Does Family Structure Matter? A Comparison of Adoptive,Two‐Parent Biological,Single‐Mother,Stepfather, and Stepmother Households

Using data from the National Survey of Families and Households, we compared quality of family relationships and well‐being across five different family structures with a particular focus on adoptive households. Four theoretical perspectives, each emphasizing the importance of different factors in determining relationship quality and well‐being, guided this work and led us to compare adoptive families with families that include two biological parents, single mothers, stepfathers, and stepmothers. We found the most support for the perspective stressing the importance of family processes that occur in all types of families, rather than family structure. Specifically, there were few family structure differences based on fathers' and children's reports, and structure differences in mothers' reports were no longer significant after controlling for disagreements between family members. The implications of these results for adoption theory and policies are discussed.     

Is Self‐Compassion Selfish? The Development of Self‐Compassion,Empathy, and Prosocial Behavior in Adolescence

Both self‐compassion and empathy have been theorized to promote prosociality in youth, but there is little longitudinal data examining this possibility. We assessed self‐compassion, empathy, and peer‐rated prosociality yearly, in a cohort of 2,078 youth across 17 schools (M age at T1 = 14.65 years; 49.2% female), as they progressed from Grade 9–12. We utilized multi‐level modeling to predict prosocial behavior, nested within students, classes, and schools. We found that self‐compassion and empathy uniquely predicted peer‐rated prosocial behavior. However, only empathy predicted increases in prosocial behavior across time. While self‐compassion is not selfish, it does not appear to facilitate the development of kindness toward adolescent peers. Self‐compassion may help to buffer against possible negative effects of empathic distress.     

What governs governance,and how does it evolve? The sociology of governance‐in‐action

Governance addresses a wide range of issues including social, economic and political continuity, security and integrity, individual and collective safety and the liberty and rights to self-actualization of citizens. Questions to be answered include how governance can be achieved and sustained within a social context imbued with cultural values and in which power is distributed unevenly and dynamically, and how governance impacts on individuals and institutions. Drawing on Gramscian notions of hegemony and consent, and recent political science literatures on regulation and meta-regulation, this paper develops a sociological model of governance that emphasizes a dynamic and responsive governance in action. Empirical data from a study of pharmaceutical governance is used to show how multiple institutions and actors are involved in sustaining effective governance. The model addresses issues of how governance is sustained in the face of change, why governance of practices varies from setting to setting, and how governance is achieved without legislation.     

What Determines the Embeddedness of Forced‐Return Migrants? Rethinking the Role of Pre‐ and Post‐Return Assistance1

Return migration is not always a process of simply “going home.” Particularly when return is not fully voluntarily, returnees face severe obstacles. This study argues that such return can only become sustainable when returnees are provided with possibilities to become re‐embedded in terms of economic, social network, and psychosocial dimensions. We analyze the return migration experiences of 178 rejected asylum seekers and migrants who did not obtain residence permit to six different countries: Afghanistan, Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sierra Leone, Togo and Vietnam. Using both quantitative and qualitative methods of data analysis, we identify several key factors that influence prospects for embeddedness, such as individual and family characteristics, position in the migration cycle, and the role of pre‐ and post‐return assistance. We find that the possibilities for successful return are highly dependent on the living circumstances provided in the host country: returnees who were enabled to engage in work, had access to independent housing and freedom to develop social contacts proved to be better able to exercise agency and maintain self‐esteem. Post‐return assistance by non‐governmental organizations will be particularly helpful when financial support is combined with human guidance and practical information to enhance a more sustainable return process.     

Object Permanence in Five‐and‐a‐Half‐Month‐Old Infants?

Event Set × Event Set designs were used to study the rotating screen paradigm introduced by Baillargeon, Spelke, and Wasserman (1985). In Experiment 1, 36 5 1/2‐month‐old infants were habituated to a screen rotating 180° with no block, a screen rotating 120° up to a block, or a screen rotating 180° up to and seemingly through a block. All infants were then tested on the same 3 events and also a screen rotating 120° with no block. The results indicate that infants are using novelty and familiarity preference to determine their looking times. To confirm this, in Experiment 2, 52 5 1/2‐month‐old infants were familiarized on either 3 or 7 trials to a screen rotating 180° with no block or a screen rotating 120° with no block. All infants were then tested on the same test events as in Experiment 1. Infants with fewer familiarization trials were more likely to prefer the familiar rotation event. The results of these 2 experiments indicate that infants did not use the possibility or impossibility of events but instead used familiarity or novelty relations between the habituation events and the test events to determine their looking times, and suggest that the Baillargeon et al. study should not be interpreted as indicating object permanence or solidity knowledge in young infants.     

