批判视域下的老年社会工作:对社区居家养老服务的反思

谈及近十年来我国在发达城市大力推行的社区居家养老服务,很容易联想到已有半个多世纪发展历程的英国社区照顾,然而,本文并没有采取同类比较的手法去启发我国的社区居家养老服务,而是从西方学界对英国社区照顾近二十年来的争议与探讨着手,重点引入批判老年社会工作方法,对我国为老服务的输送环节在批判视域下做出更好的借鉴与反思.     

Professional quality of life of adult protective service workers

Adult Protective Services (APS) workers are exposed to substantial occupational hazards and job stress, but these stressors are underdocumented. Therefore, we sought to describe APS workers’ work environments and responses to occupational hazards and stressors, including compassion fatigue, burnout, and secondary traumatic stress. Survey data were gathered with closed-ended questionnaires administered to APS workers in an urban setting. Virtually all workers (97%) reported exposure to one or more environmental hazards in their work, and 80% reported hazard exposure in the past month. Workers also reported mixed responses to their work environment and to experiences with supervision. A sizable minority (22.7%) was at high risk for burnout, 24.6% were at risk for secondary traumatic stress, and 19.9% reported low compassion satisfaction. The results document multiple stressors in APS work. The APS partner is committed to ongoing efforts to better support its staff, and these findings can inform future efforts to enhance supervisor support and worker self-care, to minimize burnout and secondary traumatic stress.     

Social innovation and ICT in social services: European experiences compared

Innovation in social services and social policies in the European welfare systems is an evolving phenomenon stimulated by socio-demographic, cultural and economic changes. Many social service innovations are linked to disruptive technologies, especially the introduction of information and communication technology (ICT). To discuss the effects of disruptive technologies on health and social services, this article first proposes a framework consistent with the social innovation paradigm. Secondly, based on case-studies, it investigates different models of social and health service innovation driven by technology. The article shows advantages and disadvantages of service innovation driven by technology, and offers some final remarks about future challenges for ICT in health and social services. More evidences of effectiveness and efficiency are necessary to promote public and private investment to implement solutions on a wider scale. However, the impacts of technology-based solutions cannot be measured only in terms of economic aspects but also taking into account whether new technologies really provide the opportunity for citizens to have a better life and advocacy for their rights.     

Sexual objectification decreases women’s experiential consumption (but not material consumption)

The current investigation examined our prediction that sexual objectification decreases women’s experiential consumption but not material consumption. Three experiments provided converging support for this prediction. In particular, female participants reported lower tendency to engage in experiential consumption after recalling a past experience of objectification (Studies 1 and 3) and chose a material product over an experiential one after receiving objectifying comments (Study 2). Furthermore, Study 3 found that sexual objectification reduced purchase inclination of experiential products, and this effect did not emerge for material products. These findings contribute to the literature on sexual objectification by showing the impact of sexual objectification on women’s economic decisions and behaviors.     

Characteristics of Couples Who Attend Family Services Counselor Visits in Relationship Education

Case management services for low-income couples receiving relationship education have been required by federal funding agencies. Studies examining relationship education outcomes for low-income couples have yet to address participant characteristics of those who attend case management services (e.g., distressed vs. nondistressed). Thus, this study examined the influence of baseline relationship satisfaction and demographics on attendance at case management visits for 2,628 low-income, partnered participants who attended relationship education. Findings indicated that participants who reported higher baseline relationship distress attended more family services counselor (FSC) visits. However, when we added demographics to the model, relationship distress no longer predicted FSC visits, whereas income served as a predictor for men and women, with those reporting greater monthly income attending more FSC visits.     

Price-setting newsvendor with strategic consumers

We consider a newsvendor who sells a single product over a single season with the objective of determining both the selling price and stock quantity to maximize the expected profit. The customers are strategic and we consider two demand cases: additive and multiplicative. For each case, we derive the newsvendor׳s optimal decisions and demonstrate that neglecting the price-sensitivity of demand leads the newsvendor to make sub-optimal decisions. Moreover, we show that under certain conditions, strategic consumer behavior may positively affect the newsvendor׳s optimal expected profit in the additive demand case.     

Need,well‐being and outcomes: the development of policy‐thinking for children's services 1989–2004

This paper describes how government policy thinking about the well‐being of children and young people developed between the Children Act 1989 and the Children Act 2004. These two Acts are milestone statements about how services to children in England and Wales should be delivered. It is an account informed by the author's own experience as a government adviser on children's social care over much of this period and supporting documentation. It traces the strands of government policy thinking about how to deliver services for children from children in need to the articulation of the five Every Child Matters outcomes. It argues that attempts to achieve coordinated service planning for children and young people played a significant role in the formulation of shared objectives and the articulation of child outcomes. However, it argues that looking at real outcomes exposes how children in the UK do relatively badly compared with other rich nations. It questions whether we can realistically expect our services to deliver significantly improved outcomes given the impact of enduring inequality in our society. This paper is dedicated to the memory of David Lambert CBE, former Assistant Chief Inspector of the Social Services Inspectorate in London, who died suddenly on 7 October 2010. He lent me articles to assist me in writing this paper.     

From Destruction to Reconciliation

SUMMARY

Daniel Johnson discusses how the application of “restorative justice” in his own life and in the life of the victim of his criminal offense contributed to his personal regeneration and healing for his victim. Mr. Johnson challenges criminal justice policy-makers to create conditions where “restorative justice” can be employed in the broadest sense in order to do what contemporary, punitive, retributive criminal justice systems are largely incapable of doing, that is, facilitate lasting offender rehabilitation and healing for crime victims and communities, and to offer opportunities for victim-offender reconciliations.     

Providing Mental Health Services to Older People Living in Rural Communities

Summary

Rural dwelling elders who experience mental health problems often have difficulty finding help since rural communities often lack adequate mental health service providers. This paper reports on the initial phase of a 5-year, interdisciplinary clinical research study that is testing the effectiveness of providing a home delivered, therapeutic psychosocial intervention, aimed at improving the emotional well-being and the quality of life of medically frail elders who live in rural communities. In the early phases of this study, the clinical research team encountered a number of interesting and often unanticipated challenges as it attempted to recruit study participants and provide services to them. In this article, we examine these challenges and share what we have learned so far about providing mental health services to elderly persons living in rural environments.     

The Making of COBRS 2.0

Abstract

Recently introduced advances in microcomputer technology offer opportunities for improving child welfare agencies' access to powerful case assessment and program evaluation tools. This paper discusses the process of fitting a child behavior outcome measurement system to a menu driven microcomputer program. Traditional strategies for measuring outcome effectiveness, managerial priorities and operational constraints are examined in terms of their bearing on the introduction of new microcomputer technology. The developmental process is traced to show how these factors influenced the addition of a number of user options to the basic program to enhance its adaptability to specific agency needs. Initial user feedback indicated general satisfaction with the basic program and the applicability of its output, little or no experimentation, as yet, in adapting the system, and, a minor need to adjust the sequencing of operator activities to better fit the realities of agency work rhythms.