En este artículo se presenta una revisión bibliográfica de la novela Terra nostra, de Carlos Fuentes, y propicia diálogos que evidencian su actualidad y su relación interdisciplinar con la filosofía, la historia, el arte, la sociedad y la cultura. En los criterios estructurales se distinguen estas temáticas: mito e identidad, relaciones con el otro, imagen y memoria, y la reconstrucción de lo que somos y seremos. Se tuvieron en cuenta franjas temporales de ocho años, desde el momento de su publicación, (...) 1975, hasta el año 2015. Los estudios destacan los problemas de la identidad latinoamericana, la intertextualidad, la multiculturalidad y la conquista; revelan su actualidad en el siglo XXI a través del mestizaje, las tradiciones culturales del Viejo y el Nuevo Mundo, y los otros mundos; y expresan, así, la necesidad de reconstruir un nuevo humanismo. (shrink)

Esta reflexión sobre la memoria del dolor se realiza con base en la particular propuesta narrativa y ficcional de la obra _La carroza de Bolívar_ del escritor Evelio José Rosero Diago, Se pretende deconstruir al sujeto mítico, encarnado en el aparente héroe latinoamericano Simón Bolívar; desde una lectura diferente de la oficial se traen al presente hechos dramáticos ocurridos en el sur de Colombia durante el siglo XIX: la batalla de Bomboná y la llamada Navidad Negra. Así mismo, se visibiliza (...) la reconstrucción del sujeto colectivo, desde la visión irónica de los descendientes de las víctimas, puesta de manifiesto en la fiesta de Blancos y Negros. Más allá de la recreación e interpretación histórica, se invita a cuestionar la manipulación de un sujeto que conjuga una serie de intereses y juegos de poder. Para desentrañar lo oculto y para que aflore una nueva conciencia vital, la lectura y la estrategia deconstructivista, ayudan a resaltar la importancia que representa para la salud del pueblo, no sólo la visión crítica de su memoria sino también, la desestructuración de la mentira. En la novela la invención de lo carnavalesco es el acontecimiento que permite depurar odios y crear una conciencia reconciliada de la vida; así el autor logra demostrar la grandeza de un pueblo, capaz de sanar heridas físicas y culturales a través del no olvido y la ironía dionisiaca. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to determine empirically the state of the art of the medical care, when healthcare personal is confronted with ethical dilemmas related with the care they give to the geriatric population. An observational, longitudinal, prospective and qualitative study was conducted by analyzing the correlation between healthcare personnel–patient relationship, and ethical judgments regarding dilemmas that arise in daily clinical practice with geriatric patients. Mexican healthcare personnel with current active practices were asked to write up an ethical (...) dilemma that arose frequently or that had impacted their medical practice. From the narrative input, we were able to draw up a database with 421 dilemmas, and those corresponding to patients 60 years and older were selected (n = 54, 12.8 %). The axiological analysis of the narrative dilemmas of geriatric patients was made using dialectical empiricism. The axiological analysis values found most frequently were classified into three groups: the impact of healthcare, the roles of the physician, and refusal of therapy; the healthcare role of educator, caring for the patients’ life and the risk of imminent death where the values found more often. The persistence and universality of certain dilemmas in geriatrics calls for awareness and requires a good training in the ethical discernment of these dilemmas. This would help to improve substantially the care and the life quality of this population. (shrink)

While the study of implicit learning is nothing new, the field as a whole has come to embody — over the last decade or so — ongoing questioning about three of the most fundamental debates in the cognitive sciences: The nature of consciousness, the nature of mental representation (in particular the difficult issue of abstraction), and the role of experience in shaping the cognitive system. Our main goal in this chapter is to offer a framework that attempts to integrate current (...) thinking about these three issues in a way that specifically links consciousness with adaptation and learning. Our assumptions about this relationship are rooted in further assumptions about the nature of processing and of representation in cognitive systems. When considered together, we believe that these assumptions offer a new perspective on the relationships between conscious and unconscious processing and on the function of consciousness in cognitive systems. (shrink)

