Withholding Of Information Research Articles

Cold Calls by Charles Benoit (review)

Reviewed by: Cold Calls by Charles Benoit Karen Coats Benoit, Charles. Cold Calls. Clarion, 2014. 278p. ISBN 978-0-544-23950-0 $17.99 Ad Gr. 7-10. Eric took a picture he shouldn’t have and failed to delete it from his phone. Fatima confessed her doubts about her Muslim faith in the margins of a book that was stolen from her locker. Shelly is running from her past, believing herself guilty and forever outcast because of a horrible incident for which she can’t forgive herself. They each receive anonymous calls, giving them instructions to inflict painful humiliation on complete strangers or risk having their secrets exposed; their attempts to carry out their assignments get them sentenced to a sensitivity training for bullies program, where they realize that they are being harassed by the same caller. Pooling their resources, they locate the culprit, but Eric can’t resist going a step too far. While the message here is timely and the mystery compulsively readable, the plot details rely entirely too much on coincidence, convenience, and the withholding of information to be fully satisfying. It’s not clear, for instance, why Fatima is even involved in the training, since she didn’t manage to bully anyone, and the blackmailer’s [End Page 501] sense of vengeance seems extreme given the slight she suffered. What is interesting, however, is the portrait of the three protagonists’ vulnerability to blackmail: Eric’s secret is truly despicable by any standards, Fatima’s is only problematic because her cultural heritage does not allow her inquiry, and Shelly’s is entirely a work of her own imagination; all three situations are believable and would lend themselves to productive discussion. Bullying is undeniably a hot topic, and readers interested in possible motivations that lead people to act in ways they ordinarily wouldn’t might find this instructive Copyright © 2014 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Let us have some consideration for the lowly reviewer

Published 2014. This article is a U.S. Governmen and is in the public domain in the USA. Scientific publishing represents a three-component collaborative process consisting of the author(s), the journal (editor), and the technical reviewer(s). In terms of the benefits received, the process should be analogous to a three-legged stool. Unfortunately, all the legs on the publication stool are not the same length, which results in both an uncomfortable as well as an unstable seat for technical reviewers. The traditional journal benefits from the author(s) output because it provides a usable product that the journal sells for a profit. In today’s world of publication metrics, if a paper is well cited, it improves the impact factor of the journal, which makes purchasing the journal (or having access to it) more desirable. Of course, the scientific community also benefits because the papers advance the science, as well as provide information that working professionals can use on problems/issues they may have to address. The author(s) also benefit from the process. The journal provides a platform that lets others in the field know what they are doing. Publication provides stature for the author(s) that ultimately can lead to recognition, promotion and higher salaries. The publication of a scientific contribution also provides self-satisfaction, at least to those not too jaded by the process. I am sure most of us still remember when our first paper was published, and still relish seeing our names in print. The third component of the process, the technical reviewer(s), ensures that papers submitted to a journal meet acceptable editorial and technical criteria. Other than the opportunity to read/learn something new ahead of the rest of the scientific community, technical reviewers obtain no direct benefits from the process. Despite this lack, I always considered reviewing part of the business of being a working scientist. If I do not review papers to assure their quality, why should I expect others to do the same when I submit a paper for publication; without competent reviews, the entire process falls apart. Good technical reviewing requires commitment from the reviewer. Based on personal experience, a thorough review of a 30–40 page double-spaced manuscript can take the better part of a day, even with today’s electronic communications. I prefer to print out the paper, check the citations, and then, while reading the manuscript, make marginal notes relative to editorial and technical issues. I then have to transfer those comments to an electronic form, check that I have clearly made the points I think are important, and then transmit the package back to the journal (editor). As noted, there are few if any tangible benefits for technical reviewing, and the process takes time. As a result, it should be incumbent on both the author(s) and the journal (editor) to make the process as aggravation-free as possible. If nothing else, both the author(s) and the editor should remember that an annoyed reviewer is unlikely to be particularly patient or generous with a manuscript. There are several things an editor can do to facilitate the review process. The review request normally transmits a title and an abstract. Most reviewers also would like to know the manuscript’s length; why is this information withheld? We are all busy people, and a manuscript’s length

