Consumer Views of a Family Centre Drop-In

Correspondence to Katy Cigno, Department of Social Policy and Professional Studies, University of Hull, HU6 7RX Summary The family centre Drop-in is a phenomenon which has developed,often in a haphazard way, at the ‘soft end’ of socialwork, mostly in the voluntary sector. Nevertheless, the literatureand the results of a small case-study argue that it has an importantplace in the lives of a wide range of families and is a partof community support networks. For some users, it provides avital alternative to social work help, or an essential supplementto it. Users' views indicate that a Drop-in achieves its broadaims of helping to prevent family breakdown by relieving isolation,of providing a welcoming environment where people can make friendsand children can play, of promoting self-esteem through itsactivities and encouraging users to help each other. There arelimits to how many families can benefit at any one time. Userslike most the relaxed family atmosphere and being able to helpand be helped informally. They are most critical of gossip,cliquiness and dependency among the users. ‘It is exactly what I wanted. I loved going ... You mix.It's very important to have friends. When I could have half-killed[child] there was someone to take her off me. We helped oneanother. We got involved with each other and each other's children.’     

Disney’s modern heroine Pocahontas: revealing age-old gender stereotypes and role discontinuity under a façade of liberation

Disney’s animated heroine Pocahontas has been touted as a new type of protagonist differing from her predecessors whose lives revolve around men. Pocahontas’ romance eventually does become subordinate to her role in protecting the social fabric of her village. Yet in placing the needs of her community before her own personal desires, she fulfills societal expectations of today wherein young women are supposed to progress from selfish absorption in relationships to selfless dedication nurturing others. Pocahontas, then, models the submersion of a young woman’s desires to allow a commitment to selfless altruism.     

Some Characteristics of Abusing Families Referred to the NSPCC

Summary The results from 85 social work schedules completed at a numberof NSPCC units for the treatment of non-accidental injury showthat there is a decreasing trend in the seriousness of recentreferral injuries and confirms the prevalence of facial bruising.Children under four were those most at risk, the mean age ofchildren being 20 months. Early parenthood appears to be a characteristicof these and other families with the likelihood of larger thanaverage families by the time the family is completed. Maternalill-health, especially psychological ill-health, is a confirmedfinding and general family violence rather than the scapegoatingof a single child was frequent. Family disruption was high withseparation, housing and employment changes, and previous criminalityoccurring in a disproportionate number of families.     

Some Answers About the Reverse Tariff: A Reply to Paley and Leeves

Summary Paley and Leeves have recently offered a critique of PaulineHardiker's work on the recommendations made by probation officersin Social Enquiry Reports. They maintain she neglects significantfactors which have a direct bearing on the recommendations,that her model is insufficiently dynamic and that it confusesoutcomes with processes. However, on inspection it is foundthat neither the empirical material introduced by Paley andLeeves, nor their theoretical challenge, is of sufficient weightto be able to sustain their criticism.     

No-one else could understand': Women's Experiences of a Support Group run by and for Mothers of Sexually Abused Children

Summary Previous studies have shown that when a woman finds out aboutthe sexual abuse of her children the consequences for her areserious and can represent a major life crisis. Women in thisposition frequently report a lack of professional understandingand support. The current study explores the experiences of women attendinga busy peer support group at the NSPCC in York. It demonstratesthe vital role that peer support can play. It traces a varietyof factors which mean that family, friends and social workersare not well placed to help. At the heart of these difficultiesare the powerful feelings of guilt and failure in their roleas mothers which the women experienced as a result of the sexualabuse of their children. For these women it was impossible toshare with social workers their doubts about their own abilitiesas mothers, particularly in a context in which those workerswere making judgements about their ‘ability to protect’.On the other hand the support group provided a safe and non-judgementalforum in which these powerful emotions could be expressed anddealt with. The study explores the role that social workerscan play in relation to such groups.     

