Operationalization

On November 24, 2021, Mr. Stephen Anning presented on Operationalizing Human Security in Contemporary Operating Environment at the 2021 CASIS West Coast Security Conference. The key points of discussion included the concept of human security, the differences between interstate and intrastate conflict, the challenges of understanding human security, and how operationalizing human security can address some of those challenges. The presentation was followed by a question and answer period with questions from the audience and CASIS Vancouver executives.

This chapter concerns the measurement of concepts related to interpersonal communication. We begin with a discussion of general measurement principles and argue that there are multiple useful ways to conceptualize and measure interpersonal communication. We then review strengths and weaknesses of common measurement techniques, including self-reports, observations, in-depth interviews, and physiological measures. Because every measurement technique has limitations with respect to assessing interpersonal communication, we argue that it is often useful for multiple techniques to be used either within or across studies. We conclude with a discussion of special considerations for designing measures in studies of interpersonal communication. Specifically, interpersonal scholars should pay particular attention to: (a) the need to consider a timeframe that provides an adequate sampling of ongoing interaction; (b) the possibility that new communication technologies are changing the nature of interpersonal communication and what should be observed, even in face-to-face settings; (c) the pitfalls of using measures designed for other purposes to assess interpersonal communication constructs, and (d) the potential for confusing statistical information for definitive proof of validity.

This is the author-version of article published as: Brown, Terrence and Davidsson, Per and Wiklund, Johan (2001) An operationalization of Stevenson's conceptualization of entrepreneurship as opportunity-based firm behavior. Strategic Management Journal 22(10):pp. 953-968. Accessed from http://eprints.qut.edu.au

Both funding agencies and scholars in science studies have become increasingly concerned with how to define and identify interdisciplinarity in research. The task is tricky, since the complexity of interdisciplinary research defies a single definition. Our study tackles this challenge by demonstrating a new typology and qualitative indicators for analyzing interdisciplinarity in research documents. The proposed conceptual framework attempts to fulfill the need for a robust and nuanced approach that is grounded in deeper knowledge of interdisciplinarity. As an example of using the framework, we discuss our empirical investigation of research proposals funded by a national funding agency in Finland.

Across subject disciplines the measure of values is hampered by the contested nature of its definition. This paper deconstructs the process of operationalizing values across a selection of the recent psychometric measures, comparing definitions, construct validity, dimensional conceptualization and applications. In the light of the relatively recent acknowledgement of context in values measure, especially cross-culturally, recommendations are made for aligning conceptual and operational definitions of values, individual and situational values – especially in religious research.

Over the past twenty-five years, professionalism has emerged as a substantive and sustained theme, the operationalization and measurement of which, has become a major concern for those involved in medical education. However, how to go about establishing the elements that constitute appropriate professionalism in order to assess them is difficult. Using a discourse analysis approach, the International Ottawa Conference Working Group on Professionalism (IOCPWG) studied some of the dominant notions of professionalism, and in particular the implications for its assessment. The results presented here reveal different ways of thinking about professionalism that can lead toward a multi-dimensional, multi-paradigmatic approach to assessing professionalism at different levels: individual, inter-personal, societal-institutional. Recommendations for research about professionalism assessment are also presented.

Informed by debates on the reductionism of defining disciplinary concepts in disability studies and religion, this article argues that theology faces a unique ethical and methodological challenge in whether to operationalize experiences with disability into anything theologically significant or useful. Analyzing how some scholarship in disability theology has problematically appropriated disability even for liberatory purposes, it contends that theology struggles methodologically to distinguish itself from ideological rhetoric that deliberately marginalizes persons with disability. However, rejecting operationalization not only threatens the collaboration between theology and the social sciences afforded by operationalizing shared inquiries , but risks suggesting that disability is not worthy of sustained theological attention. The article proposes that this double-bind forces theology to critique operationalization by scrutinizing its relationship to usefulness itself. This means resisting the methodological compulsion for all persons and things to become useful, and retaining the theological possibility that interpersonal experience—disabled and otherwise—may be useless.

There is plenty of debate in the entrepreneurship literature regarding entrepreneurial opportunity. There also has been a lack of construct clarity. These two issues have combined to stifle progress in understanding this important phenomenon. We believe that across these debates there are many underlying commonalities and potential for more clear constructs. In this paper we review how scholars have defined and operationalized entrepreneurial opportunity and opportunity-related processes in order to better understand what they really mean when they say ‘opportunity’. We found a total of 102 definitions and 51 operationalisations from 105 articles published in leading entrepreneurship and management journals. A total of 81 elements were identified across the definitions and operationalisations and compiled into an integrated process model. The model incorporates what seemed to be disparate views into a single unifying model. Comparison between conceptual definitions and operationalisations reveals many elements that are missing either conceptual or empirical attention. The model will help scholars more easily identify and build upon prior research. To that effect, numerous suggestions for future research are discussed and are summarized in a table.

