Three-dimensional virtual reality: Applications to the 12 grand challenges of social work

Abstract

The American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare (AASWSW) identified 12 Grand Challenges of Social Work to unify the profession with focused research, practice and policy applications for the most pressing social issues. Virtual Reality (VR), specifically three-dimensional immersive computer-generated environments, has a history of research and applications to address social and behavioral problems. VR is becoming more readily available, as the technology is becoming more common in mainstream platforms such as mobile technology. While social work interventions are often tailored for vulnerable populations that may not have access to VR computing, it appears that virtual reality is gaining accessibility with these advances. Within the framework of the 12 Grand Challenges of Social Work, researchers from three social work virtual reality laboratories in the United States, Texas State University, the University of Houston, and the University of Alabama, review applications previously tested and currently in development to focus future research and intervention in social work practice.     

Aging in the United States Today

Summary

As the demographics of aging change in the United States, the number of persons over the age of 65 will continue to grow. By 2030, one in every five persons will be over the age of 65. Several factors are important when considering the reality of these demographic changes. First, successful aging, given new medical technologies, is more probable today than it was for our parents and grandparents. Second, the range of diverse populations within the aging communities has become recognized. Third, generational differences impact who cares for the elderly. Fourth, baby boomers, who will soon turn 65, will likely have a huge impact on society. And lastly, spiritual matters are important as we approach and enter old age.     

Homicide–Suicides in the United States: A Review of the Literature

Homicide–suicides are phenomena where the perpetrator kills one or more victims and subsequently kills himself/herself. The typical classification includes intimate partner homicide–suicides, familial, and extrafamilial homicide–suicides. This review examines research beginning with a 1992 seminal article by Peter Marzuk, Kenneth Tardiff, and Charles Hirsch in the Journal of the American Medical Association in which they suggested that homicide–suicides constituted a distinct domain different from homicides to suicides. This review uses the JAMA article to frame the issues and discuss homicide–suicide research in the United States from the date of that publication. In addition to discussing characteristics of homicide–suicides, this review focuses on homicide–suicides involving intimate partners and compares both to homicides without subsequent suicides and suicides without prior homicides. Suggestions for further research are given as well as research problems available to Sociology.     

ENVIRONMENTAL INEQUALITY IN METROPOLITAN AMERICA IN 2000

ABSTRACT

This article compares black and Hispanic environmental inequality levels across 14 of the largest metropolitan areas in the United States and asks how conclusions regarding the existence of environmental inequality differ when different definitions of environmental inequality are employed. Using census tracts as the unit of analysis, industrial pollution data from the Toxic Release Inventory, and demographic data from the U.S. census, tobit regression analysis is used to determine whether two types of environmental racial inequality—disparate social impacts inequality and relative distribution inequality—existed in each metropolitan area in 2000. Results show that black and Hispanic environmental inequality were fairly widespread throughout the 14 metropolitan areas, that Hispanic environmental inequality was more widespread than black environmental inequality, and that conclusions vary depending upon which definition of environmental inequality is employed. This latter findings suggests that the conclusions researchers draw are likely to be inaccurate if they do not properly specify the definitions of environmental inequality they are using and the types of environmental inequality they are studying.     

The success of the Cuban success story: Ethnicity,power, and politics

This article examines the convergence of various forces that constructed a public image of Cuban Americans in the United States as a politically united, socially homogeneous, and economically successful ethnic group. The claims that comprise the Cuban “success story” are not well‐grounded in an objective, empirical reality, but do reflect the historical interplay of power and politics locally, nationally, and internationally. The focus is on how politicians, the media and the civic elite construct images of reality, the processes that determine which images gain prominence in the public mind, and the ways in which the images, themselves, shape social and political outcomes. Metropolitan Miami provides the laboratory, but the analytical approach generates important insights for the study of ethnicity and the politics of identity more generally.     

Overcoming terms of service: a proposal for ethical distributed research

ABSTRACT

The last two years has marked a turning point in access to large-scale social media data for many researchers, as platforms hobbled their APIs and made recording, archiving, and analyzing social life online far more difficult. Particularly in the context of the United States, where violating the rules put in place by social platforms has the potential to lead to criminal charges, the balance of power between the extremely financially successful social media industry on one side, and the users and researchers of these platforms on the other, has become dangerously skewed. This article argues for a pragmatic partnering with the users to do research, rather than with the platform owners, and suggests some ways in which this might be accomplished.     