Concern about security and privacy, and perceived control over collection and use of health information are related to withholding of health information from healthcare providers

This study assessed the perceptions and behaviors of US adults about the security of their protected health information (PHI). The first cycle of the fourth wave of the Health Information National Trends Survey was analyzed to assess respondents' concerns about PHI breaches. Multivariate logistic regression was used to assess the effect of such concerns on disclosure of sensitive medical information to a healthcare professional (p<0.05). Most respondents expressed concerns about data breach when their PHI was being transferred between healthcare professionals by fax (67.0%; 95% CI 64.2% to 69.8%) or electronically (64.5%; 95% CI 61.7% to 67.3%). About 12.3% (95% CI 10.8% to 13.8%) of respondents had ever withheld information from a healthcare provider because of security concerns. The likelihood of information withholding was higher among respondents who perceived they had very little say about how their medical records were used (adjusted OR=1.42; 95% CI 1.03 to 1.96). This study underscores the need for enhanced measures to secure patients' PHI to avoid undermining their trust.

Conceptualizing defensive silence in project-manager-to-project-sponsor communication

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to gain a greater understanding of fear-based information withholding in project-manager-to-project-sponsor (PM2PS) communication and to propose future research directions. Design/methodology/approach – The research consisted of a review of the literature related to the withholding of information in subordinate-to-superior communication and in PM2PS communication. Literature from project communication studies and literature from general communication theory was consulted. Findings – Using defensive silence theory as a conceptual framework, five research propositions specific to fear-based information withholding in PM2PS communication are offered. Research limitations/implications – The study findings are limited to PM2PS communication based upon fear. The study provides a foundation for further research in this area within the conceptual framework of defensive silence theory. Practical implications – The practical implication of this paper is that certain perceptions and behaviors of a project sponsor can be related to fear-based information withholding in PM2PS communication. Originality/value – The originality of this paper is that it extends defensive silence theory into the realm of PM2PS communication. The value of this paper is to provide a catalyst for subsequent empirical-based research in order gain greater insight into fear-based information withholding in PM2PS communication.

Would Disclosures of Conflicts of Interest Change Patientss Decisions and, If So, Would that Make Them 'Material' Information?

The law has long been concerned with the agency problems that arise when advisors, such as attorneys or physicians, put themselves in financial relationships that create conflicts of interest. If the financial relationship is "material" to the transactions proposed by the advisor, then non-disclosure of the relationship may be pertinent to claims of malpractice, informed consent, and even fraud, as well as to professional discipline. In these sorts of cases, materiality is closely related to the question of causation, roughly turning on whether the withheld information might have changed the decision of a reasonable advisee (i.e., a patient). The injured plaintiff will predictably testify that the information would have impacted his or her choice, but that self-serving testimony may be unreliable. The fact finder is left to speculate about the counterfactual world in which the information was disclosed. This Article shows how randomized vignette-based experimentation may create a valuable form of evidence to address these questions, for both litigation and policymaking. To demonstrate this method and investigate conflicts of interest in healthcare in particular, we recruited 691 human subjects and asked them to imagine themselves as patients facing a choice about whether to undergo a cardiac stenting procedure recommended by a cardiologist. We manipulated the vignettes in a 2 x 3 between-subjects design, where we systematically varied the appropriateness of the proposed treatment, which was described in terms of patient risk without the procedure (low or high), and manipulated the type of disclosure provided by the physician (none, standard, or enhanced). We used physician ownership of the specialty hospital where the surgery would be performed as the conflict of interest, disclosed or not, and the "enhanced" disclosure included notice that such relationships have been associated with biases in prescribing behavior. We found that the mock patients were significantly less likely to follow the cardiologist's recommendation of surgical implantation of a drug-eluting stent when he disclosed a financial conflict of interest, regardless of whether the disclosure was standard or enhanced. We also found that the mock patients were more likely to choose the treatment when they faced greater risk without it. We did not, however, find that the disclosure made patients more discerning about the appropriateness of the procedure. We discuss the implications for law and policy. Mock patients seem likely to act upon such information, declining the low-value healthcare when conflicts are disclosed. This finding suggests that the information is material to such transactions, and that disclosures may be salutary for medical decisions. Arguably, therefore, physicians already have a duty under the common law to disclose the financial relationships they choose to accept. Other regulators and policymakers should recognize and clarify this duty, and courts should embrace this form of evidence. Methodologically, although this empirical approach has limits, it reduces speculation by fact finders and policymakers, by at least focusing their attention on the right questions.