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"Recent experiences in the Balkans, Iraq and Afghanistan have demonstrated that these complex challenges cannot be resolved exclusively by military intervention, and are of such scale that no single agency, government or international organisation can manage them alone. A broad, international consensus has emerged that recognises the importance of coherent and simultaneous application of military, political, economic and civil instruments – known as ‘comprehensive approach’ – to resolve crisis situations. However, efforts to implement comprehensive approaches have been fraught with political and administrative challenges, and have suffered due to conceptual ambiguity in the understanding of collective endeavours.

By analysing research on command and control, organisational science and public administration, a multi-dimensional model is proposed that can assist military, governmental and non-governmental agency leaders in understanding the practical details of interagency interoperability when working in collective endeavours. The NATO Network Enabled Capability interaction maturity model is extended, in order to understand the actual implications of increasing levels of cooperation on organisational structures and operational practices, in cross-organisational collective efforts. The implications of increasing interagency interoperability are thus revealed"

Energy engineering is a new multidisciplinary engineering field to develop innovative renewable energy (RE) systems. On other hand software engineering has recently emerged as a new engineering field in a continuing evolution. Software engineering is a discipline whose aim is the production of high quality software, but lacks maturity compared to other traditional engineering fields. Much of the research done up to date concentrated on developing tools and methods and less work has been done on the development of the foundations for instance, such as defining the principles and the application of these principles to software development. This paper propose a development approach for RE software's using candidates' engineering fundamental principles for software engineering including operational guidelines for the selected engineering principles and foundations of RE software from an engineering perspective.

A cross-cultural modernization scale is constructed using a worldwide sample of 136 societies in the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample. The operational definition of modernization is a change from traditional customs to ones that are forced or voluntarily borrowed from a dominant society that results in changes in behavior or customs. As a result of analysis using principal component analysis, we interpret the modernization process as a series of four separate stages that societies go through. Five separate hypotheses concerning modernization are tested and receive moderate support. It appears that the first stage (changes in government, trade, and education) and last stage (changes in behavior) of the modernization process are related to the five hypotheses. The second stage (changes in health, technology, and transportation) and the third stage (changes in family structure, religion, and personal toilet) are not.

... 1991). The family as a unit and its developmental course, in turn, can profoundly influence fathers' involvement." Family time," or the timing of transitional events for the family as a unit, is important for understanding fathers. Family ...

Programs trusted with secure information should not release that information in ways contrary to system policy. However, when a program contains an illegal flow of information, current information-flow reporting techniques are inadequate for determining the cause of the error. Reasoning about information-flow errors can be difficult, as the flows involved can be quite subtle. We present a general model for information-flow blame that can explain the source of such security errors in code. This model is implemented by changing the information-flow verification procedure to: (1) generate supplementary information to reveal otherwise hidden program dependencies; (2) modify the constraint solver to construct a blame dependency graph; and (3) develop an explanation procedure that returns a complete and minimal error report. Our experiments show that information-flow errors can generally be explained and resolved by viewing only a small fraction of the total code.

The article proposes a discourse–theoretical approach to policy analysis that explores how political relations are changed through and within a strategic and interest-led process with a focus on conflictual struggles that attempt to establish, change, or consolidate specific interests and meanings as universalities. It suggests a conceptualization of hegemonic projects and discusses their relation to the common good. After elaborating on the term discourse formation as a middle-range concept and a more concrete approach to hegemony, the article suggests various clusters of (discursive) strategies to facilitate the evaluation of hegemonic processes within a policy field. Lastly, it introduces vectors of hegemony, proposing an analytical grid as a framework to facilitate reflection on hegemony. European austerity policies are examined to illustrate how some logics and strategies work to strengthen a specific governance approach to the euro-zone crisis.

