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This paper aims to understand the clinical practice of physiotherapists and occupational therapists in the Republic of Ireland in the assessment and treatment of spasticity in adults, to inform and improve spasticity management practice. This study also aims to describe therapists’ knowledge, confidence and perceived barriers in the management of spasticity.

A cross sectional survey design study was completed, and respondents were recruited through an online survey.

In total, 92 respondents from a wide range of clinical settings revealed there is considerable variation in services available nationally for adults presenting with spasticity. There were significant inconsistencies across all areas of practice. The majority of respondents (94%) did provide intervention to patients with spasticity, yet three quarters did not have access to a specialist spasticity clinic, and the majority (82%) did not feel they were providing sufficient treatment intensity for spasticity.

These findings provide a unique insight into the assessment and treatment practices of Irish physiotherapists and occupational therapists. These results demonstrate the need for further upskilling and specialist high-quality spasticity services nationally.

Aims to review the literature on evaluation and to examine research, theory and practice in relation to two key questions: What is evaluation and What is its contribution? Evaluation is increasingly a contemporary concern owing to growing demand for verification of programme results and the current political and economic climate. With the growth in evaluation activity in diverse fields, especially within new domains, those involved in health‐care delivery can benefit from an overview of the universal fundamentals of research and theory that translate into improved practice. To evaluate effectively, there is a need for a full understanding of evaluation’s nature, purposes and concepts. Identifies and reviews the key sub‐domains of evaluation, namely: definitions; theoretical underpinning; formulation of goals and objectives; specification of the programme; and cost‐benefit analysis.

This paper considers the implications of mass communications theory on public relations (PR) evaluation and briefly reviews mass communication effects, persuasion, and cognition, attitude and behaviour change theories. The implications for evaluation are then examined. Reliance on domino models is shown to be too simplistic. It is suggested that claims of PR behavioural effects may be unrealistic and it is argued that more moderate and/or alternative goals are needed if preordained failure is to be avoided. Evaluation results must be interpreted cautiously so that further significance that is not supported by theory is not assumed. This paper shows how the concept of PR evaluation could be widened to include formative evaluation and broad environmental monitoring, which are especially important in identifying and understanding why and how communication works, what its effects are, what factors restrict or facilitate effectiveness and under what conditions success can be maximised.

This study aims to provide more insight into how customer voice is captured and used in managerial decision-making at the marketing-finance interface. This study’s focus is on understanding how the customer voice, often communicated through online and social media platforms, is used in high-performing hotels.

This research is based on a case study of four high-performing Irish hotels. For each case, multiple informants, including marketing managers, general managers and finance managers, were interviewed and shadowed. Twenty seven decisions across the four cases were analysed to assess the use of customer voice in managerial decision-making.

Social media provides a stage that has empowered the customer voice because of the public nature of the interaction and the network effect. Customer voice is incorporated in managerial decision-making in three distinct ways – symbolically as part of an early warning system, for action-oriented operational decisions and to some extent in the knowledge-enhancing role for tactical decisions. While there is a greater appreciation among senior managers and the finance and accounting managers of the importance of customer voice, this study finds clear limits in its utilisation and more reliance on traditional finance and accounting data, especially in strategic decision-making.

The cases belong to a highly visible open environment of hotels in an industry where customer voice has immediate and strong effects. The findings may not directly apply to industries characterised by a relatively more closed context such as banking or insurance. Moreover, the findings reflect the practices of high-performing hotels and do not necessarily capture the practices used in less successfully operating hotels.

While marketers need to enhance their ability to create a narrative that links the customer voice to revenue generation, finance managers also need to develop a skillset and adopt a mindset that appropriately reflects the influential role for customer voice in managerial decision-making.

Despite the linkage of marketing performance to business performance, there is limited research on the impact of customer information on managerial decision-making. This research provides insight into how customer voice is considered at the critical marketing-finance interface.

This article examines the history of social work research within the UK from a perspective of evidence‐based practice, as originally advocated in the 1990s. It reviews the progress made to date in relation to the use of experimental studies in the field of children and families, and the reasons why this remains limited. It sets this in the broader context of evidence‐based practice and the education and training of qualifying and post‐qualifying social workers, including postgraduate training.

The following is an annotated list of materials dealing with information literacy including instruction in the use of information resources, research, and computer skills related to retrieving, using, and evaluating information. This review, the twenty‐second to be published in Reference Services Review, includes items in English published in 1995. After 21 years, the title of this review of the literature has been changed from “Library Orientation and Instruction” to “Library Instruction and Information Literacy,” to indicate the growing trend of moving to information skills instruction.