Perceived Relational Support in Adolescence: Dimensions,Configurations, and Adolescent Adjustment

The perceived relational support from four key providers (father, mother, special sibling, and best friend) on five provisions (quality of information, respect for autonomy, emotional support, convergence of goals, and acceptance) was examined for 2,262 adolescents (aged 12 – 18 years). In a variable‐centered approach, factor analyses yielded five dimensions of support: three specific to providers (parent, friend, and sibling support) and two specific to provisions (convergence of goals and respect for autonomy). Only parental support was found to change (decrease) across age. In a person‐centered approach, five types of adolescents with different configurations of perceived support were identified. The first three types differed in overall level of support (high, average, and low) for all of the five dimensions; the fourth type represented extremely low support from parents with above‐average support from best friends; the fifth type consisted of adolescents with no best friend. These configurations were significantly related to different patterns of adolescent adjustment in various domains (psychological well‐being, delinquency, substance use, and peer‐group functioning).     

Creating Relational Ties in Talk: The Collaborative Construction of Relational Jealousy

This study furthers recent investigations into emotional talk between close relational partners by exploring the collaborative construction of one particular type of emotional experience: relational jealousy. Conversation analytic methods were used to investigate a data base comprised of 44 half-hour conversations between male friends, female friends, cross-sex friends, and romantic partners. It was found that both romantic partners and friends constructed relational jealousy as a powerful “negative” emotional experience and, when constructed in this fashion, the content of the construction concerned the negative influence this experience can have on both relational partners and their relationship. The structure of negative constructions of this emotion often included use of the past tense, qualifiers, and normalization strategies to address the face and relationship concerns created by claiming for oneself or attributing to one's partner such an experience. It was also found that partners who shared a romantic attachment sometimes constructed relational jealousy as a “positive” experience and the structure and content of these positive constructions differs markedly from the negative ones. Finally, relational jealousy was found to be a useful resource in romantic partners’ construction of their unique relational bond and in their negotiation of the rights, obligations, and rules entailed by that particular type of relationship.     

The Relational Systems Model: Reality and Self-Differentiation

SUMMARY

This article addresses two of the major theoretical considerations that undergird the Relational Systems Model for Family Therapy. The concept of life realities posits that all that exists in the realm of human relationships may be viewed as a circle of reality consisting of self, other, context, and spiritual, Inviting clients to connect with these realities rather than human-created versions helps clients bring into awareness vital information that is actually present, but not manifest in the clients' problem-saturated lives. The self-differentiation process for the therapist is proposed as the therapeutic energy that enables clients to expand their awareness of vital parts of reality.     

The Social Life of the State: Relational Ethnography and Political Sociology

Qualitative Sociology - Political sociologists have typically studied the state as a self-enclosed institution hovering above civil society. In this formulation, the state is rendered as...     

The Ethics of Relational Leading: Gender Matters

This article is concerned with the ethical implications of conceptualizing and enacting leadership as a relational practice, rather than as a heroic‐individualistic performance. Using a small empirical study, it explores the possibilities and challenges of becoming an ethical subject against the pressures on leaders to instrumentalize and masculinize their relational work. Ethics is understood as a critical reflexive practice through which leaders come to understand the effects of their conduct and are able to transform or restyle themselves. This fashioning of an ethical subject is discussed in relation to the construction of masculinized certainty and feminized self‐doubt. The article concludes with some tentative thoughts about the capacity of embodied subjects to transgress dominant modes of being and acting.     

The Nature and Dimensions of the Grandparent Role

Abstract

Grandparenting is a fundamental personal and social role. Despite its importance, the nature and dimensions of the grandparent role and its relevance to developmental theory is not well understood. Recently, grandparenthood has been conceptualised as a highly generative activity, thus involving developmental work that previously was attributed to middle adulthood. However, the importance of generativity as a means of avoiding a sense of stagnation in older adults has yet to be thoroughly investigated. Not surprisingly, most studies have concluded that grandmothers and grandfathers find the role to be very satisfying. Nevertheless, the psychological factors that influence this satisfaction remain unclear. Future research is required to examine grandparent satisfaction in terms of grandparents' attitudes and expectations, grandparent behaviours (e.g., child care provision) and the derived meaning of grandparenthood. This research needs to follow an integrated, theoretical approach.     

The Guijin Therapist and the Nature of Therapeutic Truth: A Relational Perspective

The professional literature is replete with examples of the benefits of the client–clinician dyad being of the same ethnic group. Noted advantages include a perceived implicit understanding of the clients subjective experience and a furthering of the therapists personal and professional growth as a result of the therapeutic interaction. This paper suggests that there are also benefits to the clinician being considered a guijin or outsider to the clients culture of origin. Utilizing a relational perspective with an emphasis on multiple self-state theory, this paper will discuss the advantages of being perceived as an outsider when working with an Asian bicultural client.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Annual International Conference for the Advancement of Private Practice in Clinical Social Work in Lisbon, Portugal on June 8, 2002.     