The work presented in this paper deals with the formalization of the ontology underlying projective geometry. This formalization is done by using the conceptual graph model which has been defined in the Artificial Intelligence community. Through this experiment, we endeavour to show that applying knowledge representation techniques to mathematical fields is a relevant way to improve the reliability and efficiency

The evolving digital world requires scientifically literate citizens who are able to critically evaluate Internet sources of varying credibility. Instruction on evidence evaluation in postsecondary education often focuses on peer-review as a singular indicator of credibility. With increased access to web-based scientific information, students must also learn to think critically in real-time about the dimensions of credibility. This study describes the integration of sInvestigator, a computational evidence-based scientific reasoning tool, with a class of 32 students in an undergraduate honors course focused on socio-scientific issues. A cross-disciplinary team of researchers with expertise in science education, scientific literacy, and evidence evaluation developed and implemented an online questionnaire to measure students’ development of digital scientific literacy. After using sInvestigator to evaluate sources of scientific evidence based on publisher reputation, author competence...

Genre analysis involves at least a foray into the social/contextual dimension framing genre-exemplars. One way to explore this dimension is drawing on the concept of metapragmatics, which is primarily associated with (American) linguistic anthropology. However, with a few exceptions, genre studies have not consistently operationalized metapragmatics, either theoretically or practically. The purpose of this article is, therefore, to explore one possible angle of such operationalization by means of studying discourse fragments reflecting on fragments of (these very or other) discourses (so-called metapragmatic discourses) vis--vis any generic properties of the reflected discourse. Specifically, we analyzed comments sections for a number of YouTube videos exemplifying several lifestyle genres. The results indicate that generic references can range from simply using a generic label to refer to the discourse in question (as a token of a certain type/genre) to actually discussing the gene...

Energy engineering is a new multidisciplinary engineering field to develop innovative renewable energy (RE) systems. On other hand software engineering has recently emerged as a new engineering field in a continuing evolution. Software engineering is a discipline whose aim is the production of high quality software, but lacks maturity compared to other traditional engineering fields. Much of the research done up to date concentrated on developing tools and methods and less work has been done on the development of the foundations for instance, such as defining the principles and the application of these principles to software development. This paper propose a development approach for RE software's using candidates' engineering fundamental principles for software engineering including operational guidelines for the selected engineering principles and foundations of RE software from an engineering perspective.

Global urbanization creates opportunities and challenges for human well-being and transition towards sustainability. Urban areas are human-environment systems that depend fundamentally on ecosystems, and thus require an understanding of the management of urban ecosystem services to ensure sustainable urban planning. The purpose of this study is to provide a systematic review of urban ecosystems services research, which addresses the combined domain of ecosystem services and urban development. We examined emerging trends and gaps in how urban ecosystem services are conceptualized in peer-reviewed case study literature, including the geographical distribution of research, the development and use of the urban ecosystem services concept, and the involvement of stakeholders. We highlight six challenges aimed at strengthening the concept's potential to facilitate meaningful inter-and transdis-ciplinary work for ecosystem services research and planning. Achieving a cohesive conceptual ...

A physically based water constituent retrieval algorithm is used for the automatic processing of MERIS level 1B full resolution data. The algorithm requires several input variables for individual optimization with different sensors (i.e. channel calibration and weighting), aquatic regions (i.e. specific inherent optical properties) or atmospheric conditions (i.e. Aerosol models). The optical properties are derived from optical in situ measurements during concurrent MERIS data acquisition on 20 April 2007. Remaining parameters are iteratively optimized for best performance with 21 MERIS datasets of Lake Constance in the years 2003-2005, and validated with 11 datasets in 2006. Operational water quality sampling measurements acquired by local authorities serve as reference.

In this article, I critically evaluate the causal and temporal dimension of social scientific studies focusing on Turkish politics. A very important and yet often neglected aspect of social scientific analysis involves the temporal dimension of causal processes. The temporal dimension of causal processes has direct consequences for operationalization and measurement, and hence it is an essential component of research design. Does the dependent variable (outcome) of interest unfold over the short term or the long term? Do the hypothesized independent variables (causes) unfold over the short term or the long term? Paul Pierson (2004) provided a classification of four types of causality based on the temporal dimension of causes and outcomes using metaphors of natural disasters: tornado, earthquake, meteorite, and global warming. Operationalization and measurement of long term causes and outcomes pose a major challenge, compounded by the challenges of periodization of causes and effects. Unfortunately, a large proportion of the studies of Turkish politics do not have a clearly discernible independent variable (cause) to begin with, and they are thus better characterized as works of "non-causal description." Moreover, many of the studies of Turkish politics tend to imply, but rarely state explicitly, a global warming type of causality (long term cause and long term outcome), which necessitates focusing even more intensively on such challenges of measurement and periodization. Yet the operationalization of the key (dependent and independent) variables is often missing even in articles published in reputable academic journals of Turkish politics and society. In the spirit of constructive criticism, I suggest a number of guidelines for research design in order to address the problems of causality and temporality discussed in this article, including awareness of multi-temporal equifinality.