WHO MAKES A GOOD LEADER? COOPERATIVENESS,OPTIMISM, AND LEADING‐BY‐EXAMPLE

We examine the characteristics of effective leaders in a simple leader‐follower voluntary contributions game. We focus on two factors: the individual's cooperativeness and the individual's beliefs about the cooperativeness of others. We find that groups perform best when led by those who are cooperatively inclined. Partly, this reflects a false consensus effect: cooperative leaders are more optimistic than noncooperators about the cooperativeness of followers. However, cooperative leaders contribute more than noncooperative leaders even after controlling for optimism. We conclude that differing leader contributions by differing types of leader in large part reflects social motivations. (JEL A13, C92, D03)     

Who cares? A lack of self‐care for women in the non‐profit/non‐governmental sector

In this article I examine the lack of self‐care regimes for women working in the non‐profit/non‐governmental sector. While I draw on ethnographic research conducted in the Malaysian context of women's organizations, the issue of self‐care for activists and feminist activists is a global one that crosses borders and boundaries. I explore the gendered nature of care and care professions to demonstrate how women are predominantly affected in these working environments. To date, there has been little scholarship on self‐care and care in non‐profit/non‐governmental working environments. Using interviews with women working in the sector, I argue that women's emotional, mental and physical health comes at a cost in these hectic workplaces. This article contributes to the literature on gender, work and care in women's organizations by taking seriously women's concerns working in these spaces, where they experience self‐neglect and institutional barriers in care regimes.     

Work‐to‐Society Spillover?

Nonprofit employees can make ideal volunteers for other organizations in the sector, and understanding their participation in volunteering is a timely task. Based on “spillover theory,” this study tests how nonprofit employees’ experience on the job may carry over into the nonwork arena. The study focuses on how nonprofit employees’ satisfaction with the job and perception of the organization's mission achievement relate to their volunteering, controlling for the generally higher levels of prosocial motivation found in the sector. The findings suggest that the consequences of job satisfaction for this group extend beyond the workplace, contributing to societal benefits.     

Freedom or money? The dilemma of migrant live‐in elderly carers in times of COVID‐19

As a consequence of the lockdown measures imposed by the Belgian government to fight against COVID‐19, migrant live‐in elderly carers had to choose between safeguarding their job — at the detriment of their personal freedom, their health and their working conditions — and safeguarding their freedom but losing their job — at the detriment of their economic survival and that of their families. This article explores this dilemma from an intersectionality perspective. In order to understand their experience in times of COVID‐19 and their response to this dilemma, I analyse their position as women, as migrants, as elderly care workers, as family breadwinners and as ‘quasi‐family members’ in the families of their employer — which correspond to five interlocking systems of oppression.     

Confucian or Communist,Post‐Mao or Postmodern? Exploring the Narrative Identity Resources of Shanghai's Post‐80s Generation

Thirty years after the post‐Mao reforms, twenty years after the Tiananmen Square demonstrations, the next generation of “comrades” is emerging in China. They are called the Balinghou, or the “Post‐80s” generation, referring to the cohort born between 1980 and 1989. This article is taken from a broader study on the narrative resources that Shanghai's Post‐80s young adults call on to construct their identities, given the historical situation in which they live. Symbolic interactionism is useful for studying identity construction processes across cultural contexts, particularly in China where interactionist concepts have seen limited application to date. The discussion also explores the theoretical implications of structural elements that significantly alter the resources available for identity construction, such as the One Child Policy.     

Time Alone or Together? Trends and Trade‐offs Among Dual‐Earner Couples,Sweden 1990–2010

In recent decades, the dual‐earner couple has become increasingly normative, potentially reducing the time couples and families spend together. The authors investigated how coupled individuals allocated time together, alone, with children, and as a family, exploring changes between 1990 and 2010 in Sweden using three waves of the Swedish Time Use Survey (N = 9,544). Ordinary least squares and decomposition analyses find a trend toward time together over time alone, with childless couples spending similar time together and parents increasing family time. The shift toward family time evolved differently for men and women, indicating gender convergence in private and public spheres, but at higher costs of time alone for women. Change is behavioral and general, applying quite equally across gender and educational groups. There are educational gradients concerning time with children and certain qualitative aspects of time together, indicating that dual‐earner society may be family friendly, but not equally for all.     

