Software vulnerability due to practical drift

The proliferation of information and communication technologies (ICTs) into all aspects of life poses unique ethical challenges as our modern societies become increasingly dependent on the flawless operation of these technologies. As we increasingly entrust our privacy, our well-being and our lives to an ever greater number of computers we need to look more closely at the risks and ethical implications of these developments. By emphasising the vulnerability of software and the practice of professional software developers, we want to make clear the ethical aspects of producing potentially flawed software. This paper outlines some of the vulnerabilities associated with software systems and identifies a number of social and organisational factors affecting software developers and contributing to these vulnerabilities. Scott A. Snook’s theory of practical drift is used as the basis for our analysis. We show that this theory, originally developed to explain the failure of a military organisation, can be used to understand how professional software developers “drift away” from procedures and processes designed to ensure quality and prevent software vulnerability. Based on interviews with software developers in two Norwegian companies we identify two areas where social factors compel software developers to drift away from a global set of rules constituting software development processes and methods. Issues of pleasure and control and difference in mental models contribute to an uncoupling from established practices designed to guarantee the reliability of software and thus diminish its vulnerability.     

Stress among accounting educators in the United States

This research investigates stress among accounting educators and examines relationships between stress levels and work satisfaction levels, personality traits, and stress-coping techniques. Self-administered questionnaires were used, and 164 accounting faculty members from 41 states responded. Results of regression analyses indicated that higher stress levels can be predicted, with a relatively strong multipleR value, by a combination of variables. Of the variables investigated, overall work satisfaction was the variable most closely related to higher stress levels. The most important personality characteristics of higher stress individuals were impatience, assertiveness, workaholism, and idealism. Stress-coping techniques associated with higher stress levels were recreational time off, cultivation and maintenance of friendships among colleagues, and physical exercise. These same independent variables had minimal predictive ability for the stress level of the lower stress group of faculty.     

Advocacy for gender minority students: recommendations for school counsellors

Abstract

Research shows that teachers’ and educators’ responses to gender diversity issues in schools either improves or limits the experiences of students. The school counsellor has an important role to play in this process by working closely with other stakeholders to advocate for transgender, intersex and genderqueer (TIG) students. Following a review of recent developments in the USA, recommendations are made and resources identified to assist school counsellors in validating TIG students, and improving school systems in pursuit of their academic, social and emotional success.     

Learned suppression of photopositive tendencies in<Emphasis Type="Italic">Drosophila melanogaster</Emphasis>

A task was designed to teach individual flies to avoid a lighted area after they had displayed an initial preference for it. The flies walked in a T-maze and chose between a lighted and a darkened alley leading, respectively, to a lighted and a darkened vial. Flies that were photopositive on a first trial were subjected to an aversive stimulus (a filter paper inserted into the lighted vial and wetted with a quinine solution), and they performed 16 training trials; they learned to avoid the lighted vial. The flies trained with water instead of quinine in the lighted vial still displayed avoidance of the lighted vial, but to a lesser extent. The flies trained with a dry filter paper in the lighted vial did not show any increase in avoidance during training. Like the flies trained with no quinine at all, those trained to avoid the lighted vial under a partial reinforcement condition (one half of the trials with quinine, the other half with a dry vial) did not master the task. Finally, removal of the quinine after an avoidance acquisition criterion was reached resulted in an extinction process.