The Paradox of Protestantism and Women in Elected Office in the United States

ABSTRACT

In cross-national studies, scholars have found that wealthy countries and those with a Protestant tradition are more likely to have higher levels of women in elected office. Even though the United States should then be high in this domain, it lags behind many similarly situated countries. We posit that one reason for this paradox is that Protestantism in the United States is far more socially conservative than is typical in other Protestant countries. To test our argument, we use state-level data on the proportion of women in elected office from 2002 to 2004 and survey data on church membership. We find a negative relationship between the percentage of Protestants belonging to churches associated with the National Association of Evangelicals, a lobbying group representing socially conservative Protestant denominations, and the proportion of women in elected office.     

Black Minority Racial Status and Fertility in the United States, 1970

Abstract

Reversal in the trend toward convergence of black and white fertility rates in the United States between 1940 and 1970 has given rise to the theory of independent effect of minority racial status. The 1970 Public Use Sample is used in this study to extract data on a 1/1000 sample of all black and white women (excluding Spanish Americans) ages 15 to 59 in order to analyze relationships between fertility and other census variables. The results tend to support the theory of independent effect of minority racial status on fertility. The relationship is more pronounced for women under 35 than for women 40 and over. Distinctive patterns emerge by race and age cohorts.     

Paid Maternal and Parental Leave Legislation and Primary Prevention

Abstract

For child development, the first three years are crucial to foundations for emotional and mental health, for toilet training and vocabulary development, and for the precipitation of conscience and essential inner controls. For this reason, these are also the primary prevention years during which marital intactness and paid maternal and parental leave benefits are of crucial importance. A comparative social policy review of the status of parental leave legislation in North America and in Europe confirms that the United States is far behind.     

Measles: Current Status and Outbreak Control on Campus

Abstract

This study is part of a nationwide research project dealing with all suicides in Finland. It includes all suicides among university students during the 1-year period from April 1, 1987, to March 31, 1988. Ten students (6 men and 4 women) committed suicide during the period studied. The observed suicide rates per 100,000 students per year were 13.8 (95% CI = 5.1–30.1) for men and 9.0 (95% CI = 2.4–22.8) for women. The difference between the observed and expected suicide rate for men (13.8 v 47.7, standard mortality rate [SMR] = 29) was statistically significant. For women (9.0 v 8.3, SMR = 108), the difference was not statistically significant. Most of the suicides had experienced serious difficulties since early childhood, including narcissistic problems, difficulties in human relations, severe depressive periods, previous suicidal behavior, and alcohol problems; they had also had earlier psychiatric treatment.     

Gender,Marital Status and Social Support

Abstract

While many studies have examined the separate effects of gender and marital status on patterns of perceived social support, none have examined the simultaneous effects of these two variables while controlling for other relevant variables in a large, random sample. This paper responds to this lacuna by investigating the relationships among these variables for six specific types of problems that may elicit social support from others. Using data drawn from a representative sample of the United States population, results indicate that the perception of sources of social support is primarily shaped by differences in marital status as opposed to gender. However, gender is influential in some situations. While it is not significantly related to the perception of emotional support, gender is significantly related to the perception of instrumental support. (Women manifest a tendency to consider both spouse / partner and relatives as sources of instrumental support more than men, while men rely on friends as sources of instrumental support.) The suggestion that gender may find expression within categories of marital status is supported by findings indicating that, within each of the marital status categories, when men turn to relatives and / or friends for help they tend to be male and when women turn to relatives and / or friends for help they tend to be female. Suggestions for future research are offered.     

Developing Diversity Competence in Child Welfare and Permanency Planning

ABSTRACT

The vision of the pluralistic society of the 1960s relied on the recognition of differences rather than on assimilation. Pluralism held that finally, in America, minorities did not need to melt and adopt the norms of the majority. But the cultural pluralistic perspective has been strongly questioned since the 1990s. Concerns have been raised about whether the alteration of power relations in the United States can be achieved civilly. This article examines the value of long-held assumptions about the common core and explores the desirability of building on it for the next millennium. It moves beyond traditional perspectives of the common core and proposes the notion of a transcul-tural citizen who might be able to move with ease between cultures, whether within the confines of the United States or on a more global level. Illustrations from the United States and abroad are given. Lessons for social work in Europe and America are drawn.     

