Pandemic, war and environmental disaster demand quick answers. What it takes to do good science under pressure

by Fiona Greenland, Michelle D. Fabiani, The Conversation

Then-Secretary of State John Kerry praised the work of crisis archaeologists as ‘the gold

 standard’ in a 2014 speech about the looting of cultural artifacts.

 Credit: U.S. Department of State, CC BY 4.0

How can you know that science done quickly during a crisis is good science?

This question has taken on new relevance with the COVID-19 vaccine rollout. Researchers developed vaccines in under a year—easily breaking the previous record of four years. But that pace of development may be part of the reason about 1 in 7 unvaccinated adults in the U.S. say they will never get the COVID-19 shot. This is in spite of continued assurances from infectious disease experts that the vaccines are safe.

Scientists are called on to come up with answers under pressure whenever there is a crisis, from the Challenger space shuttle explosion to the 2020 California wildfires. As they shift from "regular" to "crisis" research, they must maintain rigorous standards despite long hours, mentally demanding tasks and persistent outside scrutiny. Thankfully, science produced under urgent conditions can be just as robust and safe as results produced under normal conditions.

We are two social scientists interested in understanding how researchers can best work on urgent problems and deliver useful findings.

In a recent study, we focused on "conflict archaeologists," an interdisciplinary group tasked with rapid assessments of archaeological destruction in Syria during the war between 2014 and 2017. Observers feared that one particular form of destruction, artifact looting, was a major source of revenue for terrorist groups, including the Islamic State. Prominent policymakers, security officials and a worried public wanted clear answers, quickly.

By any measure, conflict archaeologists succeeded. They produced findings that improved scientific knowledge. Their research led to a landmark bipartisan bill signed by President Obama. Perhaps most importantly, they raised public awareness of the problems associated with looting and smuggling archaeological materials.

Our latest research aimed to understand how work cultures played a role in these achievements—and what lessons can be applied in crisis science across disciplines.

What worked for conflict archaeologists

To investigate, we interviewed 35 conflict archaeologists and other scientists who worked with them. We also observed work in satellite labs and team meetings, and talked to people who used the data and analysis created by conflict archaeologists.

Those we interviewed worked in different physical locations and across multiple disciplines. If they met, they would do so remotely. And yet they were generally aware of what others in this research area were doing. Collaboration is central to doing good urgent science, and we found three key factors behind successfully working together during a crisis.

First, the percentage and distribution of effort matters. We call this "temporal control." We found that full-time devotion to crisis science was not necessarily the only way to produce good work. In fact, researchers involved on a part-time basis expressed higher confidence in the quality of other collaborators' work. We think part-timers were able to maintain a more comprehensive perspective on the collaboration overall.

And keeping a hand in their usual scientific practices seemed to help researchers stay sharp. It meant that when they turned to urgent science tasks, they could do so with fresh eyes and renewed attention to methodological precision.

Second, sharing responsibility for outcomes motivated researchers to generate rapid findings for policy and public-interest needs. We call this "responsibility control." Effective conflict archaeologists distributed credit among collaborators. They translated their objectives and priorities for policymakers and set boundaries and expectations for understanding and using their findings. As a result, they could do their work with the knowledge that they stood with a team—producing accurate findings that could be used to combat artifact looting and trafficking was not any one individual's sole responsibility.

Finally, it was important to have limits around the extent of an individual's personal involvement. This is "scope control," a work environment that helped scientists set boundaries between the research and their personal lives. "It was exhausting," one respondent told us. "I tried not to take the work home with me, but I know it was starting to affect my family life."

Scientists who were able to control the scope of their work, and to speak openly about their challenges, were more likely to stick with the project and express confidence in the strength of the research. We hypothesize that those who are able to set borders around what and how much work they took on were in a better position to assess the strength of both their own research and that of others—and thus feel confident in it.

Creating the conditions for good crisis science

Generating high-quality, safe and reliable scientific research under pressure is not a matter of having a heroic personality or superhuman stamina. It is a matter of thoughtful, deliberate work environments and being part of professional fields that support their members even as they hold them to high standards of rigor and ethics.

