On the Outside Looking In? The Experience of Being a Straight,Cisgender Qualitative Researcher

Research with disenfranchised and marginalized populations is often completed by those traditionally considered outsiders who are not part of the studied population. The history of outsider research has been somewhat tumultuous, and some outsider researchers have manipulated participants or carried out unethical studies. However, the insider/outsider dichotomy is overly simplistic and does not always accurately reflect the researcher position. Using lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer individuals as an example, this article will review the literature on insider/outsider researchers, suggest a more fluid concept of researcher positionality, and identify several recommendations for qualitative researchers.     

Migration,Poverty, and Risk of HIV Infection: An Application of Social Capital Theory

A majority of current HIV/AIDS interventions are designed primarily after individual-based public health models and pay little attention to the socioeconomic environment in which HIV transmission occurs. This article focuses on outlining how migration acts as a conduit for disease transmission in South Africa and then proposes a macro-level prevention model based on social capital theory, thus then supplementing current prevention literature. It is based on the argument that social disruption and stresses from migration lead to sexual interactions during the migration periods that amplify the risk of HIV transmission among migrants.     

The role of acculturative stress and cultural backgrounds in migrants with pathological gambling

The objective of the present study was to differentiate specific migration-related factors that can account for an increased vulnerability to pathological gambling (PG) among migrants in Germany. One hundred and six gamblers (61 migrants, 45 Germans) with varying degrees of gambling problems participated in the study. We analysed (1) differences between migrants and Germans regarding gambling patterns, severity of gambling problems, motivation and craving; influence of (2) acculturative stress; (3) acceptance and popularity of gambling in the culture of origin on gambling problems; (4) differences between migrants and Germans regarding family gambling and peer gambling; and (5) differences in religiosity and its influence on gambling problems. Results suggest no differences between migrants and Germans regarding gambling patterns and the severity of gambling problems. However, findings indicate that migrants have higher motivation and craving to gamble. Findings further suggest that acculturative stress is associated with more severe gambling problems. In contrast, acceptance and popularity of gambling in the country of origin was not a significant predictor of gambling problems. At the same time, family gambling and peer gambling was significantly more prevalent among migrants, constituting an additional risk factor in the present sample. On the other hand, migrants in the sample benefit more often from a protective influence of religiosity.     

Processes of Sexual Orientation Questioning among Heterosexual Women

Because very little is known about heterosexual identity development, this study assesses and describes sexual orientation questioning processes of heterosexual-identified women and offers a comparison of these processes with those employed by their sexual-minority counterparts. Participants included 333 female college students (ages 18–23; M = 19.2): 228 participants primarily identified as “exclusively straight/heterosexual,” and 105 participants indicated a sexual-minority identity. Sixty-seven percent of exclusively heterosexual respondents (n = 154) indicated having thought about or questioned their sexual orientation. The processes by which heterosexual participants described questioning their sexual orientation were coded for the presence of five emergent categories using an inductive thematic coding methodology. These five categories included unelaborated questioning (19%), other-sex experiences (16%), exposure to sexual minorities (26%), assessment of same-sex attraction (48%), and evaluations of same-sex behavior (26%). Several unifying and differentiating themes emerged between sexual orientation groups. Results from this study suggest that contemporary young women's heterosexuality is not necessarily an unexamined identity; indeed, the large majority of young women in this sample were deliberately identifying as heterosexual after contemplating alternative possibilities.     

SOUTHERN (DIS)COMFORT: SEXUAL PREJUDICE AND CONTACT WITH GAY MEN AND LESBIANS IN THE SOUTH

Recent surveys have found antigay attitudes and behavior to be commonplace. In this article, we use contact theory to explain these prejudicial attitudes. We contribute to the literature on contact and prejudice by expanding contact to include not only whether the heterosexual knows any gay men or lesbians, but also how many, for how long, and in what ways. To these, we add a new and unique measure of contact: a person's contact with the gay community. The data are from a survey of 956 undergraduate students at a large urban university in the southeastern United States. Ordinary least squares (OLS) regression analyses find that contact with gay men and lesbians significantly reduces prejudice toward them; although, only as contact with gay friends or the gay community. Contact has stronger effects on women's prejudice than men's prejudice; however, the attitudes of African Americans toward lesbians and gay men are unaffected by gay contact. The results suggest that contact intervenes between prejudice and sex, race, religiosity, and gender attitudes.     

