Inviting Autonomy Back to the Table: The Importance of Autonomy for Healthy Relationship Functioning

Autonomy, or self-determination, is a key ingredient in promoting relationship flourishing. Although autonomy has long been an important concept in the family therapy field (labeled differentiation; Family therapy in clinical practice, 1978), definitional confusions and the ascendency of attachment theory and attachment-based clinical approaches to treating couples have relegated autonomy to a minor role at best and a caricature of rugged individualism and antirelational separateness at worst. Given recent research showing the importance of autonomy for the development of secure attachment in children and the key role autonomy plays in healthy intimate partner functioning, the concept of autonomy needs to take a more central role in our research and clinical practice with couples.     

Associations Between Family of Origin Climate,Relationship Self‐Regulation,and Marital Outcomes

Using dyadic data from 961 married couples from the Relationship Evaluation Questionnaire project, the current study explored the direct association between family of origin climate and marital outcomes and the indirect association via relationship self‐regulation (RSR). Results from the actor–partner interdependence model analysis indicated that family of origin climate was positively associated with marital stability directly and indirectly via the effects of RSR and marital satisfaction for both men and women. Results suggest that the experience one has in their family of origin is associated with their marital outcomes through their RSR. Actor–partner direct and indirect effects indicate that spouses' RSR may have important consequences for both partner's evaluation of the marriage. Implications for intervention and future research are discussed.     

Association for Lesbian,Gay, Bisexual,and Transgender Issues in Counseling’s Best Practices in Addressing Conscience Clause Legislation in Counselor Education and Supervision

The amount of various, state-level legislation allowing the denial of counseling services to individuals with values that conflict with those of the professional counselor continues to increase. Such laws are in direct conflict with the values, principles, and ethical standards of the counseling profession. These “conscience clause” legislations are of concern due to the ability of the counseling profession to safeguard and protect the welfare of clients seeking counseling services. Potently, however, much of the focus of conscience clause legislation centers around the legal sanctioning of bias and refusal to provide services to affectional and gender minority clients, and the intersection of sexual/affectional orientation to spiritual and religious values. Provided is a review of these laws and the way they clash with the counseling profession. To assist profession counselors in navigating appropriate ethical behavior, specific counseling-appropriate and lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, and queer affirming recommendations are provided. Each layer of professional counseling, direct work with clients, supervision, and counselor education, is addressed.     

The duality of poverty: a replication of Mani et al. (2013) in Colombia

Theory and Decision - Scarcity acts as a mental burden that disrupts how people process information and make decisions (Mullainathan and Shafir in Scarcity: Why having too little means so much....     

The Enhanced Double Digest Problem for DNA Physical Mapping

The double digest problem is a common NP-hard approach to constructing physical maps of DNA sequences. This paper presents a new approach called the enhanced double digest problem. Although this new problem is also NP-hard, it can be solved in linear time in certain theoretically interesting cases.     

Understanding Single Mothers’ Parenting Stress Trajectories

Using data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, we examined single mothers’ (n = 1,229) parenting stress trajectories across the years when their children were ages 1, 3, and 5. Analyses were based on a latent growth curve model incorporating time-invariant and time-varying covariates to better understand single mothers’ parenting stress trajectories. Single mothers’ initial level and rate of change in parenting stress trajectories were significantly predicted by the initial levels of infants’ negative emotionality. The time-varying covariates of work–family conflict and parental engagement were significantly associated with single mothers’ parenting stress when their children were ages 1, 3, and 5.     

Evaluating Scholarship Productivity in COAMFTE-Accredited PhD Programs

Due to an increasing trend among states to cut higher education funds, many universities are relying more on private donations and federal funding to keep programs afloat. Scholarship productivity in general has become an integral factor in terms of universities granting tenure to faculty, allocating resources, and supporting program goals due to the fact that more research in a particular area tends to increase the likelihood that one will obtain funding from federal, state, and private sources. In the past, ranking systems have also been used to evaluate programs. However, most ranking systems use methodologies that do not quantify research productivity or evaluate factors that match current university trends. The purpose of this article is to explore current scholarship productivity trends among COAMFTE-accredited doctoral programs through the use of several evaluation methods. Specifically, productivity was examined in regard to the following areas: (a) family therapy journal publications; (b) family science journal publications; (c) historic journal publication trends; and (d) recent journal publication trends.