Energizing the ordinary: Biographical work and the future in stroke recovery narratives

Historically, the life course has been constructed as an organized and linear temporal progression. This holds true in various disciplines from education, to psychology, to counseling. The foundation of a life unfolding through temporal categorizations is documented in textbooks and theories that straddle these disciplines as well as many others, including the sociology of health and illness, which has often conceptualized the illness experience as embedded in a recovery trajectory.Here, we take this to task. Using Gubrium and Holstein's [Sociol. Inq. 65 (1995) 207; Gubrium, J., & Holstein, J., (1997). The new language of qualitative method. New York: Oxford University Press] analytic vocabulary of biographical work, we analyze narratives of stroke survivors by emphasizing the ordinary resources used as discursive foundations for the narrative production of the future in illness. Ordinary resources focused on include God and spirituality, comorbidities, and activity and leisure. The discussion is embedded in overarching concerns with “healthy aging” in gerontology and geriatrics.     

The issue is human quality: In praise of children

This essay is based on the premise that quality in human life is inseparably linked to the well-being of children. In this view, the well-being of children is both the principal challenge faced by a modern society and the principal focal point tor a society “bound to move away from ‘growth’ defined as quantitative product irrespective of what and whom it is for.” Children and their needs provide an anchoring point for adult relationships that is “labor intensive” and intrinsically satisfying when set within a social context rich in enduring, reciprocal interpersonal relationships. The principal threats to the quality of social life are trends toward universalistic rather than particularistic systems for evaluating individuals, and materialistic rather than social criteria for evaluating productivity. Both these trends threaten childrearing as a valued activity. Both emphasize the “hurdensomeness” of children. Large schools and socially isolated families are the contexts in which these two trends find their most dangerous expression. A sustainable society requires a pro-family orientation if it is to meet the needs of children and thus provide for the fundamental psychic needs of adults. A variety of implications for individual action and social planning are derived from this discussion. These implications include the need to preserve and restore socially strong neighborhoods, reduce school size, and conduct “family impact analysis” as a basis for guiding decisions in the public and private sectors.     

Truth-in-sentencing, law enforcement, and inmate population growth

This paper presents the empirical estimation of an econometric model of the flow of prisoners into a state correctional system. Specifically, an econometric model was built to control for the number of parolees, the probability of admission to the state system, the size of the state population, the unemployment and poverty rates, the number of law enforcement officers within the state, and the state-wide “truth-in-sentencing” law, which requires convicts to serve at least 85% of their sentences. One primary result was that increases in the number of law enforcement officers has generated a decline in the growth rate of the prison population. This suggests that a “deterrent effect” is created when more police are placed on the beat. Furthermore, the results indicate that the truth-in-sentencing law has also slowed the rate of inmate population growth. This finding may reflect the growing trend for courts to hand down nontraditional sentences and to adjust prison sentences to reflect a constant “real time” of incarceration by crime.     

Assessing outcomes for sufferers of severe mental disorder: A conceptual framework and review

A conceptual framework is presented for classifying the outcomes of services for sufferers of severe mental disorders. The proposed classification framework contains three dimensions: (a) the respondent type; (b) the social context; and (c) the domain of treatment outcomes. Respondent types include the client, the family, the extended social network, the clinician and the scientist. Social contexts include the individual, the family, work/school and the broader community. Domains of treatment outcome include “clinical status,” “functional status,” “life satisfaction and fulfillment,” and “safety and welfare.” This multidimensional framework is used to organize an illustrative review of existing outcome measures. It is concluded that: (a) measures of safety and welfare raise important social and policy questions and these measures require considerable development in order for utility to be realized; (b) although a good beginning has been made, more attention needs to be focused on defining and measuring “life satisfaction and fulfillment” and combining this domain with others to produce “well being” or “quality of life” scales; (c) the functional status area requires additional research and development especially when measurement is conducted in contexts other than work/school; and (d) although measures of clinical status are relatively well developed, the family perspective and context must be integrated into these measures.     