To be sure, no two crises are identical. At the same time, crisis science best practices can be adapted to fit the specific circumstances of the project. Global pandemics or imminent environmental catastrophe may require short, intensive, full-time bursts of work. Some research projects are lab- or equipment-sensitive and require specific personnel. As our findings show, science conducted with a supportive infrastructure, with rigor and ethics built into the process, can produce reliable results under pressure.

Like COVID-19 researchers, conflict archaeologists worked with tight deadlines under intense scrutiny. Both groups also emphasized the need for researchers to continue to employ high ethical standards in the research process.

And understanding how scientists maintain their ethics and rigor while working under difficult conditions is essential for maintaining the public's trust in science.

This much is certain: Crises aren't going away. As long as society is relying on scientists for solutions, it's important to create conditions conducive to effective research.The climate crisis gives science a new role: How research ethics must change too

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This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Disaster rituals evolve from speeches and words to actions

by Tineke Bennema, Tilburg University

Credit: Peeters Publishers

Whether it's the tsunami in Japan, the MH17, Bali bombings, Breivik's massacre, or corona, rituals have been devised for disasters worldwide since time immemorial to commemorate the victims. Martin Hoondert, of the Tilburg School of Humanities and Digital Sciences, one of the compilers of the just-published "Handbook of Disaster Ritual," collected stories of rituals, their history and their function with a team of international scholars.

Emeritus Professor of Rituals Paul Post took the initiative for the book, which is a triptych with a multidisciplinary section, including case studies and analysis. "We boldly put it down as a handbook, because many administrators don't think about rituals, while people immediately ask for them after disasters and also start ritually marking the site of a disaster. The Handbook not only provides a framework for further research, but also for policy on rituals after disasters."

One of the most impressive rituals, in Hoondert's opinion, is that in Namibia, of the commemoration of the mass murder committed by the German colonists at the beginning of the last century. Germany apologized and offered compensation a few years ago. "It may seem strange to us, but the Herero walked a memorial march, donning brown uniforms of the German army. It's a reverse symbolism: that uniform is me. That was their way of dealing with the past. Another thing I appreciated was the art exhibition in Venice where a wreck of a rubber refugee boat was on display. Barca Nostra, our boat, it was called. Again, the symbolism was very strong, what do we really know about the crisis, about how people perish while fleeing? This boat made a whole journey from Africa, to Europe, to the Venice Biennale, becoming a collective monument."

What exactly do rituals do?

First of all, rituals have no use. You don't buy anything for them. But we also can't live without them. People can't bear to put loved ones in the ground just like that. Rituals are necessary to deal with grief, to make suffering and victims visible, to acknowledge them. And they also sometimes function as a request for help and a form of protest. When I look at the protests of young people at climate demonstrations, you see ritual acting against danger. Commemorations often include monuments, symbols of what people need to know, of staying informed, and not allowing to forget. The Holocaust museum, or monuments in Rwanda or Srebrenica, aim to remind us never to let these genocides happen again. Yet rituals are culture-specific. In Bali, for example, in 2002, during the commemoration of the bombings, there was no remembrance, but rather praise for the beauty and future of the island. Mentioning the disaster could evoke a new one.

You research funerals and now disasters and rituals, heavy topics all, with a lot of human, personal suffering, does that affect you personally?

My next research project is about divorces, not a happy subject either. But these are subjects that matter, they concern death, which of course occupies people. Furthermore, we are in the middle of so-called slow disasters, such as corona and global warming, subjects surrounding death that demand answers. If done properly, rituals can offer comfort and help, and if I can contribute to processing them, I am happy to do so. I am now supervising, together with a colleague, a Ph.D. project in Rwanda. I am amazed at how the hatred between the various population groups grew, but also how people got over it. Of course I am involved in what people are going through, for example the contacts in Sebrenica affect me enormously. I also realize that I live at a distance and that these people are right in the middle of it. I follow a Bosnian woman who made a play with a Dutchbatter, she was so brave, it may sound pathetic, but my heart goes out to those people. Of course that keeps me busy, you're involved, you can't help it.

