The Challenge of the Care Workforce: Recent Trends and Emerging problems

This paper examines the paid care workforce in community services in Australia. Focusing on people employed in direct service delivery roles, I use unpublished data from the Censuses of 1996 and 2001 to document some important characteristics of the care workforce in community services, in which a large minority of care workers are employed in this country. International research has established that paid care workers suffer considerable labour market disadvantage. The paper presents evidence of deinstitutionalisation, deprofessionalisation, functional underemployment, and relatively poor pay for care workers in community service industries, which suggests that problems identified in other English‐speaking countries are also evident in Australia. I conclude by discussing the policy implications of these trends, and by raising some questions for workforce planning.     

Approximations and Heuristics for the "Cause-Modified" Life Table

Life-table analysis can help to gauge the lifetime impacts that accrue from modifications to (age-specific) baseline mortality. Modifications of interest include those stemming from risk-factor-related exposures or from interventions. The specific algorithm used in these analyses can be called a cause-modified life table (a generalization of the cause-deleted life table). The author presents an approach for approximating that algorithm and uses it to obtain remarkably simplified expressions for approximating three indices of common interest: life-years lost (LYL), excess lifetime risk ratio (ELRR), and risk of exposure-induced death (REID). These efforts are restricted to the special case of multiplicative increases to baseline mortality (modeled as an excess rate ratio, ERR). The simplified expressions effectively "break open" what is often treated as a "black-box" calculation. Several insights result. For a practical range of risk factor impacts (ERRs), each index can be related to the ERR as a function of a baseline summary statistic and a "characteristic number" specific to the population and cause of interest. Conveniently, those numbers help form "rules of thumb" for translating among the three indices and suggest heuristics for extrapolating indices across populations and causes of death.     

Recalling sexual behavior: A methodological analysis of memory recall bias via interview using the diary as the gold standard

This study examined the effect of time lag on the validity of retrospective self‐reports of sexual behavior. Seventy‐five heterosexual students (44 women, 31 men) made daily recordings of sexual behavior, condom use, and alcohol or substance use for 1 month. Ability of respondents to recall sexual behavior recorded during this period was assessed at 1, 2, and 3 months after diary completion using recall interviews (25 interviewed at each interval). For vaginal intercourse, total recall error was significantly greater at 3 months than at 1 month post‐diary. For all other variables assessed, the 2‐ and 3‐month time intervals did not produce significant increases in total recall error. Higher frequency of vaginal intercourse, orgasm, and alcohol use prior to sexual activity were associated with total recall error for some but not all behaviors and outcomes. The results provide a partial validation of the diary‐interview recall model as a method for studying recall error.     

Characteristics of the Homeless Mentally III in Case Management: Differentiation Using Major Diagnostic Categories

The homeless mentally ill are more disabled than other homeless people and require more services, but important variations exist. This study examined relationships between broad Axis I diagnostic clusters and demographic and service variables for 328 clients receiving case management at a community program for the chronic mentally ill homeless. Demographic characteristics, medical history, educational, psychological, and marital history, and case management variables were examined for psychotic, affective, and miscellaneous other clients. Differences were found in such areas as suicide attempts and current suicide status, psychiatric treatment history, education, overall impairment of functioning, length of time homeless, and time in case management but not in status at termination or number of senlices required. Psychotics had lower adaptive functioning, spent less time in case management, but had as successful outcomes as affective clients. Psychiatric diagnosis provides information that might assist case management for the homeless mentally ill.     

Overcoming neoliberal globalization: social-ecological transformation from a Polanyian perspective and beyond

ABSTRACT

The ecological crisis has intensified in many respects. Prominent proposals to deal with the crisis are discussed under the header ‘sustainability transformations’ or even ‘Great Transformation’. We argue that most contributions suffer from a narrow analytical approach to transformation ignoring the largely unsustainable dynamics of global capitalism and the power relations involved in it. Thus, a ‘new critical orthodoxy’ of knowledge about transformation is emerging which runs the danger to contribute to a spatially and socially highly uneven green capitalism. This article claims that the current debate on social-ecological transformation can be enriched by a Polanyian understanding but also based on regulation theory. We distinguish between three types of transformation: incremental adaptation of the current institutional systems, institutional change in favour of a new ‘green’ phase of capitalism, and a post-capitalist great transformation that implies a profound structural change of the mode of production and living.     

Die Regulation der ?kologischen Krise

There is a growing discrepancy between the knowledge about the ecological crisis and the effectiveness to deal with this crisis politically. Just in a time of increasing environmental problems the institutions of international environmental politics are in a crisis of legitimation and functioning. This contrasts with the broadly acknowledged anthropogenic character of climate change and the respective politicisation of this crisis phenomenon. The article firstly develops a theoretical framework which aims to contribute to explaining the growing discrepancy between crisis consciousness and crisis politics. For this purpose, the concept of societal relationships with nature is linked to insights of critical geography, regulation theory and critical state theory. Thereafter, the empirical analysis identifies the fossilist production and consumption patterns as principal cause for the mentioned discrepancy. Its deeply rootedness and global outreach supersede the ecological crisis consciousness and the negotiations on the existing terrains of environmental politics. At the same time, they contribute to intensifying the contradictions in societal relationships with nature. The (possible) processing of these contradictions and their democratically motivated politicisation will be analysed in the last section of the paper.     

Playdates: A Win‐Win‐Win Strategy for Recruitment of Infant Participants

High‐quality developmental science requires a reliable and representative stream of participants, yet recruiting infants at a satisfactory rate can be challenging. We recently developed a new recruitment technique: we invite parents to sign up for no‐strings‐attached playdates in our laboratory, where we provide toys, free coffee, and students to help entertain the children. We have consistently hosted 2–3 new parents per week via playdates. Approximately 88% of attending parents agreed to be contacted later about research, and 81% of those contacted returned for research appointments. This method has doubled the number of participants we run per week, improved our rapport with the local community, and provided an enhanced educational opportunity for students in our laboratory. We hope others find it similarly transformative.     

Belief in a Loving Versus Punitive God and Behavior

We examined the extent to which beliefs in a loving God and punitive God correspond with self‐reported behavior in an online, longitudinal survey involving three waves of data collection, each separated by 6 months. Adolescents (N = 760) reported the extent to which they believed in a loving God and a punitive God (Times 1 and 3) and reported their engagement in benevolent (helping and forgiveness) and aggressive behavior (Times 2 and 3). Participants strongly endorsed a loving God but not a punitive God. In addition, belief in a loving God corresponded with reports of less aggressive and more benevolent behavior, whereas belief in a punitive God corresponded with more aggressive and less benevolent behavior.