Itinerant Children in the Schools: A Neglected Social Issue

A hitherto neglected area of social and educational research has been the problems faced by itinerant children in their social development, personal adjustment and educational progress. These problems are likely to grow with the increasing mobility of the Australian population. This article briefly explores the issue and reviews research undertaken with geographically mobile families and children of defence force personnel. It recommends further research to delineate the extent of the problems, identify cause-effect relationships and help children and their families to cope with the effects of mobility.     

Preventing Suicide: A Neglected Social Work Research Agenda

Social workers encounter suicidal clients; however, little isknown about social work’s empirical knowledge base forsuicide assessment and treatment. In the first comprehensivestudy of social work’s contribution to the suicide literature,the authors conducted systematic electronic and manual searchesfor suicide research published in peer-reviewed journals bysocial work investigators for the period 1980–2006, withthe purpose of ascertaining the state of clinical knowledgerelated to suicide risk factors and effective treatments. Thesefindings reveal that despite recent increases to the study ofsuicide by social work researchers, they have contributed limitedevidenced-based knowledge in the last twenty-six years on thetreatment or prevention of suicide or suicide-related behaviours.The article outlines the risk factors for suicide and discussesthe implications for clinical social work practice and research.     

The Intuitive Psychologist Behind the Bench: Models of Gender Bias in Social Psychology and Employment Discrimination Law

Courts make use of psychological theories, especially in cases involving discrimination. But the courts do not appear to be cognizant of recent advances in cognitive social psychology. Flawed intuitive psychological models presently limit the law's effectiveness in dismantling the maternal wall. By understanding how the courts operate, social engaged socially psychologists might work with civil rights lawyers to influence the system and make progress dismantling the maternal wall.     

Social Representations Theory: A Progressive Research Programme for Social Psychology

The study “Psychoanalysis—its image and its public” intimates that common sense is increasingly informed by science. But common sense asserts its autonomy and, in turn, may affect the trajectory of science. This is a process that leads to many differentiations—in common sense, in scientific innovation and in political and regulatory structures. Bauer and Gaskell's toblerone model of triangles of mediation provided a distillation of their reading of “La Psychanalyse.” Here it was argued that representations are multi‐modal phenomena necessitating the use of multiple methodologies (comparative and longitudinal; qualitative and quantitative). In this paper we briefly summarise these arguments and elaborate ways in which social representation theory can be considered a progressive research programme. “Progressive” because as the theory has developed it has extended the range and depth of its conceptual basis; it provides a new synthesis for the social scientific understanding of the phenomena of common sense and of representation; it acts as an antidote to the reductionism of public opinion and, finally, it is a stimulus to depart from disciplinary silos. However, there remain unresolved issues: how to segment the relevant social milieus and how to close the feedback loop from common sense to science?     

Social Workers Talking to Clients: A Study of Verbal Behaviour

Summary Twenty-four interviews between trained social workers and theirclients were recorded and compared with the findings of a studyof how doctors talk to their patients. The social workers' techniqueswere found to be much more elaborate and much less obvious thanthose used by the doctors.     

In Home Social Work With Abused or Neglected Elderly:

This article proposes a practical guide to both assessment and treatment of abused andlor neglected elderly receiving home health care services. Indicators of mistreatment, intervention strategies, and limitations to in-home social work are discussed. This experiential article limits its focus to those elderly recipients of home health care who are living with family.     

Social Psychology in American Sociology

A Soviet scientist analyzes the emergence within the past half century of social psychology and psychological approaches in sociology as disciplines typical of Western philosophical interpretation. A contrast is made between this and the Marxist appraisal of social phenomena. Vestnik Moskovskogo Universiteta, Seria Ekonomiki, Filosofia (Journal of Moscow University, Economics and Philosophy Series), 1960, No. 5 — slightly abridged.     

Everyday Life in Social Psychology

In the field of psychology, the topic of everyday life as a specific subject of inquiry has been afforded little attention. Indeed, everyday life has recently been analyzed mainly in psychological studies that examine people's ways of behaving and thinking when they act in situations termed as mundane and ordinary. These studies are mainly carried out in two fields of social psychology which we refer to in general terms as Social Cognition and Social Representation Theory. The aim of this paper is to examine how both these fields treat some of the features commonly attributed to everyday life. In particular, the features of familiarization, continuity and stability over time and automaticity are discussed in order to try to figure out meeting points between the two fields mentioned.     

The Social Psychology of "Pseudoscience": A Brief History

The word 'pseudoscience' is a marker of changing worries about science and being a scientist. It played an important role in the philosophical debate on demarcating science from other activities, and was used in popular writings to distance science from cranky theories with scientific pretensions. These uses consolidated a comforting unity in science, a communal space from which pseudoscience is excluded, and the user's right to belong is asserted. The urgency of this process dwindled when attempts to find a formal demarcation petered out, and the growth of social constructionism denied science any special access to truth. The reaction to this led to the science wars, which ushered in a new anxiety in the use of 'pseudoscience', especially from the least secure branches. But recent writings on the disunity of science reveal how the sense of support drawn from it may be based on an illusion, creating a disunity of pseudoscience as well as of science.     

Discrimination in Social Work--An Historical Note

Correspondence to Dr. Bill Forsythe, Senior Lecturer in Social Work, 3rd Floor, Amory Building, University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4RJ. Summary It is important to examine the historical tradition of anti-discriminatorytheory and practice in social work in the light of current emphasison this aspect. There were several traditions, one anti-discriminatory,one non-discriminatory and one selfconsciously discriminatoryin nineteenth-century charitable and philanthropic work in England.There was considerable tension between these traditions andthe matter was further confused in that some workers, like ThomasBarnardo, represented an anti-discriminatory stance and yetin some of their work they clearly discriminated on such groundsas religious belief. It is concluded, therefore, that anti-discriminatorypractice can plainly be located in the pioneer phase of socialwork, illustrated by reference to such figures as JosephineButler and Elisabeth Fry.     

社会表征理论述评——一种旨在整合心理与社会的理论视角

本文梳理了社会表征理论的历史脉络及其内涵,评述了其理论创新之处及其相关研究,认为社会表征理论作为一种重返人文主义话语形态的新生理论,对美国社会心理学话语霸权具有不可低估的解构作用,但有待于进一步精致化。     

Forms and Functions of Aggression in Adolescent Friendship Selection and Influence: A Longitudinal Social Network Analysis

Aggressive children are known to have friends. However, less is known about the impact of aggression on friendship development and how this can differ for overt and relational (i.e., the forms) and instrumental and reactive (i.e., the functions) aggression. This longitudinal study utilized the forms and functions perspective on aggression to assess social selection and influence in adolescents' (N = 337, 12–14 years) friendship networks. Instrumentally and relationally aggressive peers became mutual friends with similar peers. Influence effects were observed in all types of aggression except overt aggression, suggesting that instrumental, reactive, and relational aggression may be the most susceptible to social influence. The findings are discussed in terms of theoretical and methodological implications for the study of aggression and adolescent friendships.     

Participatory Action Research: Psychology and Social Change

Participatory Action Research provides psychologists with a way of putting their skills and training to work in support of positive social change while still contributing to the important work of knowledge generation within the field. This article summarizes the development of Participatory Action Research and reviews the theoretical justification for this practice as a valid form of social research. The basic tenets and practices of this approach are discussed and the potential role of Participatory Action Research in psychology is considered.