And I like to translate my research into practice. They may be drops in the ocean, but I did research in Sebrenica on an exhibition about the massacre and was able to give advice to the board of this memorial site to take more account of the many schoolchildren who visit when setting up the exhibition. Sometimes it is enough for me to listen to these people. I interviewed a survivor, she thanked me, that I pay attention to this case so that it is not forgotten. So that applies not only to individuals but also to collective thinking; that a people is seen and heard.

How have rituals developed?

In the last 10 years, there has been a very clear shift from the ecclesiastical domain to the secular, although the latter still includes many religious elements, think of candle burning and processions that translate into silent marches. What strikes me is that rituals are becoming less linguistic, in fact the action aspect has increased. Less words and speeches, more action, marches, monuments at the locations involved so that a connection is made between past and present.Marriage or not? Rituals help dating couples decide relationship future

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 Mass shootings: A sociologist argues that society's messages about masculinity need to change

by Darcie Vandegrift, The Conversation

Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Today, Dec. 14, marks the anniversary of the tragic loss of children and teachers at Sandy Hook.

After any mass shooting, Americans hear politicians make the ritualistic call for "thoughts and prayers." Yet years after the killing of these 20 elementary students and six staff, school shootings continue to frequently claim young lives, most recently in Oxford, Michigan. There have been more than 30 in the U.S. during 2021 alone—and more than 600 mass shootings of any kind, according to the Gun Violence Archive. The archive defines a mass shooting as an incident with four or more people injured or killed, not including the perpetrator.

Thoughts and prayers are not enough. As someone who specializes in youth studies, I would argue for a deeper exploration of the problem. A social-contextual analysis would examine how shooters' shared characteristics interact with their surroundings to make them capable of the unimaginable acts they committed.

The Sandy Hook tragedy was part of a venomous chain: Aurora, Charleston, Orlando, Las Vegas, and other public mass killings. These repeated mass shooting-suicides that occur when troubled boys and men turn to guns are far too similar to one another.

After Sandy Hook, too many explanations described these horrible events as peculiar to a deranged individual or due to the sole factor of mental illness. An overly simplistic explanation of shooters as mentally ill is used as a diversionary political tactic against gun reform. This explanation is both terrifying—because the actions of someone like this killer can come out of nowhere—and comforting, in that we do not hold any obligation or responsibility.

Buried problems, buried people

These shooters have common factors. They were all men. In the case of Sandy Hook, Charleston and Des Moines, the shooters were white.

They apparently experienced a life of intense emotional pain. They demonstrated signs of a traumatic life, like severe social isolation, school or job failure or family estrangement.

But these shootings are symptoms of a deeper public health crisis that we are not talking about. Scholarship on mass shootings demonstrates a pattern for school shooters, in particular, in which the predominant understanding of masculinity combines with the cultural script of spectacular mass violence.

As sociologist Michael Kimmel found, most school suicide-murder shootings after 1990 have been carried out by white boys. Instead of exhibiting resilience or asking for help, some white boys who are bullied, under threat or disrespected turn to aggression and revenge as a toxic salve, using prior accounts of past shootings as a script for their own acts of suicidal mass violence.

This way of imagining manhood amplifies the worst messages our culture offers—that men should not demonstrate pain and vulnerability or seek help. Instead, a toxic masculinity emerges to put forth the idea that when white men are hurting, they are entitled to act violently against others to cover feelings of vulnerability.

The link between the taboo on white male vulnerability and toxic white male violence permeates everyday life. Boys are four times as likely as girls to think that everyday aggression, like cutting in line or fighting, is acceptable.

Often, debasing others' humanity involves not guns but racist, sexist or homophobic components that are not seen as violent. The worst insults lobbed at vulnerable men are that they are feminine or gay. These ideas reside in the cultural ether, occasionally emerging in the form of ugly jokes, unwanted gropes or racist cartoons. Other men may inflict these values in ways that create pain but are not immediately lethal—think about sexual harassment or emotional abuse of wives or children.

Everyone is exposed to this cultural smog that sends men messages of unearned entitlement and superiority. Some damaging elements of white masculinity even feel normal and unremarkable, such as when a parent tells a boy child to stop "crying like a girl." Many men live with this smog or actively resist it. But when mixed with pain or mental illness, these toxic elements can take a devastating turn.

