Disentangling the exposure experience: the roles of community context and report-back of environmental exposure data

This article examines participants' responses to receiving their results in a study of household exposure to endocrine disrupting compounds and other pollutants. The authors study how the "exposure experience"-the embodied, personal experience and understanding of chronic exposure to environmental pollutants-is shaped by community context and the report-back process itself. In addition, the authors investigate an activist, collective form of exposure experience. The authors analyze themes of expectations and learning, trust, and action. The findings reveal that while participants interpret scientific results to affirm lay knowledge of urban industrial toxics, they also absorb new information regarding other pollutant sources. By linking the public understanding of science literature to the illness and exposure experience concepts, this study unravels the complex relationship between lay experience and lay understanding of science. It also shows that to support policy development and/or social change, community-based participatory research efforts must attend to participants' understanding of science.     

Economic hardship and depression across the life course: the impact of welfare state regimes

Previous research in the United States suggests that depression related to economic hardship decreases with age. We test whether this pattern can be generalized to other developed nations. Based on data from 23 countries in the European Social Survey (2006--2007), multilevel analyses show that the moderating role of age depends on the socio-political context. While the hardship--depression link is not significantly different across the life course in Nordic and Bismarckian regimes, the hardship--depression link increases with age in Southern and Eastern European countries and decreases with age in strength in Anglo-Saxon welfare states. Our findings suggest that welfare state regimes play a significant role in attenuating, boosting, or even reversing the health effects of social experiences such as economic hardship on aging. Health knowledge gained through research that ignores the socio-political context may be limited in terms of generalization.     

How culture shapes community: bible belief, theological unity, and a sense of belonging in religious congregations

Feeling that you belong in a group is an important and powerful need. The ability to foster a sense of belonging can also determine whether groups survive. Organizational features of groups cultivate feelings of belonging, yet prior research fails to investigate the idea that belief systems also play a major role. Using multilevel data, this study finds that church members' traditional beliefs, group-level belief unity, and their interaction associate positively with members' sense of belonging. In fact, belief unity can be thought of as a “sacred canopy” under which the relationship between traditional beliefs and feelings of belonging thrives.     

Cosmopolitan communication online: YouTube responses to the anti-Islam film Fitna

In 2008, a Dutch member of parliament released a short anti-Islamic film entitled Fitna, which stirred a huge public controversy and provoked public condemnations around the world. In response to the film, hundreds of videos were uploaded on YouTube, mostly with the aim to provide a more positive representation of Islam, express support for the author and his views, or defend his freedom of speech. Drawing on interviews with YouTube users who posted the videos, this paper reflects on the capacity of the Internet to sustain cosmopolitan communication and examines how cosmopolitan attitudes and practices on-line differ depending on the participants' cultural and social background, especially their religious affiliations. Particular attention is paid to how the opportunities for cosmopolitan communication are shaped by the unequal distribution of cosmopolitan attitudes and practices among groups, and by global inequalities of power. In addressing these issues, the paper also engages with broader debates about cosmopolitanism, and argues for an understanding of cosmopolitanism as a quest for universalism, which remains anchored in the particular, but involves communication across difference, and requires openness to the possibility that the other is right.     

The role of community context in planning and implementing community-based health promotion projects

The current study examines how community context affected collaborative planning and implementation in eight sites participating in a healthy cities and communities initiative in California. Data are from 23 focus groups conducted with coalition members, and 76 semi-structured interviews with local coordinators and community leaders. Multiple case study methods were used to identify major themes related to how five contextual domains influenced collaborative planning and implementation. Results showed that history of collaboration can influence resources and interpersonal and organizational connections available for planning and implementation, as well as priorities selected for action. Community politics and history can affect which segments of the community participate in a planning process and what issues are prioritized, as well as the pool of partners willing to aid in implementation. Some community norms and values bring people together and others appear to limit involvement from certain groups. Community demographics and economic conditions may shape outreach strategies for planning and implementation, and may also shape priorities. Geography can play a role in assessment methods, priority selection, partners available to aid in implementation, and participation in activities and events. Results suggest that community context plays a substantive role in shaping how community-based health promotion projects unfold.     

