Mothers' and Fathers' Emotion Socialization and Children's Emotion Regulation: A Within‐Family Model

In the current study, we examined whether mothers' and fathers' reactions to young children's positive and negative emotions were associated with children's negativity and emotion regulation. We utilized a within‐family design with 70 families (mother, father, and two siblings between the ages of 2 and 5 years). Mothers and fathers completed questionnaires about their emotion socialization as well as children's negativity and emotion regulation. Results indicated that mothers' and fathers' unsupportive reactions to children's positive emotions were associated with children's negativity. Fathers' unsupportive reactions to children's emotional displays were differentially associated with older and younger siblings' emotion regulation. Fathers' unsupportive responses to children's positive and negative emotions also contributed jointly to children's emotion regulation. The results suggest that exploring the within‐family correlates of children's emotion regulation and negativity is useful for understanding children's emotional development.     

Beyond Stigma: Visibility and Self-Empowerment of Persons with Congenital Limb Deficiencies

Goffman's (1963) theory of stigma holds that rejection by "normals" leads people with disabilities to adopt practices that help them to pass as normal or cover the immediate impact of their physical difference. However, such an attempt to mitigate the effects of stigma does not characterize the life histories of three adults with severe multiple congenital limb deficiences described in this paper. For them, self-display, within the context of American culture in the 1980s, is a strategy for self-empowerment in which the primary focus is the experience of the person with disabilities rather than the reactions of people who are "normal." Their adaptations suggest some limitations to the applicability of Goffman's theory in a changing social context.     

Physiological Regulation and Fearfulness as Predictors of Young Children's Empathy‐related Reactions

Indices of physiological regulation (i.e., resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia [RSA] and RSA suppression) and observed fearfulness were tested as predictors of empathy‐related reactions to an unfamiliar person's simulated distress within and across 18 (T1, N = 247) and 30 (T2, N = 216) months of age. Controlling for T1 helping, high RSA suppression and low fearfulness at T1 predicted T2 helping. In a structural model, empathic concern was marginally positively related to resting RSA at both assessments whereas personal distress was related to RSA suppression within time (marginally positively at T1 and significantly negatively at T2). Fearfulness was associated with self‐oriented, distress‐related reactions within time. Comfort seeking (an index of personal distress) declined in mean level with age whereas helping increased, and both behaviors exhibited differential continuity (as did resting RSA). Individual, as well as developmental, differences in the types of reactions that young children exhibit when witnessing others' suffering and distress were discussed.     

The welfare service practitioners’ perception of their power position in the user participation imperative

In the popular user participation rhetoric of social work practice, and amid the outcry for sharing power with the welfare service users when providers make service decisions, much research attention has been put on the circumstances that impeded the users’ voices, presuming that the service practitioners actually have de facto power over the service users. Based on the findings of a participatory research project conducted in Hong Kong, this paper scrutinises this presumed position of power from the service providers’ own perspective. Drawn from interviews of 47 service practitioners individually or in group, this phenomenological account is important for deciphering the conscious experiences that influence the service practitioners’ actions and reactions within participative spaces.     

Effecting change in local government: local authority chief executives as emotional actors

Most change management initiatives fail. Here, we explore data which emerged from a larger research study of local authority chief executives’ subjective experiences of New Labour’s modernisation programme and argue that the route to change so often taken by central government is detrimental to the successful embedding of change within local government because it ignores fundamental human reactions to coercion and control. We demonstrate that the seeds of failure are sown in the processes adopted as much as in the content of any programme of change. A contributory factor to such failures is the apparent reliance on the part of legislators that their policies and procedures will receive a neutral reaction. We show that the reality is that legislation is responded to and enacted by people who react in ways designed to defend their own positions, irrespective of the worth of those positions. Whether seen as actors in the policy implementation process, or as agents of change, chief executives act and react emotionally. This contributes to our theoretical understanding of the policy process and the practical application of change programmes. This article will be of interest to those in central and local government who are promoting or responding to change.     

