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Reframing of Particular Trust
1-23Views:13The paper strives to reconsider the theory of particular trust, i.e. one’s trusting feelings towards her/his most intimate relatives, friends, and personal relations. By doing this, at first, the paper sheds light on two distinct interpretations of particular trust in the literature. One of these approaches addresses particular trust as a kind of core disposition of the self, and it describes how one’s trust towards her/his bonding relations establishes the given subject’s generalized trust towards others, in a broad sense, to people as such. The other interpretation argues that particular trust is important for group-level social dynamics. It claims that if members of close-knit and exclusive groups, dominated by particular trust, are interacting only with each other, and avoiding out-group relations, then broader social cooperation and collaboration are constrained, social integration and cohesion are limited, and on macro level there is an unfolding distrust. As it seems, the above-described readings of particular trust are contradictory. The current paper stresses that just one of these interpretations is coherent and consistent – the first one.
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Certain issues of reliability and validity in the case of generalized trust survey measurement in light of the Hungarian data
5-22Views:66Trust is a field of research in social sciences that has complex, well-developed theoretical
approaches, but its empirical tools are less precisely grounded. The most common survey tool
for measuring generalized trust is a formula often referred to in the literature as “standard”
trust question, which reads as follows: “Generally speaking, would you say that most people can
be trusted or that you need to be very careful in dealing with people?” The aim of the paper is to
examine this standard survey item along the dimensions of reliability and validity. In our analysis,
we use Hungarian data obtained from various international surveys. Our results indicate serious
validity problems, as the standard question shows only weak linkage with additional variables,
which, based on the conceptual background, should be in a close relationship with trust.
KEYWORDS: trust, generalized trust, survey methods, reliability, validity -
Trust, distrust, self-trust
3-18Views:70The current paper attempts to embrace trust and distrust as emotions, as well as showing trust or distrust as cognitively justified decisions in one coherent theoretical framework. It links these emotional and action-like domains together by the notion of self-trust which is interpreted as a form of rationale. The argument claims that self-trust of those people who are able to trust others functions in a completely different way in compare to the one of distrusting subjects.
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The slave trade and trust
172-177.Views:29Does culture have an impact on society, and if so, how? The study by Nathan Nunn and Leonard Wantchekon set out to examine the impact of the slave trade, which has left its mark on the African continent and its economy, but which ended some 100 years ago, on the cultural, norm-following, beliefs and values of individuals. Their aim is to explore the reasons that led to the historical disconnect within Africa between local governments or municipalities (politics), between the outlying communities (neighbours) and even within family relations, which may still influence economic development today. Nunn and Wantchekon's hypothesis is based on an earlier study by Nunn, which showed a causal link between the 400-year slave trade and the income conditions of the African population today, looking at the long-term economic effects of the slave trade.
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Visibility of marginalized social groups from a network perspective
83-108Views:182The study examines the segregation of different marginalized social groups – ex-prisoners, gypsies, gays and lesbians, homeless people – and their visibility in society. Using a size generator network method, the study builds negative binomial models to compare the segregation of marginalized groups within a representative sample of 1000 people. The alpha value in these models indicates the level of overdispersion. According to the results, the level of segregation varies between the overall network and the trust network. Specifically, the level of segregation for gypsies is the lowest in the overall network, whereas in the trust network, it is the lowest for gays/lesbians. The segregation of homeless people is extremely high, which is due to the fact that they are confined to their own space. Individuals with low education, belonging to lower classes, living in villages have the smallest network size. However, they have the highest number of marginalized social group members. A smaller network is associated with lower levels of peer support. The lack of weak bonds makes the social network homophilic and „island-like” social exlusions are formed where poverty and vulnerability are typical.
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Leadership challenges in virtual environment: The importance of the synergism in ICT toolset and leadership development
27-48.Views:25The companies connected to the global value chain inevitably and necessarily apply virtualized
solutions in their work organization. As such, the appropriate implementation of the shoring
strategies, the increasing competition and the supply-demand imbalance on the local market of
the high-skilled workers, all puts the existing organizational and leadership practices to the test.
