Family identification facilitates coping with financial stress: A social identity approach to family financial resilience

Family financial stress research has typically examined negative effects of deprivation on mental health, which in turn erode financial coping. While this work acknowledges family support’s role in buffering these effects, it has typically overlooked how family identification can act to structure the experience of, and response to, economic challenge. We adopt a Social Identity approach, arguing that family identification predicts increased social support and improved well-being, which predicts more effective coping with financial problems. We explore this in two community surveys (N = 369; N = 187). In the first we show that stronger family identification and support predict better well-being, which predicts better evaluation of economic coping. In the second we replicate these findings, and also show that the relationship between well-being and financial distress is fully mediated by perceptions of ‘Collective Family Financial Efficacy’. These findings point to a more positive understanding of how family cohesion can promote mental well-being/resilience.     

Receipt of Formal and Informal Help with Specific Care Tasks among Older People Living in their Own Home. National Trends over Two Decades

Sweden is seen as a typical example of a social democratic welfare regime, with universal and generous welfare policies. However, in the last decades, there have been substantial reductions in the Swedish provision of care for older people. This study aimed to examine trends in sources of care‐receipt in older people (77+) living in their own home and with a perceived need for help with two specific tasks: house cleaning and/or food shopping. Trends in care‐receipt were examined in relation to gender, living alone, having children and socio‐economic position. Data from the 1992, 2002 and 2011 data collection waves of the national study, Swedish Panel Study of Living Conditions of the Oldest Old (SWEOLD), were used. Response rates varied between 86 and 95 per cent, and the sample represents the population well. Trends and differences between groups were explored in bivariate and logistic regression analyses. There was a reduction in formal care‐receipt regarding house cleaning and food shopping over the study period. It was more common for women than men to receive formal care, and more common for men than women to receive informal care. Reductions in formal care have affected older women more than older men. Still, living alone was the most influential factor in care‐receipt, associated with a greater likelihood of formal care‐receipt and a lower likelihood of informal care‐receipt. It can be concluded that public responsibility for care is becoming more narrowly defined in Sweden, and that more responsibility for care is placed on persons in need of care and their families.     

Entrenchment in publicly traded family firms: Evidence from the S&P 500

Family involvement in corporate governance through ownership, management, and board membership presents a unique dilemma for understanding the strategic impetus and costs of entrenchment decisions. The presence of shared family ties and the family-centered goals of firm principals call to question the applicability of extant agency arguments regarding the nature and antecedents of managerial entrenchment. Exploring this, we develop and test a model of family firm-specific determinants (i.e., family ownership and family's involvement in management and governance) of entrenchment in publicly traded firms by drawing upon principal-principal agency theory. Findings of the empirical analysis of family owned S&P 500 firms suggest family firms are motivated to entrench managers when doing so supports the pursuit of family-centric goals. However, the extent to which entrenchment supports such goals varies at different levels of family ownership.     

Family support in practice: voices from the field

This paper revisits core family support messages for social work practice in working with children and families, linking to findings from high-profile child protection cases in the UK and the Republic of Ireland. Drawing on a comparative study where these identified practice messages were explored through the lens of testimony of family support workers in the UK and Ireland, these core messages are examined. Operating with hard-to-engage children and parents, we hear how families and family support worker colleagues now view the core functions of child and family work across both jurisdictions (Ireland and England). The authors argue that by naming a more detailed set of practices that are deemed as most useful by families, based on the benefits and challenges of intensive family support work, key messages arise that have major resonance for social work and multiagency practice into the future. A basic message from this study is that valuable lessons on engagement and intervention with families can be drawn for professionals by examining the practice elements of this group of paraprofessionals in the child and family arena. This paper adds to debates on the role of support and intervention in social work and family support work.     

The duration of residence spells among Malawians: the role of established family and friend connections at migrants’ destinations

It is well-documented that established networks in a destination increase the chances of an individual moving to that destination, but rarely have migration scholars examined how these networks are linked to the duration of one’s stay. This paper examines whether the presence of kin and/or friends known at a location prior to moving is associated with one’s duration of residence. Presumably, having both kin and friends already at a destination will be associated with the longest residence spells, since migrants would likely maximise their access to diverse network resources. Using residence history data on 1069 Malawians from the Migration and Health in Malawi (MHM) Project from 2013, subtle gender differences emerge in this relationship via discrete-time event history analyses. Women who knew some friends, but no kin, prior to migrating have a significantly lower likelihood of moving away in any year compared to those who did not know anyone, or only kin. For men, knowing some friends, but no kin, does not represent a significantly lower likelihood of leaving compared to those who knew no one or only kin prior to migrating.     

