The Tasks and Characteristics of Supportive Support Brokers

ABSTRACT

In the United States, under the Cash and Counseling or budget authority model of self-directed personal assistance where the participant manages his or her own services and supports, the Support Broker role was established to assist and coach the participant. The support broker role grew out of a person-centered planning process where focus groups and surveys helped ascertain what potential participants wanted to help them establish a self-directed alternative. But, despite this role being described in policy guidance from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid, little research has been conducted examining the functions, activities and usefulness of this position. This study draws on 76 ethnographic case studies with early Cash and Counseling participants, examines what participants and their caregivers actually saw the support broker doing, and looks at what the participants found helpful and less than helpful. Participants and family caregivers saw support broker duties as falling into four areas: Coaching, Problem Solving, Advocacy and Monitoring. Equally important was how the support broker performed these duties. Key aspects of quality included: Familiarity, Supportive Relationship, Proactive Engagement, Responsiveness, Knowledge and Cultural Friendliness. These findings can provide the basis for establishing quality indicators for self-direction.     

“Racist Propaganda”: discursive Negotiations on YouTube of Perceived Anti-White Racism in South Korea

This article analyzes YouTube comments about a Munhwa Broadcasting Company report that White “expatriates” in South Korea called xenophobic and racist. The research is important because there is a paucity of scholarship on White discourse outside the West and because there is limited work on YouTube as a space to articulate and negotiate discourses about racism. This is despite the increasingly complex flows of people and discourse around the globe. In this article, I argue that YouTube acted as a site of ideological negotiation in which Orientalist discourses were advanced under the cover of color-blind racism. Many of the YouTube comments framed Korea as xenophobic and racist, and even for self-identified White commenters sympathetic to the report, they did not challenge the construction of Korea as racist or the normative belief in postracism.     

Bayesian inference and model selection in latent class logit models with parameter constraints: an application to market segmentation

Latent class models have recently drawn considerable attention among many researchers and practitioners as a class of useful tools for capturing heterogeneity across different segments in a target market or population. In this paper, we consider a latent class logit model with parameter constraints and deal with two important issues in the latent class models--parameter estimation and selection of an appropriate number of classes--within a Bayesian framework. A simple Gibbs sampling algorithm is proposed for sample generation from the posterior distribution of unknown parameters. Using the Gibbs output, we propose a method for determining an appropriate number of the latent classes. A real-world marketing example as an application for market segmentation is provided to illustrate the proposed method.     

The Role of Heritage Language Development in the Ethnic Identity and Family Relationships of Adolescents from Immigrant Backgrounds

The influence of immigrant-background adolescents' heritage language (HL) proficiency and use of the language on parent–adolescent relationships and ethnic identity was investigated in a sample of 414 adolescents from Latin American and Asian backgrounds. HL proficiency, but not language use, was positively associated with the quality of parent–adolescent relationships. Although HL proficiency and language use were both associated with ethnic identity, when taken together, only HL proficiency was a reliable predictor. These findings indicate that it is the development of proficiency in the HL that influences adolescents' successful adjustment, rather than their choice of languages. It is therefore important to support HL development in order to help immigrant-background students to better cope with the stresses of adolescence.     

Bayesian Estimation of the Two-Parameter Gamma Distribution

In this article, we present and discuss an original price index being a special case of a general formula for price indices. We show that the discussed formula satisfies most postulates coming from the axiomatic price index theory. We compare this index to other known and popular price indices in a simulation study.     

Stemming inequality? Employment and pay of female and minority scientists and engineers

When white men overwhelmingly dominated the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) work force, the high pay in STEM occupations was a major source of gender and race inequality in the U.S. economy. As women, Blacks, and Latinos increasingly study STEM fields, new possibilities for achieving pay equality are opening. We test whether the reality matches the promise using two large data sets. Analysis of a five percent Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS) of the 2000 Census and the 2001-06 American Community Surveys shows that women and minorities earn more, relative to comparable white men, in STEM than in non-STEM fields. This general pattern persists in analysis of a 1% sample of federal personnel records, which include better measures of work experience and education. Thus, federal efforts to increase the representativeness of the STEM workforce should increase pay equality in the economy by moving women and minorities into traditionally high-paying fields.     

A local linear estimation of conditional hazard function in censored data

A local linear estimator of the conditional hazard function in censored data is proposed. The estimator suggested in this paper is motivated by the ideas of Fan, Yao, and Tong (1996) and Kim, Bae, Choi, and Park (2005). The asymptotic distribution of the proposed estimator is derived, and some numerical results are also provided.     

Graphical evaluation of robust parameter designs based on extended scaled prediction variance and extended spherical average prediction variance

For any response surface design, there are locations in the design region where responses are estimated well and locations where estimation is relatively poor. Consequently, graphical evaluation—such as variance dispersion graphs and the fraction of design space—is used as an alternative to a single-valued criterion. Such plots are used to investigate and compare the prediction capabilities of certain response surface designs currently available to the researcher. In this article, we propose the extended scaled prediction variance and extended spherical average prediction variance as prediction methods. We also illustrate how graphical methods can be employed to evaluate robust parameter designs.     

Comparing the Childrearing Lifetimes of Britain's Divorce-Revolution Men and Women

British men and women who became parents in the 1960s and 1970s were about to experience a new regime of marital instability. The effect of this on the balance between men's and women's contributions to childrearing is potentially very large. This study estimates the co-residential foundations of the new gender balance, focusing on the measurement of lifetime number of years of living with dependent-aged children. A variant of the family-status life table is used to combine two data sources: census panel observations of family status across three points ten years apart, and survey data on the years between censuses. One-quarter of women who became parents in the 1960s, and one-third of women who became parents in the 1970s, have been or will be a lone mother at some point. Lone parenthood is the main way in which women's childrearing lifetimes differ from men's, with seven and eight years respectively of lone motherhood per ever-lone-mother of the 1960s and 1970s parenting cohorts. Men's lone-father years and greater numbers of years spent in second families together provide an average of two years offset against women's lone mother years.     

Enchanted companionship of Korean Catholic youth amid compressed individualization

Korean youth are confronted with “existential vulnerability” in an uncertain labor market. “Compressed individualization” reflects a high-risk society in Korea's socio-economic context and acts as the social backdrop for the “privatization of religion.” Despite de-religionization or the unchurching climate, what are the peculiar features of Korean Catholic youth who are actively participating in a church group? The authors selected five Catholic youth groups and conducted in-depth interviews with 18 of their members. Highly religious young Catholics demonstrate coping with existential insecurity amid compressed individualization via “enchanted companionship” experienced through prayer, sharing, or service. Despite differences in communal culture between groups, the peculiar features of their enchanted companionship include holistic healing, reciprocal transcendence, and solidarity. Amid the youth's struggles to find their way toward the fullness of life, these communities offer them a “free and gratuitous haven” distinct from secular ties in the utilitarian and disenchanted world. They can also voluntarily discover the significance of life through their activities, reflections, and missions. In sum, this study explains how religiosity is formed through a socio-existential vulnerability in youth's lived religion at a micro-level analysis, and signifies enchanted companionship as a key mechanism counteracting the waves of the secular world.