Perspectives of Mothers,Fathers, and Parenting Coordinators Concerning the Process and Impact of Parenting Coordination

In a small pilot study, 31 interviewees, including 12 parenting coordinators, 11 mothers, and 8 fathers representing 14 different parenting coordination cases retrospectively described child and family functioning both pre‐ and post‐parenting coordination in phone interviews. They also detailed how often and how well different issues that arose during the parenting coordination work (acrimony, problem‐solving communication, triangulation of the child into the conflict) were actively addressed. Parties tended to view coparenting more positively when reflecting on post‐ compared with pre‐intervention, but reported less change in child adjustment. Discrepancy among same‐case informant reports was common. Parenting coordinators (PCs) consistently rated their interventions as more frequent and successful than did parents. Mothers and fathers largely disagreed on interventions they experienced. While this small N pilot can offer no definitive conclusions, it underscores need for research and wisdom in including both parents' perspectives.     

Cultivating Adolescents’ Academic Identity: Ascertaining the Mediating Effects of Motivational Beliefs Between Classroom Practices and Mathematics Identity

Teaching mathematics involves helping students develop mathematical skills and empowering students to see themselves as capable of participating in and being knowers and doers of mathematics. Extant research has postulated that mathematics identity is a critical contributor to adolescents’ mathematics achievement and subsequent academic success. Guided by motivation and instructional quality theories, this classroom-based study examined a mediating mechanism through which teacher practices associated with mathematics identity through motivational beliefs (i.e., expectancies, task values, and cost value). Participants included 525 sixth-grade students (48.6% male; 64% European American, 34% African American, 2% other race; 58.6% free-or-reduced lunch) in the United States. The findings suggest that competence beliefs and task values, except for cost value, mediated the association between teacher practices and mathematics identity. These mediation pathways also differed by race. The mediating role of mathematics expectancies was stronger for European American adolescents, while the mediating role of mathematics task values was stronger for African American adolescents, though effect sizes were relatively modest. Teachers seeking to develop students’ mathematics identity—especially in their minority or stereotyped students—might consider enhancing their sensitivity to students’ psychological needs, quality of feedback, and instructional learning supports in their daily interaction with students.

     

The Intersectionality of Discrimination Attributes and Bullying Among Youth: An Applied Latent Class Analysis

Discrimination is commonly experienced among adolescents. However, little is known about the intersection of multiple attributes of discrimination and bullying. We used a latent class analysis (LCA) to illustrate the intersections of discrimination attributes and bullying, and to assess the associations of LCA membership to depressive symptoms, deliberate self harm and suicidal ideation among a sample of ethnically diverse adolescents. The data come from the 2006 Boston Youth Survey where students were asked whether they had experienced discrimination based on four attributes: race/ethnicity, immigration status, perceived sexual orientation and weight. They were also asked whether they had been bullied or assaulted for these attributes. A total of 965 (78 %) students contributed to the LCA analytic sample (45 % Non-Hispanic Black, 29 % Hispanic, 58 % Female). The LCA revealed that a 4-class solution had adequate relative and absolute fit. The 4-classes were characterized as: low discrimination (51 %); racial discrimination (33 %); sexual orientation discrimination (7 %); racial and weight discrimination with high bullying (intersectional class) (7 %). In multivariate models, compared to the low discrimination class, individuals in the sexual orientation discrimination class and the intersectional class had higher odds of engaging in deliberate self-harm. Students in the intersectional class also had higher odds of suicidal ideation. All three discrimination latent classes had significantly higher depressive symptoms compared to the low discrimination class. Multiple attributes of discrimination and bullying co-occur among adolescents. Research should consider the co-occurrence of bullying and discrimination.     

The role of complexity theory and network analysis for examining child welfare service delivery systems

Abstract

In response to the ongoing call for a complex systems approach for understanding and informing child welfare practice and policy, this article presents a context-specific conceptual framework that combines complexity theory and network analysis. The conceptual framework rests on the complementary nature of these theoretical and methodological concepts for inter-organizational child welfare practice. Potential applications of this framework are discussed to promote network-oriented research that informs effective collaboration among organizations serving children and families.     

Resource Wealth,Democracy and Mobilisation

The impact of resource wealth on society remains highly contested in the literature. Some perspectives suggest that resource wealth is associated with political apathy, while others indicate that resource wealth fosters violent civil conflicts. We leverage these seemingly contradictory impacts of natural resources on society by expanding the scope of inquiry to explore different types of resource wealth (oil and minerals) as well as other dimensions of political life (protest). Utilising a global dataset for the period 1950–2006, we test the impact of resource wealth on mobilisation. We find that while oil wealth demobilises citizens in all regime types, mineral wealth strongly correlates with higher levels of mobilisation in democracies, though not in autocracies. In addition, using survey data, we examine individual-level attitudes toward protest participation in two resource-rich states, Peru and Ecuador. The results indicate that an individual living in a mineral-rich country like Peru is more likely to participate in a protest compared to an individual living in an oil-rich country like Ecuador. Our findings highlight the contributions of the resource activism framework for understanding the connection between natural resources and mobilisation.     

Alternative strategies for coping with officials in different postcommunist regimes: the worm's eye view

This article uses focus group methods to see how citizens in Ukraine, Bulgaria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic view their interactions with postcommunist officials. In the Czech Republic, while they complain that bureaucracy has increased with the transition from communism, and they gossip about the need to use contacts and bribery, their own experience is much more positive, and the reforms they propose centre on efficiency and convenience. At the other extreme, citizens of Ukraine complain that corruption has increased because officials are no longer afraid, and their tales about bribery and extortion extend from general gossip to specific personal experience. They see advantages in more ‘control’ and more ‘fear’. Slovakia and Bulgaria fall between these two extremes, though perhaps are rather closer to Ukraine. People seldom suggest that reform is impossible or undesirable anywhere, and, in terms of attitudes towards dealing with officials, there is no simple, clear and definitive line marking a quantum change in culture between Catholic and Orthodox traditions, or between former Hapsburg, Romanov and Ottoman territories. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.