How do we acquire a mental representation of our own face? Recently, synchronous, but not asynchronous, interpersonal multisensory stimulation between one’s own and another person’s face has been used to evoke changes in self-identification . We investigated the conscious experience of these changes with principal component analyses that revealed that while the conscious experience during synchronous IMS focused on resemblance and similarity with the other’s face, during asynchronous IMS it focused on multisensory stimulation. Analyses of the identified common factor structure (...) revealed significant quantitative differences between synchronous and asynchronous IMS on self-identification and perceived similarity with the other’s face. Experiment 2 revealed that participants with lower interoceptive sensitivity experienced stronger enfacement illusion. Overall, self-identification and body-ownership rely on similar basic mechanisms of multisensory integration, but the effects of multisensory input on their experience are qualitatively different, possibly underlying the face’s unique role as a marker of selfhood. (shrink)

Following Goldman’s seminal work, most contemporary philosophical contributions on the novice-expert relation have adopted a normative, expert-focused approach. In this paper, we aim to shift the focus of the philosophical analysis towards the characteristics of the novices, and how they might determine the choices that experts make. On the bases of recent empirical evidence from social psychology, we discuss how novices evaluate the messages that they receive and distinguish diverse kinds of novices according to their competence in message assessment. Building (...) on that analysis, we discuss the difficulties of approaches to expertise that focus only on the standpoint of novices or assume novices are homogeneous. In our analysis, we introduce the standpoint of experts, and we pay special attention to the heterogeneity of novices. This approach allows us to identify and address the difficulties faced by experts in the context of science communication. In the last part of the paper, we characterise and discuss the problem of experts when choosing a strategy in the issuing of a public campaign to advise or inform certain populations of novices. (shrink)

The aim of this research is focused on analyzing the alteration of the psychophysiological and cognitive response to an objective computerized stress test, when the behavioral response is controlled. The sample used was sports science students, with a mean age of 22.82 A quasi-experimental design was used in which the response of each participant to the DT test was evaluated. The variable “number of hours of physical activity per week” and the variable “level of behavioral response to stress” were controlled. (...) Before and after this test, the following parameters were measured: activation and central fatigue, and perceived exertion. Significant differences were found in all of the measures indicated. The usefulness of this protocol and the measures used to analyze the stress response capacity of the study subjects are discussed. (shrink)

En la genealogía del cuidado de sí, Foucault afirma que la filosofía cartesiana propina a esta tradición el golpe definitivo que la condena al olvido. A partir de entonces, el sujeto ya no debe practicar sobre su ser de sujeto ninguna transformación para acceder a la verdad, basta con el empleo correcto de sus facultades cognoscitivas. En este artículo se defiende que en Descartes la cuestión del cuidado no es olvidada, sino que precisamente la empresa de la reconstrucción del edificio (...) del conocimiento para la búsqueda de la verdad es abordada como fruto de una decisión moral sobre la forma de vida. (shrink)

Social representations of addiction and the resulting stigmatization have been widely described and studied in the literature, but their effects are no less problematic. These representations, which also occur in care settings, generate a climate of distrust which damages the therapeutic relationship, and its ethical quality. This article, combining clinical experience and an ethical stance, offers an original, innovating approach to the existence of distrust in care relationships in the area of addiction. Pragmatic approaches deriving from the human sciences and (...) analytical philosophy provide an invitation to escape from the demanding climate of mistrust, and to take the gamble on trust so as to improve the quality of interactions between protagonists in care. In complementary fashion, a sociology of action can combat the disquiet generated by distrust through a new commitment to innovating forms of action. This “poetic” mode of action is legitimized by the reflection that backs it up, and by its presentation to peers qualified to approve it. Finally, continental moral philosophy underlines the importance of a carefully weighed commitment on the part of caregivers and addicted patients towards promises aiming to support a sincere care relationship, without damaging the therapeutic dynamic or the ethical quality by providing too many safety nets. This reflection is intended to achieve better identification of the clinical and ethical issues raised by mistrust, and inclusion of these aspects in the training of personnel and in care provision planning. (shrink)