Multiple reference points in investor regret

Regret is the result of a comparison between “what is” and “what might have been”. Although regret is a relevant emotion in the life of investors, research studying the regrets of real investors and how these are influenced by multiple reference points is lacking. We present a field survey that investigated the regrets of real stock investors in relation to multiple “what might have been’s.” We found that their regrets are most influenced by what their outcomes might have been had they not invested, by their expected outcomes and by the best-performing unchosen stocks. In addition, we also found that the feeling of regret was influenced by losses or gains relative to each reference point rather than by the size of the loss or gain.     

Aging and identity politics

In this essay, I reflect on multiple identities—woman, lesbian, old—as they interconnect at different life stages. I raise an issue of identity politics (Is “old” as fundamental an identity as “woman”?) and suggest that critical gerontology offers a lens through which to interpret my personal journey from a core feminist identity to a questioning and ambivalent identity as an old woman.     

Achievement-related attitudes and the fate of “at-risk” groups in society

What causes poverty and how does an individual escape it? Factors such as intelligence and social class background are thought to be important. However, a number of economists have argued that an individual’s profile of achievement-related attitudes (ARAs) like work-orientation and conscientiousness might play a role in social success and failure. Part of their attraction is that these attitudes are regarded as responsive to nurturing and may be especially significant for those individuals with few formal skills to offer the labour market. The NCDS longitudinal dataset was interrogated to assess whether ARAs predicted an individual’s earnings measured almost two decades later. Results indicated that ARAs explain a good deal of variance in earnings, particularly for “at-risk” males. Social policy implications are discussed.     

Preventing youthful disconnectedness

Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, this article examines the characteristics (and later life histories) of 16- to 23-year-olds who, during the 1980s, were “disconnected” from mainstream society, that is, they were not enrolled in school, not gainfully employed, not in the military, and not married to someone who was “connected” in one of these ways. One in three youths were disconnected for at least half of a calendar year. As adults, youths who were disconnected for a short time (in only one or two years) did not differ substantially from those who were never disconnected in terms of educational attainment, work history, family income, reliance on government programs, and marital status. However, those who were disconnected in three or more years experienced significantly greater hardships. This article suggests that school-related interventions (such as career-oriented education, after-school “safe havens,” and targeting individual deficits) might help prevent youthful disconnectedness.     

Family life education for day care programs serving the black community

The increase in working mothers has led to a growing demand for day care cross-culturally. Attitudes and opinions vary in regard to the necessity of parental involvement in these programs. However, to foster development of the “whole” child, meaningful and shared communication must exist between the parents of preschool children and their caretakers. The Family Life Education discussion ρoup is a form of social work intervention developed around the life tasks facing families and individuals. This article explores the use of such groups in conjunction with day care programs serving black children from low-income families.     

Poverty over the family life cycle

The Panel Study of Income Dynamics is used to investigate vulnerability to poverty over the family life cycle. An examination of 1981–83 interview years reveals that family life cycle stage is a significant predictor of poverty status. Two-parent families are more vulnerable to poverty in the childbearing stage, and also when they are launching children. Female-headed families are more vulnerable to poverty when younger children are present in the household. Reasons for these different vulnerabilities to poverty are given, and the implications of these findings are discussed.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 1987 meeting of the Midwest Sociological Society. I would like to thank Joan Aldous, David Klein and Rodney Ganey for their reviews of this paper.Robert C. Tuttle is an assistant professor, Department of Sociology/Anthropology, Wilkes College, Wilkes-Barre, PA 18766. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame and includes the economic situations of families, and family policy among his research interests.     

Elderly narrative reflections on the contradictions in Turkish village family life after migration of adult children

International and domestic labor migrations are changing the face of many countries. Those economic and demographic transitions collide with cultural expectations and ways of conducting intergenerational relations. This paper is a narrative analysis of some of those changes from the perspective of the elderly who remain behind in a small village in central Turkey. In particular, their narratives focus on filial expectations of sons and daughters, the status of mothers-in-law, health and economic well-being, and the future of village life. While these “left behind” elderly feel a loss of status and control and fear for their futures as their children pursue lifestyles unfamiliar and threatening to them, they are nevertheless gradually negotiating these changes and redefining late life to adapt to new circumstances and maintain their family relations.     

