The Soviet 'wife-activist' down on the farm

Parties independent of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) were not formally permitted and non-party groups and movements needed the CPSU's approval to be allowed to form and survive. This was the situation up to Gorbachev's process of democratization. However, the CPSU had occasionally allowed the existence of social organizations which served the party and socialism and were perceived as ideologically non-threatening. One such was the 'movement of wives' ( dvizhenie zhen ) formed in the 1930s but not part of the party structure, but at best the wives could work within the boundaries of party policies. They tried to make daily life better for themselves, their husbands, children and the local community. Analyses have focused mainly on the movement as an urban phenomenon but they spread to farms and the rural sector. This article discusses their role in this context.     

Detecting the number of components in a finite mixture having normal components

A procedure is described which detects the number of components in a mixture distribution having normal components. The test is based on the behavior of the sample order statistics near the center of the distribution. Numerical results are presented and comparisons with tests proposed by Shapiro and Francia (1972) and Baker (1958) are provided.     

Gender as a Sort Assembly Tomboys' Stories

This article draws on a study of tomboys to reflect on developmental theory in psychoanalysis. To illuminate the power of chaos theory and nonlinear dynamic systems theory in understanding gender and sexuality, I trace three lines of theoretical work on gender, relevant to conceptualizing tomboy love and tomboy identity. First, I reexamine the work on gender development in which bodily life as the wellspring and organizer or gender is prominent. The second strand begins with the organization of gender development proposed by Stoller (1976) and taken tip and developed by Fast (1984). Its most articulated form is in the work of Benjamin (1988, 1993). This line of argument conceptualizes gender development through the pattern of relationships and the resultant identifications. The third strand concerns the understanding of “masculinity” in women and the evolution of work on bisexuality.     

The prevalence and incidence of HIV among injection drug users: A five year panel study

Six hundred and one injection drug users (IDUs) who attended drug treatment programs in Miami, Florida, were enrolled in a panel study to determine the prevalence and incidence of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and associated risk factors. A structured questionnaire which elicited injection and sexual behaviors was administered and blood was obtained by venipduncture. All participants were reassessed at six month intervals for 5 years. The baseline prevalence of HIV was 16.3%. African–Americans had a prevalence of HIV (37.1%) that was significantly higher than that of non-Hispanic whites (7.6%); the prevalence of HIV among Hispanics was 27.2%. Persons who were more than thirty years of age were more likely to test HIV positive (17.8%) than were younger participants (9.7%). The annual incidence per 1000 person-years of exposure for the 503 initially seronegative participants was consistently low for each year of the study. The 5 year incidence was 4.1 per 1000 person years; 7.5 for men and 1.7 for women, 7.5 for African–Americans and 3.8 for non-Hispanic whites. No Hispanic participants seroconverted. Multivariate logistic techniques were used to identify the independent risk factors for HIV prevalence. Earlier injection, ethnicity, and income were independently associated with HIV serostatus. A history of a sexually transmitted disease was marginally associated with HIV prevalence. Low incidence probably is a function of the reduction of risk behavior that occurred over the course of the study and the stage of the epidemic.     

Job Volatility of Rural,Low-income Mothers: A Mixed Methods Approach

The struggle for rural, low-income mothers to enter and remain in the workforce can contribute to job volatility, longitudinal changes in employment patterns. This study used a mixed methods longitudinal approach to examine job volatility of 245 rural, low-income mothers across 14 states. The mothers were categorized into three groups: stable employment, intermittent employment, and continuous unemployment. Work and family responsibilities were a continuous struggle for these mothers. Some mothers addressed these struggles through changing jobs, receiving social support, and/or staying out of the workforce to care for their children. To reduce job volatility, both qualitative and quantitative analyses showed that human capital development requires workplace flexibility and social support in addition to the traditional investments in education and healthcare.     

Unresolved struggles: Educating social workers in Aotearoa New Zealand

This article introduces key themes that arise throughout the history of social work education and are central to the education of social workers today. Curriculum and the goodness of fit between agency demands and professional standards, accreditation, provision of social work courses, and more recently, the competency movement, have constantly been significant, albeit in changing forms. In New Zealand, cultural awareness and knowledge of indigenous models for practice together with re-organisation of social service delivery systems have implications for social work education. Managerial devices such as the purchaser/provider split and risk/case management approaches to social work and their impact on social work education and practice are discussed. The role of the national accrediting body and the ensuing tensions around accreditation are discussed. A discussion of opportunities and concerns for the future considers relationships between those who teach social work, those who practice it, their employers and the role of Industry Training Organisations.     

Hope the Beloved Country: Hope Levels in the New South Africa

The concept of hope seems to have attracted increased attention in popular and academic discourse in South Africa. Despite this increased focus, no empirical studies on national hope levels have been conducted in South Africa to date. This article sought to address this gap by investigating national hope levels using data taken from the 2009 wave of the Human Sciences Research Council’s nationally representative South African Social Attitudes Survey of approximately 3,300 South Africans aged 16 and older. Using a slightly modified version of the widely used Snyder Hope Scale, this study found significant geographic and social differences in citizens’ average hope levels. Differences appear to attest to the continued negative association between hope levels and membership of groups that have historically been relegated to the margins of South African society. Contrary to most current political portrayals, however, there does not appear to be a significant age cohort effect. Self-perceptions of marginalisation also appear to be related to hope. In light of the paucity of South African empirical work in this area, the paper concluded by identifying possible future research needs.     

Children Who Choose Not to Eat Meat: A Study of Early Moral Decision‐making

Can young children frame their own choices in terms of moral considerations, particularly when those choices do not match the practices of immediate authority figures? To answer this question, we studied 6‐ to 10‐year‐old independent vegetarians—children who have elected to become vegetarians, despite being raised in non‐vegetarian families. In Study 1, these children were asked about their reasons for not eating meat; their replies were compared with those made by vegetarian children from vegetarian families (family vegetarians) and non‐vegetarian children from non‐vegetarian families (non‐vegetarians). Unlike the other two groups, independent vegetarians universally focused on the suffering that meat eating implies for animals but, surprisingly, they did not condemn others for meat eating. Study 2 attempted to explain this tolerance by examining if children focus on whether an individual has made a commitment to not eating meat. All three groups of children condemned meat eating by morally committed vegetarians, but not by those who have made no such commitment. The two studies show that independent vegetarians are committed to not eating meat on moral grounds and judge that it would be wrong to break that commitment. Nevertheless, like non‐vegetarian children, they remain tolerant toward people who have made no such commitment.