The Relationship of Welfare Receipt to Child Outcomes

Welfare receipt often is correlated negatively with children's cognitive and behavioral outcomes. Yet, virtually all children in households that receive public assistance are poor, prompting the question of whether poor outcomes are an effect of welfare, a spurious relationship between welfare and child outcomes, or a result of welfare selection. Using the NLSY-CS, these possibilities are examined by controlling for poverty and for selection into welfare. Controlling for child and maternal characteristics accounts for the majority of bivariate associations between welfare and outcomes among Black children. Controlling for poverty does little to change the relationship between welfare and outcomes for Black or White children. Controlling for selection into welfare further reduces the relationship between welfare receipt and outcomes among White children and has little discernible effect among Black children.     

Work—Family Interface for Same‐Sex,Dual‐Earner Couples: Implications for Counselors

The author highlights information for career counselors to consider when addressing work‐family interface with individuals who are members of same‐sex, dual‐earner couples or families. D. E. Super's (1990) life‐span, life‐space theory is the framework used to organize the literature review and discussion of current trends. Issues related to the roles of worker, partner, parent, stepparent, and caregiver are discussed. Suggestions are provided for career counselors.     

Relationships Between Parental Attachment,Work and Family Roles,and Life Satisfaction

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between parental attachment and satisfaction with work and family roles, as well as the relationship of these variables to life satisfaction. Results from a multiple regression analysis indicated that satisfaction with work and marriage, but not parenting satisfaction or parental attachment, was significantly related to life satisfaction. Responses to open‐ended questions indicated that parental attachment relationships affected participants' career, marriage, parenting, and life satisfaction in varied and complex ways. Implications for counselors and directions for future research are discussed.     

Social Work Students as Market Consumers: Faculty Perceptions of Customer Service Expectations

Social work education has become a consumers market, and social work faculty are increasingly expected to fill certain customer service roles in order to retain students as customers. Using the Academic Entitlement Questionnaire, this study sought to examine social work faculty in the USA (N = 57) who are members of the Association of Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors listserv perceptions of student customer service expectations. Findings were that these social work faculty are under increased pressure to fill certain customer service roles, and that they feel conflict about doing so. Implications for the delivery of social work education and practice are explored.     

Social capital predictors of children's school status in Mexico

This study explores whether family and community social capital variables influence children's school status in Mexico. Additional predictors related to human and financial capital were included as control variables. Two hundred and four mothers were interviewed as part of a larger study on the impact of social capital on children's street work in Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico. Logistic regression results suggest that family and community protective factors associated with children's academic achievement include parental help with homework, mothers' academic aspirations, extended family support and mothers' social support networks. The author reports on family- and community-based predictors of children's school status and discusses the social work profession's role in strengthening families and communities to enhance children's academic achievement.     

Resident Fathers’ Pregnancy Intentions,Prenatal Behaviors,and Links to Involvement With Infants

Using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study‐Birth Cohort, 9‐month resident father surveys (N= 6,816), this paper examines the association between male pregnancy intentions, prenatal behaviors, and postbirth father involvement. Findings indicate that prenatal behaviors are associated with five domains of father involvement. Men who did not want the pregnancy are less likely to exhibit paternal warmth following the birth, whereas men who wanted the pregnancy sooner than it occurred are more likely to exhibit nurturing behaviors. The influence of fathers’ pregnancy intentions and prenatal behaviors on postbirth involvement is for the most part not dependent on child gender. Findings suggest that prenatal programs that encourage fathers to actively participate in the pregnancy may be beneficial to later child well‐being.     

Chronic and Proximate Depression Among Mothers: Implications for Child Well‐Being

This article uses data from the Fragile Families and Child Well‐Being Survey (N = 2,427) to examine the association between the chronicity and timing of maternal depression and child well‐being. Maternal depression, particularly chronic depression, is linked to internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors in children, and children have worse behaviors when mothers report proximate depression. Children of depressed and nondepressed mothers have similar cognitive outcomes. Results also suggest that boys are more vulnerable to maternal depression than girls and that socioeconomic advantage does not buffer children from the consequences of maternal depression. Given that impairments in early childhood may place children on disadvantaged life‐course trajectories, early intervention and treatment of depressed mothers may help ameliorate social disparities.     

Do high rates of OSCAR deficiencies prompt improved nursing facility processes and outcomes?

Recently, some researchers have argued that high state rates of Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Online Survey, Certification and Reporting (OSCAR) nursing facility deficiencies indicate stringent enforcement, leaving the impression of better-quality care soon to follow; others maintain that the rank ordering of states' quality of nursing facility care remains fairly constant, resting on deep-seated state characteristics that change slowly, so that short-term improvement in poor-quality care is unlikely. The authors examine change in the process and outcome quality of states' Medicare nursing facility long-term care programs across 1999 to 2005, using linear and two-stage least squares regression. They find that (1) nationally, process quality generally falls across this period while outcome quality generally increases; (2) neither a prominent enforcement stringency index nor state culture, a relatively stable state characteristic, exerts much influence on state process and outcome quality scores over time, but (3) the relative costs and benefits for CMS compliance appear to contribute to explaining change in states' quality of resident outcomes over time; and (4) states' process quality is much less stable than outcome quality, and outcome indices distinct from OSCAR deficiency data provide more reliable and possibly more valid measures of care quality.