Ethno-Linguistic Exogamy and Divorce: Does Marital Duration Matter?

This research examines whether the exogamy effect on the divorce risk varies over marital duration. Registry data from 1970 to 2003 allow us to observe couples in exogamous and endogamous ethno-linguistic marriages (Finnish speakers and Swedish speakers in Finland). We find that an elevated divorce risk of exogamous couples, which has been observed in numerous studies, is not typical of recently initiated marriages only, because it does not attenuate over marital duration. Marital problems that lead to divorce seem to be more common among exogamous couples than among endogamous couples. We argue that these patterns are likely due to group-specific differences in attitudes toward marriage. The argument is supported by a persistent difference in the divorce risk across endogamous Finnish- and Swedish-speaking marriages, and by the variation in divorce risk by ethno-linguistic composition of the couples in a regional context where minority group behaviors are more likely absorbed into majority group behaviors.     

Why is the Divorce Rate Declining in Indonesia?

This article examines trends in marital dissolution in Indonesia. Analysis considers the impact of educational expansion, delayed marriage, urbanization, increasing employment before marriage, legislative change, and increased free choice in marriage on the decline in marital disruption. Trends such as delayed marriage and educational expansion account for about one third of the decline in marital dissolution. Moreover, factors associated with marital disruption are shifting in importance. In particular, age at marriage and marital duration are becoming less reliable predictors of marital stability, whereas education is becoming more important. We conclude that the shifting forces governing marital formation and dissolution in Indonesia have modified the linkages between the conjugal couple, broader kinship systems, and modes of economic support such that traditional patterns sustaining high levels of marital instability are no longer in effect.     

Does Fatherhood Matter for Men?

Ignored in the flurry of new research on fathers is that fatherhood may have consequences for men. This article explores possible effects on the lives and well‐being of men for a range of fatherhood experiences. Data are drawn from the National Survey of Families and Households. The first part of this article examines whether men's varied associations with children (no children, coresident, non‐coresident, and stepfatherhood) are associated with men's psychological health and behavior, social connections, intergenerational family relations, and work behavior. We found strong evidence that fathers differ from nonfathers in their social connections, family relationships, and work behavior. There is significant variation in effects among the father types as well. The second section of this article focuses attention only on men who are fathers and examines whether fathering behavior (e.g., the amount of time and nature of the activities that fathers are reported to be spending with their children) is associated with men's well‐being. The effects of father involvement on men was found to be most significant for those who were living with their own children.     

Health Insurance and Risk of Divorce: Does Having Your Own Insurance Matter?

Most American adults under 65 obtain health insurance through their employers or their spouses' employers. The absence of a universal health care system in the United States puts Americans at considerable risk for losing their coverage when transitioning out of jobs or marriages. Scholars have found evidence of reduced job mobility among individuals who are dependent on their employers for health care coverage. In this study, the author found similar relationships between insurance and divorce. She applied the hazard model to married individuals in the longitudinal Survey of Income Program Participation (N = 17,388) and found lower divorce rates among people who were insured through their partners' plans without alternative sources of their own. Furthermore, she found gender differences in the relationship between health care coverage and divorce rates: Insurance‐dependent women had lower rates of divorce than men in similar situations. These findings draw attention to the importance of considering family processes when debating and evaluating health policies.     

The Geographic Context of Divorce: Do Neighborhoods Matter?

Neighborhood effects on family formation processes have recently received considerable attention, but no study has yet examined the impact of neighborhood socioeconomic status on marital dissolution. This analysis merges data from 3,523 respondents to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics with census data describing the socioeconomic composition of local communities. Although a multiitem index of neighborhood socioeconomic disadvantage is positively and significantly related to the risk of divorce, this association can be explained entirely by the low incomes of husbands in distressed neighborhoods. Thus, there appears to be no direct causal influence of neighborhood socioeconomic status on marital instability. To the extent that neighborhood socioeconomic disadvantage increases the prevalence of single‐parent families, it apparently does so by increasing rates of out‐of‐wedlock childbearing rather than by disrupting existing marriages among couples with children.     

Did Unilateral Divorce Laws Raise Divorce Rates in Western Europe?

The increase in European divorce rates over the past decades was accompanied by several changes in divorce laws. Yet for European countries, research on the effects of divorce law on the divorce rate is scarce. Most of the existing studies are based on data from North America and provide numerous, but inconsistent, results. We use fixed‐effects regression models to examine the impact of the introduction of unilateral divorce on the divorce rate in Western European countries. We find that de facto unilateral divorce practices led to a sustainable increase in the divorce rate, whereas legal rights to unilaterally divorce had no long‐run effects.     

Does Campaign Spending Really Matter?

It has long been considered axiomatic that public receptivenesstoward products, ideas, and candidates can be altered by promotionalcampaigns. Consumers are often the sponsors as well as the targetsof such campaigns in the political realm. This study identifiesthe factors which lead consumers to support political campaignsand estimates the degree to which their preferences can be influencedby campaign spending. The potential effects of proposed spendingregulations are also analyzed     

How Long Does a Santa Barbara Divorce Take?

There has been considerable research about the amount of time the psychological grief process requires when couples divorce. However, there has been little research on the time the actual process of divorce requires. To address this, we obtained free and publicly available information on divorce cases from Santa Barbara County. We are able to offer some insight about the relationship among the length of divorce, marriage length, and having minor children. Our results are consistent with those found in other literature that focuses on the length of the grief process, and our results are consistent with our experiences in family law practice and mediation.     

