The ‘right time’ – negotiating the timing of interviews with vulnerable young people

Participant retention is a key factor in determining the success of longitudinal research. Challenges in re-locating and retaining participants over the long term are major issues for researchers working with young people who face adversity and experience frequent changes in circumstances. This article reports on a study of vulnerable young people and their transition into adulthood. Rather than the more conventional schedule-based approach to locating and re-interviewing young people, a relational process, the ‘right time’ framework, was used to facilitate young people's involvement in the study. Embedded in the ‘right time’ framework is recognition of the diverse and fluctuating circumstances that shape young people's availability for interviews. Several case examples are considered which amplify the way that the ‘right time’ framework allowed the research to navigate around these circumstances. The case examples highlight the value young people attached to being involved in the research, the influence on the ‘right time’ of wider relational tensions for young people and the need to negotiate researcher status as a different sort of adult. The ‘right time’ framework contributed to a high retention rate in the study generating a more representative sample and enhancing the subsequent data analysis by providing valuable insights into the lives of these vulnerable young people.     

Embracing Indeterminacy: On Being a Liminal Professional

The rise of the corporate profession has contributed to a more varied and ambiguous professional terrain that is increasingly seen to be indeterminate and fluid. This paper advances the current debate around the development of corporate professions, exploring how practitioners respond to this environment. Drawing on research with public relations practitioners, the paper shows how the idea of being a liminar facilitates the formation of a professional identity in conditions of high indeterminacy. In taking an individual level of analysis of professions, the paper suggests that indeterminacy is a more resonant feature for corporate professionals than previously suggested in the research, but that this indeterminacy is navigated in professional identity construction through ‘being a liminar’, and thus greater nuance may need to be recognized in the conceptualization of both corporate professions and corporate professionalization. It also demonstrates the use of liminality as a discursive resource in identity construction and with it, challenges the common association of liminality with self‐doubt and existential anxiety. In turn, the paper considers the implications of the liminal professional identity for the future of contemporary professions, and for understanding the liminal experience.     

Midwifery management of second-degree perineal tears in New Zealand: A cross-sectional survey of practice

Background

Second-degree tears are the most common form of perineal trauma occurring after vaginal birth managed by New Zealand midwives, although little is known about midwives’ perineal practice.

Developing a Broadly Applicable Measure of Risk Perception

Decades of research identify risk perception as a largely intuitive and affective construct, in contrast to the more deliberative assessments of probability and consequences that form the foundation of risk assessment. However, a review of the literature reveals that many of the risk perception measures employed in survey research with human subjects are either generic in nature, not capturing any particular affective, probabilistic, or consequential dimension of risk; or focused solely on judgments of probability. The goal of this research was to assess a multidimensional measure of risk perception across multiple hazards to identify a measure that will be broadly useful for assessing perceived risk moving forward. Our results support the idea of risk perception being multidimensional, but largely a function of individual affective reactions to the hazard. We also find that our measure of risk perception holds across multiple types of hazards, ranging from those that are behavioral in nature (e.g., health and safety behaviors), to those that are technological (e.g., pollution), or natural (e.g., extreme weather). We suggest that a general, unidimensional measure of risk may accurately capture one's perception of the severity of the consequences, and the discrete emotions that are felt in response to those potential consequences. However, such a measure is not likely to capture the perceived probability of experiencing the outcomes, nor will it be as useful at understanding one's motivation to take mitigation action.     

Influences on registered nurses' decision‐making in cases of suspected child abuse

This paper reports on the factors influencing decision‐making for a group of 10 South Australian community nurses in cases of suspected child abuse. Each nurse participated in a structured interview. The data were organized into themes, using the computer program NUD*IST. Factors having an impact on the nurses' decisions to report included: the type of suspected abuse, making moral judgements and decision‐making, the consequences of reporting, and the impact versus the outcomes of reporting. Most significantly, the community nurses based many of their decisions on their estimation of the kind of intervention likely to be undertaken by children's protection services. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Playing the game of school mathematics: being explicit for Indigenous learners and access to learning

Drawing on studies of successful remote schools in one region of Australia, it was found that two key strategies were common in the approaches at these schools. First, to make the strategies and expectations being adopted explicit to all those involved in the learning enterprise, and second, that consistency in approaches was crucial. Bourdieu’s theoretical project is used to understand how the practices are being adopted by the schools and how they contribute to the success of learners of mathematics.     

