Can you become one of us? A historical comparison of legal selection of ‘assimilable’ immigrants in Europe and the Americas

Pre-arrival integration tests used by European countries suggest discriminatory measures subtly persist in immigration laws. This paper draws on a comparison across the Americas and Europe to identify and explain historical continuities and discontinuities in ‘assimilability’ admissions requirements. We attribute legal shifts at the turn of the twenty-first century to the institutionalised delegitimisation of biological racism and the rise of permanent settlement immigration to Europe. Efforts to reduce Muslim immigration largely motivate contemporary European policies, but these policies test putative individual capacity to integrate rather than inferring it from a racial group categorisation, as did historical precedents in the Americas.     

Utilizing a Family Decision-Making Lens to Examine Adults’ End-of-Life Planning Actions

Guided by Rettig’s family decision-making theory, the study investigated the effect of an adult child’s decision environment, an adult child’s decision-making perceptions, and a parent’s end-of-life (EOL) planning actions before death on an integrated measure of medical and financial EOL planning actions. Data came from Wave 3 of the public use data of the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study. Results indicated that household net worth, parent’s completion of a living will before death, and adult children’s avoidance of death ideation explained the greatest proportion of variance in adult children’s EOL planning actions. Results also indicated that women, those married, and those with higher education did more EOL planning. Practitioners can use this information to close accessibility gaps due to net worth differences, advocate for a more unified approach to EOL planning, and shift the focus of discussions of death from the death itself to a life well lived.     

“We walk on eggshells”: A phenomenological inquiry of wives’ experiences of living with active-duty Marine husbands with PTSD

ABSTRACT

In this qualitative study, the authors explored the lived experiences of wives married to active-duty male Marines who have a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The first author and primary investigator conducted in-depth interviews with eight women, all of whom had been married more than 3 years and experienced at least one deployment while married. Transcendental phenomenology was used to gain an understanding of each woman’s experience. The central research question in this study was “What is it like to live with an active-duty male Marine with PTSD?” Findings demonstrated five essential themes: (1) the unpredictability of living with someone with PTSD, (2) the spouse had to take on different roles, (3) the wives felt unprepared to handle PTSD, (4) the wives received different messages when trying to seek help for their husbands, and (5) the wives wanted to send messages to other wives living with Marines with PTSD.     

Stress,Depression, and Drug Use Among Aging Mexican American Men Living in the Barrio

Residing in Mexican American barrios might place individuals at heightened risk for chronic financial and acute stress, which are associated with adverse mental health outcomes. Stressors could be exacerbated for substance users. This research explores relations between chronic financial stress, acute stress, and depressive symptomatology among aging Mexican American heroin and other drug-using men. A prospective cohort study and field-intensive outreach methodology were used to recruit 227 men for in-depth interviews. Participants were categorized into depressed and nondepressed groups based on symptomatology measured by the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale. Chronic financial stress (i.e., poverty) and acute stress (i.e., Life Events Questionnaire) associated with depressive symptomatology were tested using logistic regression. Findings suggest scores of depressive symptoms among substance users are highly related to chronic financial stress. Community-level interventions targeting chronic stressors present in the barrio could be especially salient in improving the mental health of Latino drug users.     

Effects and Durability of an SBIRT Training Curriculum for First-Year MSW Students

Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) is an evidence-based process for identification, prevention, and treatment of alcohol misuse. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of an alcohol-focused training on first-year MSW students’ (n = 71) knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs about SBIRT. Changes in item means were assessed using repeated-measures analysis of variance (critical α = .002). Data indicated a significant and strong main effect for training; perceived competence improved immediately and remained significantly higher 30 days posttraining. Other improvements included knowing what questions to ask patients, ease making alcohol-related statements, and believing that it is rewarding to work with at-risk patients.     

“Learning to become a better man”: Insights from a fathering programme for incarcerated Indigenous men

This paper reports a qualitative study of incarcerated Indigenous fathers in Australia, using a framework of generative fathering. Researchers interviewed 28 imprisoned Indigenous men about their experiences of parenting and their responses to a parenting programme. Participants identified how the programme supported their learning and their capacity to embrace the role of parenting the next generation. Responses indicate that the programme's format and content were relevant to their experience as Indigenous fathers, and enhanced by the skills of the facilitator, and provision of a safe learning environment. It facilitated their growth as individuals and as parents through acknowledging their cultural identity and roles.     

Worried,concerned and untroubled: antecedents and consequences of youth worry

Using a pattern‐based approach, worry was explored in relation to military youths' developmental and contextual characteristics, and pivotal outcomes (depressive symptoms, self‐efficacy, well‐being, coping styles, academic performance and deployment adjustment). Data were collected from parents and adolescents, age 11 to 18, living in the USA (n = 273 families). Variations in individual characteristics (age and gender), military family factors (rank, recent deployment, parents' resilient coping abilities) and family relational characteristics (parents' marital status, warm parenting, marital quality) were related to heterogeneous worry typologies. Depressive symptoms, self‐efficacy and well‐being, varied across the worry typologies. Implications are drawn from these findings for identifying potential interventions that can be accessed to modify these worry patterns and limit their harmful effects.     

Women’s views about the timing of birth

Background

Estimated date of birth (EDB) is used to guide the care provided to women during pregnancy and birth, although its imprecision is recognised. Alternatives to the EDB have been suggested for use with women however their attitudes to timing of birth information have not been examined.

Data-Informed Ebook Discovery: An Analytical Approach to the User Experience

ABSTRACT

This article reports on an effort to better understand the discoverability of ebook collections at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH). Library staff analyzed titles in nine ebook packages across disciplines and conducted a two-pronged analysis of how discoverable titles in these collections were, both in Summon Discovery Service and the online catalog, and the quality of what could be discovered about the ebooks with these tools. This study revealed that discoverability of ebooks is not equal across collections, and some collections require more work to make them discoverable in Summon and the catalog. Finally, the majority of titles were discovered in Summon, but the catalog still seems to be a better discovery engine for these ebooks.