A public health crisis

Americans have repeatedly seen instances in which white boys who feel vulnerable descend into a horrific sequence of practices that look eerily familiar. The Sandy Hook shooter painstakingly collected stories of other mass shootings as he planned. The cultural script of committing violence against vulnerable others becomes a blueprint for boys to regain respectable masculinity.

This argument isn't about condemning white men, or any men. Instead, I suggest that a public health crisis exists in which men suffer from undiagnosed depression and a lack of social connection, which are embedded in toxic masculinity. It's about eliminating a cultural contaminant that provides terrible options for men to fall back on in tough times when they need to be able to treat their pain.

In acknowledging mass shootings as a cultural script and the limits of how we construct masculinity, we can begin to consider how to change it. Ideas about masculinity are transmitted through multiple channels—the family, media, entertainment, schools, college campuses, politics and the military—and we can interrupt it in these channels, too. White parents, for examples, can teach boys other definitions of how to "be a man," ones that don't see aggression as "natural."

If we want to actually change the climate that is enabling these horrors, mourning rituals are not enough. We can push back at empty "thoughts and prayers" sentiments and support public figures who take responsibility for changing how we teach white boys what it means to be men.

Public health interventions against violence rightfully advocate tighter gun control and gender-conscious mental health care for white men. We can think nondefensively about how dominant constructions of white masculinity in everyday life provide fodder for feelings of entitlement present in suicide mass shootings.

While talking about how entitlement, racism and violence contaminate masculinity is a tough conversation, continuing to endure the consequences is even worse.Concern about school shootings tied to anxiety, panic in U.S. teens

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This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Nonprofits show resilience and initiative during second year of pandemic

by Kim Eckart, University of Washington

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

More than a year into the pandemic, Washington nonprofits have shown resiliency in serving their communities and staying afloat, a study from the Evans School of Public Policy & Governance at the University of Washington shows.

The new study explores not only how the pandemic economy impacted donations to—and the operations of—charitable organizations, but also how nonprofits responded to the simultaneous call for racial justice.

"The dual pandemic created challenges and opportunities for funding, service delivery and operations," said Emily Finchum-Mason, a doctoral candidate in public policy and one of the report's authors. "Changes made by nonprofits and funders will bring long-term benefits in terms of access to services and a greater focus on addressing racial inequities. But the short-term sacrifices—especially for smaller, BIPOC-led and -serving organizations—were significant. And those sacrifices are ongoing."

The study marks the second phase of research into the effects of the pandemic on Washington's nonprofit sector. The first phase, published in fall 2020, surveyed more than 200 organizations and showed how donations were down, community needs were up, and called on governments and other institutions to step up their support.

A year later, new findings from a subset of 37 organizations have revealed how public and private relief funds came to the rescue for many organizations but can't be counted on over the long term. The new phase of research also concentrated on how organizations responded to communities of color and incorporated diversity, equity and inclusion into their decision-making and administration.

The more than three dozen organizations sampled for this second phase were based around the state and included those in health and human services, education, the environment and the arts. Researchers interviewed nonprofit leaders during spring and summer 2021.

Among the findings:

• Nonprofits have been stretched thin in an effort to continue providing services. Some shut down programs that were running at a deficit and others had to close their doors altogether
• Emergency relief funds and generous donations helped stave off even more dramatic losses than were expected after the first several months of the pandemic, when last year's study found that funding was down 30%. Some nonprofits noted that a switch to online services helped reduce costs, so they could make the donations go even further
• Rapidly-mobilized federal assistance programs, especially the Paycheck Protection Program, were critical in keeping many nonprofits solvent at the peak of the COVID-19 crisis
• Some large foundations and government agencies prioritized nonprofits serving communities of color by increasing funding or loosening certain application and reporting requirements
• More nonprofits were able to engage in advocacy and participate in the legislative process as a result of their ability to provide online as it eliminated time and resource barriers
• Many nonprofits instituted or strengthened existing efforts to prioritize diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility in their organizations. Researchers say it remains to be seen whether this results in stronger efforts to combat underlying structural racism.