A Bedroom for Sheila Cooperton

Summary A series of interviews with a young West Indian girl livingin London reveals the profound effect of housing conditions,and the architecture of poverty generally, on the psychologicaldevelopment of the adolescent. In the reported interviews, whichhave been reconstructed, one begins to appreciate how not havingsomething as simple as one's own bedroom may influence a child'sfeelings about sexuality, sex role distinctions, family, intimacyand the emergence of her very identity. Most significantly,perhaps, is the fact that the child herself (her name has beenchanged) recognizes the relationship between environmental deprivationand the substance of conscious and unconscious materials.     

Examining the Causes of Stress in Families with Severely Mentally Handicapped Children

Summary Though it is recognized that the presence of a mentally handicappedchild may be a source of stress for a family, less is knownabout precisely which impairments are particularly stressful.This question was investigated in a study of 200 families withseverely mentally handicapped children living in two healthdistricts in South East England. Interviews were carried outwith the people responsible for the day-to-day care of the childrenand stress was measured by means of the Malaise Inventory. Theresults suggested that the highest levels of stress were associatedwith the presence of a child with behaviour disorders or withmultiple impairments; the stressfulness of these conditionswas exacerbated by adversity. A regression analysis showed thatthe factors causing most stress in carers were, in order ofimportance: behaviour problems in the child, night-time disturbance,social isolation, adversity in the family, multiplicity of impairments,difficulty in settling the child at night, problems with thechild's health, problems with the child's appearance, and moneyworries. The article ends with recommendations for the developmentof services aimed at reducing stress in families with mentallyhandicapped children.     

被男权社会扭曲的灵魂——从"弄小巧用借剑杀人"事件评说王熙凤

在《红楼梦》中,王熙凤的性格是通过一个个典型事件刻画出来的,其中“借剑杀人”就是成功的一例。在这个事件中,王熙凤的极富心机、擅权术及阴险狡诈、手段毒辣等性格特征被充分地展现出来。从这一事件中,我们可以看出,男权社会是形成王熙凤性格的根本原因,是男权社会的罪恶扭曲了这个女性的灵魂,使她变得如此卑劣。这一事件再次向我们证明:在以男性为核心的封建社会,女人是否守妇道,是否敢于向男权社会挑战,都会成为男权制度下的殉葬品。     

The Supply of Foster Families for Children in Care

Correspondence to John Miles, Institute of Social and Applied Psychology, The University, Canterbury, Kent CT2 7LZ. Summary The family circumstances of 2694 foster homes in England arecompared with representative families from the 1985 GeneralHousehold Survey. Foster families typically include a womanin the 31–55 age group, live in homes with three or morebedrooms, are two parent families with one parent working full-timeand the other not, and they have older children only. The incidenceof families with these characteristics is used to develop anestimator of the relative supply position of local authorityareas for foster care, from which a number of conclusions aredrawn. Over the last thirty years some social changes have improvedthe supply, others decreased it, and on balance the nationalsupply position is little changed. Ironically, supply is bestin those areas which have the lowest need for fostering services.Ways in which local authorities can improve their supply positionare considered. The supply estimator reveals that the averageboarding out payments made by authorities show clear signs ofresponsiveness to the local supply position for foster families.     

Delinquency and the Family

Summary A standardized procedure based upon current social work practicewas used to assess the family circumstances of a randomly drawnsample of Tower Hamlets families with son/s between 11 and 14years of age. These families were compared to those of localboys of the same age before the Courts for a first time. Two-thirdsof the officially delinquent boys came from ordinary families,intact and without serious problems. However, compared to theofficially non-delinquents in the random sample they were significantlymore likely to come from broken homes or unbroken (intact) butwith serious and persistent problems. The differences are notdue to neighbourhood or school factors that appear to a considerableextent to operate independently of family factors. Few firstCourt appearances in Tower Hamlets are explained by boys reactingto serious family stress. Follow up over two years of the delinquentsshowed that just under one-quarter of the boys from ordinaryfamilies became persistent offenders. Just over one-third ofthose from difficult family circumstances reappeared. These findings are discussed in the light of other researchand current social work practice.     

