Polygenic Influences on Pubertal Timing and Tempo and Depressive Symptoms in Boys and Girls

This study used polygenic scoring (PGS) to test whether puberty‐related genes were correlated with depressive symptoms, and whether there were indirect effects through pubertal maturation. The sample included 8,795 adolescents from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (measures of puberty drawn ages 8–17 years; of depressive symptoms at age 16.5 years). The PGS (derived from a genome‐wide meta‐analysis of later age at menarche) predicted boys’ and girls’ later pubertal timing, boys’ slower gonadal development, and girls’ faster breast development. Earlier perceived breast development timing predicted more depressive symptoms in girls. Findings support shared genetic underpinnings for boys’ and girls' puberty, contributing to multiple pubertal phenotypes with differences in how these genetic variants affect boys' and girls' development.     

Amidst the Reign of Behaviour and Disorder: Recalling Schools as Problems

In May 2013 one of the most profoundly influential books of the late twentieth and early twenty‐first century was released in its fifth edition. Yet, it is not unreasonable to speculate that this newest edition will pass largely unnoticed, even as new diagnoses (and the loss of current ones) seep into the everyday. The fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM‐5) will undoubtedly be influential in education – defining and re‐defining student maladies. Its list of extensive categories provides, so it is argued, a means to uniformly identify mental disorders. Applied in educational contexts, children and young people can thus be categorized by clinical experts and teachers able to identify an individual's problems, and in theory, respond appropriately. Criticism of the DSM includes debate over its application in cross‐cultural contexts as well as the ways that socio‐economic differences are, to put it bluntly, diagnosed differently. Although these issues of diagnosis do get attention, historical contexts can remain bereft in commentary. In this paper we consider the value that historical perspectives can bring to an analysis of the contemporary effects of DSM‐inspired readings of education and disadvantage. The paper also draws on two projects, one with young people, the other with parents of young children, both of whom experienced disadvantage and precarious relationships with education. In these excluded contexts, people are more likely to come into contact with diagnostic repertoires that originate from the DSM. Drawing on Georges Canguilhem's analysis the ‘concept' as well as Michel Foucault's discussion of Canguilhem's work, this paper considers how attention to school problems is important for disengaging with education's appetite for psychiatric disorders.     

Review and Evaluation of the J100-10 Risk and Resilience Management Standard for Water and Wastewater Systems

Risk analysis standards are often employed to protect critical infrastructures, which are vital to a nation's security, economy, and safety of its citizens. We present an analysis framework for evaluating such standards and apply it to the J100-10 risk analysis standard for water and wastewater systems. In doing so, we identify gaps between practices recommended in the standard and the state of the art. While individual processes found within infrastructure risk analysis standards have been evaluated in the past, we present a foundational review and focus specifically on water systems. By highlighting both the conceptual shortcomings and practical limitations, we aim to prioritize the shortcomings needed to be addressed. Key findings from this study include (1) risk definitions fail to address notions of uncertainty, (2) the sole use of “worst reasonable case” assumptions can lead to mischaracterizations of risk, (3) analysis of risk and resilience at the threat-asset resolution ignores dependencies within the system, and (4) stakeholder values need to be assessed when balancing the tradeoffs between risk reduction and resilience enhancement.     

Intercultural literacy dialogue: international assessment moderation in early childhood teacher education

ABSTRACT

This research reports intercultural dialogue of meaning making in literacy by lecturers, engaged with an assessment moderation process of early childhood education (ECE) preservice teacher education across Australia, New Zealand and Sweden. The purpose of the dialogue was to inform pedagogical and conceptual knowledge in their courses. The research question is: How does intercultural dialogue inform teacher education literacy practices? Methods include (1) a blind assessment review process using 30 examples from ‘high’ to ‘low’ exemplars of ECE students’ literacy assessment annotations, some from each country, and (2) textual analysis of intercultural student feedback and reflection from student forum comments and, semi-structured reflexive interviews with students about the assessment moderation process. Rich academic reflections on the data have led to our recommendations that the conceptual framework of intercultural praxis could be applied in early childhood preservice teacher education practice. Further, we suggest there are increased possibilities for the use of intercultural literacy with ECE preservice student teachers using virtual and explicit collaborations and texts as explained in this research.     

Rapping About Rap: Parental Mediation of Gender-Stereotyped Media Content

Abstract

This article examines adolescent reports of parental mediation of hip-hop music videos, a medium that has been celebrated for its artistry and empowering youth, yet criticized for stereotyped portrayals of women and men. Survey data of 315 adolescents (M age?=?15.2, SD?=?1.73) investigated the relationship between adolescent reports of viewing hip-hop music videos, parent-child communication about these videos, and attitudes about gender and the music videos. Respondents reported low levels of both positive and negative parental mediation of hip-hop music videos, yet when they occurred, reports of negative mediation positively predicted critical attitudes about these videos.     

Governing Sleepiness: Somnolent Bodies, Discourse, and Liquid Modernity

This paper is an inquiry into how a new truth about sleepiness is being produced in a society increasingly organized around the primacy of expertise and its representation in print and visual media. Sleepiness originally described a benign, naturally occurring corporeal moment, a precursor to sleep. Increasingly, however, a new and disturbing meaning of somnolence is found in a juncture of medical and epidemiological research, social movements, and popular culture. Alongside the idea that sleepiness is a tranquil promise of repose is another, emerging truth. Sleepiness, we are told, is hazardous to self and others, and, importantly, it is each person's responsibility to resist this seductive call of the body. How, we ask, is a private, routinely occurring state of partial consciousness deprivatized, linked to public health vernaculars, and transformed into a reprobate condition? This alternative, disturbing truth about sleepiness is shown to be emerging from several disparate, seemingly unrelated caches of scientific studies, social movement literatures, magazines and newspapers, and web sites. The ideas of Michel Foucault, who pioneered the contemporary study of discourse, are shown to be particularly apropos to this inquiry, though not without some modification to make them more amenable to a contemporary society shaped increasingly by what Zygmunt Bauman calls “liquid modernity.”     

Posttraumatic Play: Towards Acceptance and Resolution

Many children who experience trauma demonstrate it through posttraumatic play (PTP). This type of play is seen by professionals as a repetitive reenactment of the traumatic event within the child’s play. Reliving the event in this way may serve to retraumatize the child and lead to other psychiatric or behavioral problems. This article examines the issues surrounding childhood trauma and PTP. It uses a case study to illustrate the phases of a play therapy approach that incorporates Ericksonian principles, in order for the child to achieve resolution and acceptance. The countertransference issues that a clinician may encounter also are discussed. Editor's Note: This article is the recipient of the Judith Mishne Memorial Award for Excellence in Clinical Social Work Theory and Practice.     

Economies of visibility as a moderator of feminism: ‘Never mind Brexit. Who won Legs‐it!’

This article utilizes economies of visibility to interpret how two UK women political leaders’ bodies are constructed in the press, online and by audience responses across several media platforms via a multimodal analysis. We contribute politicizing economies of visibility, lying at the intersection of politics of visibility and economies of visibility, as a possible new modality of feminist politics. We suggest this offers a space where feminism can be progressed. Analysis illustrates how economies of visibility moderate feminism and tie women leaders in various ways to their bodies; commodities constantly scrutinized. The study surfaces how media insist upon femininity through appearance from women leaders, serving to moderate power and feminist potential. We consider complexities attached to public consumption of powerful women's constructions, set up in opposition, where sexism is visible and visceral. This simultaneously fortifies moderate feminism and provokes feminism. The insistence on femininity nevertheless disrupts, through an arousal of audible and commanding feminist voices, to reconnect with the political project of women's equality.