Familism Values,Perspective Taking,and Prosocial Moral Reasoning: Predicting Prosocial Tendencies Among Mexican American Adolescents

Mexican American youth often engage in relatively high levels of prosocial behaviors. We theorize that this may be due to a cultural value system that encourages familism values, which, in turn, may foster the development of sociocognitive processes that promote prosocial behaviors. Two hundred and five Mexican American early adolescent youth (M_age = 10.9 years, SD = 0.84; 51% girls) reported their familism values, perspective taking, prosocial moral reasoning, and six types of prosocial behaviors. The results indicated that perspective taking partially mediated the relation between familism values and the specific prosocial tendencies theoretically linked to the Mexican American culture. The study demonstrated the utility of integrating cultural and traditional developmental mechanisms in attempting to explain prosocial behaviors.     

Partnerships, Power and the "New" Politics of Community Participation in British Health Care

Multi–sectoral approaches to health improvement in its broadest sense have entailed an emphasis by the British government upon partnership working in and around community involvement in planning processes. New service planning and delivery organizations in the health service—primary care groups and primary care trusts—thus have to ensure that public and patient involvement strategies reflect a coordinated, if not integrated, multi–sectoral approach to such involvement. But how are these enforced partnership arrangements shaping the approach taken by primary care groups and trusts to the issue of public and patient involvement? More particularly, is the traditional dominance of health service managers and the medical profession in decision–making processes under challenge? This article draws on a study of primary care groups and trusts in three districts in order to gauge perceptions and calculations with regard to partnerships for involvement. Results appear to suggest that health service managers and practitioners continue to exercise considerable influence in comparison to that of patients and citizens. But, if the findings are viewed in the broader contexts of government managerialist strategies of surveillance and accountability and the growth of service–user and advocacy organizations, partnerships may offer significant scope for “lay” challenges to managerial and medical power.     

Sterilization: Whose Right to Choose?

As there is presently no safe, freely available and fully effective mode of contraception, voluntary sterilization remains a matter of importance in this sphere. The legal right to such a choice has slowly evolved and it now seems clear that there is no legal barrier to such a choice by a competent adult. Yet, at a practical level, it seems that hospitals and medical practitioners will not readily accede to a request by an individual for such an operation and usually insist on the consent of the spouse if the person is married. The disparity between the law and existing practice is examined. It is argued that an adult individual should basically have a right to determine what shall be done with his own body, and that the onus is heavily on those who exceptionally seek to justify intervention.     

A Translation and Validation Study of the Life Orientation Test Revised in the Greek Speaking Population of Nurses among Three Hospitals in Athens and Ioannina

The life orientation test-revised (LOT-R) (Scheier et al. in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 67:1063–1078, 1994) is a brief measure for assessing dispositional optimism. The aim of this study was to develop a Greek language version of the LOT-R and to assess the instrument’s psychometric properties. The LOT-R was translated and culturally adopted in Greek language, and the final version was administered, along with a questionnaire consisting socioeconomic characteristics and a single item measuring optimism, to 276 Greek speaking, hospital nurses (222 female, 54 male), aged 22–65 years (mean 37.8, SD 8.3). Results showed that the LOT-R has good internal consistency (Cronbach’s α = .71 and item total correlation coefficients from .27 to .73, a unitary structure, and stability over a 3-months period (r = .66). Moreover, the Greek version of the scale exhibited good convergent validity with single-item optimism scale (r = .73). Principal components analysis revealed a two-factor structure representing the constructs of optimism and pessimism. The Greek life orientation test revised appears to be a valid tool in assessing dispositional optimism in Greek speaking people and is expected to facilitate the examination of optimism in Greek speaking populations.     

The impact of mortality development on the number of centenarians in England and wales

The world is ageing both at an individual and a population level, and population ageing is truly a global phenomenon. Life expectancies at birth have increased at the global level from 47 years in the mid-20th century to around 70 years today, and are expected to rise to 76 years by the mid-21st century. The proportion of the world’s population aged 60 years and over has increased from 8 % in the mid-20th century to 12 %, and by 2050 it is expected to reach 21 %. The emergence of large numbers of centenarians has accompanied this development. This paper outlines this emergence historically and the likely growth in the number of centenarians in the 21st century, in particular in England and Wales, analysing mortality trends since 1840 and the rise in the number of centenarians in the 20th and 21st centuries. The number of centenarians in England and Wales increased from around 160 in 1922 to almost 12,500 by 2012, but if mortality at all ages had remained constant from 1912 to 2012, then by 2012 the number of centenarians would only have been around 720. By 2100, the number of centenarians is expected to reach around 1.4 million, but if future mortality at all ages were to remain constant, then by 2100 the number of centenarians would be around 78,000. However, if predicted mortality for those aged 55 years and over was to decrease by an additional 5 % every 5 years until 2100, then the number of centenarians in England and Wales would reach around 1.8 million by the end of the century.     

Seroadaptive Strategies of Vancouver Gay and Bisexual Men in a Treatment as Prevention Environment

British Columbia’s treatment as prevention policy has provided free access to highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) to all HIV-positive provincial residents since 1996. One outcome is an increase in HIV-positive gay and bisexual men (GBM) with suppressed viral loads. Previous cross-sectional analyses indicated that some Vancouver GBM now recognize condomless anal sex with men on HAART who report a suppressed viral load as a seroadaptive strategy. To test the hypothesis that this new strategy, termed viral load sorting (VLS), is recognized and used among by GBM in the Momentum Health Study, we analyzed longitudinal data for HIV-negative/unknown (n = 556) and HIV-positive (n = 218) serostatus participants. Analyses indicated that both groups reported VLS, and that serostatus and Treatment Optimism Scale scores were significant determinants in frequency and use. Results exemplify the medicalization of sex and Rogers’ Diffusion Of Preventative Innovations Model, and they have important implications for HIV research and GBM sexual decision-making.     

Trust in American Government: Longitudinal Measurement Equivalence in the ANES, 1964–2008

For over 50 years (1958–2012) the American National Election Studies (ANES) survey has been measuring citizens’ evaluations of the trustworthiness of the “government in Washington”—an indicator that has been widely used to monitor the dynamics of political trust in the US over time. However, a critical assumption in using attitudinal constructs for longitudinal research is that the meaning-and-interpretation of such items should be comparable across groups of respondents at any one point in time and across samples over time. Using multigroup confirmatory factor analysis for ordered-categorical data, we test the measurement equivalence assumption with data collected by the ANES from 1964 to 2008. The results confirm that the ANES’ political trust scale has the same basic factorial structure over time. But for two key items, several threshold parameters were found to be different across time points, indicating that the meaning-and-interpretation of these questions, and especially the question about whether the government in Washington wastes money that people pay in taxes, varies significantly over time.