Review Essay: Toward a Better Understanding of Latinos, Latinas, and African-Americans

Challenging Fronteras: Structuring Latina and Latino Lives in the US. , edited by Mary Romero, Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, and Vilma Ortiz.
Latinas and African American Women at Work , edited by Irene Browne.     

Extractive Regimes: Toward a Better Understanding of Indonesian Development

This article proposes the concept of an extractive regime to understand Indonesia's developmental trajectory from 1966 to 1998. The concept contributes to world‐systems, globalization, and commodity‐based approaches to understanding peripheral development. An extractive regime is defined by its reliance on extraction of multiple natural resources in the formation of an economic and political order that is also supported by global and regional forces. After elaborating the concept of an extractive regime, the article illustrates it through examination of Indonesia's developmental trajectory from its formation in the post–World War II era to its firm establishment during Suharto's New Order. Although a comprehensive study would necessitate attention to the full panoply of commodities, the study illustrates some of the workings of the extractive regime in the timber and fisheries sectors, which share spatial extensivity and other characteristics. The article concludes by considering the future of the extractive regime in Indonesia amid democratization and continued class domination and by offering suggestions for further application, specification, and extension of the extractive regime concept.     

E-Government and Bureaucracy: Toward a Better Understanding of Intranet Implementation and Its Effect on Red Tape

This article examines the interaction between bureaucratic redtape and intranet usage in state human service agencies. Wepropose a sociotechnical model for the relationship betweenintranet usage and bureaucratic red tape that takes into accountthe complexities of causal linkages including bidirectionalcausal relationships and a range of internal and external influences.This model is tested with data from the National AdministrativeStudies Project, Phase II. While we are not able to corroboratethe "demand pull" hypothesis advanced by Bretschneider and colleagues,we do find support for its corollary (the "technology push"hypothesis) indicating that intranet usage is associated withreduction in red tape. This finding on the salutary effect ofintranet usage holds for both a global measure of red tape anda more specific procurement red tape measure. We conclude witha discussion of the implications of our findings.     

Attitudes Toward Premarital Sex in Contemporary Vietnam: Findings from a National Survey

ABSTRACT

Despite growing concerns over increasingly relaxed sexual culture in Vietnam, population-based research that investigates the openness to premarital sex in contemporary Vietnam remains scarce. Using data from the Vietnam Population and AIDS Indicator Survey 2005, this study examined the acceptance toward premarital sex and documented significant differences in attitudes by gender, age, and marital status. Attitudes of Vietnamese toward premarital sex generally remained conservative. Men were more permissive than women. Among both male and female respondents, higher acceptance levels were reported to men's practice of premarital sex than to women's same practice. Unmarried respondents were more open than those who were married. A growing openness toward premarital sex among the younger age was found only among the married. Results suggest the coexistence of traditional values and a growing permissiveness toward premarital sex in Vietnam.     

Clicking Toward Better Grades: The Use of Student Response Systems in Social Work Education

Faculty members at universities are increasingly shifting their pedagogical focus from traditional lectures to active learning by integrating academic technology such as clickers (i.e., student response systems) into classrooms. However, few studies have examined the effect of clickers on learning outcomes such as test grades, and even fewer studies have evaluated this technology in social work education. This study examined the effect of clickers on learning outcomes in an undergraduate social work course. Findings indicated that frequency of clicker use significantly contributed to increased test scores after controlling for important covariates, suggesting that clickers may be an effective tool in actively engaging social work students and promoting learning. Instructors guidelines for integrating technology into future social work courses are discussed.     

Identity Dilemmas: Toward a More Situated Understanding

When are identity dilemmas—when people possess identities that conflict with one another and both are potentially stigmatizing—most likely to occur? Are they the result of generic social processes? A review of some of the extant research on “identity work” suggests that historical “misalignments” of culture and stratification, which we refer to as “lag,” create the greatest potential for stigma and the reproduction of inequalities. Lag is exacerbated by complex, intersecting axes of hierarchy, and amplified as symbolic environments globalize and subcultures multiply. Articulating culture and structure reveals how power plays out in interaction, and highlights the omnipresence of struggles for treatment as “fully human.” We consider whether “alignment” is even possible when multiple dimensions of social location intertwine, compete, and collide. Following Schwalbe and Mason‐Schrock (1996), we argue that “subcultural” or collective identity work that brings new meanings into dominant cultural narratives may offer the greatest hope, but in the interim all coping strategies are costly.     