A Control-Mastery View of Case Consultation

Case consultation is an important part of deepening a clinician's therapeutic skills. However, consultation is not theory neutral: Each theory of therapy guides consultants according to their particular theoretical orientation. Control-mastery theory assumes that clients come into therapy desiring to solve their problems and have a tentative unconscious plan for working in therapy. These assumptions have been supported by 40 years of research data. Although control-mastery theory is written in everyday language without jargon, it takes considerable time to learn to apply the theory because each plan formulation is case specific. Consultation relies on the examination of detailed process notes, within and across sessions, as well as the therapist's affective reactions to the client. Initially, it can help the therapist formulate the client's unconscious plan and determine the types of interventions that will be most helpful. Consultation is also useful during ongoing therapy to help the therapist maintain (or regain) the focus on the client's unconscious plan, especially when it is derailed by transference enactments.     

Psychological reactance and negative emotional reactions in the link between psychological control and adolescent adjustment

Researchers consistently report links between psychological control and adolescent behavior problems, but the processes linking psychological control with behavior problems are unclear. Adolescents’ negative emotional reactions and psychological reactance were tested as potential longitudinal mediators linking parental psychological control with both internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. Data were collected from a sample of 242 adolescents (M age = 15.4 at Time 1; 50.8% female; 50% white, non‐Hispanic, 18% African American, 16% Hispanic, and 16% of other or multiple ethnicities) at three time points over a 2‐year period. Adolescents self‐reported depressive symptoms, antisocial behavior, negative emotional reactions, and psychological reactance. Adolescents and their parents provided ratings of parental psychological control. Cross‐sectional models replicated patterns previously reported suggesting that negative emotional reactions and reactance mediate between psychological control and internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. However, in cross‐lagged panel models, neither negative emotional reactions nor reactance emerged as a mediator between psychological control and internalizing or externalizing problems. In contrast, results suggested that psychological control is an outcome of rather than contributor to, negative emotional reactions. Moreover, the addition of random intercepts to cross‐lagged models indicated that associations between psychological control, emotional and behavioral reactions, and internalizing/externalizing behavior may represent stable trait‐like patterns.     

The first interview as a guide to treatment 1

Abstract

This article is based on an exploratory study that examines clinical workers’ reactions to assault by a client within an established treatment relationship. Findings indicate that client assaults experienced as traumatic result in psychological processes and stages of resolution similar to those experienced by other victims of assault. The primary difference is fewer long‐term personal effects. Professional effect is significant and influences workers’ relationships with clients and their views of themselves as clinical workers. Long‐term positive professional effects are noted, and interviewed workers provide insight and advice for all who work with violent clients.     

Aboriginal Drinking: A Case Study in Inequality and Disadvantage

This paper examines an aspect of social inequality experienced by Aboriginal people living in a remote Queensland mining town. We contend that non-Aboriginal perceptions and attitudes of Aboriginal drinking behaviour contribute directly to structural inequalities within the Mount Isa community. Social drinking in the township is, for reserve-dwelling Aborigines, restricted mainly to one bar in one hotel and adjoining park and river bank area. The restrictions are preserved through both overt and covert discrimination. Aboriginal inebriation and excessive drinking are therefore more visible to the wider community and more accessible to police prosecution than that of any other ethnic group in the town. Although White folk tales concerning Aboriginal drinking often contain fear about acts of violence and crime directed towards the White community, soundly documented incidents are rare. This paper argues that the persistence of such attitudes is at the heart of a symbolic differential between the White and Black community in Queensland. Moreover, problems within the Aboriginal community that can be directly related to the excessive consumption of alcohol must also be seen as a product of these White reactions and perceptions.     

The social and economic impacts of immigration detention facilities: a South Australian case study

The negative attitudes fostered by political rhetoric against asylum seekers create significant problems when asylum seekers are housed within communities. Much of the community's opposition focuses on the perceived economic and social impacts of large numbers of asylum seekers. However, we currently lack research on the local economic and social impacts of asylum seekers. As a contribution to this evidence base our paper outlines a South Australian case study of the impact of a low security immigration detention facility on the local economy, health services and social cohesion. Our impact assessment found that community concerns were not borne out. There were increases in employment and local expenditure, no reduction in health care services or access, and tensions between residents subsided, as did initially strong reactions against the asylum seekers themselves. The minimal impacts were due to the government and community interventions such as seeking local contracts and providing onsite health services. This case study is used to provide some guidelines for other communities to effectively target the fears that matter most to the community – either through disseminating information that reduces fears and myths, or through planning and interventions that minimise negative impacts and enhance positive benefits. In this way, the arrival of asylum seekers can potentially become one that benefits all community members.     

