Perceived Similarity With Gay Men Mediates the Effect of Antifemininity on Heterosexual Men’s Antigay Prejudice

This research examined the hypothesis that heterosexual men’s motivation to differentiate themselves from gay men mediates the relationship between the antifemininity norm of masculinity and antigay prejudice. We assessed masculinity through three concepts: status, thoughness, and antifemininity. Participants then reported their perceived similarity with gay men and their antigay prejudice. The results showed that antifemininity was the best predictor of both perceived similarity and antigay prejudice: The more people endorsed the antifemininity norm, the more they perceived themselves as dissimilar from gay men and showed antigay prejudice. More important, perceived similarity mediated the effect of antifemininity on antigay prejudice. These findings provide direct evidence for the link between masculinity and the motivation to differentiate oneself from gay men, and they suggest that antigay prejudice accomplishes the identity function of maintaining unambiguous gender boundaries.     

Diagnostics in multivariate generalized Birnbaum-Saunders regression models

Birnbaum–Saunders (BS) models are receiving considerable attention in the literature. Multivariate regression models are a useful tool of the multivariate analysis, which takes into account the correlation between variables. Diagnostic analysis is an important aspect to be considered in the statistical modeling. In this paper, we formulate multivariate generalized BS regression models and carry out a diagnostic analysis for these models. We consider the Mahalanobis distance as a global influence measure to detect multivariate outliers and use it for evaluating the adequacy of the distributional assumption. We also consider the local influence approach and study how a perturbation may impact on the estimation of model parameters. We implement the obtained results in the R software, which are illustrated with real-world multivariate data to show their potential applications.     

South African Men Who Have Sex With Both Men and Women and How They Differ From Men Who Have Sex With Men Exclusively

The label “men who have sex with men” (MSM) is used to categorize a diverse population exclusively on the basis of its sexual behavior. Understanding the diversity that this label comprises is critical for the development of health interventions that effectively reach the various populations subsumed under this label. In this cross-sectional study of South African MSM (N = 480) recruited through respondent-driven sampling (RDS), we explored differences between men who had sex with both men and women (MSMW) and men who had sex with men exclusively (MSME). We found significant differences between these two groups in terms of sexual attraction, sexual identity, sexual preferences, sexual histories, and current sexual practices. MSMW were more likely to be confused about their same-sex attraction, to experience internalized homophobia, and to have paid for sex in the previous year, while MSME were more gender nonconforming and more likely to have been forced to have sex in the previous year. These findings underscore that the MSM label comprises a diverse population and that exclusive sexual engagement with other men is a critical distinction to take into account in understanding this diversity and fully grasping the lived experiences of men who have sex with men.     

Recovering Process from Child Sexual Abuse During Adulthood from an Integrative Approach to Solution-Focused Therapy: A Case Study

ABSTRACT

In recent times, strengths-based recovery approaches that focus on the present and build strategies that look toward the future have become popular. However, some cases require the consideration of experiences from previous stages of the clients’ development. This single-case study explores the psychotherapeutic process of a middle-aged woman who presented with a history of child sexual abuse (incest) and a long-term adult diagnosis of depression that was treated in public health services. This psychotherapy involved an integrative approach to solution-focused therapy; specifically, the approach proposed by Yvonne Dolan to work with adult survivors of sexual abuse, in conjunction with techniques and strategies from the transtheoretical model. Measures incorporating therapeutic working alliance and outcomes were administered over sessions. Results showed positive outcomes from this therapeutic intervention, which remained at 3-month and 12-month follow-ups. Implications for practitioners’ specialist practice in health services are discussed, given the complexity of comorbid mental health conditions with a history of child sexual abuse.     