The article aims to highlight the main challenges the virtual team leaders (VTL) are facing and
some best practices that might widen the toolset of the modern VTL. The results are based on a
case study of a multinational info-communication technology (ICT) service company in which
experienced managers and leaders shared their strategies. The main takeaways of the empirical
research are (i) the emphasis on the “early-adopter” behavior and the proper usage of the latest
technology in the communication, (ii) the importance of the ability of building trust and setting
common goals; (iii) despite that everyone is perfectly connected via the internet, the regular
personal presence is still the most powerful leadership tool. -
Informality: the Culture of Treating Others Instrumentally: An Essay about the Dynamics of the Relationship between Social Relations and Trust
49-64Views:20The current paper, without scientific systematization and artistic meditation, tries to address
life itself (the normatively understood ‘good life’) in an essayist way. It strives to draw up some
core pillars of a research program about a commonly known everyday phenomenon, informality,
more precisely its distorted form which is inducing social inequalities and injustices, and which,
because of this, should be seen reflexively and critically. The proposed argument is a theoretical
reflection on József Böröcz’s still actual and progressive scientific endeavor to create a framework
for the sociology of informality. -
Closed institution inmates’ views about the family
138-153Views:14When researching the reasons for criminal behaviour, literature almost unequivocally emphasises the responsibility and role of the family, where as the number of studies analysing the functioning of families of inmates in closed institutions (reform schools, special children’s homes) is relatively low. The present pilot research (with the purpose of preparing a wider one) tries to fill this gap. Using semi-structured interviews, we attempted to explore the inmates’ family background, what methods were used during their upbringing, what they thought about the family and its role and importance in one’s life. Harassment had occurred in juvenile delinquents’ families in various forms: it had physical and emotional manifestations, and therefore its impact on the affected person’s personality is extremely complex. These young people did not/do not have a safe background, and thus they were more easily influenced to choose the wrong way; they did not have a real childhood, never had the experience of common games or hiking, and never felt an atmosphere of trust, love and security. It was apparent that in these young people’s families very little attention was paid to each family member’s personal sensitivity or opinion, and emotional ties were either missing or were strongly distorted. In such a family environment, the young people were unable to solve the crises of adolescence which are parts of normal development, the family did not ensure support in coping with the tension, and they were left alone with solving their problems. Consequently, it is not surprising that they had great difficulties in telling what the family meant to them and what ideas they had about their future family.
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A Hidden Stream in Medical Education
56-78Views:40The general aim of medical education is the same as in the case of any other ones: creating a professional person from a lay one. A special characteristic of this education is a deep rift between the lay and the professional perspective. One of the main trends of this trait is the discrepancy between the open and the hidden curricula. The contents of the hidden curricula, in many cases, cannot support the main messages of the formal one, on the contrary, they provide a different or even contradictory set of norms, values,
attitudes. One of the main consequences of these discrepancies is that some medical students have been becoming more cynical since their entrance into medical education. The open curricula emphasize empathy, alleviating pain and suffering, the importance of trust and fidelity, and that the well-being of patients is one of the most important priorities. The hidden curricula at the same time emphasize objectivity, detachment, caution, and being suspicious against emotions. One of the outcomes of these eventually contradictory tendencies is that the ’wounded healer’ is not a precondition for becoming a healer, like in archaic times, but a by-product of medical education. -
Alternatives of how to prepare for the future labor market
146-160Views:42What happens if among the members of a society and among the smaller and larger units and groups making up the society trust and confidence seems to be disappearing at once? What happens if confidence reposed into each other fall victim to social differences as well as to the economic / cost-of-living boxing of modern information society? How to stop the crisis symptom that seems to be developing this way and which is shown in the fragmentation of communities?1 With other words, is it possible to “stick again together” a community or even a whole society started to disintegrate? The questions, even if not so characteristically phrased, provide sociologists actually with the scope of understanding our modern, individualistic world (Habermas 1994). Gusfield (1975) depicts dichotomy of community and society in a way that we should interpret community as a pervading, significant contrast. By now literature seems as if it was only be able to picture the changes taking place in the images both of the society and community describing them by even more pronounced, contradictory processes. The changes that send messages on the disintegration of categories and frames becoming insecure instead of the security and integration quasi missed by Habermas. It also seems as if—quasi as an answer given to this process—occlusion/seclusion both on the part of community members and the various communities from the seemingly unknown and insecure changes were more intensive (Légmán 2012). We intend to construe these phenomena on the next pages, but due to extension limits without the need for completeness of social interpretations. We want to do it with the help of mainly one dimension: value preference through the example of a given society, namely the Hungarian one. Thus we get to the stability and the solidarity of the members of the smallest unit of society, one which accepts and expresses various value preferences, the family.
