“She was buried in her purple dress and her red hat and all of our members wore full ‘Red Hat Regalia’ to celebrate her life”: Dress, embodiment and older women's leisure: Reconfiguring the ageing process

There is a significant literature on women's dress and clothing, women's dress and identity, and women's dress and body image. However, the way that dress shapes the self, gives public meaning to the body, and situates it within culture—its embodiment—is understudied. Older women's voices on how dress-up in leisure contexts is linked to embodiment are absent. Using data from an online survey of the Red Hat Society®, a leisure-based social group with over 1 million members, we examined the relationship between older women's dress and embodiment. Data analysis revealed three themes: 1) Dress and embodiment, doing “dress-up”; 2) Dress and embodied subjectivity, linking the personal with the social; and, 3) Dress and perceptions of ageing, fashioning to freedom. We extend the embodiment and leisure literatures by: (a) including older women's viewpoints on dress; (b) understanding linkages between embodiment and older women's leisure; and, (c) illustrating how public displays of dress contribute to older women's development.     

Temporal Ordering of Intimate Relationship Efficacy and Conflict

Drawing from social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1986) and data from 1,640 couples who remained together over the first 4 waves of the German Panel Analysis of Intimate Relationships and Family Dynamics (Pairfam) project, the authors examined the temporal ordering between each partner's relationship efficacy and conflict (constructive behaviors and frequency of negative exchanges) assessed at the dyadic and individual levels. The results revealed that each partner's constructive conflict behaviors and negatively valenced conflict frequency at the couple level temporally preceded relationship efficacy for male and female partners. There was no support for the reverse order or bidirectional linkages over time. These results challenge the prevailing theoretical and empirical suppositions regarding associations between relationship efficacy and couple interactions. The discussion theorizes a more complex efficacy process in couple relations, whereas specific efficacy beliefs shape behaviors in that domain, which subsequently inform each partner's global relationship efficacy over time.     

Lawyers’ Professional Careers: Increasing Women's Inclusion in the Partnership of Law Firms

Despite a huge increase in the number of women lawyers employed in professional service firms (PSFs) over the last four decades, the proportion of women at partnership level has changed at a much slower rate. This article investigates men's and women's understandings of women's careers and promotion to equity partner. The findings show that one reason why few women advance to equity partner level is that both men and women understand this role as requiring them to privilege work considerations over family. We recommend that PSF researchers and practitioners reflect more on the management of diversity and alternative work arrangements and organization.     

Eroding patriarchy: the co-evolution of women's rights and emancipative values

Some scholars find that top-down improvements in women's rights increase societies' value of gender equality at the grassroots, creating pressure for more adoption and enforcement. Others claim that the extension of women's rights is strongly dependent on value change at the grassroots, operating largely as a bottom-up process. We find that top-down and bottom-up dynamics are mutually reinforcing, creating a co-evolutionary dynamic in women's empowerment. We evaluate the rights/values dynamic with data on as many countries as possible, trace their changes over the longest time span available, and analyze their reciprocal relationship in both directions of impact. This is the first analysis that is at the same time (1) comparative across a diverse, global set of nations; (2) dynamic in looking at change in rights and values over time; (3) bidirectional in analyzing the interplay in both directions of impact; and, (4) controlled for relevant ‘third’ changes.     

Mining for Conflict and Staking Claims: Contested Illness at the Tar Creek Superfund Site

Drawing from extensive fieldwork and document analysis, we examine environmental illness claims in Oklahoma's Tar Creek basin, one of the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) premier Superfund sites. Our findings indicate that contested illness in the Tar Creek Superfund site differed from typical cases in that the links between high lead exposures and permanent neurological damage were thoroughly and unequivocally documented. But, despite the certainty of these linkages, residents remained embroiled in controversy and they encountered obstacles in obtaining diagnoses, treatment, and compensation. The resultant environmental dispute took two forms: conflict between residents and EPA officials over the adequacy of the agency's remediation project and conflict among residents over ultimate responsibility for children's lead exposures and consequent learning disabilities.     

