Picking Up the Pieces After the Sudden Death of a Therapist: Issues for the Client and the “Inheriting Therapist”

The death of one's therapist can be considered a traumatic event for the patient. The closeness of the relationship between therapist and patient, especially if the relationship is long-term, makes the loss analogous to losing an intimate attachment. This article will explore the complexity of issues involved for the patient who loses a therapist due to sudden death and examines the issues for the inheriting therapist as well. Case examples will be used to highlight some of the more stressful areas of practice in this difficult transition.     

Gambling Behavior of Student-Athletes and a Student Cohort: What are the Odds?

This study investigated the prevalence of gambling, gambling related NCAA violations, and disordered gambling in student-athletes (n = 736) with a comparison cohort of students (n = 1,071) at four universities. Student-athletes reported similar rates of gambling frequency, use of a bookmaker, and disordered gambling as students. After accounting for demographic differences, student-athletes were less likely to engage in sports wagering than students. Several risk factors for disordered gambling were identified, including being male and reporting at least one parent with a history of gambling problems. These findings suggest that problems associated with gambling are a university-wide issue with student-athletes meriting additional attention because of implications for the integrity of intercollegiate sports. Improved prevention and intervention efforts for collegiate gambling are recommended.     

What is the force of forced migration? Diagnosis and critique of a conceptual relativization

Theory and Society - Theorizing of forced migration and refugees has been paralyzed by excessive reliance on migration theory. This article suggests the need to transfer conceptualizations of...     

White Privilege: What's a Family Therapist To Do?

Privilege is the freedom to ignore things that other people are forced to confront; dramatic things like being gunned down by a vigilante on the way home from a convenience store or less urban and visible things like having to live on secluded parcels of land that no one else wants. Most family therapists enjoy the freedom not to experience such events. Many of the people who come to us for help don't have that freedom. My intent here is to increase felt awareness of the injustice of institutional racism and to suggest some actions that White family therapists can take to bring forth a more just society in terms of education, housing, access to wealth, and basic safety.     

Couple Differentiation: Mediator or Moderator of Depressive Symptoms and Relationship Satisfaction?

The purpose of this investigation was to determine whether differentiation at the couple level would act as a moderator or a mediator in the association between marital satisfaction and depressive symptoms over time. In a sample of 412 couples, a latent profile analysis was performed to determine how couple differentiation scores were clustered. An Actor/Partner Interdependence Model was then estimated via a group comparison procedure in structural equation modeling. There was no evidence of a moderating effect of differentiation. A mediating model was then estimated and there was evidence that differentiation mediated the association between depressive symptoms and relationship satisfaction via actor and partner effects.     

Holding a looking-glass to the ‘Movement’: A response to Worth and Abbott

This article explores the presence of US institutions of higher education in Eastern Europe as one facet of the neoliberal global environment. It draws on policy documents, institutional statistics, materials produced by interest groups and NGOs, official mission statements, press releases and media coverage, and personal narratives. The American University in Bulgaria is examined as a case of this wider phenomenon. Exclusively structuralist, critical analyses of such institutions can easily lead to conclusions of homogenization and dominance through the hegemony of ‘exporter’ education institutions and programs. Post-structural analysis—attuned to multiplicities of meanings, nuances of context, and complex interplays of power and knowledge claims—allow for more attention to the local dynamics, while human interpretation and agency may point the way to more hopeful roles for US institutions of higher education abroad. In turn, these roles may challenge the one-way deterministic flow of influence suggested by structuralist analyses.

Este artículo indaga la presencia de las instituciones de E.E.U.U. de educación superior en Europa oriental, como una faceta del medioambiente neoliberal global. Se sirve de documentos de política, estadística institucional, materiales producidos bajo grupos de interés y ONGs, declaraciones de emisiones oficiales sobre los objetivos, comunicados de prensa y cobertura de los medios y testimonios personales. Se ha examinado a la Universidad Americana en Bulgaria como un caso de este amplio fenómeno. Los análisis críticos de tales instituciones exclusivamente estructuralistas, pueden conducir fácilmente a unas conclusiones de homogenización y dominio a través de la hegemonía de instituciones de educación y programas ‘exportados’. Un análisis estructural a posteriori—adaptado a una multiplicidad de significados y matices de contexto, y las interacciones complejas de afirmaciones de poder y conocimiento—permite mayor atención a la dinámica local, mientras que la interpretación y la actividad humana pueden señalar el camino para que las instituciones de educación superior de los E.E.U.U., logren papeles más esperanzadores en el extranjero. A su vez, estos papeles pueden desafiar la corriente determinista de influencia de una sola vía, como lo sugiere el análisis estructural.

