The burden of pain on the shoulders of aging

More than 9% of the world population is older than 60. With age comes additional vulnerability to pain and the accumulation of insults that can engender ongoing misery. Insights into molecular and cellular aspects of pain might help escort people more comfortably into the senior ranks, but research that specifically addresses pain in the elderly is only now gearing up. Although a comprehensive understanding of how aging affects pain--and vice versa--is far off, experts report a good outlook for helping the millions of undertreated older people who experience pain on a daily basis.     

Evaluation of the Senate Standing Committee on Health and Welfare

In their books The Assessment of Social Research and Exemplars of Social Research, Fellin, Tripodi and Meyer develop, describe and discuss a method for classifying and assessing social research. They state that “this classification system is intended for use with empirical research reports, and is not applicable for categorising non-empirical studies such as historical and bibliographical research. Furthermore, only reports of single research investigations can be usefully classified in this scheme.”     

Standing at the Door: Reflections on the Daughters of the Second Wave

Although there are many similarities between the young women Susie Orbach describes and their counterparts in the northeastern United States, there are also complexities and multiplicities in their behavior and expression of aggression, their experience of themselves and of each other, that require us to reach beyond a comfortable intergenerational grasp. These daughters of women who came of age in the feminist movement are members of their own quite globalized youth culture with its own construction of “girls” in an era when aggression is everywhere more explicit and relationships with parents have been shaped by economic and social changes. We do not really know how concepts, like merged attachment, that were so critical to our liberation and coming of age, are relevant to the experience of these young women. It is a question to explore in a cultural context that is more familiar to them than it is to us, their parents.     

Putting old heads on young shoulders: helping social work students uncover the neoliberal hegemony

This paper explores the suggestion that younger students and social workers are more accepting of neoliberal social work practices than their older counterparts, understanding social problems more readily as failings of individual behaviour rather than as produced by societal forces such as inequality, poverty, and punitive social policy. The suggestion is made that the acceptance of a hegemonic view of people in poverty and other difficulties, which is simple and reductionist, and therefore, easy to grasp, can only be challenged by sophisticated critical thinking. Assignment results from two modules within one social work programme which significantly correlate marks attained and student age are considered in the light of the suggestion that younger students are struggling with critical thinking, and therefore, with deconstructing the neoliberal hegemony.     

Standing on the Shoulders of a Giant: Remembrances of Jack Michael,Part 2

In Part 1 of these remembrances of Jack Michael, we briefly described Jack’s history in terms of how he became a behavior analyst (Sundberg & Schlinger, 2021). We pointed out that he was one of the first to apply the principles of behavior analysis discovered in the experimental laboratory to the area of rehabilitation. In so doing, Jack was perhaps the first applied behavior analyst. In Part 1, some of his former students and close associates from his early years at the University of Houston, Arizona State University, and Western Michigan University—John Mabry, Grayson Osborne, Jon Bailey, Mark Sundberg, and J. Vincent Carbone—provided their personal tributes to Jack. In Part 2, we offer six more tributes that—with one exception, that of Ted Ayllon—provide insight into Jack’s work in the latter part of his career. In addition to Ted Ayllon, these tributes are from Jack’s students and close associates Hank Schlinger, Dave Palmer, John and Barb Esch, Carl Sundberg, and Caio Miguel. The authors provide insights not only into their views about Jack but also into their own lives. Collectively, they paint a picture of people from different backgrounds that all found their way to Jack Michael and to behavior analysis. To a person, they describe how their behavior, whether as scientists, practitioners, or both, was radically transformed as a result, and how they attribute that change largely to Jack’s influence.     

Standing on the Shoulders of a Giant: Remembrances of Jack Michael,Part 1

The Analysis of Verbal Behavior - In 1959, Jack Michael and his PhD student Ted Ayllon published “The Psychiatric Nurse as a Behavioral Engineer” (Ayllon & Michael, 1959). That...     

Political Economy of Standing against a Stand-By

What explains the actual and rhetorical defections of political elites in developing countries from the IMF programs even at times of severe economic difficulties? Scholars have focused on “domestic audience costs” of participating in IMF programs. This paper, on the other hand, suggests that as commitments to IMF programs require governments to make changes generating institutional, social and political consequences, governments choose to delay an agreement with the Fund, whenever the program is likely to antagonize key business groups that support the government. In the light of the Malaysian and the recent Turkish experiences, the paper will demonstrate that defection from an IMF program is likely to occur when the new Stand-By Agreement can jeopardize particular business interests backing the ruling political elites either through institutional reforms or economic policies.     

站在物质与精神天平上的BOBO族

本文将当今流行的BOBO族作为关注点,从它的流行与定义入手,描述这一站在物质与精神天平上的BOBO族的种种面相,并分析面相背后社会结构变迁情况下一些内在精神的产生原由。最后就BOBO族是否是新兴精英阶层还是时尚的过客、消费社会的产物进行了讨论。     

Standing Up for Science and Social Justice

What does it mean to do social science—perhaps especially for those of us whose research focuses on issues of social justice—during what my students gingerly refer to as “this time we're living in”? Community based participatory research offers one important approach.     