Including Families in Residential Work: Educational and Agency Tasks

Correspondence to Stephen Casson, Social Services Department, Civic Centre, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 8PA, England. Summary This paper identifies obstacles to the inclusion of familiesby residential establishments. A review of the literature indicatesthat the notion of including families is a worthwhile consideration,but that few programmes have committed themselves with sufficientenergies over time to test the worth of this assumption. Tobring families centre stage a set of obligations is proposedto managers and certain principles from the family dynamicsliterature are identified for inclusion in the training curriculumof residential workers.     

Maintaining Sibling Relationships--Neglected Dimension in Child Care Practice

Correspondence to Marjut Kosonen, 80, Grove Road, West Ferry, Dundee DD5 1LB, UK Summary This article describes some of the findings of a study undertakento evaluate all foster and adoptive placements in one localauthority social work department in Scotland. The numbers, characteristicsand care experiences of children in foster and adoptive carewere considered. The study found that for the majority of childrenplacement in foster care led to separation from siblings. Thechildren were most vulnerable to separation at points of entryand leaving care. Separation from brothers and sisters can havelifelong consequences for the child and his or her siblings,as few of the children were found to have plans which includedreunification with their siblings. A fragmented picture emergedconcerning siblings' living situations. Children were foundto have siblings living in a variety of situations, both inand outwith the care system. Social workers lacked full informationabout the family composition where contact with parents waslost or siblings had moved from the area. Children were mostlikely to be placed with siblings in temporary and relativefoster placements.     

The Effect of Huntington's Chorea on Family Life

Summary This paper examines the effect of Huntington's Chorea (H.C.)on family life with particular reference to the consequencesfor the spouse of the H.C. patient. It describes in some detailthe marital and parental difficulties encountered and confirmsthe severe familial disruption that occurs. It suggests thatfamilies or individuals segregating this disorder can be usefullydivided into two categories of behaviour which are referredto as ‘H.C.-orientated’ and ‘independently-orientated’.It is further suggested that for purposes of practical managementand in the hope of avoiding the process whereby families becomeH.C.-orientated, these families require and should be offeredon-going social-work support from the time a family is recognisedas being at risk of H.C.     

Children At Risk: How different are children on Child Abuse Registers?

Mark Campbell. 64. Alberta Road. Bush Hill Park. Enfield EN1 1JE. Summary Following a review of the literature a checklist of 118 itemswhich have been associated with child abuse and neglect wasconstructed. This checklist was applied to twenty-five familiesattending a Local Authority's family centres. Nine of thesefamilies had children whose names were on the local Child AbuseRegister. The checklist scores of the families on the registerwere compared with the remainder. There was little differencein the factors studied between the two groups. This suggeststhat either there is little real difference between the characteristicsof abusing and non-abusing families, or that the process ofregistration is controlled by a series of events which are notsolely related to the characteristics of the families underconsideration.     

The motives of foster parents, their family and work circumstances

Summary In foster care research the focus is generally placed on thechildren, not on the parents who perform the foster care. Inthis article the focus is on foster parents of 10-11 year-oldchildren. They were interviewed about their motives for becomingfoster parents, which were linked to their family and work circumstances.Among the 21 foster families in the study, four different butequally frequent reasons or motives for taking care of fosterchildren from the very beginning could be distinguished: relativeswho feel responsibility for a certain child; couples who wantchildren and do not think they can have children of their own;families where the mother wants to be at home taking care ofbiological as well as foster children instead of having unskilledemployed work outside the home; and parents with grown-up childrenwho want to fill the 'empty nest' by becoming foster parents- combined with a family business at home or close to home.Changing family and work patterns in Sweden do not seem to haveinfluenced foster families as much as families in general. Theworth of acquiring more knowledge about the families involvedin foster care of children and young people in order to improvefoster care and reduce breakdowns of care is discussed.     

