The Institutionalization of U.S. Political Parties: Patronage Newspapers

There is general agreement that mass political parties emerged during the Jacksonian era, but there is no consensus about their precise origins. Institutional theorists within political science contend that political parties trace their beginnings to elite who nurtured them within the civil service bureaucracy, whereas theorists in political science who rely on microlevel explanations consider that parties developed to solve problems of social choice and collective action. Historians, in contrast, indicate that newspaper patronage in Washington, DC, beginning with Jefferson, was critical for the emergence of federal political parties. This study systematically examines the empirical implications of that assumption and considers both the organizational and political processes that underlie establishment of newspapers in the Capital, contributing to the understanding that newspapers provided a model both for the civil service and for political parties.     

Interparental Hostility and Early Adolescent Problem Behavior: The Mediating Role of Specific Aspects of Parenting

This study examines how parenting helps explain the contemporaneous association between interparental hostility and adolescent problem behavior. A theoretical model of spillover was tested specifying five aspects of mothers' and fathers' parenting that might be associated with parents' hostile interactions with one another: harshness, inconsistency, psychological intrusiveness, and lower levels of acceptance and monitoring knowledge. The sample consisted of 416 early adolescents and their married parents. The association between interparental hostility and adolescent externalizing problems was mediated uniquely by fathers' and mothers' harshness, lower levels of fathers' monitoring knowledge, and mothers' psychological intrusiveness. The association between interparental hostility and adolescent internalizing was mediated uniquely by mothers' harshness, psychological intrusiveness, and lower levels of acceptance. These patterns were similar for sons and daughters.     

Predictors of short-term treatment outcomes among California's Proposition 36 participants

California's voter-initiated Proposition 36 offers non-violent drug offenders community-based treatment as an alternative to incarceration or probation without treatment. This article reports short-term treatment outcomes subsequent to this major shift in drug policy. Data are from 1104 individuals randomly selected from all Proposition 36 participants assessed for treatment in five California counties during 2004. The overall study sample was 30% female, 51% white, 18% Black, 24% Hispanic, and 7% other racial/ethnic groups. The mean+/-SD age was 37+/-10 years. Counties varied considerably in participant characteristics, treatment service intensity, treatment duration, urine testing, and employment and recidivism outcomes, but not in drug use at 3-month follow-up. Controlling for county, logistic regression analysis showed that drug abstinence was predicted by gender (female), employment at baseline (full or part-time), residential (vs. outpatient) stay, low psychiatric severity, frequent urine testing by treatment facility, and more days in treatment. Recidivism was predicted only by shorter treatment duration. Employment predictors included age (younger), gender (male), baseline employment, and lower psychiatric severity. The study findings support drug testing to monitor abstinence and highlight the need to address employment and psychiatric problems among Proposition 36 participants.     

Research Note: Managing the Financial Assets of Older People: Balancing Independence and Protection

Family involvement in managing the financial assets of olderpeople is an area of policy and practice importance. This importancerelates to the complexity of older people’s assets, systemsof paying for care and concerns around substitute decision-makingand financial abuse. Although a common task of informal care,little is known about older people’s experiences and wishesin relation to asset management. This paper reports on a qualitativestudy of the experiences and perspectives of thirty-four olderpeople receiving such assistance. It identifies three scenariosthat promote or inhibit independence in this context and drawsout the challenges for this emerging area of practice with olderadults and their families.     

Child welfare workers who are exhausted yet satisfied with their jobs: how do they do it?

In response to a study of Canadian child welfare workers that unexpectedly found participants scoring high on a measure of emotional exhaustion (burnout) and, at the same time, high on overall job satisfaction, this paper reviews research that has investigated these constructs in the social work literature as well as in selected studies from sociology, social psychology, management and women’s studies. The review reveals that some previous studies also report the coexistence of high levels of emotional exhaustion and strong job satisfaction in child welfare and social worker samples. Several studies have suggested that individual characteristics, including finding reward in helping others, having a commitment to the mandate of child welfare and believing that one’s labour is ‘making a difference’, contribute to satisfaction with child welfare work in spite of work overload and emotional exhaustion. Attributions regarding causes of exhaustion, coping strategies and goal orientation may also attenuate the expected negative effects of emotional exhaustion. Considerable evidence supports the positive influence of variables organizational managers can control, including job autonomy, supportive supervisors, workload, promotional opportunities and perception of personal safety. The degree to which this phenomenon is associated with female socialization and the ‘ethic of care’ underlying social work is discussed. Implications for child welfare research, practice and policy are offered.     

Growing Up at Centrepoint: Retrospective Accounts of Childhood Spent at an Intentional Community

A qualitative analysis of the accounts of 29 adults who grew up in a controversial New Zealand community identified positive and negative experiences and their psychological implications. In addition to highly publicized child sexual abuse that occurred at Centrepoint, children also experienced parental neglect, psychological manipulation, illegal drug use and stigma from the broader society. These factors created an adverse matrix that facilitated sexual abuse. Positive experiences included support for vulnerable families and children, recreational activities, and the opportunity to develop communication skills. While there may be positive experiences for children living in intentional communities such as this one, it is important to be aware of the potential for psychological harm to children in communities with powerful, shared systems of belief, skepticism about the broader society, and strong dynamics of dependence. These findings may have implications for other similar communities operating elsewhere in the world.