This case study considers how one public high school in Northern California offered a yearlong course that combined a semester-long LGBTQ+ studies class with a semester-long ethnic studies class, taught by the same teacher and attended by the same cohort of 26 students. Through a combination of identity maps, student interviews, and a transfer task (i.e., a digital textbook project), we explored students’ experiences and efforts to discern how their awareness of LGBTQ+ and ethnic studies issues, particularly the intersectionality of (...) those issues, may have influenced their own identities. This research offers a model for educators and policymakers, as well as lessons learned and inspiration, for incorporating intersectional LGBTQ+ content and curriculum into social studies classrooms. It presents ways, both big and small, for K-12 educators to connect LGBTQ+ issues and rights with those from communities of color. Findings illustrate that queer theory and historical thinking can indeed offer a valuable guide for encouraging social studies educators and students to expand their understanding of the intersecting experiences of people of color and the LGBTQ+ community. (shrink)

We explored the home learning environments of 173 Mexican preschool children (aged 3–6 years) in relation to their numeracy performance. Parents indicated the frequency of their formal home numeracy and literacy activities, and their academic expectations for children’s numeracy and literacy performance. Children completed measures of early numeracy skills. Mexican parent–child dyads from families with either high- or low-socioeconomic status (SES) participated. Low-SES parents (n= 99) reported higher numeracy expectations than high-SES parents (n= 74), but similar frequency of home numeracy (...) activities. In contrast, high-SES parents reported higher frequency of literacy activities. Path analyses showed that operational (i.e., advanced) numeracy activities were positively related to children’s numeracy skills in the high- but not in the low-SES group. These findings improve the understanding of the role of the home environment in different contexts and provide some insights into the sources of the variable patterns of relations between home learning activities and children’s numeracy outcomes. They also suggest that SES is a critical factor to consider in research on children’s home numeracy experiences. (shrink)

The challenges of adapting to this new world require universities to establish new actions that strengthen the preparation of their students. The objective of the research is to identify the degree of burnout that students of the Bachelor of Public Accounting (BPA) and Bachelor of Economics and Finance (BEF) programs of the Technological Institute of Sonora are experiencing. The research methodology is quantitative, non-experimental, with a cross-sectional design and descriptive scope. To collect the information, the Burnout Inventory-Student Survey (MBISS) was (...) used, developed by Schaufeli, Martínez, Salanova, GonzálezRomá and Bakker in 2002 in its Colombian adaptation and validation developed by Hederich and Caballero in 2016. The contribution is to determine the situation of the students of these academic programs in three major aspects: Exhaustion, Cynicism and Academic Efficiency, in such a way that interventions are established that support the academic transition of the student. (shrink)

Background Despite continuous performance improvements, especially in clinical contexts, a major challenge of Artificial Intelligence based Decision Support Systems (AI-DSS) remains their degree of epistemic opacity. The conditions of and the solutions for the justified use of the occasionally unexplainable technology in healthcare are an active field of research. In March 2024, the European Union agreed upon the Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA), requiring medical AI-DSS to be ad-hoc explainable or to use post-hoc explainability methods. The ethical debate does not seem (...) to settle on this requirement yet. This systematic review aims to outline and categorize the positions and arguments in the ethical debate. Methods We conducted a literature search on PubMed, BASE, and Scopus for English-speaking scientific peer-reviewed publications from 2016 to 2024. The inclusion criterion was to give explicit requirements of explainability for AI-DSS in healthcare and reason for it. Non-domain-specific documents, as well as surveys, reviews, and meta-analyses were excluded. The ethical requirements for explainability outlined in the documents were qualitatively analyzed with respect to arguments for the requirement of explainability and the required level of explainability. Results The literature search resulted in 1662 documents; 44 documents were included in the review after eligibility screening of the remaining full texts. Our analysis showed that 17 records argue in favor of the requirement of explainable AI methods (xAI) or ad-hoc explainable models, providing 9 categories of arguments. The other 27 records argued against a general requirement, providing 11 categories of arguments. Also, we found that 14 works advocate the need for context-dependent levels of explainability, as opposed to 30 documents, arguing for context-independent, absolute standards. Conclusions The systematic review of reasons shows no clear agreement on the requirement of post-hoc explainability methods or ad-hoc explainable models for AI-DSS in healthcare. The arguments found in the debate were referenced and responded to from different perspectives, demonstrating an interactive discourse. Policymakers and researchers should watch the development of the debate closely. Conversely, ethicists should be well informed by empirical and technical research, given the frequency of advancements in the field. (shrink)