Informal ethics consultations in academic health care settings: A quantitative description and a qualitative analysis with a focus on patient participation

Background Ethics consultations are established in contemporary health care. Informal ethics consultations often occur and are possibly beneficial, yet they have not been empirically studied. We sought to describe features of informal ethics consultations and to identify facilitators and disruptors of patient participation in such ethics consultations. Methods We used a mixed methods (quantitative and qualitative) evaluation design and conveniently sampled 64 sequential informal ethics consultations over a period of 3 years in two academic health care centers in one city in Canada. Data were collected by the two participating ethicists. We used statistical description for the quantitative data and thematic analysis for the qualitative data. Results Patients participated in only two (3%) of the informal ethics consultations. Factors that disrupted patient participation in ethics consultations were related to patients’ issues (mental impairments), family issues (family withholding information from the patient), and team members’ issues (efficiency considerations). Conclusion Informal ethics consultations may be used for ethics capacity building of health care providers rather than for engagement with addressed patients. Further research on informal ethics consultations is required, including in different sites.

Migrant mothering and mobile phones: Negotiations of transnational identity

Transnational mothers working in foreign countries face the challenges of providing “intensive” mothering to their children from a distance, and risk being subject to the “deviancy” discourse of mothering. This paper investigates the role of mobile phone usage, via voice, text messages, and social networking sites, in dealing with the tensions and ambivalence arising from transnational mothering as a dialectical process. We surveyed 42 Filipina and Indonesian foreign domestic workers (FDWs) in Singapore using a mixture of quantitative and qualitative methods. FDWs addressed tensions arising out of societal expectations of motherhood and their own anxieties about children’s well-being. The reluctant obsessive struggled to maintain a balance between an intensive nurturing style and a deviant mode of mothering that respected the growing independence of the children. The diverted professional had to balance the financial empowerment of being the primary breadwinner with the risk of surrogate motherhood for the employer’s children subsuming the care provided to her own. The remote-control parent shared mothering responsibilities with caregivers, usually relatives, who acted as a contradictory proxy presence for intensive mothering. The incomplete union of stressed marital parenting put further pressure on the romantic and sexual identities of migrant women. Transnational mothers utilized mobile phones actively as a tool to negotiate and redefine identities and relationships that created fissures in their sense of self. These included the management of third-party relationships, withholding of emotions or information, and engaging in counterintuitive phenomenon such as restricting, or actively dis-engaging from, mobile phone usage as a communication strategy. The paper calls for future research into the multiple, and interacting, social identities assumed and managed by transnational mothers, and the complex role played by mobile phones in the constant process of negotiation by agentic, self-relective and multifaceted women.

Enforcing the Public's Right to Government Information: Can Sanctions Against Officials for Nondisclosure Work?

In 1974, the U.S. Freedom of Information Act was amended to include a provision allowing the imposition of sanctions against individual agency employees. The provision requires a court finding that the withholding of information was arbitrary and capricious, referral of the matter to the federal employee disciplinary agency, investigation by that agency, and a determination by that agency to impose an employment-related sanction on the employee. No wonder not a single sanction has ever been imposed in the ensuring 37 years.Both states within the U.S. and other countries have also adopted sanctions provisions in their access and right-to-know laws. Some of these have been utilized; others have not.This article endeavors to catalogue the sanctions provisions in the laws of those states and countries that have them and include, where information is available, some comments on the use of those provisions. Its initial goal was to assess what works and what does not, so that recommendations might be made regarding effective sanctions; however, the many cultural and statutory variables have combined to defeat this goal. Nonetheless, the authors conclude that inclusion of sanctions in freedom of information laws leads to better training of government employees and probably provides a positive incentive to comply with the disclosure mandates of those laws. Additional research into the attitudes of government employees in the face of potential sanctions is recommended.