How Does Divorce Affect Iranian Women's Sexual Well-Being?

Sexuality and divorce are two interwoven subjects with complex effects on women's sexual well-being in Iranian culture. Results of this exploratory study using focus group discussions and individual interviews revealed how the sexual well-being of women was influenced by the divorce experience through common patterns and recurring themes. A total of 26 women participated voluntarily in the study. They were approached through a selected social support group in a center in West Tehran in 2011, and all had been divorced for less than 10 years. For the majority, sexuality-related matters became complicated and jeopardized their overall well-being in postdivorce life. This finding, along with the fact that the majority were seeking financial and emotional support, implies that counseling women and providing economic support for postdivorce life might improve women's sexual well-being.     

Does Citizenship Status Matter in Canadian Agriculture? Workplace Health and Safety for Migrant and Immigrant Laborers

This article explores how precarious legal status circumscribes differential inclusion in the agricultural labor market and affects workers' lives through a comparative study of workplace health and safety among temporary migrant guest workers and immigrants in Canada. Original, multimethod research with South Asian immigrant and Mexican migrant farmworkers examines employment practices, working conditions, and health‐care access. We find that both groups engage in precarious work, with consequences for their health and safety, including immigrant workers with citizenship. Nevertheless, migrant guest workers are subject to more coercive forms of labor discipline and a narrower range of social protection than immigrants. We argue that while formal citizenship can mitigate some dimensions of precariousness for farmworkers racialized as non‐white, achieving a more just, safer food system will require broader policies to improve employer compliance and address legislative shortcomings that only weakly protect agricultural labor.     

Does Size Really Matter? Organizational Size and Innovations in Nonprofit Organizations

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between size and innovation in a sample of nonprofit organizations. The author employed a number of size estimates (personnel and financial) and assessed different types of innovations (administrative and technological). Additionally, since the failure to take into consideration important contextual variables has been attributed to producing misleading conclusions about the relationship between size and innovation, the author controlled for those variables (formalization, centralization, specialization, leadership, board size, and organization's age) when assessing this relationship. The results of hierarchical multiple regressions showed that although the personnel size estimates were important predictors by themselves, their significance disappeared when contextual variables were introduced. Board size and organization age were significant predictors of administrative innovations. Board size was the only significant predictor of technological innovations, as well as of a total number of innovations.     

How Does the Gender of Parents Matter?

Claims that children need both a mother and father presume that women and men parent differently in ways crucial to development but generally rely on studies that conflate gender with other family structure variables. We analyze findings from studies with designs that mitigate these problems by comparing 2‐parent families with same or different sex coparents and single‐mother with single‐father families. Strengths typically associated with married mother‐father families appear to the same extent in families with 2 mothers and potentially in those with 2 fathers. Average differences favor women over men, but parenting skills are not dichotomous or exclusive. The gender of parents correlates in novel ways with parent‐child relationships but has minor significance for children's psychological adjustment and social success.     

How Much Does the Distance in Distance Education Matter? Our Students Speak

Distance learning programs in social work education have been growing exponentially throughout the United States. This study interviewed Master of Social Work (MSW) students enrolled in two synchronous distance-learning courses that employed a blended pedagogy, and evaluates their insights about the learning experience. For these two courses, material was presented via video conferencing and supplemented with online media at two campuses at a large school of social work. In order to give students a voice about their experiences, data were collected using semi-structured face-to-face interviews. Common themes included: autonomy, emotional connectedness, technological challenges, and knowledge acquisition. Both the strengths and challenges related to distance learning are discussed.     

Conflict or Divorce? Does Parental Conflict and/or Divorce Increase the Likelihood of Adult Children's Cohabiting and Marital Dissolution?

The short- and long-term effects of family structure on child well-being remains a hotly contested area among both researchers and policymakers. Although previous research documents that children of divorce are more prone to divorce themselves, much of this research has been plagued by multiple data and analytic problems. A second problematic issue relates to whether it is the divorce per se that leads to increased divorce or rather the conflict that may precede the divorce. In this article we examine whether children who experience parental conflict and/or divorce are more likely to experience a cohabiting breakup or divorce as adults compared with children from low conflict and/or intact families. Our examination improves on past research by using a three-wave longitudinal data set and by controlling for predivorce family characteristics, including the conflict between parents before divorce. We extend previous research on the effect of parental conflict and divorce on adult children's likelihood of divorce by also examining the likelihood of a cohabiting dissolution.     

Does the Organizer Matter in Volunteer Involvement? A Cross-Sectoral Comparison of Eldercare Volunteers in Beijing

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - While rich literature examines the relationship between volunteers and volunteer organizations, cross-sectoral difference...     

Alzheimer's Disease Caregiver Burden: Does Resilience Matter?

Caring for an individual with Alzheimer's disease is at times challenging and can lead to caregiver burden. Resilience is a personality characteristic that has emerged as a protective factor among aging individuals. This study was conducted to examine the moderating effect of resilience between caregiver stressors and caregiver burden. The results indicate that resilience was not identified as a moderator between stressors and caregiver burden; however, a relationship exists between resilience and caregiver burden. Specifically, as resilience in Alzheimer's disease caregivers increases, their caregiver burden decreases. These findings highlight the importance of supportive interventions that will increase resilience in Alzheimer's disease caregivers.