ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING'S "FAMILY DISEASE": ANOREXIA NERVOSA

What was Elizabeth Barrett Browning's mysterious and variously diagnosed “disease”? This study reviews biographical material in the light of modern family systems theory and develops a hypothesis that Elizabeth Barrett lived with her family of origin in “anorectic transaction”, and that chronic anorexia nervosa was embedded in the Victorian poet's lifestyle. The characteristics of anorectic families: enmeshment, overprotection, rigidity, and lack of conflict resolution, are shown to have been abundantly present in Barrett family patterns. Robert Browning is compared with a family therapist whose interventions restructure a system and free the anorectic from her dysfunctional symptom.     

A unified theory for generalized cyclic designs

Properties of abelian groups are used to unify the construction of cyclic and generalized cyclic designs. Necessary and sufficient conditions are obtained for the generation of fractional sets of blocks, and also for the generation of resolvable designs. It is shown how to apply these results in conjunction with efficiency arguments to obtain useful designs.     

Forecasting first grade public school enrollment by neighborhood

The purpose of this study is to develop an alternative method to the traditional cohort survival technique for long-run forecasting of public school enrollment by small area. In the model presented, the difference between first grade enrollment and resident births lagged six years is viewed as a function of new housing, busing, and the percent of lagged births that are white. Least squares regression analysis was used to test the model on data in four neighborhoods in New York City for the period 1958–1969. While the model fits the historical data rather well, its usefulness for long-run forecasting is diminished in areas experiencing substantial structural change.     

Stories of AIDS: The use of narrative as an approach to understanding in an AIDS support group

This paper shows how the co-creation and telling of narratives helped members of an AIDS support group transform their unique and separate experiences of suffering into shared insights, intense connections and comfort. Examples of narratives are drawn from the author's experience as a co-leader of a support group for gay men living with AIDS. Current literature on group work with persons living with AIDS is embedded in a modernist orientation in which the therapist is the scientist/expert, the client has the problem and the therapist helps the client's through exploring and interpreting the client's story according to a superseding theory (Gergen and Kaye, 1992). This approach emphasizes the need for leaders to maintain objectivity and emotional distance to avoid burnout (Gabriel, 1991; Grossman and Silverstein, 1993; Tunnell, 1991). In contrast, in a post-modern therapeutic approach, there is no privileging of the therapist's narrative and the traditional hierarchical relationship is replaced by a mutual effort as therapist and client together develop stories that translate and transcend experience. Using the AIDS work as illustration, this paper offers a post-modern, narrative approach to group work and shows how persons living with AIDS can use narrative to move beyond finite structures and the limits of life.This paper couldn't have been written without the help of the group members and my co-leader Sally Bowie. I want to thank them and other friends and colleagues-particularly the members of my Philosophy Study Group for their suggestions and support.The paper is dedicated to the memory of Jack, Paul, Mark, Alex, Richard, Hugh, Stan, Tim, Michael and Bill—all members of the group who have died and to Dean who, though not a member of the group, also died of AIDS and like the others—taught me much about dignity and courage, about being gay and about living with AIDS.     

Limitations on the Usefulness of Risk Assessment

Quantitative risk assessment (QRA) is now regarded as an essential component in the analysis of risks arising from installations classified as major hazards. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the value of the results in decision-making in practical situations. The use made of QRA in three contrasting cases which came to extensive public attention in the U.K. is examined. The first concerned an extension of domestic development near a chemical factory; the second an extension to a large petrochemical complex; and the third to a proposal to build a pressurized water reactor. The two public inquiries concerned with the chemical industry accepted standards of individual risk which were comparable to the risks from everyday accidents; the evidence of societal risk that could arise from major accidents at the petrochemical complex was compared with that of a local natural hazard — flooding. Higher standards of individual safety were set in the inquiry into the PWR proposal, and the definition of societal risk was debated at length. The QRA results were analyzed to show that risks arising from accidents were lower than those from normal operations, but they were used explicitly as a check on the overall safety of the design and of the operational and licensing organization. Such qualitative examination will always be required in addition to QRA. All these inquiries were faced with considerable technical argument. There is a need for the full details of risk calculations to be clear. The usefulness of QRA as an input to decision-making would be much enhanced if the technical points at issue could be clarified outside a formal public inquiry. In addition, there are some technical questions which apply to many installations. There should be better mechanisms of technical debate to achieve a measure of agreement on the optimum methods of calculation in these cases, and some possibilities are explored.     

The social structure of social problems in New York state

A comparative study of the 52 upstate New York counties replicated a previous state level study that did a principal components analysis of social problems and attempted to predict them by aspects of social structure. In the New York counties the percent Democrat predicted various welfare measures. Population density predicted health and crime problems, and affluence. When population density was controlled, affluence related only to crimes of property. Contrasting with the state study, political competitiveness (per cent voting) was related to few variables.     

Matching children with placements

Utilizing profiles of children in diverse residential programs, a computerized model was developed to explore the possibility of replicating existing placement patterns and to aid practitioners in making future child placement decisions. The model provides a method for rank-ordering placement alternatives for children needing residential care.