Facing Death in Clinical Practice: A View from Physicians in Mexico

Physicians' decisions and actions, once they know that their patients' death is inevitable, will influence how patients are going to live their last moments. The purpose of the present study was to explore the views of physicians about death in their clinical practices. Physicians who work at four high-specialty public hospitals and two private hospitals in Mexico City provided responses to the Physicians' Views about Death Questionnaire, which was developed for this study. Four hundred thirteen physicians were surveyed. The majority treat terminally ill patients (73.3%), but only 28% received training regarding death. Nearly half of the physicians reported a personal formative experience related to death which, together with the experience of being exposed to terminally ill patients, appear to be the manner in which the majority of physicians learn to deal with death. The great majority of participants (90.6%) would personally like to know the truth if they were going to die. Younger physicians, those with <6 years of medical practice, those with no death-related personal formative experience, no death-related academic training, and no experience treating terminally ill patients were most likely to avoid telling patients about their imminent death. Death is an important topic for physicians in Mexico. There is a relation between lack of information, experience, and formal training, and the withholding of information from dying patients. This suggests a possible value for interventions to enhance and develop coping skills for professionals who deal with end-of-life situations.

The Role of the Dance Dramaturg: The Practical Necessities

ABSTRACT: As a dramaturge, I mostly work on original creations during late rehearsals and production. Parallel to the survival and development of my own creativity, my dedication has always been to establish relationships with students and fellow artists, awarding them the same privileges that I would like others to bestow on me. I want my process and creation to be respected and I want to be encouraged and led by my dramaturge to explore what is not being communicated to its fullest potential. The artist’s work has nothing to do with the creative ideas of the dramaturge and limiting access to context establishes and protects this factor. It is the information withheld, the questions asked, and the verbal exchanges that can help achieve the desired results. Proof of success is when the artist is personally confident that what they want to communicate is strong and clear.

Research Paper - Power and (in)equality in the UK's Armed Forces: Implications for working with ex-military clients

AimsThis study explored British ex-military clients’ experiences of psychological therapy, with a view to informing the practice of those working with this client group, and others from similar set-apart institutions.BackgroundThis research contributes much-needed qualitative findings to a field dominated by quantitative methods, especially given the recent increase in the numbers of serving and ex-military personnel seeking psychological help.MethodsSemi-structured interviews were conducted with 10 participants. Narrative analysis was applied to the transcripts.FindingsParticipants identified with the military long after leaving the armed forces. Perceptions of social hierarchy based on previously held rank and status played a significant role in the negotiation of power and control in therapy. Participants felt disempowered by the withholding of information, whereas therapist selfdisclosure and a relational approach facilitated engagement. Therapy was hindered by the experience of a ‘language barrier’ with civilians, both at the level of verbal communication and at the deeper level of cultural misunderstanding. Participants described a sense not only of separateness from civilians, but superiority to them. The strong belief in a military/civilian divide was accompanied by disorientation, alienation and isolation on return to civilian life. This carried into therapy, where fear of misunderstanding and judgment often led to participants omitting their military experiences.ConclusionPractitioners working with ex-military clients should gain an understanding of military society and culture and appreciate its lasting influence, particularly in terms of power dynamics. They should be sensitive to significant cultural differences between the military and civilian worlds, and watchful for the concomitant risks of misunderstanding and judgment.

Global anthropogenic selenium cycles for 1940–2010

Selenium plays an important role in emerging thin film solar energy technologies. As solar energy is expected to have a larger share in the world's future energy portfolio, the long-term availability of selenium becomes a potential concern, yet no global cycles have ever been generated. In this work, the global cycles, stocks, and flows of selenium are characterized for the entire time period 1940–2010 by using principles of material flow analysis (MFA). The cycles present information on the production, fabrication and manufacturing, use, and resource management stages during that period. The results of the analysis show that during 1940–2010 approximately 90Gg of refined selenium was produced and entered into fabrication and manufacturing worldwide. 60Gg of this amount (two-thirds!) was dissipated into the environment through end-uses such as chemicals, pigments, glass manufacturing, metallurgical additives, and fertilizer and feed additives. The in-use stock of selenium is estimated at 2.7Gg as of 2010. Because of data limitations such as proprietary and withheld information, these figures represent informed estimates rather than exact values. Selenium can be recovered from end-of-life electrical and electronic equipment, while for other end-uses recycling is difficult or impossible. One of the ways to buttress supplies of selenium for future technologies would be to deploy recycling schemes for photovoltaics as well as other electronics applications.