Factors Contributing to Stress on Mothers Caring for an Intellectually Handicapped Child

Summary With the shift away from institutional care, increasing responsibilityis falling on families to care for their elderly or disabledmembers. Whilst this move may be cost-beneficial for the authorities,it inevitably puts additional strain on family resources. This paper examines the home care of intellectually handicappedchildren and the subsequent impact on families. Specifically,it assesses stress levels amonst mothers of intellectually handicappedchildren and explores the factors which contribute to that stress.It is argued that better understanding of the causes of stresswill help in the optimal provision of support services.     

Monitoring Interventions with Young Israeli Families

Correspondence to Dr Rami Benbenishty, School of Social Work, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel 91905. Summary This paper describes a study monitoring interventions with familiestreated by a welfare agency in Jerusalem, Israel. The treatmentapproach is eclectic and is based mainly on a view of the familyas a system and on task-centred and problem solving orientationsto family treatment. Sixty families were studied. The clients'median age was about 30 years old and the median number of childrenwas two per family. The clients approached the welfare agencyfor four main reasons: financial difficulties (especially heavydebts), severe health problems and disabilities, marital difficulties,and problems in raising children. The practitioners identifiedin two thirds of the families dangerous situations that neededimmediate attention. A repeated measures design utilizing several outcome measureswas used. According to the workers' assessments, based on theCRS (Epstein et al., 1982), functioning improved and progresstoward goal attainment was observed in most families. The magnitudeof changes in functioning, however, was small. The workers'and clients' assessments of change and of goal attainment weremore positive. There were indications of deterioration at followup. The treatment outcomes are discussed in light of the clientand treatment characteristics. Changes in client selection,length of treatment, and an active follow up strategy are suggested.     

Commonality and Diversity in Feminist Social Work

Correspondence to Vicky White, Department of Applied Social Studies, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL. Summary The relationship between feminist social workers and women serviceusers is a central concern in the feminist social work literature.The literature's discussion of feminist social worker/womanservice user relationships, along the dimensions of commonalityand diversity, is compared with the experiences and understandingsof feminist social workers who participated in a small-scalequalitative study. Two main themes are considered: first, commonalityin feminist social worker/woman service user relationships;secondly, diversity amongst women service users. Issues forfuture work are drawn out of the discussion of these themes:the problematic nature of feminist social worker/woman serviceuser commonality; the impact of social divisions other thangender on women service users' lives; the importance of unpackinggeneralizations about both women service users and feministsocial workers; the need to explore the intersections of thestatutory context and feminist social work identities. It isargued that in addressing these issues future work would beenriched if greater prominence were given to feminist practitioners'perspectives, experiences and understandings.     

Huntington's Chorea and the Young Person at Risk

Correspondence should be sent to J. R. Korer, Mental Health Research Unit, Manchester University, Department of Psychiatry, Stopford Building, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PT. Summary Social workers increasingly find themselves involved with familiesin which one or more individuals suffer from genetic disease.Huntington's chorea is such a condition and has serious implicationsfor other individuals, both in the nuclear and extended family.This paper explores some of the likely responses of young peoplein such families and how they can best be helped. A social workerneeds to be aware of the differing responses to varying degreesof risk and how young people in the situation can be advisedand helped. It follows on from an earlier study (Korer and Fitzsimmons,1985) which looked more specifically at family life within thesefamilies.     

Split in Two: Experiences of the Children of Schizophrenic Mothers

Correspondence to Jeni Webster, Lecturer in Psychiatric Social Work, University of Manchester, Department of Psychiatry, Williamson Building, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL. Summary The children and families of 28 schizophrenic women were interviewedto assess the amount of burden they experienced in the formof disruptions and problems as a consequence of the schizophrenia.Different styles of coping emerged within the family patternsthat related to behaviours associated with schizophrenia, therole of the fathers, the stages of development of the children,and the adverse effects on the family and the children.