From the lab to the front line: How individual biogerontologists navigate their contested field

This paper infuses a new perspective into scholarship on anti-aging science: the experiences of individual scientists as they have entered and navigated this controversial field. We draw on in-depth interviews with 43 prominent biogerontologists to accomplish three objectives. First, we highlight key factors that draw scientists into biogerontology – especially the unique and complex puzzles posed by aging. Second, we examine how biogerontologists define themselves and their research in relation to “anti-aging” science – particularly how scientists distance themselves from the tarnished history of the field and employ powerful language to distinguish legitimate from illegitimate scholarship, and science from industry. Finally, we explore how individual scientists manage any social, religious, and ethical objections to conducting “anti-aging” research — and the repertoire of responses they use to simultaneously dismantle objections and reinforce the legitimacy of their science. The analyses reveal how much is ultimately at stake for these individual scientists on the front line.     

Europe and Security in the Caucasus

The Caucasus has become, as a long-lasting seismic wave, a framework of enormous and underestimated relevance and uncertainty. But even so, we have not to become prisoner of a short-term “cage”. There is neither strategy nor policy, diplomacy, or war that can exist without four fundamental intellectual preconditions: historical knowledge, security knowledge, ethnic-cultural-religious knowledge, and knowledge of the geopolitical, economic, and international order. These have been recalled by some crucial comments taken from a revisited version of Homer’s Iliad, recently published by the Italian writer Alessandro Baricco, to better focus the concepts. “Men have always flung themselves headlong into battle, like moths attracted towards a fatal flame. There is no fear or self-disgust which has managed to keep them away from that flame” – he wrote – “because it is within that flame that they have always found the only way of emerging from the shadows of life. For this reason, I believe that no one will stop searching for an alternative beauty to that represented by the war path or stop looking for a reason to about face. Sooner or later we will succeed in calling Achilles away from this fateful war. Neither fear nor horror will bring him home. It will be some other completely different beauty, more dazzling than his own and infinitely more humble”. We are, in fact, aware of examples of very poor governance skills at a global level as regards the management of medium-and long-term international order options. And the Caucasus is really a case study. For these many reasons Europe cannot avoid an effective “neighbourhood policy” with the Caucasian countries. In 2003, the European Union appointed a Special Representative for the region. Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia all have Partnership and Cooperation Agreements in force with the EU. Actions plans will be soon implemented and Europe represents by and large the preferred and more reliable interlocutor for the Caucasian region.     

Functional specificity in discussion networks: The influence of general and problem-specific networks on health outcomes

Though commonly used in social science research to measure the influence of social networks, the link between discussing “important matters” within networks and the achievement of instrumental ends is frequently unspecified or untested. To address this gap, we explore the consequences of using the general “important matters” approach versus one in which the substance of discussions is directly linked to the outcomes of interest. The egocentric social networks of people experiencing an acute health crisis are examined. We identify the characteristics of and the degree of membership overlap between “important matters” and “health matters” discussants, and explore their relative power in explaining a wide range of health and health services-related outcomes. We find no evidence for the influence of “important matters” networks, while characteristics of “health matters” networks demonstrate a significant effect across all models.     

Gender violence, fan activism and public relations in sport: The case of “Footy Fans Against Sexual Assault”

This paper is based on the belief that online activism is essential for understanding the role and potential of public relations in modern campaigns. In relation to the issue of gender violence against women in football, analyzed and compared are the responses of two official, resource-rich organisations – the National Rugby League (NRL) and Australian Football League (AFL) – and an unofficial, resource-poor fan advocacy group, called Football Fans against Sexual Assault (FFASA). In cooperation and conflict with the leagues, FFASA positioned itself in the market place, taking the widely unoccupied niche of “fan advocacy”—different from “expert advocacy” or “player advocacy”.The article discusses in more detail the major strategy of the group, the Purple Armband Games, which carries many elements of cutting-edge public relations such as advocacy as third-party endorsement; “fan activism” as empowering of “expert advocacy”; “symbolic outsourcing” of participants by facilitating their mode of engagement, the “emblematic richness” of the purple armband symbol, the “oneness” of which overcomes any confrontational dualism.     

