This paper offers a critique of sustainability reporting and, in particular, a critique of the modern disconnect between the practice of sustainability reporting and what we consider to be the urgent issue of our era: sustaining the life-supporting ecological systems on which humanity and other species depend. Tracing the history of such reporting developments, we identify and isolate the concept of the ‘triple bottom line’ (TBL) as a core and dominant idea that continues to pervade business reporting, and business engagement (...) with sustainability. Incorporating an entity’s economic, environmental and social performance indicators into its management and reporting processes, we argue, has become synonymous with corporate sustainability; in the process, concern for ecology has become sidelined. Moreover, this process has become reinforced and institutionalised through SustainAbility’s biennial benchmarking reports, KPMG’s triennial surveys of practice, initiatives by the accountancy profession and, particularly, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)’s sustainability reporting guidelines. We argue that the TBL and the GRI are insufficient conditions for organizations contributing to the sustaining of the Earth’s ecology. Paradoxically, they may reinforce business-as-usual and greater levels of un-sustainability. (shrink)

We argue the need for academics to resist and challenge the hegemonic discourse of sustainable development within the corporate context. Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory provides a useful framework for recognizing the complex nature of sustainable development and a way of conceptualizing counter-hegemonies. Published empirical research that analyzes sustainable development discourse within corporate reports is examined to consider how the hegemonic discourse is constructed. Embedded assumptions within the hegemonic construction are identified including sustainable development as primarily about economic development, progress, (...) growth, profitability, and “responsibly” managed levels of resource depletion. We call for multiple voices in the discursive field to debate and to resist closure and highlight the possibilities for academic researchers to actively resist the hegemonic construction. Specifically, we advocate vigilance and awareness, critical and reflective analyses, challenge and resistance based on other frames of reference, and strategies for communicating both within and outside the academy. (shrink)

In this paper, we identify and discuss how sustainability reporting has spread throughout the Australian business community over the past twenty years or so. We identified all Australian business organisations that have produced a sustainability report since 1995, and we undertook an interview survey with managers of reporting companies. By incorporating a wide range and large number of reporting companies, we offer insights beyond those obtained from traditional report content analysis and from close analyses of singular case-study organisations. We reveal (...) that sustainability reporting has deepened in a few high-impact industries, and it has spread to a small number of firms in a wide range of low-impact industries. We tested whether there were any relationships between the drivers of reporting and the experiences of different types of reporting firms. Many of the relationships we observed were not as clear or as consistent as expected. Sustainability reporting is, however, of strategic importance to reporting companies. Given the small number of reporters in Australia, we raise the possibility of strategic differentiation as a key driver of reporting behaviour and suggest further studies to explore institutional fields that may be shaping sustainability reporting practice. (shrink)

Eating disorders are evolutionarily novel conditions that lead to some of the highest mortality rates of all psychiatric disorders. Several evolutionary hypotheses have been proposed for eating disorders, but only the intrasexual competition hypothesis is extensively supported by evidence. We present the mismatch hypothesis as a necessary extension to the current theoretical framework of eating disorders. This hypothesis explains the evolutionarily novel adaptive metaproblem that has arisen when mating motives and readily available food rewards conflict with one another. This situation (...) is exacerbated in contemporary environments characterized by sedentary lifestyles, caloric surplus and the ubiquity of social comparisons that take place via social media. Our psychoneuroimmunological model connects ultimate-level causation with proximate mechanisms by showing how the adaptive metaproblem between mating motives and food rewards leads to chronic stress and, further, to disordered eating. Chronic stress causes neuroinflammation, which increases susceptibility to OCD-like behaviors that typically co-occur with eating disorders. Chronic stress upregulates the serotonergic system and causes dysphoric mood in patients with restricting-type anorexia nervosa. Dieting, however, reduces serotonin levels and dysphoric mood, leading to a vicious serotonergic-homeostatic stress/starvation cycle whereby cortisol and neuroinflammation increase through stringent dieting. Between-individual and within-individual variation in eating disorders partially arises from (co)variation in gut microbiota and stress responsivity, which influence neuroinflammation and the serotonergic system. In binge-related eating disorders, even a short period of fasting drops serotonin levels, a state alleviated by binge eating. Eating disorder treatments should aim to reduce the chronic stress, neuroinflammation, stress responsivity and gut dysbiosis that fuel the disorders. We review the advances that have been made in recent years in understanding how to best treat eating disorders, outlining directions for future clinical research. Connecting ultimate causes with proximate mechanisms and treating biopsychosocial causes rather than manifest symptoms will enable more effective and sophisticated long-term interventions for the millions of people who suffer from eating disorders. (shrink)

