Sex after divorce: older adult women’s reflections

People who divorce experience a number of negative impacts, and yet divorce also offers opportunities for growth and transformation. This qualitative study of older adult women offers the possibility that divorce may be sexually empowering, especially for women, based on in-depth interviewing of women who had gone through one or more divorces. Detailed examples of the experiences of fourteen women with divorce and sexual expression are offered, focusing on in which situations divorce might be empowering and how it could contribute to sexual exploration and satisfaction. Overall, for the fourteen women in the study who had experienced divorce, the quality of sex in the marriage impacted the quality of sexual expression after the divorce. Also, these findings supported the idea of transformational learning through divorce, and expand divorce-stress-adjustment and transformational learning perspectives to apply more specifically to sexual expression. Understanding possible impacts of divorce over the lifespan, including strengths-based aspects, is important for social workers as the population they serve ages.     

Defining the Professional Foundation in Social Work Education

Abstract

This paper reports the results of a national study designed to identify preferred curriculum content important to the “professional foundation” in social work education. All BSW program directors were surveyed, using the Delphi Technique, to evaluate potential curriculum content The heavy response indicated a strong interest in this timely issue. The authors found that there is a high degree of consensus on curriculum material thought to be appropriate for a professional foundation.     

“Want to Stay Over?” Demographic,Intrapersonal, and Relational Differences Among Those Who Date,Stay-Over,and Cohabit

This study explored the potential uniqueness of staying over, or spending the night with a romantic partner, as a relationship status. Using a recent sample of 2,304 individuals in romantic relationships, we explored how staying over might be associated with demographic, intrapersonal, and relational characteristics. Results suggested that individuals in “stay-over relationships” were similar to those in dating relationships and that cohabiters, defined as those who lived with a romantic partner in the same residence, were the most likely to differ from those in other types of relationships on demographic, intrapersonal, and relational assessments. Staying over in the absence of cohabitation was not associated with differences in relationship outcomes once controls were taken into account, but cohabiters who were not spending the night together did report lower relationship satisfaction compared with cohabiters spending most nights together.     

Rationalists, Fatalists, and the Modern Superstitious: Test-Taking in Introductory Sociology

As sociologists we are guided by a rational approach to understanding the social world. This rational approach is also evident in the way we test students. But do students approach tests from the same orientation that we take in creating them, or are they influenced by such nonrational orientations as superstitions? To explore this question the authors created and administered the Luck and Superstition Questionnaire to 426 students taking Introduction to Sociology. We found that nearly 70 percent of students indicate some level of test‐related superstitious practice. However, we also found that superstitious practice was largely unrelated to religious belief and practice, gender and race, educational performance and grade expectations, and end‐of‐semester pressures. These results are entirely consistent with Colin Campbell's theory of modern superstition. Superstitious practice in modern society is self‐sustaining–not integrated into social institutions or systems of belief–and only “half‐believed” by the very practitioners of modern superstition.     

The quality and use of regulatory analysis in 2008

This article assesses the quality and apparent use of regulatory analysis for economically significant regulations proposed by federal agencies in 2008. A nine-member research team used a six-point (0-5) scale to evaluate regulatory analyses according to criteria drawn from Executive Order 12866 and Office of Management and Budget Circular A-4. Principal findings include: (1) the average quality of regulatory analysis, though not high, is somewhat better than previous regulatory scorecards have shown; (2) quality varies widely; (3) biggest strengths are accessibility and clarity; (4) biggest weaknesses are analysis of the systemic problem and retrospective analysis; (5) budget or "transfer" regulations usually receive low-quality analysis; (6) a minority of the regulations contain evidence that the agency used the analysis in significant decisions; (7) quality of analysis is positively correlated with the apparent use of the analysis in regulatory decisions; and (8) greater diffusion of best practices could significantly improve the overall quality of regulatory analysis.     

The ritual of reorganization in a public bureaucracy

Cultural aspects of complex organizations have recently captured the attention of scholars, yet empirical studies in this area remain rare. This paper explores the paradox that reorganizations are common in modern bureaucracies even though they have been found to have few instrumental effects. The present study of a state regulatory agency found that while reorganization had little instrumental consequence, it did provide the context for a power struggle between the administrative and occupational spheres of authority. In fact, reorganization proved to be a highly ritualized arena for significantly altering the agency's informal structure by replacing an entrenched dominant subculture. By examining the symbolic and ritualistic nature of this process, this paper looks beyond the ineffectual manifest functions of reorganization to uncover its power latent functions.Donald D. Stull is Associate Professor of Anthropology and a research associate with the Institute for Public Policy and Business Research at the University of Kansas. Steven Maynard-Moody is Associate Professor of Public Administration in the Division of Government and Director of the Policy Analysis Program in the Institute for Public Policy and Business Research at the University of Kansas. Jerry Mitchell is Assistant Professor of Public Administration, Baruch College, City University of New York. Support for this research was provided by a grant from the General Research Fund of the University of Kansas. An earlier draft of this paper was presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association in Denver, Colorado, in November 1984. We wish to thank F. Allan Hanson for his critique of an earlier version of this paper. We are grateful for the patience and openness of those working in the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.