The Spanish approximators como and como que serve multiple pragmatic functions. They can be employed in similar contexts to express vagueness when speakers experience uncertainty or to hedge and avoid being straightforward. Furthermore, these forms can alternate according to context since they represent two ways of saying the same thing. This study investigated the use of como and como que in two speech events: narratives of personal experience and therapeutic interviews, which were generated by Spanish speakers of several varieties, educational (...) levels, and lengths of residence in the United States. The study was informed by the theoretical frameworks of sociolinguistic and pragmatic variation, and the data were analyzed using quantitative and qualitative approaches. The findings revealed that while como was the preferred form among the speakers of the study they employed como que more often in the therapeutic interviews. Thus, both discourse and the pragmatic functions conditioned the use of these approximators. (shrink)

Victims of disaster suffer, not only at the very moment of the disaster, but also years after the disaster has taken place, they are still in an emotional journey. While many moral perspectives focus on the moment of the disaster itself, a lot of work is to be done years after the disaster. How do people go through their suffering and how can we take care of them? Research on human suffering after a major catastrophe, using an ethics of care (...) perspective, is scarce. People suffering from disasters are often called to be in distress and their emotional difficulties ‘medicalised’. This brings them often into a situation of long term use of medication, and one can wonder if medication is of help to them in the long run. In our paper, we will explore another moral perspective, focusing on the importance of the victims’ narrative and their lived experiences. We will use Paul Ricoeur’s phenomenological reflections from ‘Suffering is not the same as pain’ for conceptualizing human suffering and how to apply it to victims of disaster. Ricoeur suggests that suffering is not a quantity that can be measured, but a characteristic that should be studied qualitatively in interpersonal and narrative contexts. Above all, the perspective of care and listening could offer an opportunity to reconcile people from their loss and suffering. (shrink)

The supply chain of the auto body industry in Duitama, Boyacá, faces challenges that affect its efficiency, such as the lack of integration of new technologies and organizational management models, limiting its competitiveness in expanded markets. The purpose of this research is to analyze the key links in the supply chain: procurement, production, distribution and organizational performance, in order to identify opportunities for improvement that promote the strengthening and sustainability of the local auto body industry. Methodologically, a qualitative approach with (...) descriptive scope is employed, using a documentary review and direct observation. The findings indicate that the main difficulty lies in the absence of integrated logistics and management strategies, which leads to the isolated operation of the links in the chain, reducing the efficiency and competitiveness of the companies. It is concluded that it is essential to develop proposals that promote the implementation of management guidelines that strengthen each link of the supply chain and are more integrative and effective, ensuring the continuity and business success of the bodywork sector in Duitama. (shrink)

Ante las dificultades que presenta el camino que hace ya algún tiempo se decidió emprender en este país, un camino lúgubre en el que proliferan como hongos diversas reivindicaciones del derecho de autodeterminación, esto es, de la soberanía, por parte de distintos pueblos o naciones, se hace evidente la necesidad de reflexionar sobre el mismo concepto del poder soberano. En este texto se aborda tal problema desde tres perspectivas, fáctica, normativa y racional. Al mismo tiempo que se ponen de manifiesto (...) las insuficiencias de las dos primeras, se defiende una comprensión racional del poder soberano, que quizá podría contribuir a la disolución de los malos augurios que se ciernen sobre nuestro futuro. (shrink)

In our time there is growing interest in developing a systematic approach to oncologic patients and end-of-life care. An important goal within this domain is to identify the values and ethical norms that guide physicians’ decisions and their recourse to technological aids to preserve life. Though crucial, this objective is not easy to achieve.

