Distinguishing Cultural Expectations in Assessment of Financial Exploitation

Formal protocols for the screening of financial exploitation have tended to be rooted in the assumptions reflective of a white, middle class perspective and have often failed to account for cultural differences in minority communities. This article discusses the significance of cultural considerations in screening for financial exploitation. It proposes that we view exploitation on a continuum utilizing a broader definition with a focus on the dynamics of interactions in families.     

The Indochinese Refugees

Cambodian, Laotian and Vietnamese refugees who have come to North American host countries via the South Asian camps have been exposed to many potentially traumatic events and have been submitted to an alienating migration process. A comprehensive analysis of their experience both in refugee camps and North American host countries is facilitated by the use of various stress theories. The stressors of change, acculturation, bereavement and trauma are identified with regard to the migration process of the Indochinese refugees as well as to the pre- and post-migration period. Some implications for practice in social, physical and mental health settings are underlined: in particular a sensitivity to the meaning of physical illness within this population, to the cultural reticence towards mental health consultation, to the possibility of longterm vulnerability to post-traumatic stress disorders and to increasing value conflicts within the family. Intervention experiences both in the South Asian refugee camps and in North American host countries suggests the importance of traditional healers and natural support networks.     

Traumatic symptomatology characteristics of adult children of alcoholics

Traumatic experience symptomatology, resiliency factors, and stress among young adults who had experienced alcoholism within their family of origin were assessed in comparison to adults who as children experienced traumatic life events other than alcoholism and those who indicated neither problem (parental alcoholism or traumatic life event) during their childhood. These three groups were compared on self-report measures of stress, resiliency, depressive symptomatology, and trauma symptoms. Results indicated adult children of alcoholics (ACOA) had more self-reported stress, more difficulty initiating the use of mediating factors in response to life events, and more symptoms of personal dysfunction than the control group. Results suggest ACOAs may develop less effective stress management strategies and present more clinically at-risk patterns of responses than their counterparts.     

Baseline Characteristics of Dependent Youth Who Have Been Commercially Sexually Exploited: Findings From a Specialized Treatment Program

ABSTRACT

Commercial sexual exploitation of children has emerged as a critical issue within child welfare, but little is currently known about this population or effective treatment approaches to address their unique needs. Children in foster care and runaways are reported to be vulnerable to exploitation because they frequently have unmet needs for family relationships, and they have had inadequate supervision and histories of trauma of which traffickers take advantage. The current article presents data on the demographic characteristics, trauma history, mental and behavioral health needs, physical health needs, and strengths collected on a sample of 87 commercially sexually exploited youth. These youth were served in a specialized treatment program in Miami-Dade County, Florida, for exploited youth involved with the child welfare system. Findings revealed that the youth in this study have high rates of previous sexual abuse (86% of the youth) and other traumatic experiences prior to their exploitation. Youth also exhibited considerable mental and behavioral health needs. Given that few programs emphasize the unique needs of children who have been sexually exploited, recommendations are offered for providing a continuum of specialized housing and treatment services to meet the needs of sexually exploited youth, based on the authors’ experiences working with this population.     

上海非物质文化遗产的保护与旅游开发

非物质文化遗产被誉为＂人类精神的家园＂,应该加以珍视。在保护的基础上,非物质文化遗产可以进行适当旅游开发。本文以大都市上海为背景,廓清了非物质文化遗产的特色、优势、作用、影响,以使非物质文化遗产重新走入大众视野,焕发出盎然生机,实现非物质文化遗产保护与旅游开发的＂双赢＂。     

Predictors of secondary traumatic stress among children's advocacy center forensic interviewers

This study examined various predictor variables that were hypothesized to impact secondary traumatic stress in forensic interviewers ( n = 257) from children's advocacy centers across the United States. Data were examined to investigate the relationship between organizational satisfaction, organizational buffers, and job support with secondary traumatic stress using the Secondary Traumatic Stress Scale. The most salient significant result was an inverse relationship between three indicators of job support and secondary traumatic stress. Also significant to secondary traumatic stress were the age of interviewer and whether the forensic interviewer had experienced at least one significant loss in the previous 12 months. Implications for future research, training, program practice, and policy are discussed.     

Predictors of Secondary Traumatic Stress among Children's Advocacy Center Forensic Interviewers

This study examined various predictor variables that were hypothesized to impact secondary traumatic stress in forensic interviewers (n = 257) from children's advocacy centers across the United States. Data were examined to investigate the relationship between organizational satisfaction, organizational buffers, and job support with secondary traumatic stress using the Secondary Traumatic Stress Scale. The most salient significant result was an inverse relationship between three indicators of job support and secondary traumatic stress. Also significant to secondary traumatic stress were the age of interviewer and whether the forensic interviewer had experienced at least one significant loss in the previous 12 months. Implications for future research, training, program practice, and policy are discussed.     