The experiences of “aging” among formerly homeless adults with chronic mental illness: A qualitative study

Little is known about the life course of older adults with serious mental illness who have also been homeless. Using 44 life history interviews with 25 study participants ages 40 to 62, this study used case study and thematic analysis to examine the lived experience of such individuals as they enter their mid- and later-life years. Participants, whose lives were marred by early-onset substance abuse, symptoms of mental illness and a descent into homelessness, spoke of an awareness of aging and premature mortality. Major themes that emerged were: (1) reflecting on losses, (2) growing older and wiser, (3) struggling with normality, (4) having space and time to reevaluate, and (5) awareness of the future and “time left.” Life histories which focus on the person-in-context and their subjective experiences provide a viable research method to further the understanding of one of the most underserved and hardest-to-reach populations.     

“We're Not Old!”: Older Women's Negotiation of Aging and Oldness

This article is based on participant observation research at a seniors' center in central Canada in which the writer sought to acquire an understanding of how older adults define, interpret, and negotiate their realities and identities. Through activity and group membership, the center members — the majority of whom are single, older women between the ages of 50 and 90 — seek to distance themselves from the category of “old” and the accompanying ageist stereotypes. Striving to establish and preserve their precarious membership in the “not old”, center members struggle to reconcile their belief and experience of older adulthood as a time of activity, health, and happiness with their ever-present fear of declining health and the realities of widowhood and the loss of youthful attractiveness.     

The World Bank and housing policy in Madras

The World Bank began its involvement with housing and urban programmes in 1972, offering a new theory and practice. This new theory emphasised “affordability” and the recovery of costs from the beneficiaries of programmes. It stood in contrast to the conventional way of doing things, with government providing “permanent construction” housing with extensive subsidies. “Affordable” housing would take the form of serviced plots of land on which the occupants arranged their own building (i.e. sites-and-services schemes), and in situ slum upgrading. In Madras, policymakers and senior public servants had a positive attitude to housing, especially for low-income groups. Consequently Madras contains much interest for developing countries generally in an evaluation of World Bank experience there, commencing in 1977.     

‘Aging’ identities: Degradation and negotiation in the search for employment

This study draws on data from interviews with individuals aged 45 to 65 (n = 30) to examine changes in identity that occur during their search for employment. Findings indicate that once participants perceive they have been labelled “old” by others (i.e. potential employers and personnel at older worker programs) they begin to define themselves as “old” and become susceptible to identity degradation. However, the majority of individuals are able to successfully negotiate their identities by drawing on social support, attending older worker programs, changing their identities, maintaining some of their key roles, and altering their overall mental outlook. This paper draws attention to the paradoxical nature of the job search process and to the latent consequences of older worker programs — individuals go to older worker programs for job search assistance, yet some of the experiences encountered during attendance at these programs mirrored many experiences encountered with discriminatory employers.     

Attachements indésirables, attachements acceptables : autour d’un échange de seringues en prison

To inquire into innovation in public policy, attention is focused on the work done by a group that proposed an innovative project for “preventing” drug-use in a prison in Luxembourg. After several events and reversals, the final arrangements, which brought together disparate interests, was grounded in the contingent attachment of various persons to the leading role played by a general practitioner and the “permanent attachment” of authorized needles distributed in a case. In a situation where attempts to work out a theory in terms of “positions”, “power” and “control” would have difficulty coming up with a convincing explanation of this surprising process, preference is given to describing this innovation in terms of “passages” and “attachments”.