Psychotherapy dropouts: differences by modality, license, and DSM-IV diagnosis

Dropouts are frequent in mental health care. Several client factors have been identified as dropout predictors, including ethnic minority status, race, low SES, and more severe symptoms. Research on therapist and process variables is less common, and findings are inconsistent. This study used administrative data for 434,317 patients from CIGNA Behavioral Health (CIGNA) to examine dropout rates by profession of provider, therapy modality, and DSM-IV diagnosis. Results indicate that among the providers, MFTs have the lowest dropout rates in the CIGNA network. Of the therapy modalities, individual therapy is associated with lower dropout rates than family therapy. Mood and anxiety disorders have lower dropout rates than other diagnosis categories, while schizophrenia, psychotic, and substance use disorders have the highest dropout rates.     

Development of the Edmonson Psychiatric Fall Risk Assessment Tool

The purpose of this study was to develop a fall risk assessment instrument for the inpatient psychiatric population. Nine risk factors were identified through a review of the literature. The instrument was applied retrospectively to patient records, and the percentage of those who fell who triggered each of the items in each domain was calculated. The expected value of the population and weighting system were established. The Morse Fall Scale and Edmonson Psychiatric Fall Risk Assessment Tool (EPFRAT) were administered simultaneously to inpatient psychiatric patients. Sensitivity of the EPFRAT was 0.63, compared with 0.49 for the Morse Fall Scale; specificity of the EPFRAT was 0.86, compared with 0.85 for the Morse Fall Scale. Initial psychometric testing of the EPFRAT indicates the instrument is more sensitive in assessing fall risk in the acutely ill psychiatric population than those currently available. Additional psychometric testing is needed to determine the reliability and validity of the EPFRAT.     

How consistent are class size effects?

Thus far researchers have focused on computing average differences in student achievement between smaller and larger classes. In this study, the author focus on the distribution of the small class effects at the school level and compute the inconsistency of the small class effects across schools. The author use data from Project STAR to estimate small class effects for each school on mathematics and reading scores from kindergarten through third grade. Then, all school estimates were combined to calculate an overall weighted average. The results revealed that a large proportion of the school-specific small class effects are positive, while a smaller proportion of the estimates are negative. Although students benefit considerably from being in small classes in many schools, in other schools being in small classes is either not beneficial or is a disadvantage. Small class effects were inconsistent and varied significantly across schools in all grades indicating a small class by school interaction.     

The effects of drinking status and believability of ads featured in a social norms campaign on college students' estimation and accuracy of other students' celebratory drinking

This study examined estimation and accuracy of normative perceptions for students during one celebratory drinking occasion. Students who drank on St. Patrick's Day overestimated the percentage of others who also drank, whereas the students who did not drink on St. Patrick's Day underestimated the percentage of others who also did not drink. The students' drinking behaviors on St. Patrick's Day did not substantially differentiate their accuracy scores. However, of the students who drank on St. Patrick's Day, those who did not believe the ads showed stronger overestimation of others who drank than did those who believed the ads.     

Effects of Multiple Exemplar Training on the Emergence of Derived Relations in Preschool Children Learning a Second Language

We evaluated the facilitative effects of multiple exemplar training (MET) on the establishment of derived tact relations in typically developing children. A multiple-probe design across stimulus sets was implemented to introduce MET. Participants were first taught to conditionally relate dictated names in English to their corresponding objects (listener behavior; A-B relations), followed by tests for derived tacts (B-A relations). If participants failed these tests, MET was implemented whereby tact relations were explicitly taught with novel stimulus sets, followed by test probes with the original training set. MET continued with novel stimuli until participants met criterion for the emergence of derived tact relations or after exposure to three MET sets. Results indicated failed tests for tact relations following direct training in listener relations, and marked improvements in derived tact relations following MET across all participants.