本文探讨了美国高等教育机构作为全球新自由主义环境的一个侧面在东欧的存在。本文根据政策文件、机构统计数据、利益团体和非政府组织提供的资料、正式使命声明、新闻稿和媒体报道,以及个人记述写成,以位于保加利亚的美利坚大学作为这一更广泛现象的个案进行了考察。作为一种完全的结构主义,对这些机构的批判性分析很容易得出通过“出口”教育机构和各种项目的霸权实现同质化、获取支配力的结论。后结构主义分析——切合多重意义,语境的微妙变化,以及权力与知识的宣称之间复杂的相互作用——使人们更多地关注当地的动力学,而人的解释及动因可能为海外美国高等教育机构发挥更加充满希望的作用指明方向。反过来,这些角色可能挑战结构主义分析所提出的影响流的单向决定性。     

What Are the Correlates of Infertility-Related Clinical Anxiety? A Literature Review and the Presentation of a Conceptual Model

Infertility is a major stressor for many couples. Although several reviews addressing psychological distress and depression within infertile couples exist, less emphasis has been placed on infertility-related anxiety. Yet it is important to know whether clinical anxiety is a prevalent problem among infertile couples and what are the characteristics of those suffering from clinical anxiety. The present article summarizes the literature on infertility-related anxiety published between 1997 and 2008 and presents a model of infertility-related clinical anxiety that identifies variables that may distinguish individuals who present with clinical anxiety from those who successfully cope with infertility. This model is intended to inform both research and clinical practice with partners of infertile couples. Methodological shortcomings of infertility research and recommendations for future studies are also discussed.     

Sustainability and Disaster Planning: What Are the Connections?

In this article, we examine the connections between resiliency and sustainability by asking: Can disaster planning lead to more sustainability actions? In a survey we conducted of 1,899 cities, towns, and counties across the United States in 2015, we found that disaster plans are three times more common than sustainability plans. Our regression models find both types of plans lead to sustainability action as does regional collaboration across the rural‐urban interface. However, we find that hazard mitigation planning may be done without including sustainability staff, citizens, and other officials. After controlling for motivations, capacity, and cooperation, we find that rural communities are more likely to have sustainability plans than suburbs, though their level of sustainability action is lower due to capacity constraints. Our models of multilevel governance find local motivations balance sustainability’s concept of environmental protection, economic development, and social equity—and are more important drivers of action than grassroots or higher‐level government funding and policy. This bodes well in a context where federal government leadership on sustainability is absent.     

What is society? Social thought and the arts of government

Following conservative politicians, neoliberal philosophers and radical critics, different strands of social science, including those using Foucault's governmentality approach, joined the questioning of the salience of 'society' and ideas of 'the social' over the last decades. When the social reappeared, it was often in the moral domains of community and civil society. This argument re-evaluates the contribution of Foucauldian histories, or 'genealogies', of the social to these fundamental questions. Drawing upon them, it attends to their arguments concerning the place of social thought on the modern episteme in relation to economics, the emergence of the idea of 'society' with the modern arts of government of the state, and the formation of the 'social question'. The argument here allows that preconditions of formation of 'society' lie in the legal and political techniques of the territorial sovereign state. However, the literature under investigation indicates the implicit normativity of an idea of 'society' as a 'problematic unity' and the enduring necessity of a social domain in a law-governed state with a relatively independent economic sphere. This discussion thus seeks to contribute to the wider revaluation and redeployment of these terms in today's context.     

