Mid-Career Transition

Abstract

The era of change is now the rule rather than the exception. Organizations are adapting to environmental demands such as an expanding international market, individual work techniques in manufacturing are being replaced by work group techniques because of increasing competition, and the individual himself/herself is experiencing changes in values through the maturation process as well. At mid-career these transitions pose difficult questions for the individual; he/she is concerned with maintaining work competency and managing change related stress. A strategy involving the continuous scanning of organizational, work and individual issues may assist the mid-careerist in answering these questions. Learning, understanding, predicting and acting, and controlling are the elements required in the process of problem-solving and decision-making for the individual as he manages his/her mid-career transition through this myriad of organizational, work, and individual change.     

Organization and Leadership in the Participatory Community

Abstract

Participation is a community mobilization process which develops in relation to its internal and external conditions. Two of the most salient internal conditions due to their importance for the development of community participation (CP) are the organization and the leadership adopted by participants throughout the participatory project. That is, the community constructs along its self-management process, the particularities that those conditions should have, so that they correspond with the meaning of participation orienting it and with the characteristics of the goals the community attempts to achieve. It is argued that organization and leadership develop in the participatory community not only as related conditions, as they jointly influence CP, but as two conditions which mutually influence one another, so that the definition the community makes of one of them converges with the definition of the other one. That relationship is examined taking as illustration a case study of CP which has a successful history of seventeen years of continued participation.     

Managing Bullying and Managing Difference

Abstract

Much work on school bullying focuses on developing our understanding of the various factors that contribute to bullying and its management. This case study focuses on the possible connections between parts and offers a metaperspective of one mainstream secondary school. Demonstrating that bullying and its management is embedded within the network of relationships which together form the school system, a range of issues and dilemmas relevant to all schools are highlighted and discussed.     

Violence Prevention

Abstract

Violence prevention requires a broad focus. Several multimedia-enhanced, psychological education courses that are capable of Internet delivery have been developed at Arizona State University and at KnowConfhct, LLC. These interactive interventions have evolved from earlier work on simulations and computer-based learning; however, they incorporate recent technological advances and current psychological research in areas such as differential diagnosis, observational learning, and cognitive restructuring. They specifically address changing the irrational beliefs that mediate low self-esteem and occupational stereotyping, educating parents on practices affecting the career outcomes of their children, and altering attributions relevant to academic motivation and performance. Although all of these psychological education curricula are relevant to violence prevention, and all have been subjected to continuing conceptual and empirical scrutiny, the most recent project deals directly with enhancing the conflict management skills of our nation's youth.     

社会组织参与政府购买公共服务的困境与优化--基于制度场域框架的分析

社会组织在参与政府购买公共服务时存在诸多困境,已有研究多从政府主导角度进行分析,这并不能真正解读相关困境。本研究以B市C区为个案,运用访谈和参与观察的方法收集社会组织参与政府购买公共服务的第一手资料,并提出社会组织运行的制度场域分析框架。研究发现,社会组织在服务供给中存在的服务目标、服务过程和服务能力等困境已经对政府购买公共服务制度实践产生了明显的消极影响。这些困境的产生是社会组织运行的制度场域中权力、规则和信息等资源的扩散机制综合影响的结果,涉及到政府、第三方评估机构和社会组织等三类代表主体。因此,社会组织参与政府购买公共服务的困境应当通过制度场域中各代表主体协商共治加以优化。通过解决社会组织运行的制度场域中存在的系统性困境,可以有效激发社会组织的理想功能,显著推动政府购买公共服务健康发展,进而对探索中国社会治理体系和能力提供路径选择。     

Schizophrenia,AIDS and the Decision to Prescribe HAART

SUMMARY

Individuals with schizophrenia are at risk of developing HIV and are known to experience barriers to optimal medical care. Our goal was to determine, among a cohort of HIV clinicians, whether or not the diagnosis of schizophrenia affected the clinical decision to offer highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) to AIDS patients.

This is a cross-sectional study of a random, national sample of HIV experts drawn from the membership of the American Academy of HIV Medicine. Participants were mailed a self-administered questionnaire with a case vignette of a new onset AIDS patient and were specifically asked whether or not they would recommend HAART treatment. Vignettes were randomly assigned to include a diagnosis of schizophrenia or not. We located 649 clinicians (93%); 347 responded (53.4%). Responders and non-responders did not differ in demographics or work characteristics. Recommendation of antiretroviral treatment did not differ between those who received a case vignette with schizophrenia versus those who did not (95.8% vs. 96.6%, p = 0.69). Compared to those who received a case vignette without schizophrenia, those who received vignettes with schizophrenia were more likely to avoid prescribing efavirenz, a medication with known neuropsychiatric side effects (17.7% vs. 45.5%, p < 0.01), more likely to agree to be helped by a specialist (34.5% vs. 12.9%, p < 0.01), and more likely to recommend directly observed therapy (20% vs.10%, p = 0.01). HIV clinicians recognize the importance of recommending HAART treatment to individuals with schizophrenia and AIDS and avoid using antiretroviral medication with known neuropsychiatric side effects.     

