Youth leaving care: how do they fare?

This chapter summarizes recent Canadian and international research on the outcomes for youth after they age out of the child welfare system. It paints a disturbing picture for this small and vulnerable population. Youth leaving care face many challenges in making the transition from state care to independence and adulthood. They bear the emotional scars of childhood neglect or abuse. They do not have a family support network, have limited or no financial resources, are often lacking in life skills, and usually have not completed school. Despite these setbacks, we expect them to function independently once they reach age eighteen. Research shows that once youth leave care, they do not fare as well as their peers. They are at much greater risk of relying on social assistance, becoming homeless, engaging in substance abuse, becoming single parents, experiencing mental health problems, or coming into contact with the criminal justice system. Some youth aging out, however, have more successful transitions. These typically have completed high school, have role models, have access to postsecondary opportunities, refrain from alcohol or drug use, and obtain life skills and independent living training. Having stable placements while in care is also critical in ensuring more positive outcomes. Canada does not have the capacity to track the outcomes of youth as they leave the child welfare system, nor can it identify the types of interventions showing the most promise in helping them achieve better outcomes. Canadian governments need to improve their transitional planning for youth in care who are approaching the age of majority. Some recommendations include extending the age for services and financial assistance to age twenty-four, developing standards to prepare youth for leaving care, and exploring ways to enable youth to pursue higher education or training. Finally, Canada should develop a national longitudinal survey to monitor the outcomes of youth after they leave care.     

Regulating older drivers: how are the states coping?

The nation's population is growing older and its dependence upon the automobile for mobility has never been higher. Traffic safety data indicate that older operators have more fatal crashes than other age groups. As more people approach their senior years the safety issues surrounding older drivers will become even more important. Findings from a 1995 survey are reported identifying the practices of states and the perceptions of licensing officials concerning the older driver issue. The results indicate a diversity in approaches and a series of institutional and behavioral conflicts in the older driver policy subsystem that contribute to imperfect licensing controls.     

Patterns of delayed marriage: how special are the Irish?

"This paper deals with delayed marriage and singlehood among the Irish as a focus for the study of the persistence of ethnic characteristics. Patterns of delayed marriage in Ireland in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries are reviewed, and evidence is also presented that Irish persons in other countries (especially in the United States) continue to show significantly higher rates of singlehood and postponed marriage than persons of other nationality groups. Discussion includes how delayed marriage became common in Ireland during the past 150 years and what may be involved in the apparent persistence of this pattern today in Ireland and among the Irish in other countries."     

Characterizing how to aggregate the individuals�� deprivations in a multidimensional framework

Most of the existing multidimensional poverty indices are constructed in two steps. First, the deprivation felt by each individual with respect to each attribute is computed. Then, these deprivations are aggregated to form a summary index of the overall deprivation. This paper explores properties for the aggregation stage and analyzes their implications. The axioms we propose are necessary and sufficient to characterize a procedure to aggregate the different individuals’ deprivations in order to measure the extent of deprivation in society.     

The socioeconomic gradient in health: how important is material deprivation?

In this paper we use the Spanish Living Conditions Survey (2005–2008) to investigate the existence of a socioeconomic gradient in health when alternative measures of socioeconomic status, apart from income, are considered. In particular we construct a material deprivation index that reflects minimum standards of quality of life and that incorporates comparison effects with societal peers and we estimate health equations with probit adapted least squares, fixed effects and instrumental variables. Our results reveal that the relationship between health and income operates through comparison information with respect to societal peers. In contrast, material deprivation in terms of financial difficulties, basic necessities and housing conditions exerts a direct effect on individual health. Mixed evidence is found with respect to gender.     

Affective networks: how WeChat enhances Tencent’s digital business governance

An emerging body of literature has revealed that social media enhance digital business governance to facilitate Internet companies in generating profit throughout regulating the everyday lives of users. However, although existing debates are often contextualized in the West, little attention has been paid to China, where social media are widely used. To fill this knowledge gap, this article investigates the digital business governance practiced by Chinese Internet companies such as Tencent. Specifically, I employ an affective lens to analyze how WeChat, the most popular social media application launched by Tencent, allows this Internet company to influence users for its own business purposes. Chinese college students, which constitute a representative group of young people, were early adopters of WeChat, and they have led the trend of social media use in China. Based on a yearlong netnographic study of Chinese college students, the results reveal that the affective design of WeChat captured their attention and influenced their everyday practices. These results provide insight into how digital business governance operates in the Chinese context, in which authoritarianism and capitalism work closely together.     