Constructing Personal and Couple Narratives in Late‐stage Cancer: Can a Typology Illuminate the Caring Partner Perspective?

There is a large body of work focusing on the well‐being and relationships of couples facing late‐stage cancer. The systemic study underpinning this paper explored a less researched topic: How do people caring for a partner with terminal cancer construct their experience and relationships through personal and couple narratives? This UK‐based study drew upon dialogical approaches to narrative analysis to focus on six caring partners and their care relationships. Following individual case analysis, two methods of cross‐narrative analysis were developed, and an analysis of narrative themes and a typology of archetypal narratives were drawn from the data. This paper focuses on the typology. The clinical implications of the study are considered, focusing on the contribution of a typology to this and future studies.     

Up and Down or Down and Up? The Process of Change in Constructive Couple Behavior during Traditional and Integrative Behavioral Couple Therapy

Observed positive and negative spouse behavior during sessions of Traditional (TBCT) and Integrative Behavioral Couples Therapy (IBCT) were compared for couples with successful outcomes and their unsuccessful counterparts. One hundred and thirty‐four married chronically and seriously distressed couples (on average in their forties and 80% Caucasian) were randomly assigned to TBCT or IBCT. Trained observers made ratings of 1224 segments from approximately 956 sessions sampled from the course of up to 26 sessions. Multilevel modeling was used to examine change over time. TBCT treatment responders demonstrated a boost‐drop pattern, increasing in constructive behaviors early (more positive behaviors and less negative behaviors) but decreasing later. IBCT responders demonstrated an opposite, drop‐boost pattern, decreasing in constructive behaviors early and increasing later. Patterns were significant for positive behaviors (p < .05) and approached significance for negative behaviors (p = .05). In both treatments, nonresponders showed a significant pattern of decline in positive and increase in negative behaviors over time, although a trend (p = .05) indicates that TBCT nonresponders initially declined in negative behaviors. This study helps clarify the different process of change in two behavioral couple therapies, which may assist in treatment development and provide a guide for therapists in considering behavioral markers of change during treatment.     

Perceptions of Misogyny in Hip Hop and Rap: What Do the Youths Think?

This article presents the results of an exploratory study conducted at a community forum sponsored by a prominent African American church and a historically Black university. These institutions are concerned with negative messages given to African American females about their appearance and their morals. The data presented describe the population of female (68.6%) and male (31.4%) participants ages 18 to 24 and inform us about their perceptions about hip hop and rap music, especially as they relate to misogyny. This study found that listening habits and age were significant in understanding youths' views about misogyny.     

“What Would a Loving Mom Do Today?”: Exploring the Meaning of Motherhood in Stories of Prenatal and Postpartum Depression

Prenatal depression (PD) and postpartum depression (PPD), experienced by up to one-quarter of pregnant women and new mothers, are associated with maternal impairment and disruptions to children’s behavior, development, and health. Women experiencing PD/PPD must cope with negative feelings and detrimental outcomes that stand in contrast with cultural conceptions of how (ideal) mothers feel and act (i.e., the discourse of intensive mothering), thus furthering stigma and negativity surrounding the PD/PPD experience. The present study, couched in relational dialectics theory, aims to explore how women, through naturally occurring online narratives, make sense of motherhood in light of both PD/PPD experiences and cultural expectations/understandings of mothers. Throughout the narrative corpus, the culturally dominant Discourse of (Self-)Sacrificing Blissful Moms (DSBM)—which expands on the discourse of intensive mothering—is de-centered, albeit never fully delegitimated, by the Discourse of Mothers as Whole People (DMWP). Rather than closing down the DSBM, the DMWP works to expand meanings of what “good” mothers can feel and do. This finding holds both cultural/theoretical and practical implications, as discussed by the authors.     