"We've known that there are deep racial disparities in the nonprofit sector," says report co-author and professor Mary Kay Gugerty. "Seeing that their values, including their commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion and access, were out of alignment with their mission, many nonprofits started shifting program priorities and engaging in advocacy efforts. There's a lot more work to be done, but this trend is promising."

In light of the findings, researchers recommend governments and large foundations take further steps to help nonprofits continue to provide essential services: Allocating funding over longer periods of time (beyond just emergency relief), and imposing fewer restrictions on funds, thus allowing nonprofits to take actions they deem necessary both to survive and to serve their communities. "Nonprofits are closer to the communities they serve and understand the dynamic nature of the challenges those communities face. Trust them," the authors wrote.Study finds nonprofit partnerships can help solve bureaucratic tangles

More information: The research is available at s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/uw- … ncertainty_FINAL.pdf

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Vast majority of American workers like their jobs, even as a record number quit them

by Scott Schieman, The Conversation

To safeguard the health of staff and respondents during the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2021 GSS data collection used a mail-to-web methodology instead of its traditional in-person interviews. Research and interpretation done using the data should take extra care to ensure the analysis reflects actual changes in public opinion and is not unduly influenced by the change in data collection methods. Credit: Chart: The Conversation, CC-BY-ND Source: GSS, Angus Reid Global

A record share of American workers are quitting their jobs, thanks in part to a strong economy and a labor shortage.

Does that mean Americans are unhappy with where they work?

The answer would seem to be yes, according to many economists and other observers. That's the narrative driving the Great Resignation, in which workers are simply fed up with their current jobs and demanding something better.

Survey data I've been collecting during the pandemic, along with social survey results from previous years, however, suggests this is far from the whole story. Rather than being motivated simply by dissatisfaction, it appears many of them are simply taking advantage of a strong economy to look around, while for others, the pandemic has prompted them to consider their options.

Are you satisfied?

The General Social Survey, a reputable national survey of American adults, has been asking workers questions about how they feel about the quality of their working life since 2002.

There are actually three key types of questions it asks that help us get at this idea: the level of dissatisfaction with current work, turnover intention and confidence in finding a new job.

Let's start with dissatisfaction. The question is: "On the whole, how satisfied are you with the work you do—would you say you are very satisfied, moderately satisfied, a little dissatisfied or very dissatisfied?"

In 2002, about 12% of respondents said they were very dissatisfied or a little dissatisfied with their work, a figure that barely changed in subsequent surveys through 2018. In 2021, a tad over 16% said they weren't satisfied—an increase, but not a big one. And on the flip side, a little over 83% said they were moderately or very satisfied.

This means that by and large the vast majority of Americans—at least according to this survey—express moderate to high satisfaction with their work.

Looking for a change

Turnover intention is another important indicator. The General Social Survey asks:

"Taking everything into consideration, how likely is it you will make a genuine effort to find a new job with another employer within the next year—would you say very likely, somewhat likely or not at all likely?"

My interpretation of a "very likely" response to this question is that it signals an immediate interest in leaving their present job. In 2002, about 19% said they were very likely to try to find a new job soon. Over the years, the share who said this rose and fell a little, but has remained very consistent.

Credit: Chart: The Conversation, CC-BY-ND Source: GSS, Angus Reid Global

Unfortunately, the survey hasn't posed the question since 2018, so I partnered with polling company Angus Reid Global to conduct two large national surveys of American workers in November 2020 and November 2021. One of the questions I asked was the one on turnover intentions, though I extended the period of time in which they expected to look for a new job to two years.

As you might expect given the rising quit rate, the share saying they were very likely to hunt for a new position jumped. It rose to 26% in 2020 and to 29% in November 2021.

While it's likely that my number is a bit elevated just because of the extended time horizon—two years instead of one—the increase is consistent with the Great Resignation narrative that workers are keen to find a better workplace.

But these two figures—job satisfaction and turnover—reveal an interesting paradox: A greater share of people say they are contemplating quitting than express dissatisfaction with their current job. There are several possibilities for why a worker might be happy with their job, yet eyeing a move to another company. Perhaps they're seeking more status or reconsidering their career, or maybe they're worried about possible layoffs.