An Ecological Paradigm

Abstract

Consultation is defined as a preventive service, the goal of which is to create a variety of social, economic, and psychological resources for the continued development of the consultee organization. Ten principles are presented for the assessment and development of the consultee organization. These principles focus upon ways to generate social support and self-direction for the individual members and for the total organization. The framework for the presentation of the principles is an ecological perspective which emphasizes the concepts of persons, settings, and events as resources for the individual members of the organization and the total organization. Ecological concepts are presented, such as interdependence and adaptation, to direct the work of the consultation. Working from an ecological perspective, the consultant focuses upon assessing the natural social processes that bind persons and social settings together, while also assessing the prospects for how new social processes can be generated. Consultation succeeds as a preventive service when the organization is able to identify and create its own resources internally and then link to other external resources. This chapter provides the orienting framework for four case examples in the following chapters.     

The New Zealand Model for Prevention of Cyberviolence

Abstract

In 1998, New Zealand's Internet Safety Group established a national initiative to prevent cyberviolence through education. This organization developed a comprehensive program that included sending an Internet Safety Kit to every school in the country, stimulating research on Internet use in New Zealand, and co-hosting a national symposium on the social impact of the Internet. This article looks at who is participating in the Group, what strategies they have used, what they have been able to achieve and their plans for future development.     

Interdisciplinary Programs in Community and Applied Research

SUMMARY

This article describes the critical role of interdisciplinary programs in addressing the mission of the Society for Community Research and Action. In the past decade, interdisciplinary approaches to graduate education have increased in importance yet the makeup of the Society does not reflect this change. The mission, organization, and curriculum focus of five programs are described. They include human development and family studies, social welfare, law/psychology, and community-social psychology. Prevention research and program evaluation are highlighted as key areas for program development.     

Residual Effects of Repeated Bully Victimization Before the Age of 12 on Adolescent Functioning

Abstract

In this study, data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY 97) were used to examine early adolescent functioning as a result of being bullied. The NLSY 97 asked 4807 youths from age 12 to 14 whether they had been the victims of repeated bullying before the age of 12. In this study, 19.1% of the youths responded that they had experienced this repeated violence. It was found that the youth who have been bullied are exhibiting behaviors that are very different than their non-bullied peers. In every instance those individuals that admit to being repeatedly bullied before the age of 12 were less successful in negotiating various aspects of their life as a teenager. This underscores the need for programs that address bully prevention. Some programmatic initiatives aimed at reducing this victimized population are discussed.     

Introduction

Summary

Rapid population growth in the Third World has been accompanied by the creation of national family planning programs, which attempt to slow growth rates through programs aimed at the prevention of births. These programs represent large scale, modern bureaucratic health delivery systems that are transplanted from the industrialized world. They raise the problem of whether such modern organizations can have an impact on reproductive behavior throughout the Third World. A large scale research program on Asian family planning programs provides some of the answers to these critical questions. First, pooled cross-national time series data indicate that as family planning programs grew and their inputs of staff and funds increased, both contraceptive and birth prevention increased. Further, multiple regression analyses indicate a positive impact of program inputs on both contraceptive use rates and birth prevention, even when levels of social and economic development are controlled. There is also, however, much variance among countries in their patterns of both program performance and birth prevention. Four country cases are examined-the Philippines, Malaysia, South Korea, and Indonesia-to show that the character of political organization has an impact on the performance of these modern bureaucratic birth prevention organizations.     

Overview of Michigan Prevention Programming

Abstract

The Michigan Department of Mental Health's prevention programming has centered around the development of community service models through pilot demonstration projects. A systems approach has resulted in the formulation of departmental guidelines and policies. Pilot demonstration projects have been directed primarily at enhancing coping skills of high risk populations. Collaborative interagency efforts have provided an additional dimension to Michigan prevention programming.     

Exploring Work as an Arena for Prevention Research

Abstract

This article offers a rationale and reviews the research evidence for a focus on work transitions in prevention research. The organization and current research of the Michigan Prevention Research Center are then described. Current research and dissemination activities are presented in the context of a prevention research cycle that moves through four domains: problem analysis, intervention design, evaluation, and knowledge dissemination.     