Various 'nonmarket' economic valuation methods have been used to compute 'total' value of nonmarketed natural resources and related recreation. We first outline the history of these valuation techniques and use the Exxon Valdez disaster response and the valuation of whooping cranes, an endangered species, as examples of how these tools can constrain policy. We then explain how, by excluding non-economic social spheres, economic valuation techniques produce a terministic screen that deforms policy makers' vision of the ecological problems faced by society. (...) Using Luhmann's functionalist social theory, we demonstrate that when natural resource managers privilege economic motives, they trivialize other social functions such as education, politics, religion and law. This process presents a significant ethical dilemma for democracies by first naturalizing, then ethicizing, existing pattersns of domination. (shrink)

The application of hierarchy theory to ecological systems presents those who seek a radical change in human perspectives toward nature with a unique window of opportunity. Because hierarchy theory has enabled scientific ecologists to discover that the window through which one chooses to observe a system influences its reality, they may now be more amenable to including the perspectives of deep and feminist ecologists into their self-definition. A synergy between deep, feminist, and scientific ecology could improve environmental policy by encouraging (...) more ecofeminists to encompass the marginalisation of nonhuman life-forms within the ethic of care, more deep ecologists to encompass the issues of overconsumption and militarisation within the anthropocentric-biocentric polarity, and more scientific ecologists to scrutinise the politics behind their investigations. (shrink)

We present data from 122 nations showing that Baumard's argument on the ecological predictors of life history strategies and innovation is incomplete. Our analyses indicate that wealth, parasite stress, and cold climate impose orthogonal effects on life histories, innovation, and industrialization. Baumard also overlooks the historical exploitation of other nations which significantly enlarged the “pooled energy budget” available to England.

We study companies that do not produce a sustainability report in contexts where institutionalisation is assumed. Based on a careful analysis of interaction patterns between non-reporting companies, sustainability interest groups, and peer organisations, we find patterns of discursive and material isomorphism that suggest sustainability reporting is confined to an issues-based field, rather than spreading as an institutionalised practice across the business community. We argue that the issues-based field exerts only weak pressure for sustainability reporting, and that encouraging more firms to (...) report rests on understanding what influences companies to interact more widely to become part of this field. (shrink)

This collection applies the characterisations of children and childhood made in Deleuze and Guattari's work to concerns that have shaped our idea of the child. Bringing together established and new voices, the authors consider aspects of children's lives such as time, language, gender, affect, religion, atmosphere and schooling.

Perception of music and speech is based on similar auditory skills, and it is often suggested that those with enhanced music perception skills may perceive and learn novel words more easily. The current study tested whether music perception abilities are associated with novel word learning in an ambiguous learning scenario. Using a cross-situational word learning (CSWL) task, nonmusician adults were exposed to word-object pairings between eight novel words and visual referents. Novel words were either non-minimal pairs differing in all sounds (...) or minimal pairs differing in their initial consonant or vowel. In order to be successful in this task, learners need to be able to correctly encode the phonological details of the novel words and have sufficient auditory working memory to remember the correct word-object pairings. Using the Mistuning Perception Test (MPT) and the Melodic Discrimination Test (MDT), we measured learners’ pitch perception and auditory working memory. We predicted that those with higher MPT and MDT values would perform better in the CSWL task and in particular for novel words with high phonological overlap (i.e., minimal pairs). We found that higher musical perception skills led to higher accuracy for non-minimal pairs and minimal pairs differing in their initial consonant. Interestingly, this was not the case for vowel minimal pairs. We discuss the results in relation to theories of second language word learning such as the Second Language Perception model (L2LP). (shrink)