The Educational Expectations of South African Youth

Abstract

Educational expectations, in particular the relationship between race/ethnicity and educational expectations, have been understudied in less developed countries. We use data from the Cape Area Panel Study (CAPS) to examine the educational expectations of black (African), coloured (mixed race), and white (European ancestry) youth in Cape Town, South Africa. The educational expectations of all three racial groups are high, although coloured youth are less likely than black and white youth to expect to complete postsecondary or postgraduate schooling. Supporting research on educational expectations in the United States and other more developed countries, our findings indicate that socioeconomic status and academic performance matter for educational expectations in South Africa, although their importance varies by racial group. In contrast to U.S. studies that have found effects of family composition for whites only, we found virtually no effects of family composition on the educational expectations of whites or nonwhites. Our findings suggest possible similarities and differences across social contexts in the processes shaping the educational expectations of youth from disadvantaged groups.     

Bad breeders and monstrosities: racializing childlessness and congenital disabilities in slavery and freedom

ABSTRACT

By the antebellum years, popular and professional thinking about infertility and the birth of children with congenital disabilities followed a racialized pattern that hewed to the familiar contours of the United States’ larger racial and gender ideologies that legitimized slavery. Whites routinely blamed enslaved women for these conditions through toxic, intersecting discourses about race, gender, and disability that trafficked in racist stereotypes of black women’s supposed lasciviousness and immorality. At the same time, white women of elite or middling social stature were absolved of any imagined responsibility for these very same conditions on the grounds that their pure, delicate physicality left them vulnerable and susceptible to these ‘afflictions.’     

Difficult Commitments: Intercountry Adoption to the United States and Accession to the Hague Convention

Abstract

Why have relatively few countries joined the Hague Convention on Protection of Children and Co-Operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption? Have countries that send children to the United States been more likely to join? The United States has joined this convention and prefers sending countries to do so also. However, our findings show that countries that send children to the United States are not more likely to join than other countries. In addition, countries with large “orphan” populations are less likely to join the convention. These findings have implications for the potential of the Hague Convention to improve transparency and accountability in intercountry adoption.     

Education for Cross-Cultural Social Work Practice

Abstract

Little attention has been given to the needs of international and American social work students who are preparing for direct practice outside of the United States. A preliminary model of cross-cultural social work practice is described as the basis for a course in direct social work practice in international settings.     

Suicide and Religion: A Comparative Analysis

Abstract

Previous work on the relationship between religion and suicide has focused on the simple bivariate relationship and has failed to address the problem of the possible convergence between Catholicism and Protestantism in the underlying determinant of suicide, the degree of social integration. The present study explores the relationship more systematically through a series of multiple regression analyses. The lack of any significant relationship between the proportion Catholic and measures of the suicide rate supports the convergence hypothesis. In contrast, two control variables taken from other prominent theories of suicide have considerable explanatory power. Tests of Durkheim's theory of marital integration and suicide all confirm a significant relationship but one of a parabolic form. Finally, the paradigm connecting the level of industrialization to suicide is confirmed, but preliminary analysis of social mobility rates and suicide indicate that this relationship is more of a function of cultural heterogeneity produced by the modernization process than of increasing mobility rates.     

Vaginal Douching Among University Women in the Southeastern United States

Objective: The authors assessed the knowledge, beliefs about, and practices of vaginal douching among women attending 2 universities in the southeastern United States. Participants: There were 416 participants in this study; 46.9% were black and 44.5% were white. Methods: The authors administered a 30-item questionnaire to women enrolled in health-related and social science courses at 2 southeastern universities. Results: Approximately 38% of participants reported vaginal douching, mostly for hygienic reasons (70.7%). Most women first learned about douching from their mother. Douching was more common and more frequent among black women (48%) than among white women (27%). Age of first douche correlated positively with age of first sexual intercourse and age of first period. Conclusion: Women who had been informed not to douche by a healthcare professional were less likely to have douched within the past 6 months than were women who were not given this information. Misconceptions about douching are common and should be addressed by healthcare professionals.     

The people of California are suffering': The ideology of white injury in discourses of immigration

Abstract

This article examines how the ideology of white injury both conceals and sustains inequitable social relations in turn‐of‐the‐millenium California. Understanding the political and economic context of California in the early 1990s in relation to media, law, and culture helps explain why Californian citizens passed the unconstitutional initiative, Proposition 187, in 1994. Targeting undocumented Mexican immigrants, this ‘color‐blind’ Proposition functioned to conflate economic insecurities with racial anxieties. An analysis of culture, law, and media discloses how racial anxieties limit our understandings of exploitative capitalist relations, serving to artificially augment the white middle‐class ‘ wealth, opportunities, and power, while making vulnerable populations in the United States even more open to exploitation.