Understanding the Role of Outsiders in Community-Based Development Interventions: A Framework with Findings from Iran

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - This article analyzes various roles of development practitioners (called outsiders) in five different cases of...     

Understanding the implementation of the Grow! parenting program: Findings from a mixed methods pilot study

Evaluating the implementation of parenting interventions is critical to program diffusion and quality across populations and settings, and to enhancing treatment outcomes. This article presents implementation findings from a pilot study of Grow!, a universal parenting program targeting parents of five to eight years olds that aims to improve child outcomes through strengthened parenting. Grow! was implemented at two community sites in central Pennsylvania by trained facilitators. Implementation data was gathered from facilitators and participants using mixed methods, including surveys, observation checklists, semi-structured interviews, and focus group discussions. These data were analyzed and integrated to explore, within the context of Proctor et al.'s (2011) implementation outcome framework, four implementation outcomes (i.e., acceptability, appropriateness, fidelity, and feasibility). Overall, these findings demonstrate that Grow! can be, and was, implemented effectively in a community setting. Moreover, they demonstrate how the Proctor et al. (2011) framework can be operationalized and applied specifically to hybrid effectiveness-implementation design studies.     

Toward Understanding the Child's Experience in the Process of Parentification: Young Adults' Reflections on Growing up With a Depressed Parent

This article reports on a qualitative study with 21 young adults who grew up with a depressed parent. We examined how young adults make sense of their childhood experiences of parental depression and how their retrospective reflections help us to understand the experiences of children and the processes of parentification. Participants recounted that their childhood consisted mainly of actions in the service of family well‐being. At that time, they reflected on their own experiences only rarely. In adolescence, there was an evolution toward a greater consideration for oneself and a repositioning within the family. In the discussion, we explore the therapeutic implications of this study—and in particular—the meaningfulness of silence in the family process of parentification.     

Toward a Cross-Cultural Understanding of Work-Related Beliefs

Although psychology's contribution to a study ofthe Protestant Work Ethic (PWE) made a slow start we nowhave an impressive array of studies which have examinedthis construct, even cross-culturally, and find that not only is this construct seeminglyalive and well, but also that it is espoused morestrongly by non-Protestant and non-Western countries.Furnham (1990b) examined a composite of seven scales designed to measure the PWE, and found thatseveral factors could be identified. A study wasundertaken to compare the meaning of work in twodifferent cultures, one Western Christian(Australian) and the other non-Western Buddhist (Sri Lankan).The results suggest that both cultures have similarperceptions about the meaning of work, but Sri Lankansseem to be more strongly committed to hard work.Although work related beliefs seem to be similar, SriLankans do not endorse the belief that hard work leadsto success as enthusiastically as Australiansdo.     

Toward a Conceptual Framework for Understanding Community Belonging and Well-Being: Insights from a Queer-Mixed Perspective

Although previous research indicates a positive relationship between community belonging and well-being, little is known about how this relationship is experienced within diverse communities. In this study, interviews were conducted with 12 queer-mixed-identified individuals. Proposed is a conceptual framework for understanding how and why experiences of community belonging contribute to and detract from well-being. Specifically, the dimensions being close, being read, being seen, and being heard are explored through participants’ intersectional and often-contradictory narratives. This study may enhance scholarship regarding lived experiences of community; research and practice related to multiracial, queer, and trans* experiences; and community efforts to promote well-being.     

State Fragmentation: Toward a Theoretical Understanding of the Territorial Power of the State

In existing theories of revolution, the state is narrowly defined as an administrative entity, and state breakdown simply refers to the disintegration of a given political regime. But this narrow definition cannot deal with this question: Why, in a revolutionary situation, do some states become fragmented and others remain unified? I would therefore argue for the broadening of the concept of state breakdown to include the territorial power of the state and to treat the latter as a key analytical dimension in the study of state fragmentation. The dynamics of territorial state power involve the control of critical territories and valuable resources associated with the spatial position of a given state in the interstate system. A strong territorial state is able to maintain its organizational coerciveness and territorial integrity, whereas a weak territorial state is vulnerable to fragmentation. The overall state crisis derives from the accumulated effects of geopolitical strain by which territorial fragmentation unfolds.     