Unravelling Memories of Family Separation Among Sri Lankan Tamils Resettled in Australia, 1983–2000

Abstract

Using life story interviews with 10 Sri Lankan Tamil refugees resettled in Australia, this article shows how family separation in experiences of civil war and resettlement produce long-lasting and emotional memories of fear and determination. The findings explore how young Tamil people gave meaning to family when they interacted with key individuals and negotiated cultural practices in different spaces. Moreover, intergenerational family narratives emerged as a key practice through which Tamils preserved the family identity. The analysis demonstrates how and when family separation can manifest in personal memories to reveal stories of agency and resilience. A critical engagement of the past can help to better understand concepts of childhood in relation to family and family separation in war affected diaspora communities.     

文化认知中定向思维模式的建构与解构——以中国少数民族文化范式为研究视阈

定向思维模式的建构与解构实际上反映出认知结构的二重性特征，两者在文化认知活动中可互为挹注共存于对立统一关系里。因此，对中国少数民族文化范式的研究，不仅要重视建构之功能催生的符号化文化构成，还应关注解构之功能显现的非常见的文化元素。同时，只有弄清楚定向思维模式的建构与解构在文化认知中的意涵，才能明确定向思维模式的“趋向”和“专注”特点以及“惰化”和“孤立”倾向，从而为牵及民族文化事项的认知固化与迁移提供理论工具并用以指导多元文化实践。     

Social network and family business: Uncovering hybrid family firms

What does it mean for a private enterprise in China to be embedded in a family? Our purpose here is twofold: (1) use social network analysis to describe what it means for a firm to be embedded in a family, (2) reveal from the application a new kind of firm, not family, yet akin to family. Armed with data on a large probability sample of private enterprises — a third of which meet ownership and employment criteria of being family businesses — we uncover a category of “hybrid family firms” that look modern in the style of firms that exclude family, but operate socially in ways similar to family firms. Our conclusion from summary statistics on the sample is that there are no differences in average performance level or network advantage for the three categories of businesses: family firms, hybrid family firms, and family-excluded firms. The fact that CEOs of family firms and hybrid family firms more often turn to family as key business contacts is a fact about network composition that raises no question about network mechanisms. Whether the CEO turns to more or fewer family contacts, government help is more likely with stronger political connections, and business success and survival are more likely with a large, open network. That said, the look-modern, act-traditional hybrid family firms stand alone in prospering with a CEO embedded in a closed business network. Recognition of hybrid family firms adds to the literature’s illustrations of social network analysis used to distinguish types of businesses and business people, and extends the population of organizations within which governance and strategy are likely to be better understood when viewed through a family logic.     

互动视角下构式压制和承继的合力机制——基于羡余否定构式“好不X”封闭语料库的研究

构式与其组构成分间的互动关系一直是构式语法关注的核心问题之一。Goldberg在构式语法理论框架中提出了动词与构式的双向互动观，但在实际论述中却过于强调构式对动词的单向压制，降低了动词义对构式生成的贡献，忽略了对构式组构成分的系统研究。以构式与其组构成分间的互动关系为视点，从构式压制与承继的辩证关系出发，进一步阐释图示构式生成是构式与组构成分在互动压制和多重承继合力作用下的结果。同时，基于封闭语料库穷尽分析汉语羡余否定构式"好不X"的特征，结果表明：构式压制与词汇压制是双向互动的；图示构式特征的形成取决于构式对其组构成分的多重动态承继；图示构式基于互动压制承继合力机制的形成。     

从《了凡四训》到《训儿俗说》——关于袁了凡及其家风家训的思想史考察

袁了凡（袁黄）以其《了凡四训》闻名于世，该书亦被当作训子家书。其实，了凡所作家训并非《了凡四训》，而是《训儿俗说》。作为王龙溪（王畿）的及门弟子，了凡在思想上是阳明后学的一分子，其人生轨迹属于典型的儒家士大夫，其日常修持及著述呈现三教汇通的思想特色。了凡家风淳朴，家学深厚，以儒为宗，兼收并蓄，强调道德主义，注重积德行善，具有出世情怀，对其人格产生深刻影响。