Kirsten Foot’s research while affiliated with University of Washington and other places

Multiprofessional, interorganizational, and cross-sector collaboration is widely recognized as essential to counter human trafficking. Considerable effort is invested in collaborating against human trafficking, both between and within countries. Recent and long-standing illustrative examples of such efforts include the initiative by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) to foster public–private partnerships, the “enhanced collaborative model” multidisciplinary task forces funded by the United States (US) Department of Justice, and technologies such as the Online Community Platform recently launched by the National Freedom Network in South Africa that allows for information to be shared more easily and facilitates access to resources and opportunities for organic collaboration between organizations on the African continent. To be sustainable, such collaborative efforts must result in positive outcomes for the collaborating partners and demonstrable progress against human trafficking. However, the processes of organizing and leading robust collaborations are complex and challenging—and understudied.

Restaurant employees in the United States have experienced unprecedented challenges to their mental health and well-being (MHW) during the COVID-19 pandemic, yet little is known about communication regarding MHW in the restaurant industry. Drawing on health, organizational, and interpersonal communication concepts, this exploratory, survey-based study probed whether, how, and why or why not restaurant employees in western Washington State conversed about MHW with one another and their managers during the winter of 2021. Key findings include that there are many reasons why some restaurant employees do not engage in conversations about MHW with other members of the workplace. However, when such conversations do occur, they are typically mutual, positive, and relationally-oriented—more so among coworkers than between employees and managers. Additionally, both coworkers and managers are sources of social support and resource exchange during these conversations, although the evidence is stronger among coworkers. Our findings contribute to the extant literature on mental health communication in the workplace and demonstrate the merit in more closely examining superior-subordinate and coworker communication about personal and sensitive topics, like MHW. Comparative analysis of employees’ MHW-related communication with coworkers versus managers revealed both similarities and differences that carry implications for managerial practice and future research. KEYWORDS: Mental Health and Well-being (MHW); Disclosure; Superior-subordinate Communication; Peer Coworker; Social Exchange; Social Support; Interpersonal Communication Motives (ICM), Restaurant Employees

Continuous-living-cover (CLC) agriculture integrates multiple crops to create diversified agroecosystems in which soils are covered by living plants across time and space continuously. CLC agriculture can greatly improve production of many different ecosystem services from agroecosystems, including climate adaptation and mitigation. To go to scale, CLC agriculture requires crops that not only provide continuous living cover but are viable in economic and social terms. At present, lack of such viable crops is strongly limiting the scaling of CLC agriculture. Gene editing (GE) might provide a powerful tool for developing the crops needed to expand CLC agriculture to scale. To assess this possibility, a broad multi-sector deliberative group considered the merits of GE—relative to alternative plant-breeding methods—as means for improving crops for CLC agriculture. The group included many of the sectors whose support is necessary to scaling agricultural innovations, including actors involved in markets, finance, policy, and R&D. In this article, we report findings from interviews and deliberative workshops. Many in the group were enthusiastic about prospects for applications of GE to develop crops for CLC agriculture, relative to alternative plant-breeding options. However, the group noted many issues, risks, and contingencies, all of which are likely to require responsive and adaptive management. Conversely, if these issues, risks, and contingencies cannot be managed, it appears unlikely that a strong multi-sector base of support can be sustained for such applications, limiting their scaling. Emerging methods for responsible innovation and scaling have potential to manage these issues, risks, and contingencies; we propose that outcomes from GE crops for CLC agriculture are likely to be much improved if these emerging methods are used to govern such projects. However, both GE of CLC crops and responsible innovation and scaling are unrefined innovations. Therefore, we suggest that the best pathway for exploring GE of CLC crops is to intentionally couple implementation and refinement of both kinds of innovations. More broadly, we argue that such pilot projects are urgently needed to navigate intensifying grand challenges around food and agriculture, which are likely to create intense pressures to develop genetically-engineered agricultural products and equally intense social conflict.

Organizational communication scholars have historically conducted research in large for-profit businesses, governmental agencies, and a few high-profile nonprofits/NGOs—all of which are relatively easy to access and presumably “safe” to study. It is largely unsurprising, then, that limited scholarship addresses the challenges associated with conducting research in less standard contexts that are often perceived to be difficult, dangerous, and/or vulnerable (DDV). In this forum, we offer lived stories—unfiltered messy narratives—to demystify three core ethical challenges inherent in conducting research of this nature and share how we (imperfectly) navigated them. In addition, we offer practical strategies for conducting research in DDV contexts. Taken together, our overall collective aim is to successfully prepare future scholars to conduct research projects in DDV contexts.