Research on New Public Management from a Multi-dimensional Perspectiv

At present, community pension has become a new type of pension. However, with economic development and social transformation, our country has entered a special period of diversified interests and complex contradictions. Environmental mass incidents show a high incidence trend. "Dilemma." This article uses a new perspective of behavioral public management to analyze the interaction between the government and the public in the decision-making process of environmental projects, and draws the conclusion of "two transformations": the cognitive framework of "public management". Scientific understanding is needed. Transform into the cognitive framework of "public epistemology"; accordingly, the interactive mode of the one-way role of the government and the people and the intermediary influence of experts needs to be transformed into the two-way role of "public epistemology". Based on the interactive mode in which the government, the people and experts play a regulatory role, it is recommended to transform the path dependence of government decision-making led by bureaucratic experts and technical experts into completely democratic decision-making.

Resisting the Tide: The Roles of Ideology in Sustaining Alternative Organizing at a Self-managed Cooperative

This paper examines how organizational ideology can be collectively mobilized to sustain an alternative organizational form—a self-managed cooperative—in resistance to institutional prescriptions perceived as hostile. Based on an ethnographic study of the Venezuelan cooperative Cecosesola, we identify three roles through which ideology enables the reproduction of the alternative form over time: ideology as a mobilizing normative framework to justify resistance; as a cultural-cognitive framework to engage members and integrate them into the resistance project; and as a regulatory framework ensuring member compliance. However, we find that in parallel with sustaining self-management as an alternative form, mobilizing ideology may also paradoxically entail costs in terms of individual sacrifices, exclusion of members and reduction of group heterogeneity, leading to the creation of an authoritarian system. These findings shed light on the ideological drivers of institutional resistance and bring new insights to understand the challenge of sustaining self-management and other alternative organizational forms within a hostile institutional context.

Neo-Hobbesianism in the DPRK: A Provisional Theory of Authoritarianism

This article presents an original historical-philosophical conception that attempts to discern the matter, form, and power of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (dprk). A panoramic and problematizing cognitive framework, the theory configurates 629 years of sociopolitical history from 1392 to 2021 and then comparatively discusses the dprk system in relation to ancient democracy and liberal democracy from Pericles to Samuel P. Huntington. The article is divided into three parts, which outline the theory and its principles, map historical foundations and political phases, and address social relations, state will, and political reality. Description and analysis convey the thesis that the dprk polity is home to a Neo-Hobbesian formation: a hybrid state entity that is historically modern, politically absolutist, and illiberally democratic, with a transforming cross-civilizational physiognomy. By design, the “soft” theory is conceived to stimulate academic discussion and debate, not declare a final solution.

Treating Caregiver Grief With Narrative Therapy

Dementia, a devastating neurodegenerative disease with over 10 million new diagnoses each year, is characterized by many symptoms including memory loss .Individuals with memory less experience changes in mood, personality, behavior, cognition and activities of daily living which affect their daily lives. These monumental life shifts often occur rapidly, leaving caregivers unprepared to deal with the changes. Caregivers face a unique situations navigating anticipatory grief and changes in their relationships with their loved ones. Current psychological intervention for caregivers includes utilization of cognitive-behavioral therapy and psychoeducation. More recently, intriguing research has emerged regarding the efficacy of narrative therapy for couples where one partner experiences memory loss. However, treating the anticipatory grief component specifically for caregivers has been largely overlooked in these studies. Narrative therapy revolves around identifying the current story that caregivers utilize as their cognitive framework, helping to find alternative plotlines and to process their newly-built cognitive framework. It involves externalizing the problem (in this case, dementia) and locating strengths that the caregiver and their care receiver share to “fight” the problem. Insights from both the current literature and the field have demonstrated a promising outlook on the use of narrative therapy. Such insights imply a need for more research regarding this modality specifically for caregivers, as its core ideas can be easily disseminated to gerontologists, mental health professionals and caregivers.