Moments,Monuments and Explication: The Standing of the Millennium Dome

The construction of the Millennium Dome near the origin of Greenwich, at a cost of something in the order of one billion pounds to the British taxpayer, 1 see, for example, Nick Mathiason 'Downturn hits Dome sale,' The Observer , Sunday October 21, 2001. provides an excellent, if somewhat expensive, opportunity to reconsider the interrelations of time and space. For the Dome seeks to monumentalise and celebrate a moment of time as it simultaneously takes the form of a material structure that will persist. 2 Although the extent of this persistence has been a constant matter for considerable debate. This trade between moment and monument is replayed between the Dome as a startling visual immediacy, a whole to be apprehended in wonder, and the serialisation in progressive fashion of its staged contents. But it also represents an opportunity to see in the Dome a reflection of the society in which we live, and the possibilities it delivers. And we contend that the monumentalisation of the Dome may be read as an evisceration of the power of the moment, of the capacity of the human subject to engage in 'authentic unconditional ethical' ( i ek;, 2001, p. 151) action. In Britain, at least, much of the millennial moment was mediated through the Domic narrative. Nowhere else, after all, 'has anything like it'. An organising symbol for both malcontents and modernizers, reactions to the product were certainly diverse. But the majority of these reactions to the contents of the monument, and indeed the monument itself, represent a retreat from and obfuscation of our own complicity in the monumentalisation of our current society, of our refusal to treat the institution of society as an active product of our own imaginary making (Castoriadis, 1997). In their and our lack of reflection on, and problematisation of, the moment in time that is being monumentalised, we and they re-institute a denial of the possibility of 'real' time and thus of 'real' action and change. Through consideration of the work of Castoriadis (1997) and i ek (2001) we attempt to take back the millennial moment from the conservatism of the monument. Through a collage of media commentary on the Dome and constructivist and poststructualist commentary on our social condition, we attempt to show how a particular reading of the Dome as reflection of the impoverishment of our contemporary, progressivist modernity can open up an opportunity to engage in a project that wills a different society.     

The Skinny on Success: Body Mass, Gender and Occupational Standing Across the Life Course

Several studies have analyzed the impact of obesity on occupational standing. This study extends previous research by estimating the influence of body mass on occupational attainment over three decades of the career using data from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study. In a series of covariance structure analyses, we considered three mechanisms that may alter the career trajectories of heavy individuals: (1. employment-based discrimination, (2. educational attainment, and (3. marriage market processes. Unlike previous studies, we found limited evidence that employment-based discrimination impaired the career trajectories of either men or women. Instead, we found that heavy women received less post-secondary schooling than their thinner peers, which in turn adversely affected their occupational standing at each point in their careers.     

The Social Life of Homelessness: Myths and Social Standing

There are two groups of people, the Insiders and the Outsiders. Insiders have access to a network of social transactions that enable them to tap into resources and information that lead to employment, housing, and other opportunities for upward mobility. These processes are often informal, and sometimes exclusive. The social networks that Outsiders have pertain largely to the acquisition of a meal or a night’s shelter. They do not have access to the better-endowed social networks of Insiders, and are therefore not privy to the informational and resources exchange that takes place therein. This translates into fewer job interviews, fewer housing applications, etc. Finally, this means that when an Outsider experiences a stressor (i.e., the flu, eviction, unemployment), it can take on crisis proportions leading ultimately to homelessness. However dim the prospects of Outsiders are, there are specific corrective processes, which can be implemented.     

守望相助,共克时艰——寄语“三八”国际妇女节

2020年注定是不平凡的一年。新冠肺炎疫情发生以来,中国政府和人民全力以赴抗击疫情。外国妇女组织和机构、国际组织、港澳台妇女组织、海外华人华侨妇女组织以及在华留学生代表,纷纷向全国妇联发来慰问,为中国加油,为武汉加油。2020年也是北京第四次世界妇女大会25周年,在今年“三八”国际妇女节来临之际,他们将暖心的祝福,送给所有中国的妇女姐妹。     

Standing up to complexity: researching moral panics in social work

Moral panics are central to social work policy and practice. Voluntary agencies and statutory bodies (including governments) create and sustain moral panics in order to raise awareness of, and win support for, their own understandings of social issues and problems. This is not a neutral enterprise; on the contrary, moral panics often have consequences that are negative, whether intended or unintended. Far from leading to greater social justice and a more equal society, they may reinforce stereotypes and lead to fearful, risk-averse practice. This paper discusses one such moral panic in 2013 that centred on the story of ‘Maria’, a Bulgarian Roma child living in Greece. The paper explores the meaning and use of the concept of moral panic before unpacking this case-study example in more detail. We argue that the moral panic over ‘Maria’ has much to tell us about ideas of welfare and protection, institutional racism and children and childhood, as well as the connections between ‘private troubles’ and ‘public issues’. We conclude that social work as a profession must stand up to complexity, and in doing so, be aware of its own role in relation to moral panics.     