Seems a Fate in It: Misdirection and Foreshadowing in Bleak House and A Pair of Blue Eyes

Foreshadowing in a novel would seem to imply that that novel takes place in a world of fate, but Charles Dickens’s Bleak House and Thomas Hardy’s A Pair of Blue Eyes complicate this assumption. Instead of directly arguing against a world of fate, however, their foreshadowing techniques present fate as a subjective experience, most likely shared by people who have been trained to read their own lives novelistically. While Dickens’s novel shows readers a meaningful world in which all secret plot information will be revealed eventually, Hardy’s novel stresses readers’ inability to know the whole story and teases them with withheld information all the way to its end. In this thesis, I attempt to explore foreshadowing in especially cryptic passages of Bleak House and A Pair of Blue Eyes. In Bleak House, I focus on the foreshadowing in the scenes leading up to Krook and Tulkinghorn’s deaths. In A Pair of Blue Eyes, my focus is less chapter-centric, although I spend considerable time examining Henry Knight’s near-death experience on the Cliff Without a Name. Much of the critical framework for my close readings comes from Peter Brook’s Reading for the Plot and Michael Andre Bernstein’s Foregone Conclusions. While Reading for the Plot supplements my commentary on repetition’s relation to resolution in a plot, Foregone Conclusions gives me the vocabulary to discuss different types of foreshadowing and their effects. Although these critics, and others, inform my work, I add my own perspective on the features of foreshadowing, by looking at how readers’ experiences of foreshadowing change when they re-read a text.

IP Addresses And Expeditious Disclosure Of Identity In India

Concomitant with the proliferation of cybercrime in India has been the use of Internet Protocol (IP) addresses by law enforcement agencies to track down criminals. While useful in many situations, the potential for misuse of this information raises important concerns for the privacy of individuals online. This note reviews the statutory mechanisms regulating the retention and disclosure of IP addresses by internet companies in India. It identifies and analyses the four broad sources to which the regime of IP Address disclosure by Internet Service Providers (ISP) may be traced: under the (i) operating licenses issued under the Telegrah Act, 1885, (ii) Information Technology Act, 2000, (iii) Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (hereinafter, “the Cr.P.C.”) and (iv) contractual agreements between users and ISPs. It concludes that the various layers of Indian law create an atmosphere that is intensely hostile to the withholding of such information by ISPs and intermediaries. Despite this, the author submits that there remains scope for optimism.

Relative Performance Evaluation and Corporate Discretionary Disclosure

According to the unraveling result, an informed party ends up revealing all the private information to uninformed parties without being able to exploit information advantage despite its discretion to disclose the information (Grossman and Hart, 1980; Grossman, 1981; Milgrom, 1981; Milgrom and Roberts, 1986). In contrast, this paper shows that strategic delegation of disclosure decision coupled with relative performance evaluation (RPE) enables a firm to withhold private information by serving as a credible commitment to withhold information. The use of RPE naturally makes a manager focus on the difference between his own firm's performance and a peer firm's performance. Then, to maximize the difference, the manager does not want to share market demand information with a rival firm. The selfish but rational withholding of information decreases a firm's profit ex post under low demand when a market needs coordination between two firms' productions. But the consistent ex post withholding of information allows a firm to sustain withholding information in equilibrium and a firm's expected profit improves under the equilibrium.

Young Adults’ Perceptions on Life Prospects and Gender Roles as Important Factors to Influence Health Behaviour: A Qualitative Study from Karachi, Pakistan

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore perceptions and expectations of young males and females, in Karachi, Pakistan, regarding their life prospects and gender roles, with resulting implications for health behaviour. The main theme emerging was “Young adults’ prospects in life are hampered by psychosocial and gender equality constraints”. Gender inequality and the low status of women in society were described as major obstacles to the prosperity and development. Persistent withholding of information to the younger generation on sexual and reproductive health issues was perceived to increase exposure to health risks, particularly sexually transmitted infections (STIs). The present study reveals new discourses on equality among young adults, pointing towards an increasing, sound interaction between the sexes and aspirations for more gender equal relationships. The study further reveals serious misconceptions about HIV/AIDS. Such views and awareness among the younger generation constitutes a strong force towards change of traditional norms, including reproductive health behaviour, and calls for policy change.