Women’s perceptions of how their dyslexia impacts on their mothering

Women with children have been depicted as struggling to justify themselves in the shadow of intensive mothering ideology. However, little is said about women who have a disability such as dyslexia, and how disability may intersect with intensive mothering ideology to present additional challenges. In this paper, life-story interviews are drawn upon to start to unpack the ways in which mothering and dyslexia may intersect. The themes discussed include: fear and perceived challenges of having a child with dyslexia; how mothers perceived their impairments manifest in their mothering, including poor organisational skills, short-term memory, reading and spelling; and how mothers may attempt to reframe the apparent contradiction between a ‘good’ mother and a mother with dyslexia by, for example, portraying themselves as a positive role-model for their child and better able to identify and cater for their child’s needs.     

Children’s health-related life-styles: how parental child care affects them

This paper examines parental influence on school children??s everyday activities that are related to a healthy or an unhealthy lifestyle. Using the Danish Time-Use and Consumption Survey from 2008/2009 with information on fathers??, mothers?? and children??s time use, we found no evidence of a relationship between parental working hours and children??s time allocations, while a 1-h increase in parental child care reduces the time children spent on TV/computer games by 12?C19?min. We also found a relationship between parents?? and their children??s time use, as the amounts of time the two generations spent on exercise were positively correlated, which indicates that parental time use on some healthy activities affects children??s lifestyle behavior more than parental child care.     

Successful aging: how does physical activity influence engagement with life?

With the increasing number of individuals over the age of 65?years worldwide, it is critical for society to recognize the importance of helping seniors maintain their health, physical, and cognitive functioning as well as their engagement with life. These three dimensions provide the foundation for successful aging (SA). The positive role of engagement with life has been understated to date in the literature. This review highlights the components of SA with particular emphasis on engagement and how physical activity positively impacts engagement which in turn positively influences health and physical function.     

What is cyberbullying & how can psychiatric-mental health nurses recognize it?

Cyberbullying is an emerging issue within our society, particularly among adolescents. The phenomenon is similar to traditional bullying in that it is hurtful, repetitive behavior involving a power imbalance, often causing psychosocial issues. With the availability of cell phones, Internet, and video gaming systems, adolescents are constantly plugged into technology and therefore at risk of being a victim or a perpetrator of cyberbullying. Both physical and mental health problems can result from cyberbullying, which, in turn, can affect an adolescent's performance in school and other crucial areas of life. Legal action is an option, but many times the law is not clear. Psychiatric-mental health nurses are in a position to help educate children about resources to prevent or cope with cyberbullying in a way that will help not only the patients themselves but also parents, teachers, school administrators, and the community.     

Sensitive research with adolescents: just how upsetting are self-report surveys anyway?

Distress related to answering personal survey questions about drug use, suicidal behavior, and physical and sexual abuse were examined in multiple convenience samples of adolescents. Samples varied in consent procedures utilized (active vs. passive parental consent), data collection setting (school vs. juvenile justice), developmental level (middle school vs. high school). Participation rates differed across consent procedures (e.g., 93% with passive vs. 62% with active parental consent). Results indicated that small percentages of adolescents in every sample reported frequently feeling upset while completing the survey (range 2.5% to 7.6%). Age, race, gender, and data collection strategy did not emerge as significant predictors of feeling upset. Instead, as hypothesized, adolescents reporting a history of suicidal ideation or attempt, illicit drug use, or experiences of physical or sexual victimization endorsed more frequent feelings of upset while completing the survey than peers without these experiences. Taken together, however, these sensitive event experiences explained only 6.6% of the variance in adolescents' upset ratings. The scientific and ethical implications of these findings are discussed with regard to adolescent participation in survey research about sensitive topics.     

Systems approaches to risk assessing healthcare, how far have we come?

Systems approaches and their relevance to risk assessment are considered through an examination of a number of recent applications in England. The importance of visual mapping of systems is emphasised. This approach encourages participation from those within the system with less technical knowledge but with important information to add to a risk assessment. Other advantages outlined include the ability to readily identify system boundaries, map processes and record both strengths and weaknesses of existing or planned system changes. The use of risk assessment methods with this approach should be cautious, as any one method may only identify a sub-set of all risks.     

创业之"how"——从廖锦登先就业后创业谈起

如何(how)创业,对于每一个创业者来讲都有不同途径和方法,廖锦登"曲线创业"之路,可能更适合今天想创业的大学生. 从高中开始,就喜欢电脑和IT技术的廖锦登,2007年从深圳信息职业技术学院计算机应用系多媒体专业(网页设计方向)毕业后,并没有马上自己开公司,而是有目的、有步骤地实施着先打工、后创业的计划.     