Intermarriage,Ethnic Identity,and Perceived Social Standing Among Asian Women in the United States

This study investigates the consequences of Asian women's intermarriage—whether it is associated with higher social standing and lower ethnic identity, using data on Asian women (N = 589) from the National Latino and Asian American Survey (NLAAS). The socioeconomic status of partners of women who intermarried and partners of women who married men of the same ethnicity are compared. The potential associations between intermarriage and two subjective measures—ethnic identity and perceived social standing—are explored. The study rejects the hypothesis based on the conventional belief that Asian women in the United States find “better” partners with higher socioeconomic status from other racial or ethnic groups. The findings support the view that marital assimilation leads to identificational assimilation and demonstrate that intermarriage is not associated with higher perceived social standing. The results suggest that educational and occupational endogamy plays a larger role in Asian women's intermarriage than social exchange.     

Standing guard—being a relative to a hospitalised,elderly person

Caregiving relatives continue to feel primarily responsible for the care and well-being of elderly persons, when they are admitted to hospital. Although involvement of relatives in decision-making is rare, and the hospitalisation therefore may be a frustrating experience, little is known of relatives' experience of the hospitalisation of elderly persons from a life-world perspective. In this phenomenological study, hospital admission was a time of crisis and possible transition for the relatives, and the encounter with the professional system added to the relatives' emotional and physical burden. They felt responsible for protecting the elderly person and ensuring they received sufficient care. The history of the relationship and care was the frame of reference in which the hospital stay of the elderly person was reflected and understood. Feelings, roles and experiences were brought into the hospital setting and formed the basis for the relatives' expectations, values and conducts there.     

Standing their ground: Southern white hegemonic defense of place through camouflaged narrative continuity

Public relations research typically conceptualizes the practice as organization-centric by emphasizing strategies, tactics, and tools used to achieve objectives that advance organizational interests. Often less organizational but essential to understanding community self-governance, grassroots actors use public relations to defend, advance, or challenge ideographs such as freedom, democracy or environmental quality. The ideograph analyzed in this case is the postbellum narrative continuity of “Southern Heritage not Hate” which served as camouflage for redeeming the Lost Cause, the argument that the South did not lose the Civil War. This essay normatively identifies, interprets and judges public relations strategies southern advocates used to “stand their ground” by defining place as a cultural issue and source of relational agency. This grassroots public relations campaign sought to defeat the post-Civil War Reconstruction narrative continuity that fostered the societal agency of African Americans; postbellum activists re-imposed a narrative favorable to Southern white male hegemony. To stand their ground, “Southern” voices used military textuality, focused on CSA General Robert E. Lee, as narrative continuity during the U.S. Civil War (1861–1865), Reconstruction (1865–1876), and Jim Crow (1877–1954). The term “camouflage” is used to explore this narrative and critically illuminate how text can define place so as to make it seem different than it is. Camouflage encodes messages differently to different decoders; it conceals as it reveals. Such strategies are typically more emergent contextually than the result of a grand plan. Through grassroots activism by groups such as the United Daughters of the Confederacy and Sons of Confederate Veterans, what once was overt became covert regarding national military culture.     

Women's Economic Standing,Marriage Timing,and Cross‐National Contexts of Gender

Proponents of the theory of specialization and exchange hypothesize that in any national context, women's higher economic standing will decrease their chance of marriage. Some researchers suggest, however, that only in industrialized countries with a high degree of role differentiation by gender does the inverse relationship between women's economic standing and the chance of marriage exist. To evaluate contrasting cross‐national predictions, I test with longitudinal data and standardized methods whether the inverse relationship exists in 3 similarly affluent industrialized countries that vary in their degree of role differentiation by gender: the United States, Japan (a context more differentiated by gender than the United States), and Sweden (a context less differentiated by gender than the United States). Contrary to the prediction that develops out of the theory of specialization and exchange, results indicate that women's higher levels of income discourage first marriage formation in Japan, but encourage it in the United States and Sweden.     

Advanced Standing and Two-Year Program MSW Students: An Empirical Investigation of Foundation Interviewing Skills

Abstract

Fifteen advanced standing and 23 two-year program Master of Social Work (MSW) students interviewed a simulated client. Blind raters working from videotapes of these interviews reliably evaluated the students' use of three core interviewing skills: Facilitation, Questioning/Clarification, and Support/Empathy. No statistically significant differences were found between the two groups of students on these skills. These results support the Council on Social Work Education policy of offering advanced standing to graduates of accredited Bachelor of Social Work programs.