Despite the emphasis placed by most curricula in the development of social and emotional competencies in education, there seems to be a general lack of knowledge of methods that integrate strategies for assessing these competencies into existing educational practices. Previous research has shown that the development of social and emotional competencies in children has multiple benefits, as they seem to contribute to better physical and mental health, an increase in academic motivation, and the well-being and healthy social progress of children. (...) This study aims at assessing the possible changes in children’s self-esteem, socio-emotional competencies, and school-related variables after participating in the Learning to Be project (L2B) project.Methods:This quasi-experimental study included an intervention group (L2B) and a control group. The participants were 221 students in primary education (55.2% girls) between the ages of eight and 11 (M= 9.31; SD = 0.89). The L2B intervention program took place over a period of 5 months. The assessment was carried out twice, before and after the intervention through three main evaluation instruments: the Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem questionnaire, the Socio-Emotional competence questionnaire (SEQ), and self-report scales for measuring school difficulties, school engagement, opinions about school, and school absence. Ten schools from different Spanish provinces participated.Results:The results indicate that those participants in the experimental group show higher self-esteem, better responsible decisions, and higher self-awareness than those in the control group. There were no other statistical differences between groups.Conclusions:The results of this work suggest that the implementation of the L2B program did not improve social and emotional competencies in primary school students. Further research related to how include formative assessment in SEL programs is needed. (shrink)

Traducción del artículo originalmente publicado como Sorgner, S. L. (2017). Immortality as Utopia and the Relevance of Nihilism. En Y. Tuncel (ed), Nietzsche and transhumanism. Precursor or enemy? (pp. 248-261). Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Este texto ha sido Publicado con la autorización de Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Agradecemos a Stefan Lorenz Sorgner por autorizarnos a realizar la traducción de este texto.

Biomedical technologies capable of sharply reducing or ending human aging, “radical life extension”, call for a Christian response. The authors featured in this article offer some preliminary thoughts. Common themes include: What kind of life counts as a “good life;” the limits, if any, of human freedom; the consequences of extended life on the human species and on the Earth; the meaning and value of finite and vulnerable embodied life; the experience of time; anthropological self-understanding; and human dignity. Notably, all (...) four authors share serious concerns about RLE’s potential effects. (shrink)

Promoting honesty is considered a key endeavor in the betterment of our societies. However, our understanding of this phenomenon, and of its evil twin, dishonesty, is still lacking. In this text, we analyze the main tenets assumed by empirical models of vigilance and sanctions. We approach our analysis in three sections. Initially, we investigate the concept of honesty as assumed by commonly used methodologies in studying honesty. This then leads us to identify the previously overlooked but essential element of epistemic (...) privilege in characterizing honesty. In the third part, we delve into how current explanatory models of honesty lack sufficient consideration of epistemic privilege, resulting in incomplete narratives about honesty. Our analysis of the extant literature suggests that both internal (including the self-concept maintenance theory) and external vigilance models fall short of explaining honesty and dishonesty because of both conceptual problems and empirical inadequacy. Identifying these shortcomings allows us to suggest some possible directions of research. (shrink)

Was ist Natur oder was könnte sie sein? Diese und weitere Fragen sind grundlegend für Naturdenken und -handeln. Das Lehr- und Studienbuch bietet eine historisch-systematische und zugleich praxisbezogene Einführung in die Naturphilosophie mit ihren wichtigsten Begriffen. Es nimmt den pluralen Charakter der Wahrnehmung von Natur in den philosophischen Blick und ist auch zum Selbststudium bestens geeignet.