Given emerging evidence that learning to play a musical instrument may lead to a number of cognitive benefits for older adults, it is important to clarify how these training programs can be delivered optimally and meaningfully. The effective acquisition of musical and domain-general skills by later-life learners may be influenced by social, cultural and individual factors within the learning environment. The current study examines the effects of a 10-week piano training program on healthy older adult novices’ cognitive and motor skills, (...) in comparison to an inactive waitlisted control group. Fifteen participants completed piano training led by a music facilitator in small groups (max n = 4 per lesson class; two experimental, two waitlisted control groups). Data was collected using an explanatory sequential design: quantitative data from a battery of cognitive and motor tests was collected pre/post-test on all participants, with further post-test data from the waitlisted control group (n = 7). Qualitative data included weekly facilitator observations, participant practice diaries, and an individual, semi-structured, post-experiment interview. Bayesian modelling demonstrated moderate evidence of a strong positive impact of training on part A of the Trail Making test (TMT), indicating improved visuo-motor skills. Moderate evidence for negative impacts of training on part B of the Trail Making Test (and difference score delta) was also found, suggesting no benefit of cognitive... (shrink)

When people interact with novel technologies (e.g., robots, novel technological tools), the word “creepy” regularly pops up. We define creepy situations as ambiguous situations involving uneasy feelings as eliciting uneasy feelings and involving ambiguity (e.g., on how the behave or how to judge the situation). A common metric for creepiness would help evaluating creepiness of situations and developing adequate interventions against creepiness. Following psychometrical guidelines, we developed the Creepiness of Situation Scale (CRoSS) across four studies with a total of N (...) = 882 American and German participants. In Studies 1-3, participants watched a video of a creepy situation involving technology. Study 1 used exploratory factor analysis in an American sample and showed that creepiness consists of emotional creepiness and creepy ambiguity. In a German sample, Study 2 confirmed these subdimensions. Study 3 supported validity of the CRoSS as creepiness correlated positively with privacy concerns and computer anxiety, but negatively with controllability and transparency. Study 4 used the scale in a 2 (male vs. female experimenter) x 2 (male vs. female participant) x 2 (day vs. night) field study to demonstrate its usefulness for non-technological settings and its sensitivity to theory-based predictions. Results indicate that participants contacted by an experimenter at night-time reported higher feelings of creepiness. Overall, these studies suggest that the CRoSS is a psychometrically sound measure for research and practice. (shrink)

In this paper, we explore the ontological and theological ground of political institutions in order to then reflect upon the eschatological calling of society. The paper builds on Tillich's ontological insight that love does not simply transcend justice, but that it permeates and drives justice, that justice gives form to love's reunion of the separated. This relation between love and justice is at play in political institutions: these unite human beings under forms of justice that must be transformed ever anew (...) if they are not to lose touch with the dynamic power of love and freeze into increasingly unjust juridicalism. The modern history of Western civilisation bears witness to this ontological tension, and the phenomenon of globalisation is yet another instance of human society's mystical calling. Thus, love heads the dynamic movement that transforms political institutions ever anew. Yet society as a whole must become conscious of its ontology for humanity to truly reach its eschatological potential, and this will require both that theology recovers its ground and that political theory thinks theologically. (shrink)

At the turn of the century Idealism was perhaps the leading school of philosophy in the English-speaking world. By the 1960s the situation was very different. There had occurred during the previous two generations what has been described as 'a revolution in philosophy', one consequence of which had been the almost total eclipse of Idealism. Originally published in 1962, this book is a critical study of certain aspects of the work of four Idealist philosophers: F. H. Bradley, T. H. Green, (...) Bernard Bosanquet and Josiah Royce. It deals mainly with their social philosophy, but some consideration is also given to their metaphysics. It is the thesis of this book that there is a valid and significant form of Idealism to be found in the work of these philosophers, but that they did not succeed in developing it fully and consistently. (shrink)

Originally published in 1962, this book is a critical study of certain aspects of the work of four Idealist philosophers. It is the thesis of this book that there is a valid and significant form of Idealism to be found in the work of these philosophers, but that they did not succeed in developing it fully and consistently.