Confidence in the job search

An additional theme in the Great Resignation narrative is that workers feel more confident about finding alternative job prospects—and that's one reason they have been quitting in droves.

Fortunately, the General Social Survey asks that very question:

"How easy would it be for you to find a job with another employer with approximately the same income and fringe benefits as you now have—not at all easy, somewhat easy or very easy?"

Two years before the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2018, about a quarter of respondents said finding another job would be very easy. I asked the same question in my 2020 and 2021 surveys and found that number had actually decreased to around 22%.

This means that worker confidence or optimism about finding a palatable alternative job has not climbed all that much, making it less likely to be a factor in driving the current wave of resignations.

What's going on here?

While the data doesn't show that Americans overwhelmingly love their jobs or anything like that, they do suggest most people like them enough to hold on to them.

Of course, this isn't the end of the story. The data does show important differences depending on the type of job we're talking about. For example, workers in the service sector were more dissatisfied with their jobs and much more likely to express an intent to quit than the average respondent.

But all in all, the survey data doesn't support the common narrative that it's a "take this job and shove it" economy, in which increasingly unhappy workers are finally sticking it to their managers.

Rather, when you dig down into the data, something different appears: A slice of workers are always considering leaving their jobs—and as the labor market looks brighter, the pent-up impulse to quit kicks in. But the shift in worker sentiment—or at least the way it has been portrayed—seems exaggerated.

The 'great resignation' is a trend that began before the pandemic, and bosses need to get used to it

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 This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Banning non-disclosure agreements isn't enough to stop unethical workplace leader behaviour

by Peggy Cunningham, Minette Drumwright, The Conversation

Ending workplace sexual harassment means going beyond holding perpetrators to account to address a ‘network of complicity’ that enables unethical conduct. Credit: Shutterstock

Just weeks after Prince Edward Island became the first province in Canada to pass a bill restricting the use of non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) on Nov. 17, some harms of NDAs have been in the news. NDAs are contracts in which parties agree not to disclose certain information.

On Dec. 3, CBC reported that according to multiple sources, NDAs were used to silence three individuals who had come forward with sexual harassment complaints at the University of P.E.I.

The board of governors at the University of P.E.I. announced Dec. 8 there would be an independent investigation of allegations of workplace misconduct by the university's former president, whose conduct was at the center of two sexual harassment complaints filed by employees in 2013. That year, the university reached settlement agreements about those complaints with the P.E.I. Human Rights Commission.

Some forms of NDAs are merely routine practice, such as when consultants promise not to disclose information about a company that they learn while undertaking a project, or when senior employees quit their jobs and promise not to disclose proprietary information to competitors. Other NDAs, however, are harmful to victims of misconduct.

When NDAs are harmful

Organizations—and high-profile figures like Harvey Weinstein and Donald Trump—have used NDAs to silence the survivors of illegal and unethical behaviors. NDAs have been used to prevent people from publicly discussing toxic workplace conditions.

We know from our research and from news reports that NDAs also have been used by other universities. NDAs seem especially contradictory in the context of universities given their commitment to seeking truth. As our research in universities, businesses and other workplaces has documented, NDAs can have negative effects on workers and their organizations.

Movements in Canada and the United States have called for the ban of NDAs. For example, California Senator Connie M. Levya called for such a ban to end the "curtain of secrecy" resulting from such agreements. The #MeToo movement highlighted problems of NDAs in a variety of settings including entertainment, broadcast, journalism and high-tech industries.

Julie Macfarlane, an emerita professor of law at the University of Windsor, co-founded a global campaign—Can't Buy My Silence—to end the misuse of NDAs. Former Fox News Anchor, Gretchen Carlson, who signed an NDA as part of her $20 million settlement for sexual harassment by the then-CEO Roger Ailes, launched a nonprofit, Lift Our Voices, with the mission of ending NDAs.

She tells as much of her story as she can in a documentary on NDAs. The New York Times reported in 2019 that 12 U.S. states have bills to restrict NDAs in instances of sexual harassment and assault, but only New Jersey has effectively made NDAs unenforceable when victims violate their terms. California has strengthened its NDA restrictions, which will take effect in 2022.