Reciprocal Pathways Between Autonomous Motivation and Affect: A Longitudinal Investigation of American and Chinese Early Adolescents

The current research examined the reciprocal pathways between children's autonomous motivation in school and affect over early adolescence in the United States and China. Beginning in the fall of 7th grade, 825 American and Chinese children (mean age = 12.73 years) reported on their autonomous (vs. controlled) motivation as well as unpleasant and pleasant affect every 6 months until the end of eighth grade. In both the United States and China, there were negative reciprocal pathways between children's autonomous motivation and unpleasant affect. Over time, heightened autonomous motivation predicted dampened unpleasant affect, which in turn predicted heightened autonomous motivation. Positive reciprocal pathways between children's autonomous motivation and pleasant affect were evident over time only in China.     

QUANTITATIVE EASING AND THE UK STOCK MARKET: DOES THE BANK OF ENGLAND INFORMATION DISSEMINATION STRATEGY MATTER?

We use intraday aggregate stock market data and an event‐study framework to assess the UK's equity market reaction to the unexpected element of the Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee's (MPC) asset purchase announcements for the 2009–2017 period. We assess the reactions of equity returns and their volatility over various time frames, both preceding and following the MPC announcements. Our results show that the UK unconventional monetary policy shocks have a significant impact on domestic equity returns and volatilities. The strength of this impact depends on the Bank's information dissemination through inflation reports and the publication of the MPC's voting records. (JEL G14, E44, E52)     

Gay men's digital cultures beyond Gaydar and Grindr: LINE use in the gay Chinese diaspora of Australia

ABSTRACT

Recent research on gay men's digital cultures has focused predominantly on Western, English-language-based sites and populations. In the case of Australia, a country with an official multiculturalism framework in place and against a backdrop of significant levels of Asian immigration over the past several decades, a more pluralistic approach is needed to critically interrogate the dialectic between platforms, users and wider sociocultural complexities. To this end, the current paper presents research in progress on the social chat application LINE and its use amongst the Chinese diaspora of gay men in Australia. Drawing on data from participant observation carried out over several months during late 2015 and early 2016 in an Australian-based LINE group for local Chinese gay men, we highlight here how LINE functions as an important intermediary for many Chinese men engaging with gay men's digital cultures in this context. In particular, we show how LINE plays a crucial role in Chinese gay men's engagements with gay men's digital culture in Australia by (1) mediating this group's navigations of new social and cultural environments and (2) remediating their experiences within other platforms central to the broader GLBT community.     

Putting Fathers Back in the Picture

SUMMARY

Drawing on over a quarter of a century of Panel Study of Income Dynamics data, this paper examines links between childhood home environment (as reported by fathers during those childhood years) and children's outcomes in early adulthood. The emphasis is on the role of fathers and the unique contribution of their activities and characteristics to children's development, measured in terms of the children's completed schooling, wage rates, and nonmarital childbearing in early adulthood. The paper shows that fathers' abilities add substantial predictive power to models based on maternal characteristics. Fathers' church attendance and the precautionary actions of parents are also strong predictors of children's adult outcomes, although differentially so for sons and daughters.     

I Believe… in What? Arvo Pärt's and Alfred Schnittke's Polystylistic Credos

Abstract

From the late 1960s until the dissolution of the Soviet Union, numerous composers, especially those belonging to the generation born in the 1930s and commonly referred to as non-conformist, 'avant-garde' or 'unofficial', produced over 100 religious musical works. Some of these composers, such as Arvo Pärt (b. 1935) and Alfred Schnittke (1934–1998) employed the controversially flamboyant polystylistic compositional idiom to express their faith in God. Because the merits of the employment of mimetic polystylism in the realm of sacred music have rarely been analysed, my aim is to demonstrate that, in the Soviet context, it was a very appropriate vehicle for conveying religious sentiments by musical means, as it enabled the composers to express their beliefs, but also to narrate related stories. I shall address this issue by analysing three pieces: Arvo Pärt's Credo for piano solo, chorus and orchestra (1968), and the Credo movements from Alfred Schnittke's Requie m (1975) for three sopranos, contralto, tenor, mixed choir and instrumental ensemble, and Second Symphony 'St Florian' (1979) for mixed chamber choir and large orchestra. The reason for choosing the Credo 'genre' is that by definition it is a manifesto of the composer's faith in God, and hence it bears exceptional moral and spiritual weight.     