Gender, Status, and Leadership

More than a trait of individuals, gender is an institutionalized system of social practices. The gender system is deeply entwined with social hierarchy and leadership because gender stereotypes contain status beliefs that associate greater status worthiness and competence with men than women. This review uses expectation states theory to describe how gender status beliefs create a network of constraining expectations and interpersonal reactions that is a major cause of the "glass ceiling." In mixed-sex or gender-relevant contexts, gender status beliefs shape men's and women's assertiveness, the attention and evaluation their performances receive, ability attributed to them on the basis of performance, the influence they achieve, and the likelihood that they emerge as leaders. Gender status beliefs also create legitimacy reactions that penalize assertive women leaders for violating the expected status order and reduce their ability to gain complaince with directives.     

Moderators of the Relation between Shyness and Behavior with Peers: Cortisol Dysregulation and Maternal Emotion Socialization

This study investigated the relations among shyness, physiological dysregulation, and maternal emotion socialization in predicting children's social behavior with peers during the kindergarten year (N = 66; 29 girls). For shy children, interactions with peers represent potential stressors that can elicit negative emotion and physiological reactions. Behavior during these contexts can be viewed as adaptive (e.g., playing alone) or maladaptive (e.g., watching other children play without joining in) attempts to regulate the ensuing distress. Whether shy children employ adaptive or maladaptive regulatory behaviors was expected to depend on two aspects of emotion regulatory skill: (1) children's physiological regulation, and (2) maternal emotion socialization. Findings supported the hypotheses. Specifically, shy children with poorer cortisol regulation or have mothers who endorsed a higher level of non‐supportive emotion reactions engaged in more maladaptive play behaviors whereas shy children with better cortisol regulation or a high level of supportive maternal emotion reactions engaged in more adaptive play behaviors.     

Strategic uncertainty,coordination failure and emergence: A game theory study on agency‐structure interactions

In the social sciences there is a long standing debate over the primacy of structure or agency in shaping human behavior. Structurationists like Giddens think of individuals' agency and collective features as two sides of the same coin while emergentists including Archer and Elder‐Vass claim that structurationists are blurring an important ontological distinction——they argue for effective social analysis, we should think of structures and individuals as different things because emergence happens when the properties of the collective are not reducible to the properties of the parts that constitute them. This paper contributes to the agency‐structure debate by showing how production and reproduction of emergent properties of social groups sharing same normative commitments (norm circles) can be empirically studied using two behavioral game theory experiments, adding a previously neglected insight that strategic uncertainty can lead to coordination failures of individual behaviors within norm circles, manifested as unintended outcomes of interdependent actions that are difficult to predict. Here the synchronic relation between the unpredictable collective outcomes of each game round and agential reactions of the participants to them defines emergence——the previous outcomes are diachronic inputs but they appear in the new outcome only through their effects on the individual decisions.     

Helping families when child sexual abuse is suspected but not proven

This paper reports from a project investigating reactions within families when intra‐familial child sexual abuse was suspected, and family members’ responses to a therapeutic approach. Data were obtained from therapeutic sessions and follow‐up interviews with mothers, children and alleged perpetrators. Before treatment the mothers felt uncertain as to how to interpret the children’s unclear signs. The children had severe symptoms, but had seldom disclosed abuse. The alleged perpetrators were often not informed about the suspicions. The families were in a state of crisis and shock, and communication within the family was characterized by uncertainty about what to talk about and whether the suspicions should be shared. In most cases after treatment the conflicts had been reduced, the children had few symptoms, supervised contact had been established, and the clients were satisfied with the treatment. One conclusion is that therapeutic sessions, where family members share information about concerns and take part in the decisions of how to protect children, seem relevant and helpful to the clients in unclear abuse cases.     