Skilled Immigrants in Rome

Skilled migration, taking the forms of brain drain, movements of professionals and job transfers, has become an important component of contemporary migration flows. However, it does not necessarily follow that incoming flows of highly qualified immigrants automatically translate into an effective supply of skilled labour, since immigrants are often prepared to accept underemployment and working conditions that nationals from the local market have refused.
This study aims to verify whether the phenomenon of brain waste exists in Rome. We analysed the data of 147,587 foreigners recorded in the City Register Office as being residents on 31 August 1999. Of these, 68,539 indicated their educational level and 73,746 their occupation.
The data also revealed that the more stable segment of immigrants to Rome, i.e. those who have taken up residency, is composed mainly of qualified, or highly qualified, persons. Many foreign residents possess university degrees and are employed in managerial and/or intellectual professions. Alongside this important datum, however, we observe that the majority of foreign residents are employed in unqualified jobs, a considerable percentage of whom possess much higher qualifications than those required for the job they do.
Analysing the temporal evolution of these data on the qualifications and professions of foreign residents leads us to believe that the phenomenon of underemployment is decidedly on the upturn.
In order to understand the cause of this phenomenon, qualitative data from case study interviews have also been analysed. The most common reason why immigrants take on under-skilled jobs is lack of job offers appropriate to their academic or professional qualifications due to the peculiar situation of the Roman labour market. Other problems, such as the lack of protocols concerning the recognition of the academic qualifications of non-EU citizens and the language barrier, also play a role.     

A Test of Exogeneity Without Instrumental Variables in Models With Bunching

This paper presents a test of the exogeneity of a single explanatory variable in a multivariate model. It does not require the exogeneity of the other regressors or the existence of instrumental variables. The fundamental maintained assumption is that the model must be continuous in the explanatory variable of interest. This test has power when unobservable confounders are discontinuous with respect to the explanatory variable of interest, and it is particularly suitable for applications in which that variable has bunching points. An application of the test to the problem of estimating the effects of maternal smoking in birth weight shows evidence of remaining endogeneity, even after controlling for the most complete covariate specification in the literature.     

Clinical and behavioral evaluation of pathological gambling in Barcelona,Spain

This paper assesses both the clinical characteristics and gambling behavior of 45 pathological gamblers (40 male, 5 female, average age 41) in a psychiatric hospital in Barcelona, Spain. These pathological gamblers tend to have other addictions and psychiatric disorders in addition to their pathological gambling. Suicidal ideation and attempts were one of the most frequent complications with these patients. Slot and fruit machines were found to be the most preferred form of gambling. Loans and crime were frequently used by the gambler to finance his or her gambling. Nevertheless, the gambler is rarely aggessive, and legal problems resulting from serious crimes are the exception. The profile presentes is similar to that found among pathological gamblers in other countries.     

The Tempered Discrete Linnik distribution

We introduce a new family of integer-valued distributions by considering a tempered version of the Discrete Linnik law. The proposal is actually a generalization of the well-known Poisson–Tweedie law. The suggested family is extremely flexible since it contains a wide spectrum of distributions ranging from light-tailed laws (such as the Binomial) to heavy-tailed laws (such as the Discrete Linnik). The main theoretical features of the Tempered Discrete Linnik distribution are explored by providing a series of identities in law, which describe its genesis in terms of mixture Poisson distribution and compound Negative Binomial distribution—as well as in terms of mixture Poisson–Tweedie distribution. Moreover, we give a manageable expression and a suitable recursive relationship for the corresponding probability function. Finally, an application to scientometric data—which deals with the scientific output of the researchers of the University of Siena—is considered.     

Experienced crawlers avoid real and water drop-offs,even when they are walking

Crawling experience was recently linked to crawling and walking infants’ avoidance of falling on real and water cliffs, whereas walking experience had no effect on walkers’ avoidance behavior (Burnay et al., 2021). In the current study, the behavior of 25 infants was analyzed on the Real Cliff/Water Cliff apparatus using a longitudinal study design. Infants were tested as experienced crawlers (M_crawling = 2.93 months, SD = 1.07), novice walkers (M_walking = 0.68 months, SD = 0.29), and experienced walkers (M_walking = 4.90 months, SD = 0.92). Infants avoided falling on both cliffs when tested as experienced crawlers and their behavior was not different when tested as novice or experienced walkers. These findings confirmed the effect of crawling experience on crawling and walking infants’ avoidance of falls from heights and into water and the transfer of perceptual learning from crawling to walking postures.