Politics as a Vocation: Notes Toward a Sensualist Understanding of Political Engagement

Drawing data from works of political non-fiction that help to reveal the moral and sensual underpinnings of political practice, this paper seeks to adumbrate a sensualist understanding of political engagement. After beginning with a brief discussion of Weber’s seminal essay “Politics as a Vocation,” I then construct an ideal type of political passion with which to highlight the inherent shortcomings that plague traditional explanations of political action. My argument is that these approaches are all vitiated by their reliance on Chinese-box epistemology. I go on to suggest that in order to obtain a genuinely sociological account of political engagement, one must develop methods that are true to the experiential specifics of politics while recognizing the conditions that shape the possibility of those very experiences.

Toward a Greater Understanding of the Cohabitation Effect: Premarital Cohabitation and Marital Communication

The goal of the present study was to examine the relationship between premarital cohabitation experience and marital communication in an effort to understand the robust finding known as the cohabitation effect, whereby couples who cohabit before marriage have greater marital instability than couples who do not cohabit. Observed marital problem solving and social support behavior were examined as a function of premarital cohabitation experience in a sample of 92 couples in the first 2 years of their first marriages. Spouses who cohabited before marriage demonstrated more negative and less positive problem solving and support behaviors compared to spouses who did not cohabit. Sociodemographic, intrapersonal, and interpersonal functioning variables did not account for the association between cohabitation experience and marital communication.     

The Peer Context of Adolescent Substance Use: Findings from Social Network Analysis

To examine the peer context of adolescent substance use, social network analysis was used to measure three domains of attributes of peer networks: social embeddedness, social status, and social proximity to substance users. The sample was a panel of 5,104 sixth, seventh, and eighth graders in three public school systems surveyed every 6 months for five assessments. Hierarchical generalized linear models showed that adolescents less embedded in the network, with greater status, and with closer social proximity to peer substance users were more likely to use substances. Also, adolescents in less dense networks and networks with higher smoking prevalence were more likely to smoke and use marijuana. Results establish the utility of social network analysis for measuring peer context and indicate that conventionality of relationships—having friends in the network, being liked but not too well liked, and having fewer friends who use substances—is most beneficial.     

Toward an Understanding of Russian Speaking Heroin Addicts and Drug Treatment Services in Israel

Abstract

This pa per de scribes the find ings from a pur pos ive sample of 152 male and fe male Rus sian-speak ing drug ad diets who im migrated to Is rael dur ing the last ten years. Ap prox i mately one-third of the co hort was not Jew ish, in clud ing 47 per cent of the women. Forty-one per cent of the subjects re ported be ing phys i cally abused and 25 per cent of the women, com pared to 5 per cent of the men, re ported be ing sex u ally abused as a child. Al co hoi abuse was found to be dif fer ent among the par ents of male and fe male ad diets: 46% of the women com pared to 31% of the men had fa thers who drank ex ces sively; 14% of the women compared to 5% of the men had moth ers who were heavy drink ers. Also, female ad diets were more likely than male ad diets to have a mother who used il licit drugs. Treat ment re lated is sues are dis cussed along with the need for specialized, culturally sen si tiveser vice pro vision.     

The Clinician as a Dreamcatcher: Holding the Dream

This paper describes the child patient's communication to the clinician of cherished hopes and ambitions—the child's dreams. The clinician performs important holding functions by catching and keeping the child patient's dreams intact for him or her over time. The paper also demonstrates essential mirroring selfobject functions the clinician performs by recognizing and acknowledging the child's dreams in the therapeutic relationship. Dreams are understood as a component of development. The therapist's dreamcatcher role bolsters the child's tentative capacity to be interested in himself/herself and the outside world. Three clinical vignettes are used to highlight the role of the clinician in creating an empathic milieu by acknowledging, understanding, validating and preserving the dreams.     

Exploitation of Intercountry Adoption: Toward Common Understanding and Action

The conflation of various illicit intercountry adoption activities under the umbrella of “child trafficking” has caused confusion in the adoption literature. Utilizing a pragmatic approach, this article explores the cacophony of opinions that have arisen with regard to trafficking in illicit adoption activities and identifies the concept of exploitation as a useful framework for differentiating among them. To improve and increase the accuracy of research, policy, and programming, the authors suggest the new labels child trafficking, the sale of children, birth mother trafficking, and abuse of process for use in identifying and discussing different forms illicit adoption.