Carers and Professionals' Perspectives on Foster Care Outcomes: The Role of Contact

This study investigates the association between the contact of children or young people in care with their family, and the foster care placement evaluation (positive or negative) in Portugal. According to the perspectives of foster carers and service professionals' perceptions regarding children and young people's reactions, during and after the visits, are measured. Utilizing a quantitative approach, two fostering services teams and 140 foster carers completed questionnaires, which had 212 children in common. Results indicated that despite the importance of continued contact, especially for children and their parents, it was not determined to be essential to long-term placement. On one hand, there was the perception that a high percentage of children expressed positive reactions during and after the visit, while on the other hand, this didn't influence the perception of placement success. This study also showed significant differences between foster carers' and the professionals' perceptions on several dimensions of foster care, especially the children's reactions during visits. These differences need to be further analyzed in future research and the outcomes used to help improve contact management.     

Frame-changing in the media coverage of a school shooting: The rise of Columbine as a national concern

This essay explores the media frame-changing process in the news coverage of the 1999 Columbine shootings, clarifying the news discourse focus on Columbine's national importance. The study applies the van Dijk/Bell scheme of media analysis to 683 news articles from print and broadcast media published within 30 days following the incident. Insight is offered into the thematic content of the Columbine coverage, including the school shooting event itself, reactions, and commentaries. Analysis indicates that the initial focus of the coverage was what happened at Columbine, but over time the news increasingly highlighted Columbine's national salience.     

More than Two Decades of Changing Ethnic Attitudes in the Netherlands

This article uses data from three studies to examine changing reactions toward ethnic minority groups in the Netherlands (1979–2002). Using realistic conflict theory, Study 1 focuses on support for discrimination of immigrant groups in general. The findings indicate that this support is more widespread in times of high levels of immigration, when the unemployment level has recently risen strongly, and among cohorts that grew to maturity in times of large immigration waves or high unemployment rates. Studies 2 and 3 focus on changing feelings toward different ethnic out-groups in an ideological context (2001–2004) marked by a shift from multiculturalism toward assimilation. Study 2 showed that the shift toward assimilation negatively affected Dutch participants' feelings toward Islamic outgroups, but not to other minority groups. Study 3 used an experimental design, and the results showed that ethnic attitudes are more negative in an assimilation compared to a multicultural context. It is concluded that the structural and ideological social context is important for understanding people's changing reactions .     

Perspectives of Taiwanese practitioners on therapeutic reactions to disclosure of childhood sexual abuse

Disclosure of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) is a difficult decision, because CSA is a traumatic experience. Because of the sensitive nature of CSA in Taiwan, reactions to disclosure of CSA in treatment contexts can be challenging for practitioners. Little is known about Taiwanese practitioners' reactions to disclosure that occurs while they are working with CSA survivors. In-depth, phenomenological interviews were used to fully explore three practitioners' clinical reactions to disclosure of CSA. The significant categories and themes that emerged from the study are discussed. Limitations and implications of the present study and recommendations for future research are addressed.     

Reactions to cyberbullying among high school and university students

In this study, behavioral and emotional reactions to cyberbullying were investigated by surveying 567 undergraduate-level university students and 211 high school students. Among the study participants, 170 of the undergraduates (29.98%) and 120 of the high school students (56.87%) reported that they had recently been cyberbullied. A four-factor scale with 37 items was used to investigate the behavioral cyberbullying reactions of victimized students. The four factors were revenge, countermeasure, negotiation and avoidance. An additional two-factor scale with 11 items was used to classify victimized students’ emotional reactions as either internalizing or externalizing. Explained variance values of both scales were above 50%, and the factors were found to have acceptable internal consistency coefficients. Behavioral and emotional reactions varied according to gender and school level. Computer self-efficacy and internet use were associated with different reaction types.     

Undergraduate women's reactions to body image and eating disorder research

The purpose of the study was to determine college women's (N = 405) reactions to body image and eating disorder research as well as predictors of negative reactions. Results suggested that the majority of women (94%) did not experience negative reactions and reported benefits to participating. Regression analyses revealed that disordered eating and poorer body esteem were predictive of negative reactions to research participation. Additional analyses were conducted to better understand those participants (N = 26; 6%) who reported negative reactions. Overall, results indicated that body image and eating disorder research is not distressing for the vast majority of participants.