Behavior Problems in Children Exposed to Wife Abuse: Gender Differences

Family aggression patterns and behavior problems of children, aged 6-12, recruited from shelters for battered women (shelter group) were contrasted with three comparison groups of currently nonviolent families: two-parent, single-mother, and homeless. Girls who had been exposed to recent interparental wife abuse were predicted to show more internalizing and externalizing behavior problems than similarly exposed boys, based on recent literature. Homeless and shelter mothers reported the highest rates of parent-child aggression. Shelter girls obtained significantly higher total, internalizing and externalizing behavior problem ratings than shelter boys, and than two-parent and single-mother girls. Shelter boys obtained significantly higher internalizing ratings than two-parent boys. Shelter and homeless children were rated as having equivalent levels of behaviour problems. Across all groups, mothers' psychological adjustment was a better predictor of daughters' adjustment than that of sons. The study concluded that the assumption that preadolescent girls have greater immunity to psychosocial risk is unfounded.     

Binge eating in anorexia nervosa predicts later onset of substance use disorder: A ten-year prospective,longitudinal follow-up of 95 adolescents

The cooccurrence of binge eating and increased alcohol intake and substance abuse has been reported in clinical and community epidemiological samples. To further investigate the nature and causes of this comorbidity, we examined the 10-year prospective, longitudinal course of illness in 95 nonsubstance abusing adolescents hospitalized for treatment of anorexia nervosa. Survival analysis with Cox regression was used to quantitate the cumulative risk of developing substance use disorder (SUD) as a function of patterns of binge eating vs. dietary restraint within this cohort. Subjects who were binge eating at the time of intake were robustly distinguished from restrictors, having increased risk of SUD as well as greater likelihood of having at least one first-degree relative with SUD. The findings suggest binge eating that develops in the underweight stage of anorexia nervosa may reflect developmental, biological, and genetic risk processes shared in common with SUD.Received Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Pittsburgh. Research interests include the etiology, course, and treatment of eating disorders, and the natural history and treatment of juvenile mood disorders.Received R.N. from Rush-Presbyterian Hospital. Research interests are in the area of adolescent mental health treatment and the treatment of anorexia nervosa.Received R.N. from Northeastern Univeristy. Research interest is the inpatient psychiatric treatment of adolescents.Received R.N. from the University of Windsor and her M.N. from UCLA. Research interest is the outcome studies of treatment effectiveness in adolescent and adult psychiatry.     

EU update

This is the latest edition of Baker & McKenzie's column on developments in EU law relating to IP, IT and telecommunications. This article summarises recent developments that are considered important for practitioners, students and academics in a wide range of information technology, e-commerce, telecommunications and intellectual property areas. It cannot be exhaustive but intends to address the important points. This is a hard copy reference guide, but links to outside websites are included where possible. No responsibility is assumed for the accuracy of information contained in these links     

Gender Inequality and Patterns of Abuse Post Leaving

Drawing on Connell’s (Gender and power: Society, the person and sexual politics. California: Stanford University Press, 1987; Masculinities. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1995) model of gender relations, this paper examines patterns of intimate partner violence among women who have recently left an abusive partner. In so doing, we attempt to better understand the social structural factors that shape the relations of power and control in intimate violent heterosexual unions. The data come from the first wave of a longitudinal prospective survey of 309 women who had left an abusive partner in the previous 3 years. Our data suggest that structured relations of inequality, namely relations of production, power and cathexis, shape women’s risk of abuse and harassment after leaving, and do so in ways that shape relations of coercive control. These results have implications for understanding the social context within which male violence against women occurs, and how this context constrains and/or enables women’s strategies for leaving and safety. This research was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) New Emerging Team Grant #106054 and Institute of Gender and Health Operating Grant #15156 (Marilyn Ford-Gilboe, Principal Investigator). The authors thank the participants in the Women’s Health Effects Study. We also thank Julie McMullin, Kim Shuey, and the Health Effects research team for their helpful feedback.     

The Social Construction of Illegality and Criminality

In this article illegal immigrants, a relatively new group of immigrants living at the margins of society, are discussed. The question of the significance of crime for groups that are officially excluded from the formal labour market and public provisions, is presented within the framework of the Unknown City research project, conducted in the four largest Dutch cities (interviews with illegal immigrants; an ethnographic study to determine the extent of support by various ethnic communities; and an examination of the ways in which the restrictive policies towards illegal immigrants were implemented by the police, the Aliens Departments, and by professionals within public or semi-public institutions in the fields of education, healthcare and housing). Both the relatively limited involvement in crime in general and the differences between groups can be explained by the embeddedness of illegal immigrants in the labour sphere and the support by ethnic communities. Attention is paid to the social and legal construction of the illegal immigrant through new legislation and to the observation that illegality is increasingly linked to crime. The majority of illegal immigrants are not criminally active. One exception is the category that is active in the lower levels of the hard drug trade. The authors' analysis suggests that the perception of the criminal illegal immigrant first and foremost reflects the division between wanted and unwanted immigrants, which is the result of the shift towards a restrictive policy.     

Foetal politics and the birth of an industry

In early Western society, women were considered to have a minor role in the reproductive process. Their social status was, correspondingly, secondary. Since the eighteenth century, women's contribution to procreation has been widely accepted, yet their social status remains. Women's importance in the reproduction of the species has not guaranteed them social prestige and the argument of this paper is that women's social standing is being further assaulted by the legal and economic consequences of innovations in birth technology. Two well-publicized innovations, Artificial Insemination by Donor, and In-Vitro Fertilization (or ‘test-tube babies’) have provoked legal, political and economic considerations which focus upon the possibilities of extensive bioengineering. The significance of this for women is that birth technology is not being fashioned after the interests of its clients but, instead, is becoming a new mercantile frontier in which women's needs may well be eclipsed by commercial and political ambitions.