The attitude towards cloud computing is influenced by multiple factors acting as drivers and barriers for its adoption. This research paper aims at the reconceptualization and operationalization of widely accepted influencing factors on technology adoption in relation to cloud computing. A literature review on technological innovation characteristics in this context is conducted to identify potential gaps in ongoing research. The review also provides an overview of relevant empirical studies on cloud computing that are based on theories for innovation adoption such as the Diffusion of Innovation (DoI) theory and the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). Consequently, the focus is set on the examination of the factors "compatibility", "relative advantage", "complexity", "image" and "security & trust". Furthermore, an operationalization of each factor in the context of cloud computing is provided.

A aprovação da Lei da Água no Brasil (Lei nº 9.433/97) não garantiu a sua operacionalização, incluindo o princípio da gestão participativa nas instâncias dos organismos de bacia (Comitês de Bacia Hidrográfica). Este trabalho aborda a importância da consideração conjunta de conhecimentos científicos e vivenciais, bem como da organização de uma sociedade da informação em rede, para a viabilização deste processo. Aspectos como capacitação dos decisores, visão sistêmica, subjetividade, valores, percepções, atitudes, ética e diálogo são alguns dos elementos cognitivos abordados e considerados estratégicos para o sucesso da gestão participativa. O trabalho visa levantar reflexões sobre o papel do conhecimento e sobre a relevância da integração de qualidades individuais na busca de processos decisórios eficientes. A pesquisa foi realizada como parte do processo de doutoramento no Centro de Desenvolvimento Sustentável/UnB.

Emerging evidence suggests that early bilingual experience constrains the development of attentional processes in infants, and that some of these early bilingual adaptations could last into adulthood. However, it is not known whether the early adaptations in the attentional domain alter more general cognitive abilities. If they do, then we would expect that bilingual adults who learned their second language early in life would score more highly across cognitive tasks than bilingual adults who learned their second language later in life. To test this hypothesis, 170 adult participants were administered a well-established (non-verbal) measure of fluid intelligence: Raven’s Advanced Progressive Matrices (RAPM). Fluid intelligence (the ability to solve novel reasoning problems, independent of acquired knowledge) is highly correlated with numerous cognitive abilities across development. Performance on the RAPM was greater in bilinguals than monolinguals, and greater in ‘early bilinguals’...

In this article, I critically evaluate the causal and temporal dimension of social scientific studies focusing on Turkish politics. A very important and yet often neglected aspect of social scientific analysis involves the temporal dimension of causal processes. The temporal dimension of causal processes has direct consequences for operationalization and measurement, and hence it is an essential component of research design. Does the dependent variable (outcome) of interest unfold over the short term or the long term? Do the hypothesized independent variables (causes) unfold over the short term or the long term? Paul Pierson (2004) provided a classification of four types of causality based on the temporal dimension of causes and outcomes using metaphors of natural disasters: tornado, earthquake, meteorite, and global warming. Operationalization and measurement of long term causes and outcomes pose a major challenge, compounded by the challenges of periodization of causes and effects. Unfortunately, a large proportion of the studies of Turkish politics do not have a clearly discernible independent variable (cause) to begin with, and they are thus better characterized as works of "non-causal description." Moreover, many of the studies of Turkish politics tend to imply, but rarely state explicitly, a global warming type of causality (long term cause and long term outcome), which necessitates focusing even more intensively on such challenges of measurement and periodization. Yet the operationalization of the key (dependent and independent) variables is often missing even in articles published in reputable academic journals of Turkish politics and society. In the spirit of constructive criticism, I suggest a number of guidelines for research design in order to address the problems of causality and temporality discussed in this article, including awareness of multi-temporal equifinality.

A cross-cultural modernization scale is constructed using a worldwide sample of 136 societies in the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample. The operational definition of modernization is a change from traditional customs to ones that are forced or voluntarily borrowed from a dominant society that results in changes in behavior or customs. As a result of analysis using principal component analysis, we interpret the modernization process as a series of four separate stages that societies go through. Five separate hypotheses concerning modernization are tested and receive moderate support. It appears that the first stage (changes in government, trade, and education) and last stage (changes in behavior) of the modernization process are related to the five hypotheses. The second stage (changes in health, technology, and transportation) and the third stage (changes in family structure, religion, and personal toilet) are not.