Relating a Sustained Monologue Speaking Production Test to CEFR: Towards Alignment

This article evaluates a sustained monologue speaking production test to validate its link to the CEFR model. The monologue test is a low-stakes production test that engages the test taker in sustained monologue tasks targeted at B2-C1 of the CEFR levels. The evaluation of the test included determining the extent to which the monologue speaking tasks and the single assessment criterion-related rating scale developed for the test are valid and reliably aligned to CEFR benchmarked descriptors. The socio-cognitive framework for test evaluation was adopted, and an explanatory sequential mixed-methods research design was implemented. The evaluation revealed some contentious points of contrast between the test items and the language demand that each item prompted in production. Consequently, selected items were improved or deleted to ensure the appropriate competency levelled at B2-C1 are correctly prompted. Additionally, the findings underlined the imperative need for test developers to adhere to five inter-related sets of procedures in the justification of a claim that the monologue speaking test is aligned to the CEFR. These include familiarisation, specification, standardisation and benchmarking, standard-setting, and validation. It emerged that thorough familiarity with the CEFR by test item writers and examiners is a fundamental requirement for a test closely related to CEFR construct and levels. Thus, familiarisation training of CEFR and its illustrative descriptors is a mandatory prerequisite for ensuring test items and assessment of the elicited production correspond to the levels and ratings described in the CEFR model.

Qualitative analysis of the cognitive triad in a sample of the general population in response to the COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has created a profound mental health challenge worldwide. The goal of this paper is to explore cognitive responses to the pandemic in order to better understand underlying beliefs for those reporting and not reporting symptoms of depression within the context of a period of realistic health, economic and social threat. This paper described a cross-sectional survey carried out with a convenience sample from the general population between December 2020 and February 2021. As part of that survey, adult respondents (n=555) were asked to fill in open text box questions which provided prompts of the Cognitive Triad: “I am…/I am not…”; “Others people are…/Other people are not…”; “The world is…”. These qualitative data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. Thematic responses between people who screened above and below the cut-off for moderate depressive symptoms showed noticeable overlap, especially in terms of negative cognitions. The largest distinct difference in cognitions was the lack of positively framed cognitions across the cognitive triad in those screening above the cut-off for moderate depressive symptoms. These data highlight the importance of developing a positive cognitive framework to the pandemic, indicating that approaches such as Positive Psychology or Compassion-Focused Therapy which emphasise positive emotions, empathy, and gratitude may be particularly helpful.

The Paradoxical Effect of Living Alone on Cognitive Reserve and Mild Cognitive Impairment among Women Aged 60+ in Mexico City

An elderly person who lives alone must often be autonomous and self-sufficient in daily living activities. We explored if living alone and marital status were associated with mild cognitive impairment and low cognitive reserve in a sample of Mexican women aged 60+ attending continuing education courses using a cross-sectional design. Objective cognitive functions were assessed using the MMSE and Blessed Dementia Scale. We administered the Cognitive Reserve Questionnaire. Independence skills were assessed with the Katz index and Lawton index. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was used. We recruited 269 participants (x¯ = 69.0 ± 5.8 years). Single, widowed, separated, and divorced women comprised 73% of the participants. A third lived alone and 84% had completed high school. Mild cognitive deficit was observed among 24.5–29.0%; the upper range for cognitive reserve was 61.7%. Living alone versus living with someone was associated with cognitive impairment (OR = 0.51, p = 0.04) and with low to medium cognitive reserve (OR = 0.51, p = 0.02) after adjusting for confounding variables. Living alone was an independent factor associated with a lower probability of displaying mild cognitive impairment and a higher probability of displaying high cognitive reserve. Women living alone in this study had a more robust cognitive framework and had built their own support networks.

Thinking Structurally: A Cognitive Framework for Understanding How People Infer Structural Causes of Inequality

To accurately explain social group inequalities, people must consider structural explanations, which are causal explanations that appeal to societal factors such as discriminatory institutions and policies. Structural explanations are a distinct type of extrinsic explanation—they identify stable societal forces that are experienced by specific social groups. We argue that a novel framework is needed to specify how people infer structural causes of inequality. The proposed framework is rooted in counterfactual theories of causal judgment, positing that people infer structural causes by discerning whether structural factors were “difference-making” for the inequality they observe. Building on this foundation, our framework makes the following novel contributions: First, we propose specific types of evidence that support this inference, and second, we consider the unique contextual, cognitive, and motivational barriers to the availability and acceptance of this evidence. We conclude by exploring how the framework might be applied in future research examining people’s explanations for inequality.