Backstabbing in Organizations: Employees’ Perceptions of Incidents, Motives, and Communicative Responses

This study examined employees’ perceptions of backstabbing in the workplace and an initial typology was developed for backstabbing incidents, perceived motives, and communicative responses. We employed thematic inductive analysis and unitizing to develop the typology and approached this study from the decoder's perspective (the target), whereas previous research on other negative behaviors in the workplace focused on the encoder's perspective (the perpetrator). Results indicated that active incidents (e.g., talked behind back) were more prevalent than passive incidents (e.g., withheld information), perceived motives were primarily self-interest (e.g., self-advancement), and communicative responses included interaction (e.g., confronted backstabber), action (e.g., left job), and inaction (e.g., ignored). Other responses were emotion and cognition. Demographics indicated that this phenomenon cuts across numerous organizations, industries, and hierarchical positions.

The Earnings Management Game: It's Time To Stop It

The relations between managers and board members and capital markets are, with few exceptions, characterized by the well-known “earnings management game” in which corporate officers regularly take actions to meet or beat analyst and market expectations for earnings or certain key performance benchmarks. These actions are associated with manipulation, lying, dissembling, withholding of information, etc, and lead to vast out-of-integrity behavior that substantially damages the firm itself and investors, customers, employees, communities and the functioning of the capital markets. The damage caused by this almost universal game is huge, easily in the range of cutting the values of most firms by 50% or more. There are exceptions to this behavior. In this chapter we provide a way to see this phenomenom for what it is and a way for organizations and managers to extricate themselves from the behavior and the damaging consequences it leads to.

Bullying Among Hospital Staff: Use of Psychometric Triage to Identify Intervention Priorities

Survey of workplace bullying in a Norwegian hospital found that 10% of nurses, therapists, and physicians (N=440) had witnessed bullying. Negative Acts Questionnaire (NAQ) scores were low, Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (MSQ) scores were positive, and Organizational Commitment Questionnaire (OCQ) scores were neutral. NAQ scores and having witnessed bullying both predicted low MSQ scores, low over-all job satisfaction, and low OCQ scores. By psychometric triage, some of the NAQ’s 22 negative acts can be identified for priority administrative intervention based on a) the degree to which NAQ items predict decreased satisfaction and decreased commitment, b) the prevalence rates of particular negative acts, and c) efficiency of intervention. Psychometric triage recommended intervention first on the problem of “necessary information withheld”, which had an 18% prevalence rate and predicted lower MSQ and OCQ scores. The second priority should be on “pressure to give up entitlements”, which had prevalence of 2% but also predicted lower MSQ and OCQ scores. The third and fourth priorities should focus on “tasks below level of competence” (reported by 51%) and on “unmanageable workload” (reported by 28%), neither of which predicted MSQ or OCQ scores.

Giving and Withholding of Information following Genomic Screening: Challenges Identified in a Study of Primary Care Physicians in Estonia

The use of predictive genomic information to improve medical care remains a contentious topic. However, it is generally agreed that the potential of genomics to improve medicine relies on medical care providers' ability to effectively communicate and put in context the meaning of test results. As the amount of information available increasingly outstrips providers' ability to offer qualified judgments on what the information means, consumers inevitably will be faced with test results of uncertain significance, as well as difficult questions about what they do or do not wish to know. Results of this survey of 64 primary care doctors in Estonia suggests that it may be inherently difficult for physicians to withhold genetic information obtained by genome scans or sequencing, even when they believe that having that information is not in the best interests of their patient. The descriptive data suggest introducing genomic medicine through primary care physicians, as proposed by the Estonian Genome Center of the University of Tartu, will require further genetics education as well as a carefully developed set of guidelines for determining where, when and how to use test results.