An Evaluation of Caller Satisfaction with Solution-Focused Telephone Counselling

Abstract

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The telephone is a potentially valuable intervention tool in family counselling. The Child, Adolescent & Family Health Service has been experimenting with a response which combines the traditional advantages of telephone counselling with aspects of Steve deShazer's solution-focused approach (deShazer 1985). In 1990 a study was conducted to evaluate caller satisfaction with this approach. Results indicate a high level of satisfaction with the counselling. At a time of increasing funding cuts and lengthening waiting lists, it is important that as many options as possible remain available to our clients. An expansion in effective telephone counselling services may well be one way of achieving this.     

Top Ten Challenges for Understanding Gender and Aggression in Children: Why Can’t We All Just Get Along?

This essay identifies ten significant methodological challenges for understanding aggression and gender. In light of the recent explosion of research on indirect/relational/social aggression, it seems important to clarify gaps in our current understanding and to identify promising methods by which better answers might be found. The discussion begins with basic issues of definitions, contexts and subtypes, moves on to points concerning sampling and measures, and addresses whether current evidence warrants deciding that girls are as aggressive as boys. We conclude that although research has shown that the majority of girls' aggression takes indirect/relational/social forms, it is premature to conclude that boys do not also engage in these behaviors. We caution against assuming that physical and indirect/relational/social aggression are comparable in their developmental origins and consequences, and urge researchers to consider that fully understanding indirect/relational/social aggression might require different conceptual frameworks and research methods.     

Young Children's Emotional Attachments to Stories

In the interest of developing a more holistic and integrated understanding of young children's experience of stories, this study describes preschoolers' emotional attachments to stories and the cultural beliefs and practices which surround such attachments. Thirty-two European-American, middle-class families, participated in an interview study of their children's story attachments, and five of these mothers also participated in a short-term, longitudinal diary study. Every child experienced at least two emotional attachments to stories. Children were captivated by stories presented in different media, with many attachments occurring around video stories in addition to books. They expressed their attachments by repeatedly requesting the story, expressing strong feelings, and enacting the story in pretend play. Story attachments were social in two fundamental ways: children created relationships with the characters in their favorite stories, and story attachments emerged in the context of relationships with caregivers whose beliefs and practices supported such attachments.     

Asymptotic equivalence of the harrell-davis median estimator and the sample median

This paper presents an asymptotic equivalence result with a sharp rate of convergence forthe sample median and the Harrell-Davis median estimator. The consequences of this result are discussed.     

When Precaution Creates Misunderstandings: The Unintended Effects of Precautionary Information on Perceived Risks,the EMF Case

In the past decade, growing public concern about novel technologies with uncertain potential long‐term impacts on the environment and human health has moved risk policies toward a more precautionary approach. Focusing on mobile telephony, the effects of precautionary information on risk perception were analyzed. A pooled multinational experimental study based on a 5 × 2 × 2 factorial design was conducted in nine countries. The first factor refers to whether or not information on different types of precautionary measures was present, the second factor to the framing of the precautionary information, and the third factor to the order in which cell phones and base stations were rated by the study participants. The data analysis on the country level indicates different effects. The main hypothesis that informing about precautionary measures results in increased risk perceptions found only partial support in the data. The effects are weaker, both in terms of the effect size and the frequency of significant effects, across the various precautionary information formats used in the experiment. Nevertheless, our findings do not support the assumption that informing people about implemented precautionary measures will decrease public concerns.