The changing importance of white women's economic prospects for assortative mating

Given recent changes in the labor force participation and economic standing of women, we ask whether a woman's position in the labor market has become a more important determinant of her position in the marriage market. Unlike much prior research on trends over time in assortative mating, we take an individual‐level approach to the analysis and rely on improved measures of labor market position, such as measuring wives' wages before marriage and considering multiple indicators of husbands' longer term economic standing. Our analysis relies on data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Young Women (N = 759) and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (N = 767). Our results are consistent with growth over time in the importance of women's earnings potential in determining their marriage prospects.     

Continuity and Change in Grandchildren's Closeness to Grandparents: Consequences of Changing Intergenerational Ties

Drawing on data from Waves 2 and 3 of the National Survey of Families and Households, this study examines whether grandchildren's (N = 496) previous patterns of closeness to grandparents are associated with their current closeness to grandparents and whether changes in parents’ intergenerational ties make a difference in the development of grandchildren's closeness to grandparents when grandchildren experience young adulthood. The findings suggest that there is a possibility for both continuity and change in grandchildren's bonds to grandparents. Grandchildren's closeness to grandparents was associated not only with their earlier patterns of closeness to grandparents and with parents’ concurrent relations with the grandchild and grandparent generations but also with changes in parents’ intergenerational ties over time. Also, the grandchild's gender moderated linkages between certain intergenerational ties in the family.     

China's tobacco industry's communication practices: Paradoxes and proposals for public policymaking

The People's Republic of China's expanding tobacco-control efforts call for additional, urgent government action on two major fronts: (a) conducting comprehensive health-communication campaigns on the clinical and economic effects of tobacco use; and (b) requiring major policy changes in the (structural and administrative) relationships between the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration (STMA) and the industry at large, that is, primarily, the China National Tobacco Company (CNTC). China's signing (in 2003) and ratifying (in 2005) the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC) place it in a position to adopt some of the anti-smoking measures common in some developed nations. Even though the country's tobacco industry acknowledges publicly health concerns over its products, it engages in communication practices that are paradoxical, in that they circumvent public-health initiatives and the expanding regulatory regimes of product-risk reduction even as the government promotes tobacco use. That paradox calls for three public-policymaking proposals: to conduct more comprehensive, nationwide health-communication campaigns; to use legislation to reduce tobacco use; and to restructure the tobacco industry.     

Three Decades of Interest Inventory Results: A Case Study

This article analyzes selected results of 4 Kuder Occupational Interest Surveys (KOIS; Kuder & Zytowski, 1991) administered over a 30-year span, in the light of the author's career as a counseling psychologist. Certain consistencies and changes are observed, leading to a conclusion supporting the “thematic” interpretation of interest inventory results rationalizing aspects of the author's occupational and avocational career.     

Nonstandard Work and Marital Instability: Evidence From the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth

This article replicated and extended Harriet Presser's (2000) investigation of the linkages between nonstandard work and marital instability. We reexplored this question using data from a sample of 2,893 newlywed couples from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) and using different analytic techniques. In contrast to Presser, we found that the key dimension of husbands' and wives' employment was nonemployment. Similar to Presser, we found that wives' working of fixed night shifts increased the risk of divorce, driven by the experience in marriages over 5 years in duration. However, we did not replicate Presser's finding that the effect is significant only among households with children; rather, wives' fixed night shifts were associated with divorce only among those without children.     