Peek‐a‐What? Infants’ Response to the Still‐Face Task After Normal and Interrupted Peek‐a‐Boo

Infants’ sensitivity to the vitality or tension envelope within dyadic social exchanges was investigated by examining their responses following normal and interrupted games of peek‐a‐boo embedded in a Still‐Face Task. Infants 5–6 months old engaged in two modified Still‐Face Tasks with their mothers. In one task, the initial interaction ended with a sequence of normal peek‐a‐boos that included tension build‐up, peak, and release. In the other task, the initial interaction was followed by a sequence of peek‐a‐boos that ended with an interrupted peek‐a‐boo in which the build‐up was followed directly by the still face. Infants showed the still‐face effect with their attention and smiling when the still face followed the normal peek‐a‐boo sequence, but only with smiling when the still face followed the sequence with the interrupted peek‐a‐boo. Infants’ social bidding to their mothers in the still‐face phase was greater following the interrupted peek‐a‐boo sequence. When social exchanges are interrupted before the closure of the vitality envelope, infants respond with more attention vigilance and social bidding, demonstrating their awareness of the structure of social exchanges.     

Predicting a Partner's End‐of‐Life Preferences,or Substituting One's Own?

Numerous studies comparing patients' end‐of‐life health care treatment preferences with their surrogates' reports of those preferences indicate that partners do not know one another's treatment preferences: Random guesses are just as likely as surrogate choices to match the patients' preferences. The present study uses the empathic accuracy model and the assumed similarity model to shed further light on accuracy and bias in surrogate reports. The data come from the National Center for Family and Marriage Research/Knowledge Networks Pilot Study 2010, a national sample of 1,075 heterosexual American couples age 18 to 64. Surrogate reports were simultaneously biased (i.e., correlated with the surrogate's own preference) and accurate (i.e., correlated with the partner's actual preference). Higher relationship quality and legal marriage (vs. cohabitation) were associated with increased assumed similarity bias. These findings suggest that practitioners working in end‐of‐life care need to be familiar with their partnered patients' relationship dynamics.     

The case for mindfulness‐based approaches in the cultivation of empathy: Does nonjudgmental,present‐moment awareness increase capacity for perspective‐taking and empathic concern?

Empathic responding, most notably perspective-taking and empathic concern, has important implications for interpersonal functioning. While empathy training approaches have received some support for a variety of populations, few extant interventions have targeted empathic responding in couples. Mindfulness- and acceptance-based behavioral approaches, for couples as a unit and/or for individual family members/partners, are proposed as an adjunct to empathy training interventions. Preliminary findings suggest that the viability of these interventions for increasing empathic responding should be further investigated, and specific suggestions for this line of research are offered.     

How does a board of directors influence within‐ and cross‐sector nonprofit collaboration?

Board members play a significant, yet largely unexamined, role in nonprofit collaboration. Processes, such as finding prospective partners, creating common ground with a partner, and establishing appropriate collaborative governance implicate nonprofit board members. In contrast to the scholarship of the role of interlocking directorates as potential networks for nonprofit collaboration, this paper examines the role of board members' social and human capital on nonprofit collaboration with other nonprofits, businesses, and government agencies. Drawing on online survey data from 636 nonprofit organizations, this paper finds that board social capital—but not board human capital—is positively related to the presence and number of within‐sector and cross‐sector nonprofit collaboration. However, board human capital enhances nonprofit‐government collaboration, when board social capital is also high. The results provide a novel perspective in nonprofit collaboration and board management research.     

Great Expectations? Working‐ and Middle‐Class Cohabitors' Expected and Actual Divisions of Housework

Young adults often express preferences for egalitarianism but often find themselves in conventional household arrangements. Using interview data from 122 working‐class and middle‐class cohabitors, the authors applied Komter's (1989) concepts of manifest, latent, and hidden power to examine the ways that contemporary young adults reinforce and modify gender norms surrounding the division of housework. Cohabiting women more often expect equal housework arrangements than men, regardless of class, yet middle‐class women achieve equal divisions more often because they are better able to exercise manifest power than their working‐class counterparts and because middle‐class men appear more willing to cede to their partners' demands. In contrast, working‐class women's desires to achieve equality are frequently rebuffed as they face greater resistance or defer to their partners' competing wishes. Although the exercise of manifest power is central to arranging housework, the hidden power of gender conventions pervades across class, leading many couples toward traditional arrangements.     

Signs of Change? At‐Home and Breadwinner Parents' Housework and Child‐Care Time

The authors analyze American Time Use Survey data to examine patterns in domestic work among at‐home and breadwinner parents to gauge how time availability, relative earnings, and gender shape time use in couples with extreme differences in earnings and work hours. They find that involvement in female‐typed housework is an important driver of overall housework time. It is counternormative housework behavior by at‐home fathers that shapes conclusions about how time availability, relative resources, and gender influence parents' housework. Although time availability appears to shape child care in comparable ways across parents, mothers are more engaged in child care than similarly situated fathers. Overall, comparisons point to the importance of distinguishing among gender‐normative housework tasks and accounting for differences in engagement on work and nonwork days. The results provide a basis for assessing the social significance of growing numbers of parents in work–family roles that are not gender normative.