PREVALENCE OF FAMILY THERAPY MODELS: A RESEARCH NOTE

A survey was undertaken to assess the prevalence of family therapy models utilized by a sample of members in the American Association for Marital and Family Therapy. Frequencies and rankings of widely recognized therapeutic frameworks are reported. Brief discussion centers on the highest ranking choice, the notion of eclecticism, and cautious interpretation of the data.     

Temperature schedules for simulated annealing

It is well known that the behaviour of the simulated annealing approach to optimization is crucially dependent on the choice of temperature schedule. In this paper, a dynamic programming approach is used to find the temperature schedule which is optimal for a simple minimization problem. The optimal schedule is compared with certain standard non-optimal choices. These generally perform well provided the first and last temperatures are suitably selected. Indeed, these temperatures can be chosen in such a way as to make the performance of the logarithmic schedule almost optimal. This optimal performance is fairly robust to the choice of the first temperature.The dynamic programming approach cannot be applied directly to problems of more realistic size, such as those arising in statistical image reconstruction. Nevertheless, some simulation experiments suggest that the general conclusions from the simple minimization problem do carry over to larger problems. Various families of schedules can be made to perform well with suitable choice of the first and last temperatures, and the logarithmic schedule combines good performance with reasonable robustness to the choice of the first temperature.     

Une Dialectique Des Migrations : Acculturation Et Transition Démographique

It is argued that two types of migration have tended to follow each other. One is a ‘colonizing’ migration corresponding to a technical, military and economic advantage of one group over another, associated at first with a demographic surge in the first group; the other is a ‘social-capillarity’ migration occurring when the first, ‘colonizing’ group has completed its demographic transition and the second has barely started. Two hypotheses concerning the outcome of this process are presented. The first — optimistic — hypothesis of economic advance in the second group, implies a return to demographic equilibrium. The second hypothesis is a catastrophic one, the implications of which are hard to predict. Finally, the need for a specific co-operative effort is underlined.     

Two-stage electoral competition in two-party contests: persistent divergence of party positions

Models of party competition building on Downs (1957) have recognized that there are centrifugal and centripetal forces in party competition; but one such force, the existence of party primaries, has been remarkably neglected in recent literature. We consider party/candidate policy divergence in two-party competition in one dimension where there is a two-stage electoral process, e.g., a primary election (or caucus) among party supporters to select that party’s candidate followed by a general election. We develop a model in which (some or all) voters in the primary election are concerned with the likelihood that the primary victor will be able to win the general election and being concerned with that candidate’s policy position. This model is similar in all but technical details to that given in an almost totally neglected early paper in Public Choice Coleman (1971) 11:35–60, but we offer important new results on electoral dynamics for candidate locations. In addition to accounting for persistent party divergence by incorporating a more realistic model of the institutions that govern elections in the U.S., the model we offer gives rise to predictions that match a number of important aspects of empirical reality such as frequent victories for incumbents and greater than otherwise expected electoral success for the minority party in situations where that party has its supporters more closely clustered ideologically than the supporters of the larger party (in particular, with a concentration of voters between the party mean and the population mean).A much earlier version of this paper was presented at the Annual Meeting of the Public Choice Society, Long Beach, California, March 24–26, 1995. We are indebted to Dorothy Green and to Clover Behrend-Gethard for bibliographic assistance and to Nicholas Miller and the late Peter Aranson for helpful suggestions.     

Social Class and Opportunity In Canada

Cet article illustre le niveau des differences regionales et provinciates qui existent dans la distribution de classe entre ceux qui sont nés au pays et des immigrants qui arriverent au Canada avant 1946 et durant la periode 1946–1961. En utilisant un index socio-economique compose de trois cent vingt (320) occupations, on etablit six classes sociales. Au Quebec et dans les provinces de l'Atlantique, ceux qui sont nes au pays sont quelque peu sous-representes dans les trois classes superieures, tandis que les immigrants venant des Etats-Unis, du Royaume-Uni, et de l'Allemagne sont sur-representes. Par ailleurs, ceux qui sont nes au Canada sont sur-representes dans la province de 1'Ontario et dans les provinces de 1'Ouest. Les immigrants americains qui emigrerent au Canada durant la periode de I'apres-guerre, sont substantiellement plus sur-representes dans les trois classes superieures que tout autre groupe d'emigrants. lis sont suivis, en cela, par les emigrants d'apres-guerre du Royaume-Uni. Ce sont les principales conclusions de l'auteur. This paper shows the extent to which regional and provincial differences exist in the class distribution of native-born and immigrants who arrived before 1946 and between 1946 and 1961. Using six classes based upon a socioeconomic index of 320 occupations the author shows that in the Atlantic provinces and Quebec, the Canadian-born are slightly underrepresented in the three top classes. Immigrants from the United States, tie United Kingdom and Germany are overrepresented. In Ontario and the Western provinces, the Canadian-born are overrepresented. The postwar immigrants from the United States have a substantially higher degree of overrepresentation in the three top classes than any other immigrant group, followed by postwar immigrants from the United Kingdom.     

The development of a CAHPS instrument for Nursing Home Residents (NHCAHPS)

We report on a federal initiative to develop a CAHPS (The Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems) survey to measure residents' experiences with quality-of-care and quality-of-life in nursing homes (known as NHCAHPS). We focus on how we created and tested questions for inclusion in the instrument and tested a possible cognitive screener to determine which residents could participate in a NHCAHPS interview. The major lessons learned were: (1) In contrast to other CAHPS surveys, ratings were more useful than reports because of the difficulty that residents had with summarizing over time and people; (2) consistent with other CAHPS surveys, the 0 to 10 response scale appeared to work well with nursing home residents for many of the quality-of-care questions; however, a different response scale was needed for many of the quality-of-life items; and (3) in contrast with typical survey methodology and other CAHPS surveys where explicit time reference periods are used, a non-specific present reference period in questions seemed to work best.     

WORKING CARERS OF OLDER ADULTS

Juggling work and care presents particular challenges to carers and employers. Employers are increasingly under pressure, both from within organizations and from recent government legislation and policy, to develop family-friendly policies to support informal carers in the workplace. Yet existing ‘family-friendly’ schemes and services are still primarily designed for working parents of young children and rarely address the needs of employees who care for older or disabled adults. This paper reports on a study which investigated how working carers and managers in two public sector organizations — a Social Services Department (SSD) and a National Health Service (NHS) Trust — combined their work and caring responsibilities. A multi-method approach was adopted consisting of five phases. First, a profile of the two organizations was established, followed by a short screening questionnaire to all employees to identify who was caring for an older adult over the age of 60. Third, a lengthier postal survey was sent to the 365 carers who had indicated a willingness to participate further. In the fourth and fifth phases, carers and managers were interviewed in depth about their experiences. This paper reports briefly on the survey, but then concentrates in particular on what was said in the interviews about what helps and hinders working carers of older adults. Despite the existence of policies to support carers, our findings suggest that these were far less important than informal support from colleagues and a sympathetic manager in the workplace. Commuting distance between work, home and the older person also posed difficulties for carers, along with inflexible schedules and work overload. Employers are urged to explore these issues further if they are serious about recruiting and retaining employees, and developing the work – life balance agenda to meet the needs of those caring for older and disabled adults.