La obra De revolutionibus orbium coelestium instaló la piedra fundacional de una mentalidad que concibió un nuevo modelo de racionalidad. La hipótesis heliocéntrica ideada por Nicolás Copérnico ha ingresado en la narrativa contemporánea como una de las batallas libradas en contra de la cosmología medieval, lo que se traduce como un enfrentamiento a la hegemonía socio-política que la iglesia católica proyectaba sobre las cuestiones más decisivas de la humanidad. No obstante, la cosmología, vista a través de una mirada hermenéutica propuesta (...) por Ernst Cassirer, nos permite suspender la condición ascendente de la historia para dirigir nuestra atención a la filiación neoplatónica, pitagórica y gnóstica de ciertas cualidades que finalmente jugaron a favor de la aceptación de la nueva imagen del mundo. Estas doctrinas fueron clave en la articulación de aquella nueva cosmología, y sin embargo, nuestra modernidad no ha sabido reconocer sus aportes a una historia de la ideas. Por estos motivos pondremos en relación la obra con algunos preceptos cosmológicos en el contexto epistemológico del Renacimiento, lo cual arrojará luz sobre ciertas zonas desconocidas de la obra, y también, porqué no, sobre ciertas zonas ignotas del espíritu de nuestra modernidad. (shrink)

Das "Hegel-Jahrbuch" ist das Jahrbuch der Internationalen Hegel-Gesellschaft. die 1953 von Wilhelm Raimund Beyer in Nürnberg gegründet wurde. Es erscheint seit 1961und wurde bis 1984 von W. R. Beyer, seither vom jeweils amtierenden Vorstand der Gesellschaft herausgegeben. Seit 1994 erscheint das Jahrbuch im Akademie Verlag. Es dokumentiert die Beiträge der Internationalen Hegel-Kongresse, die alle zwei Jahre zu wechselnden Schwerpunktthemen stattfinden.

El presente trabajo se propone ofrecer una panorámica general de un tema que ha sido, es y seguirá siendo polémico: la responsabilidad penal de los menores. Para lograr dicho objetivo se dará cuenta de la regulación vigente al respecto, la que hasta llegar a la situación actual ha debido recorrer un largo camino de reformas que serán revisadas en algunos de sus aspectos más controvertidos. Asimismo se fundamentará el indudable carácter penal de la LO 5/2000, de 12 de enero, reguladora (...) de la responsabilidad penal de los menores, de las medidas que impone y, en consecuencia, de la responsabilidad que se exige a los menores sometidos a ella. Parte importante de este artículo estará dedicada, de un lado, a estos menores de entre 14 y 18 años destinatarios de la LO 5/2000, respecto de los que, entre otras cuestiones, se determinará si son o no imputables; y, de otro, a aquellos que tienen menos de 14 años, reflexionando, entre otros extremos, sobre la necesidad o no de rebajar dicha edad como límite mínimo para comenzar a exigir responsabilidad criminal. (shrink)

This article discusses the notion of justice from a capabilities approach. We undertake an empirical analysis of the concepts of justice held by healthcare personnel, gleaned from a qualitative analysis of interviews on the subject of ethical dilemmas in everyday practice. The article states that Justice undoubtedly presents a work in progress, which implicates the link between justice as capability and human dignity.We empirically found a contrast between the views of justice based on the patient's own perceptions and those based (...) on the perceptions of healthcare personnel. We establish the kind of actions, communication skills and justice required to build a stronger relationship between patients and healthcare professionals, which would improve prognosis, treatment efficiency and therapeutic adhesion. (shrink)

