Worker authenticity in group work

The article focuses on the issue of worker authenticity in working with groups. It is suggested that authenticity is an important ingredient in the helping relationship and that the social worker needs to encounter the members as a human being who is willing to reveal himself rather than as a professional, playing a role. While the importance of the worker being genuine is highlighted, attention is also given to those situations when it may be inappropriate for the worker to disclose personal thoughts and feelings. The author suggests specific guidelines based on timing, appropriateness, and motivation.     

Educating back-injured workers: What should we be teaching?

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to identify what information people with acute and chronic back pain, health care practitioners, employers and case managers felt should be included in an educational brochure for recently back-injured workers. STUDY DESIGN: Four focus groups were convened, each comprising several representatives from one of the four constituencies. Participants rated 32 information items regarding their inclusion in an educational brochure. Ratings were tabulated for ranking and for group comparisons. RESULTS: While consensus was strong for most information items, there were apparent differences between the groups for several items relating to work resumption, medical attention, and legal or compensation consultation. CONCLUSIONS: Perceived educational needs of back-injured workers may differ from those of their health care practitioners and from their employers or insurers. Future efforts to prevent back disability through education should include evaluation of the informational needs of injured workers.     

Are we keeping the people who used to stay? Changes in correlates of panel survey attrition over time

As survey response rates decline, correlates of survey participation may also be changing. Panel studies provide an opportunity to study a rich set of correlates of panel attrition over time. We look at changes in attrition rates in the American National Election Studies from 1964 to 2004, a repeated panel survey with a two-wave pre-post election design implemented over multiple decades. We examine changes in attrition rates by three groups of variables: sociodemographic and ecological characteristics of the respondent and household, party affiliation and political and social attitudes recorded at the first interview, and paradata about the first wave interview. We find relatively little overall change in the pre-post election panel attrition rates, but important changes in demographic correlates of panel attrition over time. We also examine contact and cooperation rates from 1988 to 2004.     

Subgroup analyses of clinical effectiveness to support health technology assessments

Subgroup analysis is an integral part of access and reimbursement dossiers, in particular health technology assessment (HTA), and their HTA recommendations are often limited to subpopulations. HTA recommendations for subpopulations are not always clear and without controversies. In this paper, we review several HTA guidelines regarding subgroup analyses. We describe good statistical principles for subgroup analyses of clinical effectiveness to support HTAs and include case examples where HTA recommendations were given to subpopulations only. Unlike regulatory submissions, pharmaceutical statisticians in most companies have had limited involvement in the planning, design and preparation of HTA/payers submissions. We hope to change this by highlighting how pharmaceutical statisticians should contribute to payers' submissions. This includes early engagement in reimbursement strategy discussions to influence the design, analysis and interpretation of phase III randomized clinical trials as well as meta-analyses/network meta-analyses. The focus on this paper is on subgroup analyses relating to clinical effectiveness as we believe this is the first key step of statistical involvement and influence in the preparation of HTA and reimbursement submissions.     

Analysing Financial Returns by Using Regression Models Based on Non-Symmetric Stable Distributions

The daily evolution of the price of Abbey National shares over a 10-week period is analysed by using regression models based on possibly non-symmetric stable distributions. These distributions, which are only known through their characteristic function, can be used in practice for interactive modelling of heavy-tailed processes. A regression model for the location parameter is proposed and shown to induce a similar model for the mode. Finally, regression models for the other three parameters of the stable distribution are introduced. The model found to fit best allows the skewness of the distribution, rather than the location or scale parameters, to vary over time. The most likely share return is thus changing over time although the region where most returns are observed is stationary.     

Preschool predictors of loneliness in school-age children

Chronic loneliness is a risk factor associated with adverse psychological, physical, and academic outcomes. Converging evidence suggests that young children experience and can reliably report on their own loneliness: thus, a clearer understanding of the risk factors for child loneliness is needed. The aims of this study were two-fold: (a) to examine if temperament (i.e., negative affect, effortful control, inhibitory control), and attachment security assessed at the age of four predict loneliness at the age of six and (b) to determine if social competence at the age of five mediates the relation between temperament and attachment security at the age of four and loneliness at the age of six. Participants included a diverse sample of 796 4-year-old children, about half of whom were male. Results of hierarchical regression analyses indicated that lower levels of effortful control and inhibitory control at the age of four significantly predicted greater loneliness at the age of six. Also, while lower levels of negative affect (NA) and higher levels of effortful control and attachment security at the age of four significantly predicted higher levels of social competence at the age of five, social competence at the age of five did not predict loneliness at the age of six. There was no evidence that social competence at the age of five mediated the relation between the age of four temperament, attachment security, and the age of six loneliness. These findings reveal that early self-regulation is associated with later child-reported loneliness and that intervention for children who struggle with behavioral regulation may be effective in decreasing risk for later loneliness.     

Perceived consequences of hazing exposure during the first year of college: Associations with childhood victimization

Objective: This study investigates the association between histories of childhood victimization and perceived consequences of college hazing. Participants: First-year college students at four US universities (N?=?120). Method: Participants completed Web-based surveys asking about childhood victimization (eg, child maltreatment), peer victimization, and perceived consequences of hazing during college. Results: Results indicated that college students with childhood victimization histories perceived hazing to be negative. In particular, physical dating violence and a greater total number of childhood victimization exposures were related to a higher number of perceived negative consequences. Conclusion: Past victimization exposures confer risk on college students who experience hazing, in that these students are more likely to perceive negative consequences of hazing. Hazing-related policies and outreach efforts should consider these potential negative consequences, and counselors should be aware of the link between past victimization and how hazing might be experienced.     

Slavery and the American university: discourses of retrospective justice at Harvard and Brown

American universities have drawn international attention in recent years as their ties to and historical complicity in slavery and the slave trade have been increasingly exposed. This essay examines Harvard and Brown's self-reflective investigations into their involvement in slavery and highlights how the universities have deployed a discourse of retrospective justice as a way to grapple with the incorporation of the history of slavery into the heritage of their institutions. The essay finds that by engaging in conversations about memorialization, apology, and reparations, the universities attempt to confront the past while constructing the future.