Chapter 9: The Use of Law for Prevention in the Public Interest

Summary

One of the most important functions of law and the legal system is to prevent harm by regulating conduct prospectively. Almost all law—whether in the form of a statute enacted by a legislative body or a judgment decreed by a court—is designed, at least in part, to avoid some socially undesirable future state of affairs. This chapter explores some of the more significant ways in which lawmaking (both legislative and judicial) may be regarded as a form of prevention and the legal system may be used for prevention in the public interest. Although the chapter focuses on litigation and legislation of particular interest to those in the fields of mental health and mental retardation, the legal processes and principles described extend to many other areas of law with implications for promoting health and preventing harm.     

An Examination of Strategies for the Prevention of Gender-Based Violence at Four-Year Institutions of Higher Education

ABSTRACT

Although gender-based violence prevention programs at institutions of higher education (IHEs) are mandated by federal legislation, research focusing on the prevalence or content of programming is limited. The present exploratory research examines campus websites for a nationally representative sample of Title IX eligible IHEs that offer at least a four-year degree (n = 389), assessing whether IHEs offer prevention programs and whether programs include information cited in federal legislation or adhere to best practices. Differences in programming are also examined across IHE types. Results demonstrate that most IHEs report offering prevention pro- grams (86%), but that differences do exist across IHE type: 97% of public nonprofit IHEs report programming compared to 46% of tribal institutions. Disparities also exist across IHE types regarding the content of programming. Results highlight the need to advance prevention programming to better align with “what works” in prevention science or what is expected by federal legislation.     

Education and Employment in Rural Alaska

SUMMARY

The history of my work experience in rural Alaska suggests the value of combining academic and field experience in community psychology with employment in graduate school. Twelve years of employment in rural Alaska leading to my present position with a rural Alaska Native Health organization is briefly reviewed. It is concluded that graduate students should examine, carefully and openly, their choices in preparing a path for applied community psychology employment.     

Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Maslach Burnout Inventory

Abstract

Although the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) is widely used to assess burnout in human service workers, doubt has been cast on the usefulness of the conceptualization on which it is based and the independence of its subscales. A confirmatory factor analysis using the methodology employed in a previous study of child welfare workers revealed that the final model had only a minimally adequate fit and the constructs of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization were not separate and unique. The findings suggest that research in child welfare settings should avoid continued reliance on the MBI for the assessment of burnout. Scales that are balanced in terms of positive and negative items and where each dimension represents a distinct construct need to be developed.     

China's Shanzhai Culture: ‘Grabism’ and the politics of hybridity

This article focuses on the broad spread of shanzhai culture in 2008, exploring the central question: what is it that brings such disparate phenomena together under one label? Shanzhai things have typically emerged from new spaces for participation in production beyond the control of formerly monopolistic authorities. But things are not necessarily shanzhai by birth, for it is also an identity affixed to things by consumers. The shanzhai identity's inherent ambiguity—almost the same but not quite—brings with it a dimension of disruption of authority (cf. Bhabha), but its political standpoints are elusive. Using insights from hybridity theory, this article characterizes shanzhai as a contemporary successor to what Lu Xun termed Grabism: the active reappropriation of economic and cultural authority for diverse local purposes, which have themselves been shaped and redefined by those same authorities.     

Community and Families

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present the social organization, social networks and interactive processes supporting family systems living in communities with marginal economies, in disadvantaged neighbourhoods (barrios) in Caracas, Venezuela. Twelve families inserted in four different communities were observed by four researchers, taking thirty-six ethnographic records of the families' daily life activities, as well as the interaction patterns between family members, and between the family system and the community and social organizations. Some characteristics of the organization, structure, and functioning of the underprivileged family systems as well as their interrelations to the community and to the educational and social institutions are shown. It is concluded that the analysis of these interactive patterns permits the researcher to explore the complexity of family life in poverty stricken communities, its culture and process of change.     

Controlling Crime and Delinquency in the Schools

Abstract

This paper provides an analysis of data on school security measures which were obtained from a survey administered to a sample of 230 high school students. The majority of students indicated that the school police officers and security officers help keep the schools safe and that the drug-sniffing dogs help reduce drugs in the schools, but there was no clear consensus among the students on the issues of whether the video surveillance cameras increase safety, whether the police and security officers should search students with metal detectors, or whether there should be more police and security officers in the schools. The only security measure which the majority of students disliked was the policy that all backpacks be translucent. An examination of gender differences in student perceptions of school security measures shows that males were significantly more likely than females to negatively evaluate the school police officers and to oppose the use of metal detectors in the schools. Finally, the data indicate that the aforementioned security strategies have little impact on the presence of drugs and weapons in the schools. The policy implications are discussed.