The article proposes a discourse–theoretical approach to policy analysis that explores how political relations are changed through and within a strategic and interest-led process with a focus on conflictual struggles that attempt to establish, change, or consolidate specific interests and meanings as universalities. It suggests a conceptualization of hegemonic projects and discusses their relation to the common good. After elaborating on the term discourse formation as a middle-range concept and a more concrete approach to hegemony, the article suggests various clusters of (discursive) strategies to facilitate the evaluation of hegemonic processes within a policy field. Lastly, it introduces vectors of hegemony, proposing an analytical grid as a framework to facilitate reflection on hegemony. European austerity policies are examined to illustrate how some logics and strategies work to strengthen a specific governance approach to the eurozone crisis.

Principles are abstract rules intended to guide decision-makers in making normative judgments in domains like the law, politics, and ethics. It is difficult, however, if not impossible to define principles in an intensional manner so that they may be applied deductively. The problem is the gap between the abstract, open-textured principles and concrete facts. On the other hand, when expert decision-makers rationalize their conclusions in specific cases, they often link principles to the specific facts of the cases. In effect, these expert-defined associations between principles and facts provide extensional definitions of the principles. The experts operationalize the abstract principles by linking them to the facts. This paper discusses research in which the following hypothesis was empirically tested: extensionally defined principles, as well as cited past cases, can help in predicting the principles and cases that might be relevant in the analysis of new cases. To investigate this phenomenon computationally, a large set of professional ethics cases was analyzed and a computational model called SIROCCO, a system for retrieving principles and past cases, was constructed. Empirical evidence is presented that the operationalization information contained in extensionally defined principles can be leveraged to predict the principles and past cases that are relevant to new problem situations. This is shown through an ablation experiment, comparing SIROCCO to a version of itself that does not employ operationalization information. Further, it is shown that SIROCCO's extensionally defined principles and case citations help it to outperform a full-text retrieval program that does not employ such information.

One of the critical topics in contemporary innovation management literature concerns what constitutes innovation capability (IC) at the firm level. There have been many attempts to conceptualize and operationalize this capability. Still, they either fail to discriminate the elements that characterize IC or to present consistent, comparable elements across distinct models or frameworks. This paper reports the results of a systematic approach to formulate a firm-level IC framework. To do so, the authors conducted an extensive systematic literature review, screened 19,589 papers, and analyzed in detail 186 documents that directly address empirical or theoretical elements of IC. The researchers cross-analyzed these papers for direct and indirect references to ICs (and related concepts, such as innovation orientation, innovation competence, and innovativeness) and generated thematic categories. We drew on a hybrid approach moving between inductive and deductive coding and theme development. We adopted an ex-ante theoretical perspective of the propensity/ability axis built upon the willingness–ability approach and the dynamic capability lens. The proposed synthetizing framework is coherent with Teece’s (2014) ordinary and dynamic capabilities. It comprises two sets of elements: on one hand, structural and contextual antecedents that characterize an organization's propensity toward innovation and, on the other hand, actions and resource-related capacities that act as causal mechanisms that, articulated within functions—sensing, seizing, and transforming—constitute the ability to generate innovation.

How is the concept of “vulnerability” employed in Canadian immigration law? This article presents findings from research conducted as part of the VULNER project (2019–23). We analyze how vulnerability is operationalized in Canada’s inland refugee (or asylum) determination procedures compared to its overseas resettlement program by first discussing some general principles, followed by an examination of the treatment of women and LGBTQI+ individuals seeking protection. We show that legal-bureaucratic logics have constructed two very heterogeneous worlds of vulnerability that may reproduce and exacerbate vulnerabilities rather than create a more inclusive, equitable protection regime in law, policy, and practice.

Over the past twenty-five years, professionalism has emerged as a substantive and sustained theme, the operationalization and measurement of which, has become a major concern for those involved in medical education. However, how to go about establishing the elements that constitute appropriate professionalism in order to assess them is difficult. Using a discourse analysis approach, the International Ottawa Conference Working Group on Professionalism (IOCPWG) studied some of the dominant notions of professionalism, and in particular the implications for its assessment. The results presented here reveal different ways of thinking about professionalism that can lead toward a multi-dimensional, multi-paradigmatic approach to assessing professionalism at different levels: individual, inter-personal, societal-institutional. Recommendations for research about professionalism assessment are also presented.

This is the author-version of article published as: Brown, Terrence and Davidsson, Per and Wiklund, Johan (2001) An operationalization of Stevenson's conceptualization of entrepreneurship as opportunity-based firm behavior. Strategic Management Journal 22(10):pp. 953-968. Accessed from http://eprints.qut.edu.au