Limiting NDAs is just the first step

Limiting NDAs, as the P.E.I. bill does, is a good first step, but much more needs to be done.

NDAs are not the main enabler of persistent unethical behavior in workplaces. They are merely a symptom of a much larger problem. Our research found that the root cause of widespread and persistent unethical behavior in workplaces is networks of complicity: networks formed by perpetrators that increase perpetrators' power, and disguise and hide wrongdoings. People who are part of these networks prey on anyone who resists the actions of the perpetrator or the wider group.

We interviewed 28 people in diverse organizations in which persistent sexual harassment had occurred. This included people at nine different universities located in both Canada and the U.S., and people from other types of organizations.

Networkers inside and outside organizations

Perpetrators are excellent networkers inside and outside their organizations. They lure people into their networks of complicity with rewards, favors and undeserved promotions, or with fear and intimidation. While their behavior is unethical, perpetrators may also be charismatic and charming.

They control information and build myths about themselves, their successes and their importance to the organization.

Over time, the network of complicity becomes powerful and entrenched. It causes considerable harm to victims and organizations.

The network of complicity typically is supported and enabled by the passivity of bystanders. They often suffer from moral myopia, a distortion of moral vision in which ethical issues do not come clearly into focus, and moral muteness, in which they do not talk about ethical issues.

Network members create and perpetuate toxic work cultures as they turn a blind eye to persistent unethical behavior or even participate in it. They instill a sense of helplessness and dismay among employees, causing turnover to increase, and often the most talented employees exit the organization. Employees who remain become disheartened and lose their motivation to perform.

Complicity in universities

The membership of networks of complicity typically consists of influential people from inside and outside the organization. In the case of universities, for example, network of complicity members might include senior university administrators, members of the human resources department, professors and staff, as well as outsiders such as government supporters and members of regional educational associations.

The network has the tools and the power that enable it to influence, control and victimize people in the organization. NDAs are only one tool among many used by networks of complicity to silence victims.

The networks also use intimidation, fear, rumors that denigrate objectors or witnesses of unethical behavior, threats of demotion or job loss and various types of uncivil behavior, to name a few. Even less severe unethical behavior by network members, such as incivility, can be damaging to individuals and organizations.

Addressing unethical behavior

NDAs that silence victims of persistent unethical behavior need to be banned, but uncovering and halting persistent unethical behavior in workplaces requires much more.

Perpetrators, of course, must be removed, but that is not enough because the network of complicity typically remains intact. Leaders must proactively work to identify and disband the network of complicity. For example, some members may need to be dismissed, but others could be reassigned to different units.

Survivors, who typically have been disenfranchised and isolated by the network of complicity, must be provided the resources they need and networked into the organization in meaningful ways. Importantly, the organizational culture must be transformed, which is typically a long-term endeavor, but it can be done.

Where leaders themselves are involved in these networks, there are only two options: an internal, informal leader with the skills to give voice to their values and inspire their co-workers to take collective action must emerge; or boards or external regulators must order investigations to be undertaken by unbiased third parties.

Our research suggests that investigators must go beyond looking at individual wrongdoers and identify the members of the network of complicity who supported them. These people also should be held to account.Over 2 decades, the FDA consistently approved new opioids based on studies lacking critical safety and efficacy data

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Study finds that classrooms with more Black and Latinx students receive lower quality of teaching

by New York University

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

In a new study, researchers find that classes taught by the same teacher receive a lower quality of teaching when they comprise higher percentages of Black and Latinx students.

"Previous research has revealed different forms of racial inequality within the U.S. schooling system, including that youth of color tend to be taught by less experienced and credentialed teachers, but virtually no work has examined inequalities in the primary responsibility of teachers: How teachers actually teach," says Hua-Yu Sebastian Cherng, associate professor of international education at NYU Steinhardt and lead author of the study. "Our results uncovered a bias that aligns with work on racial biases, and particularly anti-Blackness, that is pervasive in U.S. education and society, and underscores the importance of better teacher training."

