Treading new ground in household sector innovation research: Scope,emergence, business implications,and diffusion

Individual consumers in the household sector increasingly develop products, services and processes, in their discretionary time without payment. Household sector innovation is becoming a pervasive phenomenon, representing a significant share of the innovation activity in any economy. Such innovation emerges from personal needs or self-rewards, and is distinct from and complementary to producer innovations motivated by commercial gains. In this introductory paper to the special issue on household sector innovation, we take stock of emerging research on the topic. We categorize the research into four areas: scope, emergence, implications for business, and diffusion. We develop a conceptual basis for the phenomenon, introduce the articles in the special issue, and show how each article contributes new insights. We end by offering a research agenda for scholars interested in the salient phenomenon of household sector innovation.     

Reading research in Hungary

Much recent reading research in Hungary has focused on the formation of readers’attitudes and value judgements. This paper reports the results of a number of such studies, based on research with various groups, including library users, ‘killed-worker’ students, and children. A‘more books’programme has been found to be successful in developing a more discriminating approach to literature, but there is concern over national trends in reading. International studies have shown Hungarian students to be comparatively good at science but poor at reading. More books are being bought, and the proportion of women readers is increasing, but adults are spending less time on reading, and have a growing interest in non-fiction. The results of reading research in Hungary are not regarded as of purely theoretical interest. Such results are regularly used by librarians and by educational administrators.     

Demands and Job Resources in the Child Care Workforce: Swiss Lead Teacher and Assistant Teacher Assessments

Center-based child care has been struggling with poor health and high turnover rates of child care staff and their adverse impact on care quality for decades. Yet little is known about personal and structural antecedents of job resources and job demands that are valid predictors of health and turnover in the child care workforce. Research Findings: This study investigated job resources and job demands among child care staff of different education levels (491 lead teachers and 310 assistant teachers) from Switzerland. Results from t-tests and hierarchical regression analyses indicated slightly higher job resources and job demands for lead teachers than for assistant teachers but similar antecedents of job resources and job demands. Overall, center characteristics shaped job resources and job demands more strongly than staff characteristics. More specifically, job resources were predicted by structural characteristics associated with professionalism in child care work, whereas job demands were primarily dependent on adequate staffing. Practice or Policy: The findings suggest that center characteristics (e.g., work environment and staffing levels) should be targeted in order to increase job resources and reduce job demands, which would in turn promote health and lower turnover rates among child care staff.     

The influence of business strategies on technological network activities

This paper investigates the impact of business strategy on technological interweavement. Based upon a sample of 451 manufacturing companies, five empirical business strategy types are identified with the help of a cluster analysis, namely the technological leader, the customer-focused developer, the cost leader, the specialiser and the dissipater. It is shown that these types differ significantly in regard to structure and intensity of their technological network. Furthermore, the findings show that there is no overall superior type of network, but that a network must match the business strategy.     

Soziale Disparit?ten und die ?ffnung des Sekundarschulsystems

Efforts to break the link between the school type attended and the qualification awarded are seen an important step in the modernization of Germany??s tracked secondary school system. However, it remains disputed whether these efforts have reduced social disparities or in fact increased them. This study examined the transition from lower secondary education in academic- and intermediate-track schools to upper secondary education in general and vocational gymnasium schools in the state of Baden-Württemberg. When indicators of parental social background and school-leaving qualifications were controlled, the opening of upper secondary education was found to be associated with a decrease in the social selectivity of upper secondary education for intermediate-track students. At the same time, for those intermediate-track students who were entitled to enter upper secondary education, social background had predictive effects on the transition decision; however, the overall size of these effects was low.