Peer paradox: the tensions that peer relationships raise for vulnerable youth

The contribution peer relationships make to positive adolescent development is well recognized. Accordingly, peer problem measures typically assess youth with few age‐appropriate peers as having peer problems. Yet, youth facing high levels of personal and/or social adversity may reduce their association with antisocial peers as part of coping or risk mitigation strategies. While such strategies will result in higher scores on peer problem measures, they may also facilitate resilience and constitute a resource social workers can draw on in their work with youth. To test this proposition of peer adaptation as a risk mitigation strategy, mixed‐methods data relating to two groups of youth who were exposed to different levels of adversity were compared on a standardized peer problem measure and a range of risk measures. Qualitative interviews extended this data and explored vulnerable youth perceptions of social withdrawal as a coping strategy. Results from the survey and qualitative data indicated that a subgroup of youth facing high levels of adversity restricted association with antisocial peers to reduce their behavioural risks. However, without adequate support from adults in both formal support systems and youths' social ecologies to compensate for the loss of peer friendships, this strategy did not reduce behavioural risk in the medium term. The social withdrawal strategy also appeared to heighten mental health concerns for these youth. The implications of this finding for the development of policy and practice with vulnerable youth are discussed.     

(Un)ethical practices: intimacy and Internet in the media coverage of the Ashley Madison hack

In the summer of 2015, the “cheating website” known as Ashley Madison came under scrutiny, as a group calling itself the Impact Team revealed users’ private information. This case study explores the controversy’s Canadian media coverage and sheds light on the main discourses about intimacy and the Internet that were made visible during this event. It interrogates how cheaters, hackers, and the company were represented. To varying degrees, the mainstream press condemns the cheaters, the hackers, and the company for their behaviour. The article also addresses the ways intimate practices are politicized and commercialized in the digital context, including a discussion of the emphasis on “privacy.” To conclude the article, I discuss the transparency and privacy issues implicated in digital intimacies and the power–knowledge (im)balance implied by hackers’ online anonymity.     

Older adults' narratives about a flood disaster: Resilience, coherence, and personal identity

Older adults are a vulnerable group in a disaster and are more at risk of adverse effects as a result. This paper draws on the use of narrative theory in health and gerontology studies to examine how a disruptive disaster was storied. Narrative interviews were conducted with nine older adults aged over 65 years who had recently experienced a flood disaster. The participants' narratives about the disruptive event were integrated with past personal events that spanned more than seven decades. The disaster became a reference point for previous challenging experiences, which created biographical continuity, coherence and order over time. Furthermore, the disaster stories were about biography and identity, and showed how older adults made sense of the flood from a life-course perspective. The use of narrative approaches provides an insight into how the flood disaster was experienced, and reveals how four older adults storied their experiences of a significant life challenge.     

Sexual Hookups and Adverse Health Outcomes: A Longitudinal Study of First-Year College Women

“Hookups” are sexual encounters between partners who are not in a romantic relationship and do not expect commitment. We examined the associations between sexual hookup behavior and depression, sexual victimization (SV), and sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among first-year college women. In this longitudinal study, 483 women completed 13 monthly surveys assessing oral and vaginal sex with hookup and romantic partners, depression, SV, and self-reported STIs. Participants also provided biological specimens that were tested for STIs. During the study, 50% of participants reported hookup sex and 62% reported romantic sex. Covariates included previous levels of the outcome, alcohol use, impulsivity, sensation seeking, and romantic sex. Autoregressive cross-lagged models showed that, controlling for covariates, hookup behavior during college was correlated with depression, Bs = .21, ps < .05, and SV, Bs = .19, ps < .05. In addition, precollege hookup behavior predicted SV early in college, B = .62, p < .05. Hookup sex, OR 1.32, p < .05, and romantic sex, OR 1.19, p < .05, were associated with STIs. Overall, sexual hookup behavior among college women was positively correlated with experiencing depression, SV, and STIs, but the nature of these associations remains unclear, and hooking up did not predict future depression.