Dealing with Complexity in Research Processes and Findings: How Do Older Women Negotiate and Challenge Images of Aging?

The Representing Self—Representing Ageing initiative has been funded by the ESRC as part of the New Dynamics of Ageing cross-council research program. It has consisted of four projects with older women using visual research methods and participatory approaches to enable women to articulate their experiences of aging and to create alternative images of aging. Complex research processes were utilized. Innovative methods included the use of art elicitation, photo diaries, film booths, and phototherapy.     

Issues Impacting on the Governance of Deafened Adults

Following the onset of profound deafness, the newly-deafened person is confronted with the various social meanings attributed to disability, particularly by the medical model. These values focus moral pressure on the individual to conform themselves with reified notions of so-called able-bodied, economically self-sufficient, hearing citizens. This moral arena privileges interventions such as cochlear implants over identifications with the Deaf Community, sign language and alternative communication technologies. The purpose of this paper is document and situate the moral milieu in which deafened people have to act, within its broader historical context. It then documents linkages between broadly-based social movements that commenced centuries ago, with specific attempts to govern aspects of the lives of deaf and deafened people. The analysis shows that as deaf and deafened people today struggle for social equality, they have much more in common, than has perhaps been recognised in the past.     

Resource adequacy perception and marital satisfaction of rural wives and husbands: A nonrecursive model

Rural families have experienced rapid changes in their social and economic environment in the past few decades. How do rural husbands and wives perceive the adequacy of their resources in the face of economic pressures? Is there a relationship between their perception of resource adequacy and their marital satisfaction? These questions are explored using data from a random sample of 205 couples living in rural Minnesota. Age and Locus of Control are predictors of Perceived Resource Adequacy for both husbands and wives; employment is a predictor of Perceived Resource Adequacy for wives; and Money Management is negatively related to Perceived Resource Adequacy for husbands. Cohesion is the only salient cause of Marital Satisfaction for husbands and wives. No reciprocal relationship is found between Perceived Resource Adequacy and Marital Satisfaction. Implications for theory, research, education, and counseling are discussed.     

A hierarchical modelling approach to analysing longitudinal data with drop-out and non-compliance, with application to an equivalence trial in paediatric acquired immune deficiency syndrome

Longitudinal clinical trials with long follow-up periods almost invariably suffer from a loss to follow-up and non-compliance with the assigned therapy. An example is protocol 128 of the AIDS Clinical Trials Group, a 5-year equivalency trial comparing reduced dose zidovudine with the standard dose for treatment of paediatric acquired immune deficiency syndrome patients. This study compared responses to treatment by using both clinical and cognitive outcomes. The cognitive outcomes are of particular interest because the effects of human immunodeficiency virus infection of the central nervous system can be more acute in children than in adults. We formulate and apply a Bayesian hierarchical model to estimate both the intent-to-treat effect and the average causal effect of reducing the prescribed dose of zidovudine by 50%. The intent-to-treat effect quantifies the causal effect of assigning the lower dose, whereas the average causal effect represents the causal effect of actually taking the lower dose. We adopt a potential outcomes framework where, for each individual, we assume the existence of a different potential outcomes process at each level of time spent on treatment. The joint distribution of the potential outcomes and the time spent on assigned treatment is formulated using a hierarchical model: the potential outcomes distribution is given at the first level, and dependence between the outcomes and time on treatment is specified at the second level by linking the time on treatment to subject-specific effects that characterize the potential outcomes processes. Several distributional and structural assumptions are used to identify the model from observed data, and these are described in detail. A detailed analysis of AIDS Clinical Trials Group protocol 128 is given; inference about both the intent-to-treat effect and average causal effect indicate a high probability of dose equivalence with respect to cognitive functioning.     

Does care matter? Care capital and mothers’ time to paid employment

The aim of this study is to introduce the concept of care capital and provide an example of its application in the context of childcare and maternal employment using the currently most suitable American data. We define care capital as the nexus of available, accessible, and experienced resources for care. The American setting is an ideal context to investigate the linkages between child care capital and maternal employment as the patterns of child care use tend to be more diverse compared to other national contexts. In the presented application of care capital, we examine mothers’ entry to paid employment during the first 36 weeks following a birth, and its association with the experience of non-parental child care use before labour force entry. Using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Survey—Birth Cohort (N = 10,400 mothers), results from discrete-time hazard models show that use of non-parental child care prior to employment is independently and positively associated with entry into maternal employment. This finding applies both to first-time mothers (n = 3,800) and to mothers of multiple children (n = 6,600). Although data currently available for investigating child care capital are limited with regard to care availability and access, our results suggests that childcare availability, access, and use, understood as a form of capital alongside economic and human capital, should be considered in future studies of maternal employment.     

Counting snowbirds: The importance of and the problems with estimating seasonal populations

Using the example of the seasonal population of ``snowbirds' that spend the winter in Arizona and other Sunbelt states, this paper examines the issues involved with estimating temporary populations. Specifically using the experience of ASU's ongoing research efforts on Arizona snowbirds, the paper discusses some of the problems associated with estimating a seasonal population – in particular: (1) defining the population under study and (2) developing effective procedures to collect information relating to the population. The concluding section emphasizes the growing national importance of temporary populations and the needs of both the public and private sector to have better information on both their size and characteristics.     

Community availability of contraceptives and family limitation

This study examines the impact of contraceptive service availability on contraceptive use in Korea, Mexico, and Bangladesh. Using World Fertility Survey Data on once-married females and their communities of residence, the mutivariate analysis finds that the community level of contraceptive availability directly affects the likelihood of current use, net of the effects of community development, education, parity, and marital duration. The results are supportive of the recent policy emphasis on maximizing the geographic availability of contraceptive services.