Infancy and Childhood in India: A Critical Review

Empirical studies of childhood in India have been rare. Guided by universalistic theories of child development, developmental psychologists have seldom examined cultural variations in child-rearing patterns with Indian samples. Psychoanalytic studies of Hindu childhood have been influenced by therapeutic observations with segmented middle-class populations that are generally Westernized and educated, inviting a lively debate about the transferability of psychoanalytic individualism to non-Western contexts. Anthropological studies, invariably focused on cultural variation, have not searched for consistent cultural patterns in ethnographic materials on Hindu socialization. Based on fieldwork conducted in a village near Delhi, this article presents one of the first systematic quantitative and ethnographic studies of patterns of child care in Hindu extended families during the preschool years. The findings are discussed in terms of achieving a consensus between developmental, psychoanalytic, and anthropological observations of Indian childhood.     

Talking as a primary method of peer defusing for military personnel exposed to combat trauma

1. Humanitarian relief missions and military operations are unquestionably stressful and clearly have potential to affect the mental health of soldiers. 2. After being exposed to traumatic events, soldiers may develop acute stress reactions, a historically known phenomenon better recognized and understood today. 3. Although organized resources exist, they may not be accessible or appropriate. Soldiers are the most precious asset the military forces have and their peers may be the best and only resource available to them. 4. The need to ventilate and the relief that follows after talking about distressing events are evidence that defusing by talking should be encouraged after exposure to a traumatic event.     

Is Laughing at the Expense of Victims and Offenders a Red Flag? Humor and Secondary Traumatic Stress

Those who work with human trauma often use humor to handle job stressors. Research has demonstrated that lighthearted humor is related to lower secondary traumatic stress scores, while gallows humor has the inverse relationship. This work explores how three types of humor relate to secondary traumatic stress: (a) humor at the expense of victims, (b) humor at the expense of offenders, and (c) humor containing sexual innuendo. Internet crimes against children taskforce personnel completed questionnaires about secondary traumatic stress and coping techniques. Humor at the expense of victims was rarely used, but when it was, it was indicative of higher secondary traumatic stress. There were no relationships between secondary traumatic stress and the use of humor at the expense of offenders or humor containing sexual innuendo.     

Traumatic bonding: clinical implications in incest.

The concept of traumatic bonding, taken from the literatures on trauma, victimization, and exploitation, holds promise for explaining some of the more confusing dynamics of incest. This article offers a definition of traumatic bonding, demonstrates how it can be applied in cases of incest, and discusses the implications of this concept for therapeutic intervention.     

Omnivorousness as the bridging of cultural holes: A measurement strategy

Recent research and theory at the intersection of cultural sociology and network analysis have converged around the notion of cultural holes: patterns of cultural choice that position the person as a bridge not between other persons but between cultural worlds. This is an approach that promises to open up new vistas in our conceptualization of the relationship between social position and cultural taste, but that so far lacks operational grounding. In this article, I draw on Breiger’s (1974) formalization of the idea of the duality of persons and groups along with classical formalizations of brokerage for sociometric networks (Burt 1992) to suggest that the “cultural ego network” of a typical survey respondent can be reconstructed from patterns of audience overlap among the cultural items that are chosen by each respondent. This leads to a formalization of the notion of omnivorousness as relatively low levels of clustering in the cultural network: namely, omnivorousness as cultural network efficiency. I show how this metric overcomes the difficulties that have plagued previous attempts to produce ordinal indicators of omnivorousness from simple counts of the number of cultural choices, while providing novel substantive (and sometime counter-intuitive) insights into the relationship between socio-demographic status markers and patterns of cultural choice in the contemporary United States.     

Body-Related Emotions in Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Following Childhood Sexual Abuse

Traumatic experiences are associated with emotions such as anxiety, shame, guilt, disgust, and anger. For patients who have experienced child sexual abuse, these emotions might be triggered by perceptions of their own body. The aim of this study was to investigate the extent of the association of the body to traumatic experiences and to discern the emotions linked to trauma-associated body areas. Ninety-seven female participants were assigned to four groups: post-traumatic stress disorder following child sexual abuse with co-occurring borderline personality disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder following child sexual abuse without co-occurring borderline personality disorder, borderline personality disorder without post-traumatic stress disorder, and healthy controls. Participants rated 26 body areas regarding their association with trauma and 7 emotions. Emotions were assessed by questionnaires. Results suggest that specific areas of the body are associated with trauma and linked to highly aversive emotions. In post-traumatic stress disorder patients, the areas associated with highly negative emotions were the pubic region and inner thighs. Thus, the patient’s body may act as a trigger for traumatic memories.     

Former Athletes' Illness Stories of Brain Injuries: Suspected Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy and the Entanglement of Never-Aging Masculinities

Examining former athletes' health-related beliefs and behaviors on the long-term effects of concussions and potentially developing chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) offers a domain to understand how men renegotiate their masculinities. In this paper, we explore how the cultural production of the concussion crisis shapes the ways in which men athletes make sense of self and their masculinity in the face of declining health. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 27 male, former athletes, this article examines the multiple ways in which gender shapes their experience and treatment of traumatic brain injuries or suspected CTE. We show how men are re-negotiating their aging masculinities through illness narratives and how the cultural production of the concussion crisis in sports shapes these narratives. We break down our analysis into three sections: (1) reflections of chaos narratives and stories of never-aging masculinities, (2) the ways the concussion crisis shapes their restitution narratives, and (3) quest narratives combining never-aging and aging masculinities. Whether or not these athletes have or are treated for CTE, we argue that they reformulate their masculinity to regain control over their manhood and to feel a sense of relief.     

