their practice. Other work highlights that individual values are only part of the story: values are embedded within professional norms and organisational cultures, while policy and governance frameworks serve to structure and constrain individual agency, particularly in marketised and performative systems. This paper draws on examples from recent research in England to argue that leadership responses to structural constraints should be seen on a spectrum in terms of how far they reflect individual agency and values, proposing four possible categories – ‘toxic leadership’, ‘pragmatic compliance’, ‘principled infidelity’ and ‘authentic agency’. It also discusses the question of how values operate at locality and national levels as well as within individual schools and draws the analysis together into a conceptual frame.

Career Paths and Professionalism: Examining ICMA Credentials among City Managers

The emphasis on professionalism in public administration has highlighted the importance of city managers and their role in managing cities effectively. While there are various avenues for city managers to improve their professionalism, such as a Master of Public Administration (MPA) degree, there has been limited research on other organizations that facilitate professionalism. This paper focuses on the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) credentialing program. ICMA is a nationally recognized organization that helps dictate professional norms among city managers. The purpose of this paper is to explore the motivations of city managers who pursue additional credentials and to identify the types of city managers who are more likely to attain professional certification. I argue that the ambition of city managers, as measured through their career path, is related to their pursuit of professionalism. Specifically, city managers with a diagonal career path are more likely to attain additional professional certification compared to those with a ladder career path because it signals their promising ability to future employers, namely city councils. To test this hypothesis, this paper uses two datasets. The first dataset examines the career paths of city managers in California, Florida, and North Carolina from 2012 to 2023. The second dataset focuses on newly hired chief administrators from 2021 to 2023 across the United States, drawing data from the ICMA job advertising information. From these two datasets, I find that city managers with diagonal career paths are more likely to possess ICMA credentials than those with ladder career paths.

(In)vulnerable Managers in an Immigration Context

Our study examines managerial vulnerability in a bureaucratic context, namely in Finnish immigration centres. We bring a care ethics perspective to the study of vulnerability and address how managers navigate relationships with vulnerable clients and their own vulnerability. Based on empirical data collected through interviews with immigration centre managers, we show how managers negotiated their (in)vulnerability through two alternating positionalities: (1) professionalism, through which they seek to control negative emotions in order to manage their own experiences of vulnerability and affective relationships with clients, and (2) temporal disconformity, which provides space to engage and manage with a variety of emotions and manoeuvre bureaucratic professional norms. Our study then contributes to the literature on managerial work by demonstrating how managers cope with their vulnerable selves and how different notions of care emerge in complex, ethically sensitive managerial situations.

Epistemic negotiations on a closed psychiatric ward

ABSTRACT On a closed psychiatric ward, conflict and disagreement may exist between patients and psychiatrists on how to interpret the patient’s condition. This forms a complexity for implementing contemporary ideals such as shared decision making, which would require a substantial degree of epistemic flexibility from both psychiatrists and patients. Recently, authors have argued that psychiatrists are pluralistic and pragmatic in their interpretation of the patient’s condition, implying a space for this flexibility in the clinical encounter. In this article we present an empirical study in which we aim to describe, understand, and explain this epistemic space and the dynamics between the psychiatrist’s and patient’s interpretation. We aim to explore and contextualize philosophical discussions through empirical research. We performed a qualitative inquiry on a closed psychiatric ward and found that both patients and psychiatrists were epistemically flexible, but epistemic negotiations were more complex and variegated than often presumed. We constructed an empirically grounded typology of different types of epistemic interaction, which shows that this interaction can only be properly understood if one acknowledges that it is shaped by different professional, societal and personal norms and values. We conclude by discussing the scope and limits of the epistemic space that we found.

Open Archaeology, Open Source? Collaborative practices in an emerging community of archaeological software engineers

In this article, we investigate modes of collaboration in this emerging community of practice using 'open-archaeo ', a curated list of archaeological software, and data on the activity of associated GitHub repositories and users. We conduct an exploratory quantitative analysis to characterise the nature and intensity of these collaborations and map the collaborative networks that emerge from them. We document uneven adoption of open source collaborative practices beyond the basic use of git as a version control system and GitHub to host source code. Most projects do make use of collaborative features and, through shared contributions, we can trace a collaborative network that includes the majority of archaeologists active on GitHub. However, a majority of repositories have 1-3 contributors, with only a few projects distinguished by an active and diverse developer base. Direct collaboration on code or other repository content - as opposed to the more passive, social media-style interaction that GitHub supports – remains very limited. In other words, there is little evidence that archaeologists ' adoption of open-source tools (git and GitHub) has been accompanied by the decentralised, participatory forms of collaboration that characterise other open-source communities. On the contrary, our results indicate that research software engineering in archaeology remains largely embedded in conventional professional norms and organisational structures of academia.

Geopolitics of decolonization: Carnegie Endowment’s diplomatic training program 1960–73

This paper considers the case of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s ‘Programs in Diplomacy’, which from 1960 to 73 provided international, bilingual training for the diplomats of ‘newer states’ – former colonies that gained independence after 1945. Drawing on archival research in three continents, we can see that the spaces and practices of diplomatic training through these programmes were inherently geopolitical: they would shape social and professional norms and networks, in turn shaping state-building and international life. As a result, the pedagogies, curricula, and spaces of these courses must be understood through the prism of contemporary (geo)political tensions: the ideological confrontations of decolonization and the Cold War. Organizers sought ‘neutral ground’ for the programmes, in terms of both their locations and their content. Beginning in Geneva and New York, the programmes shifted quickly towards universities in the Global South and articulated Third World ideals such as African unity. Despite consistent attempts to frame the programmes as technical and non-ideological, their discursive and material geographies reveal an approach to ‘learning the international’ that privileged Western liberal norms and practices, particularly through a pedagogy of socialization.