Islam and patriarchy: how robust is Muslim support for patriarchal values?

Evidence that Muslims support patriarchal values more than non-Muslims is abundant but the nature of this evidence is contested. The ‘cultural’ interpretation suggests that patriarchal values are an inherent element of Muslim identity. The ‘structural’ interpretation holds that patriarchal values reside in structural characteristics and have little to do with Muslim identity. Evidence on these contradictory claims is inconclusive. Neither have advocates of the cultural position shown that Muslim support for patriarchal values remains robust under control of structural characteristics; nor have proponents of the structural position demonstrated that Muslim support for these values vanishes under such controls. Filling this gap, we use multi-level models to test whether Muslim support for patriarchal values vanishes under control of patriarchy's structural underpinnings. We find that Muslim support for patriarchal values is robust against various controls; and we identify mosque attendance as a mechanism to sustain Muslim support for patriarchy in non-Muslim societies. Yet, rising levels of education, labor market participation, and a glacial emancipative trend diminish Muslim support for patriarchy, especially among women.     

Initial courtship behavior and stalking: how should we draw the line?

As noted by Schaum and Parrish (1995), stalking blurs the boundaries between normal courtship and obsessive behavior. Consequently, stalking proves an elusive phenomenon to define and to study. Where does courtship end and stalking begin? To address this question, 197 women and 44 men from the University of Pittsburgh who had loved someone who did not love them in return were surveyed about their feelings and actions in response to this rejection. Factor analyses revealed six groupings of behaviors in response to unrequited courtship: approach, surveillance, intimidation, harming oneself, verbal abuse/mild physical harm, and extreme physical harm. Approach behavior was reported to be used more often by men, but there were no significant differences between men and women in the self-reported prevalence of other types of courtship behaviors. Correlations reveal that feelings of anger and depression were the most common predictors of violent behavior for both men and women. Pursuer-perceptions of what behaviors connoted "going too far" in pursuit of a relationship proved unreliable. However, when pursuers were asked whether their love interest was afraid of them, fear was a reaction perceived in response to intimidation. Although it is likely that pursuer perceptions of where to draw the line would differ from the view of the love object, these results suggest that engaging in intimidation would be an appropriate place to draw the line between courtship and stalking.     

Assessment method of accessibility conditions: how to make public buildings accessible?

The enforcement of accessibility today has faced several difficulties, such as intervention in historic buildings that now house public services and cultural activities, such as town halls, museums and theaters and should allow access, on equal terms to all people. The paper presents the application of a method for evaluating the spatial accessibility conditions and their results. For this, we sought to support the theoretical foundation about the main issue involved and legislation. From the method used--guided walks--it was possible to identify the main barriers to accessibility in historic buildings. From the identified barriers, possible solutions are presented according to the four components of accessibility: spatial orientation, displacement, use and communication. It is hoped also that the knowledge gained in this research contributes to an improvement of accessibility legislation in relation to the listed items.     

Stretching the borders: how international business travel affects the work–family balance

This study examined the consequences of international business travel for the balance between work–family domains by exploring how international business travellers and travellers’ partners manage the boundaries between work and family in order to maintain the balance. Interpretative phenomenological analysis was used in analysing the semi-structured interviews of 10 male travellers and 10 partners. Because of its irregular nature, international business travel affects the personal life and the family of business travellers. Work-related travel also has an impact on how travellers and their partners construct, manage and negotiate borders between work and family in order to avoid an imbalance between these domains. Integration of work and family is usually inevitable in international business traveler families. Integration may lead to role blurring and thus lead to imbalance.     

Dating, marital, and hypothetical extradyadic involvements: how do they compare?

Patterns of extradyadic involvement (EDI) were assessed for three samples: an undergraduate dating sample and a community marital sample reporting on an actual experience of EDI, and an undergraduate sample which denied recent EDI and was asked to imagine a hypothetical experience of EDI. Good consistency of responses within and between measures was found for the hypothetical EDI sample. Persons reporting on a hypothetical EDI were generally less approving of EDI and imagined that they would experience higher levels of primary relationship satisfaction, overall remorse, and specific types of distress, particularly in comparison to the dating EDI group. Relative to the dating EDI group, the marital EDI group recalled greater dissonance with the EDI behavior, more concern about disapproval from others, and higher levels of intimacy, self-esteem, and love reasons for the EDI. No differences were found among the groups on the level of emotional closeness with the extradyadic partner.