Significant Conversations or Reduced Relational Capacity? Exploring Couple and Family Therapists' Expectations for Including a Client Feedback Procedure

Little information exists on the specific reflective processes that precede therapists' choice of including or not including a structured feedback procedure in their established practice. In the present study, we aim to describe and explore experienced couple and family therapists' expectations for how the comprehensive therapy feedback procedure Systemic Therapy Inventory of Change might influence their practices. Through a thematic analysis of six focus group interviews, two main themes were elicited. The first main theme involved values embedded in current practice, with the following subthemes: (1) balance between the therapist's expert knowledge and the client's experience‐based knowledge; and (2) making time to build alliances. The second main theme concerned the presumed influence on current practice, with the following subthemes: (1) ‘Systemic Therapy Inventory of Change will disturb the therapist's capacity to stay present’; (2) ‘Systemic Therapy Inventory of Change will shape conversations’; and (3) ‘Systemic Therapy Inventory of Change will contribute to increased qualitative depth’. We discuss these results in relation to the notion of Systemic Therapy Invention of Change as a ‘third party in the room’. We also discuss the results in relation to implications for collaborative practices, and for client and therapist autonomy.     

Testing for normally in censored regressions

This paper derives a Lagrange Multiplier test for normality in censored regressions. The test is derived against the generalized log-gamma distribution, in which normal is a special case. The resulting test statistic coincides to some extent with previously suggested score and conditional moment tests. Estimation of the variance is performed by using the matrix of second order derivatives in order to get an easy to use test statistic. Small sample performance of the test is studied and compared to other tests by Monte Carlo experiments.     

Evaluation of an inter-organizational program for prevention of work-related injuries in a WHO Safe Community

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effect of a community-based injury prevention program on work-related injuries. STUDY DESIGN: A population-based quasi-experimental design was used with pre- and post-implementation measurements in an intervention and a control area. The program was based on cross-sectoral participation in detecting and taking action against work-related injuries. Change in the relative risk of injury was estimated by the odds ratio. RESULTS: The relative risk of work-related injury decreased following program exposure, whereas a tendence toward increase was observed in the control area. Middle-aged men accounted for the largest decrease in injury risk. Among the women, a decrease was observed only in the upper middle-aged group. No female-dominated occupational area showed a decrease in injury risk following exposure to the program. CONCLUSION: The study showed that the community-based approach had a general effect on the incidence of work-related injuries.     

Workplace bullying as predicted by non-prototypicality,group identification and norms: a self-categorisation perspective

ABSTRACT

Research and theory on deviance in work groups suggest that non-prototypical members risk devaluation and mistreatment by their peers. Drawing on the self-categorisation theory, we propose and test a contextual model to explain workplace bullying from a target perspective, using non-prototypicality as a predictor and social identification and anti-bullying norms at the work group level as two- and three-way cross-level moderators. Multilevel modelling and a sample of employees from the university sector in the Low Lands (n?=?572) was employed. In line with our first hypothesis, we found that risk of exposure to workplace bullying is particularly high for non-prototypical work group members. We also hypothesised that work group social identification would facilitate bullying of non-prototypical members, while anti-bullying norms would buffer it. Results showed, however, that both conditions acted as buffering moderators on the main association. Lastly, the combination of the two also entailed a cross-level three-way interaction effect, showing that non-prototypicality is associated with bullying only in work groups characterised by low levels on both moderators. These novel and partly unexpected results demonstrate the relevance and significance of group level explanations for workplace bullying, holding significant implications for scholars and practitioners.     

Higher Education Marketization: a Case of Language and Colliding Interests

Public Organization Review - This article examines how market interests and state regulations come into play as policy makers engage in establishing language primacy within higher education (HE)....     

Immigrant mothers’ preferences for children’s sexes: A register-based study of fertility behaviour in Norway

Parental sex preferences have been documented in many native populations, but much less evidence is available on immigrants’ preferences for the sexes of their children. Using high-quality longitudinal register data from Norway, a country with a recent immigration history, we estimate hazards regression models of third birth risks by the sex composition of the first two children. A central question in the extant literature is whether the sex preferences of immigrant mothers match those observed in their country of origin, or if cultural adaption to local conditions is more important. Our analyses indicate that the sex preferences of immigrants generally match those previously documented for their native population, especially in the case of son preferences. The pattern of sex preferences is unmodified by the mother’s exposure to the host society. In sum, our evidence generally supports theories emphasizing cultural persistence in preferences, rather than theories of adaption or immigrant selectivity.     

Occupational Identity in Administrative Service Work: The Aspect of Carefulness

This article explores ‘carefulness’ as a salient aspect of occupational identity in two administrative service occupations. Drawing on empirical data obtained through interviews with medical secretaries and post‐office cashiers, and on a theoretical perspective sensitive to different bases of identification and classification, the meanings and ambiguities of carefulness are discussed in a wider context of gender, modernity and office work. The empirical material indicates that the theme of carefulness is closely connected to issues of competence and power. It is the author's argument that a closer focus on competence‐related themes and concepts central to working individuals themselves, combined with an occupational identity approach that takes modernity as well as gender into consideration, will contribute to a better understanding of the contested realities of administrative service work.     

Unemployment compensation and the use of social assistance among second-generation immigrants in Sweden

Previous studies have shown that the participation of first-generation immigrants in the Swedish income security system deviates from that of the native population. However, so far there has been no research that has focused on this issue where second-generation immigrants are concerned. This study shows that the rates of participation in different parts of the income security system vary considerably between different groups of second-generation immigrants. Second-generation immigrants whose parents come from Western Europe have low participa-tion rates in all the studied parts of the income security system. Their participation rates are even lower than for natives with both parents born in Sweden. Second-generation immigrants with parents from southern Europe and from outside Europe, on the other hand, have very high participation rates in especi-ally social assistance. The differences between the groups are of course to a great extent explained by differences in their labour market situation. According to the findings of the study, there are reasons to be concerned about the future labour market integration of second-generation immigrants with parents of non-European origin.