The Role of Friends and Peers in Adolescent Body Dissatisfaction: A Review and Critique of 15 Years of Research

We review the research conducted in the past 15 years concerned with the role of friends and peers in adolescent body dissatisfaction. A number of friend and peer group characteristics have been associated with heightened body dissatisfaction both concurrently and longitudinally. Most widely studied and more consistently linked to body dissatisfaction are appearance teasing and perceived pressure from friends to be thin. Other interactions between friends and peers that communicate and strengthen appearance ideals and direct attention to appearance also have been associated with body dissatisfaction, including appearance‐related conversations, friends' modeling of dieting behavior, and perceptions of friends' appearance‐related attitudes. Finally, the research is critiqued, new directions considered, and strategies are proposed that could be implemented to reduce body dissatisfaction.     

Parental Discussion of Child Sexual Abuse: Is It Associated with the Parenting Practices of Involvement,Monitoring, and General Communication?

We investigated whether parents who reported more positive parenting practices (i.e., monitoring, involvement, and communication) reported more discussion of child sexual abuse (CSA) with their children. Parents from Australia and the UK (N = 248), with children aged 6 to 11 years, completed an online survey. About half of parents reported directly discussing CSA, whereas 35% reported telling their children that CSA perpetrators may be family members. Rates of discussion were higher for other CSA-related topics such as body integrity and abduction. Correlational analyses showed that parents who reported speaking to their children about CSA also reported more positive parenting practices, more discussion of other sensitive topics, and assessed CSA risk for children (in general) to be higher. Discussion of CSA risk was not associated with parents' CSA knowledge, confidence or appraisal of own-child risk. Parents higher in positive parenting believed their children to be at less CSA risk. Parents who appraised higher own-child risk reported less positive parenting practices and were less confident about their parenting and their ability to protect their children from CSA. The findings are the first to report on the associations of parenting practices with parents' CSA discussion with their children.     

Change Processes in Couple Therapy: An Intensive Case Analysis of One Couple Using a Common Factors Lens

The article describes a research study that explored the process of how change occurred for one distressed couple and a specific therapist in a naturalistic setting. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected on the couple at multiple points in the therapy. A research team comprised of five members met regularly to analyze the data and collectively they arrived at a theory of change for the couple posttherapy. Conclusions are made related to how change occurred for the couple with an emphasis on the role of extratherapeutic events, client motivational factors, the therapeutic alliance, hope and expectancy factors, therapist factors, specific techniques and interventions, and other surprise factors that contributed to change.     

Lebenspraxis Wissenschaft? Von der praktischen Sperrigkeit des Work-Life-Balance-Konzepts im wissenschaftlichen Feld

The concept of work-life-balance (WLB) aims to improve reconciling the areas of work and life, which are considered as structurally divided in society by sociology. This separation is actually discussed as blurring of boundaries between work and other areas of life. Building on this, the article addresses WLB in academia by following the approach of practice theories and discusses findings of an empirical study at an Austrian university. Referring to existing literature the analysis of qualitative interviews indicates that the idea of balancing academic work and life is contradicted by the constitutive logic in the academic field. The guiding image of a “life for academia” dominates the discourse on professional academic practice and private life, and centres work on research and on being present in the academic field as the actual life.     

Child-related Criminal History Screening and Social Work Education in Australia

Increasingly human service organisations in Australia require staff, volunteers, and social work students on placement to undergo child-related criminal history checks. In turn, many schools of social work require prospective or enrolled students to undergo criminal history checks and provide a clearance of their suitability to work with children. Universities have historically played a role of gatekeeper to the social work profession, but the appropriateness of using past criminal history in this gatekeeping process is contested. This study examines the websites of 30 Australian universities to ascertain the extent to which they require social work students to undertake child-related criminal history screening. Most universities required students to have a child-related criminal history clearance, and all but one of the remaining universities identified that screening may be required, depending upon placement agency requirements. This may limit or close off access to social work education for people with criminal histories and lived experience of hardship and disadvantage.     

What Makes Inheritance Fair in Stepfamilies? Examining Perceptions and Complexities

This article examines the complexity of fairness in the inheritance process within the context of divorce, remarriage, and stepchildren. Interpersonal social justice theory and qualitative vignette methods were used to explore family members' perceptions of fair inheritance outcomes and processes for financial assets and personal possessions. Findings identify decision rules for determining fair outcomes, including treating biological and stepchildren equally and differently. Who participates, what structures are relied upon, the role of information, and ethical interpersonal treatment were identified as key factors when determining fair processes. Understanding fairness provides a sound basis for helping stepfamily members navigate unavoidable inheritance decisions.     

Counternarratives of students’ experiences returning to comprehensive schools from an involuntary disciplinary alternative school

Educators’ excessive uses of exclusionary discipline have led to increased placements of students in disciplinary alternative schools, but few studies examine student experiences after their alternative school placements. Using a theoretical framework informed by critical race theory and the role of the discourse of safety in student discipline, we compose the counternarratives of nine middle school students’ experiences with the transition from an involuntary disciplinary placement back to a comprehensive school. We then analyze across cases to identify commonalities in their stories. Findings show that students experience dehumanization and exclusion that reflect second-class citizenship. We discuss how educators can resist perpetuating this under class even as the overtly racist rhetoric of populist nationalism replaces the neoliberal color-blind version of the discourse of safety.     

Making Marriage Promotion into Public Policy: The Epistemic Culture of a Statewide Initiative

Though political sociologists have sought to understand how self-interest influences politics and policymaking, little research has examined the mechanisms involved in the relationship between constructing knowledge and forming policy. This article extends the concept of epistemic culture to the field of policymaking to uncover the mechanisms of knowledge production in policy formation. It offers an extended case study of government marriage promotion policies that seek to fund and disseminate marriage education among poor couples with the goal of lifting them out of poverty. Based on an ethnography of a statewide marriage initiative in Oklahoma, this article maps out the parameters of an epistemic culture of marriage promotion shaped by three mechanisms: 1) The articulation of connections between policy, commonsense ideas, and extant epistemologies; 2) The formation of policy that consolidates research findings to quell controversy; and 3) The creation of networks to convince relevant actors of the importance of marriage promotion policy.     

Designing response scales with multi-trait-multi-method experiments

ABSTRACT

Split-ballot multi-trait-multi-method experiments are used to evaluate the quality of measurement of different response scales of survey items gauging “evaluation of government services” and “political trust.” The response scales differ by agree/disagree scales, item-specific scales, total number of categories, and the presence of fixed reference points on their constructing extreme items. The Center for Opinion Studies of the Catalan government in Spain conducted the survey in 2011. The best response scale depends on the complexity of the topic and of the formulation of the question. For simple topics and formulations, the format of the response scale has no effect on the quality of measurement.