Dimensions of Intimacy: The Interrelationships between Gender and Listening

In the introduction to their text on intimate relationships, Perlman and Duck (1987, p. 9) note that psychologists, sociologists, family scientists and communication experts “are all making important contributions” to the study of personal relationships, thereby reflecting the recent multidisciplinary aspect of this field. However, in many important works on intimacy and intimate relationships, the gender differences that often create barriers to intimacy, and how these differences are reflected in the communication process, have, until recently, been notably absent.¹ While alluded to repeatedly, nowhere, in fact, is the connection directly made between intimacy and the listening behavior of women and men. This paper therefore attempts to fill this absence by integrating into the literature on intimacy the salient aspects of listening that affect the quality of intimate relationships between women and men. Hopefully, such understanding will contribute to our knowledge of the concept of intimacy in our culture and will facilitate razing the barriers to intimate relationships that are a product of cultural expectations.     

Our Story: The Parent and LGBTQ Child Relational Process

This study explores the parent-lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) child relational process, before and after the child discloses his or her sexual orientation and/or gender identity to his or her parent(s). Eleven parent-adult child dyads were interviewed in this grounded theory study. Participants included children representing the full LGBTQ spectrum and their parents. Results indicate that parent-child dyads experience a relational process occurring in five sequential phases, the last one continuing indefinitely. Parent-LGBTQ child close relationships manifest societal beliefs regarding LGBTQ identities. Dyad members share an evolving relational identity and construct a shared narrative that shifts in response to familial life events and broader societal changes.     

The Children's Depression Scale in Family Therapy: Hearing the Hurt

In this article I review the changes in thinking about childhood depression since the 1950s, with an emphasis on the struggles to find language for childhood depression. My interface with these changes is described, with a particular focus on the development of the Children's Depression Scale (CDS). Clinical applications of family therapy using the CDS in treatment of childhood depression are then illustrated with a composite case example. The idea is developed that depression in children can be seen as a blocked communication, and that increasing emotional expressiveness in families is an appropriate therapeutic aim and intervention. The relevance of the historical context to current practice is considered.     

The Relational Systems Model: An Analysis of Gottman's Findings on Marital Success

ABSTRACT

This paper reviews John Gottman's research on marriages through an overlay of the recently developed Relational Systems Model (RSM) by Ray Bardill. Gottman's findings, which identified three styles of marriages that sustain themselves over time and identified those actions that indicate the resolution of conflicts or the eventual ending of the marital relationship, can be interpreted by Bardill's RSM model. Such an interpretation can be made through the concepts of self-differentiation; the realities of self, other, context and spirituality; multigenerational transmission of values and beliefs; and emotionalized right/wrong.

The RSM model effectively illuminates Gottman's work and develops additional categories for illustrating why people stay in or leave relationships. The introduction of the emotionalized right/wrong concept produces a self-regulating component for the individual and a self defining component for the family. In keeping with Gottman's research, the RSM model provides integration of both positivistic and constructionistic elements as well as familiar insights into the eco-systemic nature of the marital system.     

The Companies We Keep: Effects of Relational Embeddedness on Organizational Performance1

Building on first‐hand qualitative and quantitative data collected from computer motherboard manufacturers, this research proposes a contingency argument for the effects of relational embeddedness on organizational performance. Results show that the effects of embeddedness vary depending on the specific dimension of embeddedness, organizational age, performance measures, and the type of supplier relations, and that the concept is far more complex than previous literature suggests. Two main conclusions are that a closer supplier relationship improves both organizational growth rate and production quality for younger organizations, while in chipset supplier relations, a highly committed supplier worsens production quality more for younger firms.     

The Dimensions of Subjective Well-Being Among Black Americans:

This study examined the factorial structure of subjective well-being (SWB) among black Americans. A multiple indicator structural equation model that includes 17 items (observed indicators) and four first-order factors was proposed to account for the dimensionality of subjective well-being encompassing strain, life satisfaction, self-esteem and self-efficacy. Data for the research came from the 1980 National Survey of Black Americans. Analysis of covariance structures, or LISREL, was used to evaluate three alternative measurement models of subjective well-being. The findings revealed that the four factor model was not supported and consistently replicated across two randomly divided subsamples. The results suggest that subjective well-being among black Americans tends to be multidimensional. Implications of the results for future are discussed.     

Performing Women: The Gendered Dimensions of the UK New Research Economy

This article explores the development and maintenance of familiar gendered employment patterns and practices in UK universities, which are exemplars of new modes of knowledge production, commodification and marketization. After discussing in detail the evidence of gender discrimination in UK higher education and the changes in the academic labour process consequent to the incorporation of universities, at least at the policy level, into the ‘knowledge economy’, institution‐specific data is used to highlight the gendered aspects of the research economy from the three intermeshing perspectives of research culture, research capital and the research production process. This nexus is constructed in such a way as to systematically militate against women's full and equal involvement in research. Lack of transparency, increased competition and lower levels of collegiate activity coupled with networking based on homosociability are contributing to a research production process where women are marginalized.