Ideas in action: the politics of Prussian child labor reform, 1817–1839

This article explains the political origins of an 1839 law regulating the factory employment of children in Prussia. The article has two aims. First, it seeks to explain why Prussia adopted the particular law that it did. Existing historical explanations of this particular policy change are not correct, largely because they fail to take into account the actual motivations and intentions of key reformers. Second, the article contributes to theories of the role of ideas in public policymaking. Ideas interact with institutional and political factors to serve as motivators and as resources for policy change. As motivators, they drive political action and shape the content of policy programs; as resources, they enable political actors to recruit supporters and forge alliances. I offer a theory of the relationship between ideas, motivation, and political action, and I develop a methodological framework for assessing the reliability of political actors’ expressed motivations. Further, I explain how political actors use ideas as resources by deploying three specific ideational strategies: framing, borrowing, and citing. By tracing how different understandings of the child labor problem motivated and were embodied in two competing child labor policy proposals, I show how the ideas underlying reform had significant consequences for policy outcomes.     

“Would You Do That in Your Home?” Making Nursing Homes Home-like in Culture Change Implementation

Qualitative interviews with nursing home administrators reveal innovative and cost-conscious ways to physically modify facilities that help institute culture change practices. Telephone interviews were conducted following a national survey of nursing home nursing directors and administrators. In this cross-sectional snapshot of administrator experiences, motivations for making facilities more home-like and less institutional and creative responses to challenges are described. State and corporate support and regulator encouragement are noted that help their reform efforts. Administrators note that small steps to create a more home-like environment can result in a positive impact that minimizes disruption to existing care processes. They describe how they respond to challenges, such as the physical plant and high costs, and note how comparative shopping, cost-conscious physical improvements, and continuous involvement of staff and residents contribute to successful efforts. Their examples illustrate novel ways to humanize long-term care facilities that other nursing homes can emulate.     

Gerontological Social Workers' Perceived Efficacy for Influencing Client Outcomes

Using a sample of practitioners (n = 269) from the 2004 National Study of Licensed Social Workers, this article employs a quality assurance structure–process–outcome model to examine factors at the practitioner, workplace, and service delivery levels that influence the perceived efficacy of licensed gerontological social workers to affect client outcomes in the context of a highly challenging health care environment. A regression model accounted for 33.9% of the variance (adjusted R ² = .291) in perceived efficacy with 3 aspects of service delivery satisfaction having significant effects: ability to address complex/chronic care, to influence the design of services, and to help clients navigate the system.     

Experts,ideas, and policy change: the Russell Sage Foundation and small loan reform, 1909–1941

Between 1909 and 1941, the Russell Sage Foundation (RSF) was actively involved in crafting and lobbying for policy solutions to the pervasive problem of predatory lending. Using a rich assortment of archival records, I build upon political learning theory by demonstrating how institutional conditions and political pressures – in addition to new knowledge gained through scientific study and practical experience – all contributed to the emergence and development of RSF experts’ policy ideas over the course of this 30-year period. In light of these findings, I suggest that policy ideas and political interests are mutually constitutive, and that the notion that ideas must be shown to operate independent of interests in order to “prove” that they matter in policymaking is misguided. Furthermore, I discuss the implications of the remarkable success of RSF’s policy proposals for current understandings of institutional change. In particular, I argue that the passage of RSF’s controversial Uniform Small Loan Law in 34 states suggests that political actors’ collective agency can produce significant policy reforms in a context of normal policymaking without the intervention of major destabilizing events.

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