‘Nomadic’ organization and the experience of journeying: Through liminal spaces and organizing places

This paper explores the author's experience of ‘nomadic’ organization [Deleuze, G., and F. Guattari. 1988. A Thousand Plateaus. London: Continuum] through the findings of an ethnographic study of an annual folk-culture community festival in a rural region of Sweden. The study concerned the practices of one small village community organizing group, of which the author was a member, in contributing to the festival. Using autoethnographic methods, the author brings together phenomenological theories of embodied knowledge [Merleau-Ponty, M. 1962. The Phenomenology of Perception. Abingon: Routledge; Küpers, W. 2011. “Dancing on the Līmen – Embodied and Creative Inter-Places as Thresholds of Be(com)ing: Phenomenological Perspectives on Liminality and Transitional Spaces in Organisation and Leadership.” Tamara – Journal for Critical Organization Inquiry Special Issue on Liminality 9 (3–4): 45–59.] and process theories or organizing [Chia, R. 1999. “A Rhizomic Model of Organizational Change and Transformation: Perspective from a Metaphysics of Change.” British Journal of Management 10 (2): 209–227; Tsoukas, H., and R. Chia. 2002. “On Organizational Becoming: Rethinking Organizational Change.” Organization Science 13 (5): 567–582] to examine his experiences of nomadic ‘journeying’. This highlights his movement in and through liminal spaces, both physical and metaphorical, as part of the research project, and his engagement with fellow participants in the co-construction of a place as part of the festival site organization. The impacts of these experiences on the author and their implications for the spatial relations of organizing are examined using fragments of reflexion, incorporating photographic and poetic elements.     

What makes a big demonstration? Exploring the impact of mobilization strategies on the size of demonstrations

ABSTRACT

Massive demonstrations are the staple of powerful social movements, but research on the factors affecting the size of demonstrations (in terms of number of attendants) is almost nonexistent. Why do some demonstrations pack long avenues with masses of people while other ones barely fill a street corner? Combining resource mobilization, political opportunity, and framing theories, we argue that mobilization strategies – the sequence of decisions and actions taken by protest organizers before staging a protest – shape demonstration size. Multivariate models with 937 Chilean demonstrations between 2000 and 2012 show that demonstrations are larger when they display more demands (especially universalistic demands), target the national government, attract more organizations (especially umbrella organizations), and mobilize cohesive groups with broad public support. We reinforce the internal validity of our argument using interviews with movement leaders and secondary research on Chilean society.     

Women and pensions: a decade of progress?

This Issue Brief compares changes from 1989 to 1998 in pension participation, accumulation, and allocation for employed women, versus employed men, ages 18-62. In addition, it provides an estimate of the gender "pension gap" in defined contribution accumulations, contrasts this with the gender "earnings gap," and provides explanations for these differences. Between 1989 and 1998, the percentage of employed women with a pension or retirement plan at their current job increased from 43 percent to 45 percent, compared with a decline from 53 percent to 52 percent for employed men. For both women and men, the percentage with defined contribution retirement plans increased dramatically, while the percentage with defined benefit pension plans dropped sharply. Between 1989 and 1998, the ratio of women's to men's defined contribution plan accumulations increased from 40 percent to 44 percent, indicating a narrowing of the gender pension gap. However, the narrowing was concentrated among the cohort ages 45-53 in 1998. The gender pension gap increased for women in other age groups. Gender differences in defined contribution plan accumulations can be attributed to differences in earnings and job characteristics. Between 1989 and 1998, for workers with defined contribution plans, the ratio of women's to men's earnings remained unchanged at 57 percent. Employed women with defined contribution plans are more than twice as likely to earn less than $25,000 per year than employed men with defined contribution plans, but almost five times less likely to earn more than $100,000 per year. From 1989 to 1998, the percentage of employed men with defined contribution balances invested mostly in low-risk, low-return assets declined much more than the percentage of employed women who followed that investment strategy. Whereas the percentages of men and women with retirement plans invested mostly in bonds were nearly equal at 31 percent and 32 percent in 1989, respectively, by 1998, 20 percent of women (compared with 14 percent of men) had their retirement plans invested mostly in bonds. The trend toward defined contribution plans and riskier retirement portfolios has resulted in significant wealth accumulation over the decade. In real terms, both men and women have greater retirement plan wealth, but increases have been larger for men than for women. Since there is no evidence that plan provisions vary by gender, improvements in the gender pension gap will come only with changes in women's labor force experience and investment decision-making.