The idea of man in José Gaos could be explained taking in account two essential axes that make an inter-relationship between them and define man substantially: 1) antinomy love-hate-emotions and motions-expression and 2) reason-thought-language. The first is “the condition of possibility” of the second, being the element more suitable and radical that allows man to think concepts. The emotions and motions impose conditions over his will and determine the moral being that is. The man is a unity, but at the (...) same time, is an oscillation between opposites that make him take consciousness of his individuality, from the others, his historicity and intersubjectivity. The Gaos proposal is an important contribution to the anthropological reflection of the moment, because of the analysis categories that offers, of undeniable value, to the better understanding of suitable aspects of the being and acting of the Latino American man. (shrink)

Resumen. En México, la mercadotecnia promocional se ha erigido como la segunda más grande inversión demercadotecnia, principalmente debido a que las compañías tienden con más frecuencia a subcontratar laresponsabilidad de los aspectos operativos de la mercadotecnia. Las empresas contratantes exigen cada vezmás la garantía de seguridad y certidumbre en la prestación de los servicios, por lo que la calidad de éste seha convertido en un factor determinante en la elección de una agencia de promociones. El presentedocumento técnico busca compartir un (...) caso de estudio relacionado a una empresa de promoción de ventasque enfrenta una alta tasa de deserción de clientes con su consecuente contracción en las ventas, pero quecontradictoriamente está inmersa en un mercado que tiene un crecimiento sostenido del 15 por ciento en losúltimos años. El problema fue abordado desde la perspectiva de la calidad en el servicio y la satisfacción delcliente a través de la aplicación de encuestas Servqual a algunos clientes de la compañía. Dichas encuestaspermitieron: identificar las dimensiones de calidad relevantes en el servicio, detectar las áreas de oportunidadentre el servicio esperado y el servicio real, y la elaboración de un plan de acción que posteriormente fuesistematizado e implementado. Los resultados muestran que la implementación del sistema de calidad redujola deserción de los clientes; además, se descubrió que las dimensiones de calidad del Servqual afectan enproporciones diferentes a la satisfacción del cliente.Palabras Claves. Calidad en el servicio, deserción de clientes, mercadotecnia promocional, promoción deventas, QFD, satisfacción del cliente, Servqual, sistema de calidad.. In Mexico, the promotional marketing has emerged as the second largest marketing investment,mainly because companies tend to outsource most often the operational aspects of marketing. Thosecompanies are increasingly demanding security and certainty in the delivery of services. As a consequence,service quality has become a determining factor in the election of a sales promotion agency. This technicalpaperwork shares a case study related to a sales promotion company facing high customer defection rate withits consequent contraction in sales, but ironically immersed in a market that has a sustained growth of 15 per cent in recent years. Approach of the problem was from quality service and customer satisfaction perspectivethrough the use of Servqual surveys applied to some customers. These surveys allowed: to identify relevantdimensions of quality service, to identify opportunities between the expected service and the actual service,and the development of an action plan which was later systematized and implemented. Results show that theimplementation of the quality system reduced customer desertion. Also, found that the quality dimensions of SERVQUAL affect customer satisfaction in different ways.Keywords. Customer defection, customer satisfaction, quality service, quality system, QFD, sales promotion,Servqual. (shrink)

The most popular work of Francisco Sánchez, Quo nihil scitur (1581), transmits an absolutely sceptic thought. However, other writings like Carmen de Cometa anni M.D.LXXVII (1578), offer us different ideas about how Sánchez considers possible the scientific knowledge like, for example, his idea about the casual relations between natural objects.

This article discusses the notion of justice from a capabilities approach. We undertake an empirical analysis of the concepts of justice held by healthcare personnel, gleaned from a qualitative analysis of interviews on the subject of ethical dilemmas in everyday practice. The article states that Justice undoubtedly presents a work in progress, which implicates the link between justice as capability and human dignity. We empirically found a contrast between the views of justice based on the patient's own perceptions and those (...) based on the perceptions of healthcare personnel. We establish the kind of actions, communication skills and justice required to build a stronger relationship between patients and healthcare professionals, which would improve prognosis, treatment efficiency and therapeutic adhesion. (shrink)