Jessie Bernard: The Unfolding of the Female World*

This article reviews Jessie Bernard's work on families and family relationships over a forty-year period and identifies her paradigmatic shift from a functionalist orientation to a strong feminist perspective. Through chronicling women's relationships over the years she found a new way of viewing family and women's issues. This article argues that Bernard is one of the first sociologists who can be called a feminist.     

Themes from older men's lay definitions of successful aging as indicators of primary and secondary control beliefs over time: The Manitoba Follow-up Study

Constructs of control have theoretically been equated to successful aging in the psychology literature. Hence, we used themes from lay definitions of successful aging to quantify the prevalence of primary and secondary control beliefs over time. In doing so we hoped to shed new light upon the virtually uncharted area of older men's primary and secondary control beliefs over time. Using successful aging narratives spanning a 10-year timeframe from the Manitoba Follow-up Study cohort, we mapped themes from older men's lay definitions of successful aging onto Rothbaum, Weisz, and Snyder's (1982) constructs of primary and secondary control. We then examined the prevalence of the constructs of control over 10 years and found that some men emphasized primary control, some emphasized secondary control, and others emphasized both, prospectively. Counter to what had previously been theorized, many older men continued to emphasize primary control as important well into late life. As expected, secondary control became more important with age. Furthermore, among those men who endorsed both primary and secondary control, significantly more men switched emphasis from primary to secondary control beliefs as they aged. This finding supported Rothbaum et al.'s (1982) surmise that individuals could switch from one type of control to another, presumably as life circumstances dictated. Knowing which types of control beliefs older men emphasize as they age has theoretical and practical implications. Theoretically, it sheds new light on the under-researched area of control beliefs in older men. Practically, it is informative for anyone interested in enhancing older men's perceptions of control in very late life, particularly in the face of otherwise uncontrollable age-related decline and imminent demise.     

EXAMINING THE EXTERNALITY OF UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE ON CHILDREN'S EDUCATIONAL ACHIEVEMENT

I exploit differences in the generosity of unemployment insurance (UI) benefits across states and over time to investigate the link between UI and children's academic achievement. Estimates show that a 1% increase in maximum weekly UI benefits reduces the probability that a child repeats a grade by around 0.03 percentage points. The effect is concentrated among children of low‐ and middle‐income families. This paper's findings, which are the first in the literature to show evidence of a positive effect of UI on children's educational outcomes, provide insight into the role of UI in the human capital accumulation of children. (JEL I20, I38, J65)     

A GAME THEORETIC ANALYSIS OF VOLUNTARY EUTHANASIA AND PHYSICIAN ASSISTED SUICIDE

In countries/states where voluntary euthanasia (VE) or physician-assisted suicide (PAS) is legal, the patient's decision about whether to request VE or PAS heavily relies on the information others provide. We use the tools of microeconomic theory to study how communication between the patient, his family and his physician influences the patient's decision. We argue that families have considerable power over the patient and that the amount of information that is transmitted from physician to patient might be severely diminished as a result of legalizing VE or PAS. We discuss our main results in the context of the ongoing normative debate over the legalization of VE and PAS. (JEL D8, I12)     

Long‐Term Influences of Intergenerational Ambivalence on Midlife Parents' Psychological Well‐being

We investigated changes in midlife parents' intergenerational ambivalence toward a focal child and its influence on their psychological well‐being over 14 years, as the focal child moved from adolescence into young adulthood. We estimated growth curve models using three waves of data from the National Survey of Families and Households (N = 1,510 parents aged 35–54 years at Time 1). Parental ambivalence declined over time, equally among mothers and fathers. The prediction from ambivalence theory that children's attainment of adult statuses reduces parental ambivalence received only modest support. Only the focal child's marriage reduced parental ambivalence. The focal child's lifestyle–behavioral problems during adolescence still elevated ambivalence 14 years later, albeit less so. For its part, intergenerational ambivalence counteracted trends toward declining depressive symptoms and greater happiness for mothers and fathers alike, and its effects remained constant over time.