Posttraumatic stress disorder and occupational performance: building resilience and fostering occupational adaptation

Resilience and vulnerability refer to an individual's capacity to persevere in the face of adversity. Resiliency and vulnerability are distinctive personal characteristics influenced by environmental factors such as socio-cultural and institutional contexts. Resiliency and vulnerability are not absolute; they are psychosocial constructs of a phenomenological continuum. Hence, a resilient individual is not invincible to all life events but has the capacity to endure in most circumstances. Clients who sustain traumatic injuries or witness traumatic events have a greater vulnerability to stress disorders like posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Occupational therapy practitioners should be cognizant of a client's resilient and adaptive capacities when providing services to a client who has endured a traumatic event. This paper explores resilience theory and its application to occupational therapy practice.     

Vicarious traumatization,secondary traumatic stress,and burnout in sexual assault and domestic violence agency staff

This study investigated three occupational hazards of therapy with trauma victims: vicarious trauma and secondary traumatic stress (or "compassion fatigue"), which describe therapists' adverse reactions to clients' traumatic material, and burnout, a stress response experienced in many emotionally demanding "people work" jobs. Among 101 trauma counselors, client exposure workload and being paid as a staff member (vs. volunteer) were related to burnout sub-scales, but not as expected to overall burnout or vicarious trauma, secondary traumatic stress, or general distress. More educated counselors and those seeing more clients reported less vicarious trauma. Younger counselors and those with more trauma counseling experience reported more emotional exhaustion. Findings have implications for training, treatment, and agency support systems.     

Effects of trauma exposure on anger, aggression, and violence in a nonclinical sample of men

This study assessed the impact of traumatic exposure and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms on anger, aggression, and violence among civilian male college students. Results suggest that civilian men who have been exposed to a potentially traumatic event (PTE) and report symptoms of PTSD indicate more trait anger, more internal anger and hostility, and more aggression and violence than men who do not report symptoms of PTSD. Results are contrasted to those found in clinical samples of male veterans with PTSD and discussed in terms of understanding and treating anger and aggression in non-clinical, trauma-exposed populations.     

MINING ERROR VARIANCE AND HITTING PAY-DIRT:

According to traditional error theory, sentiment measurements vary unsystematically from individual to individual. However, we find some patterned deviation in sentiments that characterize subsets of respondents within a seemingly homogeneous population. After demonstrating the existence of such patterns, we report an exploratory study aimed at identifying social characteristics of people with different patterns of sentiments. People embedded in multiple social networks have exaggerated sentiments that contour cultural patterns, and people with few social associations have attenuated sentiments conveying cultural detachment. In addition, people with disciplinary parents and romantic privation have some distinctive sentiments, depending on their gender.     

Habitus and Cultural Capital in the Field of Personal Finance

Key concepts drawn from the work of Pierre Bourdieu – in particular, habitus and cultural capital – which have been widely used to analyse the fields of education and the arts, are applied here to the sociologically neglected field of personal finance. The cultural project to promote marketization has not created an informed public of sovereign consumers rich in cultural capital. On the contrary, the development of commodified mass-market financial products and services implies a lowering of the threshold not just of economic but also of cultural capital needed for their acquisition. Financial scandals, such as the widespread misselling of personal pensions in the UK from the mid-1980s , typically involve in Bourdieu's terms an 'objective complicity' between a wide variety of stakeholders – including the government, employers, financial service providers, industry regulators, and financial advisers – and private investors whose habitus and lack of cultural capital prepare them for co-operation in their own exploitation.     

Risk and protective factors for secondary traumatic stress and burnout among home visitors

ABSTRACT

The overarching goal of this study was to understand the context of home visitor secondary traumatic stress and burnout, and how this might affect intention to quit among home visitors, particularly focusing on potential risk factors and supportive strategies identified by the home visitors. All home visitors providing services in the state in which the research was conducted (N = 27) completed a structured interview and a quantitative survey at two time points, 6 months apart. Results indicated that more than two-thirds of the home visitors experienced either medium or high levels of secondary traumatic stress and burnout over the course of the study. Approximately one quarter of home visitors indicated thinking of leaving their present positio. Qualitative data indicated that risk factors associated with burnout included those related to both direct and non-direct services. Risk factors associated with secondary traumatic stress included traumatic stress of families, inability to recognize one’s own experiences of secondary traumatic stress, and unhealthy work culture. In terms of protective factors, home visitors strongly emphasized the importance of having a supportive supervisor who they could trust and communicate with openly.