The researchers analyzed data collected during academic years 2009-2010 and 2010-2011 from the Measures of Effective Teaching database to determine the extent to which differences in teaching quality are primarily due to differences among teachers (e.g., credentials) or within teachers (e.g., bias). The study focuses on English language arts (ELA) and mathematics teachers in grades four through nine.

The results are outlined in their article "Teaching Bias? Relations between Teaching Quality and Classroom Demographic Composition," published by the American Journal of Education.

The authors measured teaching quality using two in-classroom observational ratings (the Framework for Teaching and the Classroom Assessment Scoring System), and students' increases in standardized scores.

They found that roughly half of the differences in classroom teaching quality were driven by differences among teachers like their credentials, while the other half could be attributed to factors like biases within teachers. Between the ELA and mathematics courses, the relationship between teaching quality and classroom demographics was stronger in mathematics classes. The authors suggest that this result could be caused by the perception of math as a natural ability and a greater bias among mathematics teachers found in previous research.

"We also found that teachers across racial/ethnic groups show the same patterns in teaching that disadvantage Black youth, which suggests that all teachers, not just white teachers, can benefit from better training and development," the authors write. The authors explain that while there are different reasons for why teachers of different races teach in ways that disadvantage Black youth, their disparate reasons likely reflect the historical and racialized nature of teaching.

"The findings of the study also come at a time when legislators in the majority of states are seeking to prohibit the teaching of race," Cherng said. "Without these conversations, existing inequalities will only widen, as teachers—who as a profession are dedicated to serving future generations—will continue to be ill-equipped with the tools necessary to provide all youth an equal education."

In addition to Cherng, the study's authors include Peter F. Halpin, an associate professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; and Luis A. Rodriguez, an assistant professor of education leadership and policy studies at NYU Steinhardt.Virtual pupils make for more confident teachers

More information: Hua-Yu Sebastian Cherng et al, Teaching Bias? Relations between Teaching Quality and Classroom Demographic Composition, American Journal of Education (2021). DOI: 10.1086/717676

Journal information: American Journal of Education 

Provided by New York University 

Anti-gay slurs not targeted just at gay men

by Laurie Fickman, University of Houston

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

The childhood playground can be a tough place with insults flying faster than dodgeballs, and while some children outgrow the name calling, others never seem to. Hurling slurs as adults only exacerbates problems. The use of anti-gay slurs by heterosexual men against other heterosexual men is the focus of a new study by Nathan Grant Smith, an associate professor of counseling psychology and chair of the Department of Psychological, Health, and Learning Sciences in the University of Houston College of Education. 

"Our results suggest that using anti-gay slurs may serve a status-protecting function for heterosexual men: When their masculinity is threatened, they may be more likely to punish other heterosexual men by calling them the f-word," said Smith, whose findings were published in Current Psychology. 

Smith, along with colleague Tyler Brown at McGill University, explored whether heterosexual men who had their status threatened were more likely to use anti-gay slurs against other heterosexual men. A group of 139 heterosexual male college students were randomly assigned to receive feedback on their gender roles: Half were told that their gender role was in the average male range and half were told that their gender role was in the average female range.  

"We then presented them with vignettes of heterosexual men engaging in behaviors that go against traditional masculinity, like being emotionally expressive or not being physically strong or sexually virile and asked how likely they would be to use an anti-gay slur against the man in the vignette," Smith said. "We found that those who had their status threated by receiving the 'average female range' feedback were more likely to say they would use an anti-gay slur against the man in the vignette." 

After examining responses further, the team found that straight men are targeted by anti-gay slurs, not because of their sexual orientation, but because of their perceived transgressions against traditional male group dynamics and norms.  

"Using anti-gay slurs to put other men down may be a way to try to maintain status when men's status is threatened," Smith said. "These findings highlight a significant problem in our culture and offer insights into ways that we can help men strive for status in pro-social rather than anti-social ways. It is our hope that our research can help men to develop healthy masculinities that lift up all men, gay and straight alike." New research finds gay and bisexual men still earn less

More information: Tyler L. Brown et al, Experimentally testing the impact of status threat on heterosexual men's use of anti-gay slurs: A precarious manhood and coalitional value perspective, Current Psychology (2021). DOI: 10.1007/s12144-021-02489-7

Provided by University of Houston