From time immemorial, one of the crucial questions of mankind has been what the future has in store for us. The future, however, has remained unfathomable up to this day, and even future studies promises only as much as prognosticating what is likely to continue and what will plausibly change in the world. Thus, no wonder, that already the first “real” economists of the 18th century (Adam Smith et al.) considered the creation of the future model of labor economy as a challenge. At the present era of modern labor market, this task is closely connected with the future status of labor market since in a consumer society income acquired by work forms the basis of satisfying needs (Ehrenberg – Smith 2003, Galasi 1994).We are not saying anything new by stating the fact that the demand for labor force is determined by new places of work and that an ideal supply of labor force must be adaptable to the requirements of demand. To meet requirements and to be adaptable is possible only if we are armed with the necessary competencies and capital (Hodges – Burchell 2003, Bourdieu 1998). The question, to what extent students in higher education are prepared for changes in the demand for labor force, arises at this point. What can young people expect on the labor market in this ever changing world? What kind of job opportunities and work conditions are there for them, and how much are they prepared to face these changes?
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Community is more than just a physical space: Discuss this statement with specific reference to the role of the concept and experience of contemporary community
129-145Views:20What happens if among the members of a society and among the smaller and larger units and groups making up the society trust and confidence seems to be disappearing at once? What happens if confidence reposed into each other fall victim to social differences as well as to the economic / cost-of-living boxing of modern information society? How to stop the crisis symptom that seems to be developing this way and which is shown in the fragmentation of communities?1 With other words, is it possible to “stick again together” a community or even a whole society started to disintegrate? The questions, even if not so characteristically phrased, provide sociologists actually with the scope of understanding our modern, individualistic world (Habermas 1994). Gusfield (1975) depicts dichotomy of community and society in a way that we should interpret community as a pervading, significant contrast. By now literature seems as if it was only be able to picture the changes taking place in the images both of the society and community describing them by even more pronounced, contradictory processes. The changes that send messages on the disintegration of categories and frames becoming insecure instead of the security and integration quasi missed by Habermas. It also seems as if—quasi as an answer given to this process—occlusion/seclusion both on the part of community members and the various communities from the seemingly unknown and insecure changes were more intensive (Légmán 2012). We intend to construe these phenomena on the next pages, but due to extension limits without the need for completeness of social interpretations. We want to do it with the help of mainly one dimension: value preference through the example of a given society, namely the Hungarian one. Thus we get to the stability and the solidarity of the members of the smallest unit of society, one which accepts and expresses various value preferences, the family.
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Touristic entrepreneuring: „Szeklerland, the East of West and West of East”
206-226Views:23The present article analyses the touristic market in Covasna/Kovászna county, Transylvania, Romania. The basis of the paper are 30 semistructured deep interviews and one
focus group interview which had 6 participants who are all representatives of organisations active in the field of tourism. As the result of our research we can clearly state
that there are four different regulation levels: the level of governmental regulations,
professional organisations, cooperation and level of informal economy. Through the
presentation of these four levels we will also touch upon the issues related to professionalization, trust and quality.
