Cross‐Sectional Psychological and Demographic Associations of Zika Knowledge and Conspiracy Beliefs Before and After Local Zika Transmission

Perceptions of infectious diseases are important predictors of whether people engage in disease‐specific preventive behaviors. Having accurate beliefs about a given infectious disease has been found to be a necessary condition for engaging in appropriate preventive behaviors during an infectious disease outbreak, while endorsing conspiracy beliefs can inhibit preventive behaviors. Despite their seemingly opposing natures, knowledge and conspiracy beliefs may share some of the same psychological motivations, including a relationship with perceived risk and self‐efficacy (i.e., control). The 2015–2016 Zika epidemic provided an opportunity to explore this. The current research provides some exploratory tests of this topic derived from two studies with similar measures, but different primary outcomes: one study that included knowledge of Zika as a key outcome and one that included conspiracy beliefs about Zika as a key outcome. Both studies involved cross‐sectional data collections that occurred during the same two periods of the Zika outbreak: one data collection prior to the first cases of local Zika transmission in the United States (March–May 2016) and one just after the first cases of local transmission (July–August). Using ordinal logistic and linear regression analyses of data from two time points in both studies, the authors show an increase in relationship strength between greater perceived risk and self‐efficacy with both increased knowledge and increased conspiracy beliefs after local Zika transmission in the United States. Although these results highlight that similar psychological motivations may lead to Zika knowledge and conspiracy beliefs, there was a divergence in demographic association.     

Toward an assessment of the social role of rural midwives and its implication for the family planning program: an Iranian case study

An axiom of family planning programming is the importance of culturally-appropriate communicators and motivators. Traditional midwives seem ideal for this task but few studies have been done to verify this assumption by analyzing the midwife's social role as perceived by the community. 325 married women and 81 unmarried girls from a "model village" near Shiraz were interviewed by female undergraduates. 82.5% of the women are of childbearing age; 66% married before 14 years; 33% use contraception, mostly the pill, but most want large families because they expect high child mortality rates. Most of the older women are able to assist in childbirth but none, except the village's one recognized midwife, who is considered to have divine backing, will do so except in an emergency. The midwife's activities cause her to be held in low esteem by the community because 1) she has contact with a woman's sexual parts and this fact is public; 2) she has contact with vaginal excretia which are, in Islam, polluting; and 3) she is paid for her services, which labels her as a woman "without shame". The midwife is, however, widely used since women and their husbands fear the trip to the hospital and treatment by a male doctor much more than a midwife-supervised birth. The midwife in the study village had been there only 2 years and feels that she is not fully trusted. She is not consulted on birth control at all, because women expect the pill to be dispensed by doctors and consider other methods as a matter strictly between husband and wife. The midwife's role seems to complement that of the government health authorities rather than compete. The midwife's low status and circumscribed sphere of activity, the weak respect in which her advice is held and the pattern of having only 1 recognized midwife in a village at a time make the midwife a poor agent for family planning services. Her effectiveness as an agent of social change could be improved by training her in hygienic practices of childbirth and by redefining her role-relationship with the community. Studies should be done to identify the areas where traditional birth attendants are the best family planning communicators and those where that role is best left to others.     

Evaluation of a Training to Reduce Provider Bias Toward Pregnant Patients With Substance Abuse

The objective of this article is not to present a scientific or systematic study, but to provide an initial framework for designing a training workshop to enhance health practitioners’ (nurses, social workers, physicians, etc.) knowledge regarding substance abuse treatment and to decrease their bias toward substance-abusing women, particularly pregnant women in rural communities. We incorporated the 4 Transdisciplinary Foundations from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration Competencies Model, with specific competencies targeted that related to provider bias. After the conference, 52 of the 70 participants completed a questionnaire to self-assess knowledge level and confidence in skill related to substance abuse management. Participant mean scores were statistically significantly higher following the conference than 1 week prior (p < .001) in the area of “gender difference with substance abuse,” moving from an average of 2.6 to 4.5 on a 5-point Likert scale. Our conference was successful in increasing attendees’ knowledge about gender difference and substance abuse among pregnant patients.     

Placeholders and Changemakers: Women Farmland Owners Navigating Gendered Expectations

Gendered expectations are central to the continuation of agricultural land tenure systems that concentrate land and power in the control of men. These expectations about how land should be used and by whom are communicated through cultural narratives and maintained through social interactions. Through analysis of qualitative data collected through in‐depth interviews with women farmland owners in Iowa, this article identifies a pivotal person without whom the success of these stories is in jeopardy: the “placeholder.” In this article, I identify how cultural narratives place two gendered expectations on women in the placeholder position: (1) that women landowners maintain farmland through the continuance of its use and preexisting land agreements with tenants or co‐owners, and (2) that women landowners defer their authority as landowners to men. Further, I identify the “changemaker” as an emerging character within cultural narratives—one who refuses to fit the expectations of placeholder and whose behavior may or may not be accepted by the community. Finally, I find that alternative social networks provide enabling environments for changemakers as sites of potential narrative revisions or shifts.     

Identifying meaning and perceived level of satisfaction within the context of work

OBJECTIVE: The primary objectives of this study were to identify sources of meaning for individuals within the context of a work environment, and to compare varied sources of meaning for individuals with high and low work satisfaction levels. METHOD: Participants were chosen based on satisfaction levels in employment, full-time employment status within an organization for at least one year, and diversity in the work setting. Data were gathered through a series of interviews and observations of the participants' workplaces. A comparative analysis of transcribed interviews was conducted by the researchers and with an expert occupational therapy faculty panel. From these analyses, the researchers developed work narratives for a mechanical engineer, a high school teacher, an employee of mechanical services, and a career service counselor. RESULTS: Emerging themes from the work narratives indicated that the various meanings employees found in work had an effect on their perceived levels of job satisfaction. Participants conveyed that organization identification, financial benefits, independent decision-making, reciprocal respect, opportunities for creativity, and maintaining significant relationships outside of work enhanced meaning and satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS: The worker role is a significant source of an individual's identity, meaning, and satisfaction in life. Professionals in various fields can work with employers to develop meaningful work environments for increased job satisfaction, greater motivation for work, increased productivity, and decreased employee turnover.     

Constructing family relationships: Intimacy, harmony and social value in accounts of sheltered retirement community residents

This research was undertaken at a West Coast USA sheltered retirement community where fifteen able elder residents were interviewed about their personal relationships and communication with peers, family and younger people. This paper focuses on respondent's discursive constructions of their relationships with family—particularly adult grandchildren. The analysis shows how respondents' talk about family relationships is largely positive and discusses how respondents build an image of intergenerational solidarity through their accounts of frequency and quality of contact with grandchildren. Some of the ways that intergenerational solidarity is communicated in the context of the interview are: discounting of family problems; cataloguing achievements and talking about grandchildren with pride; demonstrating that they–the elder–are valued; and accounts of how problematic aspects of their relationships are avoided in intergenerational talk.     

Consuming Youth: Timorese in the Resistance Against Indonesian Occupation

This article explores the role played by risk-seeking Timorese youth, known as the New Generation (Geraçao Foun), in the resistance movement against Indonesian occupation (1975–1999). It discusses the capture, regimentation and marginalisation of youthful radicalism by the national resistance movement. The paper looks at these processes of youth revolutionary involvement sympathetically though the memories of former participants in the clandestine struggle and is representative of a new reflexive phase in young Timorese' post-colonial self-realisation. This phase is decidedly non-triumphalist, one which dwells on the inability to be ‘recompensed’ for the dreams that were captured and lives that were side-tracked in a conflict that consumed youth.