FAMILY CARERS: SOME IMPEDIMENTS TO EFFECTIVE POLICY AND SERVICE DEVELOPMENT

The shift to community care for people with disabilities in Australia has given rise to some recognition and acknowledgment, in both academic research and policy development, of the importance of their carers. However, information about government policy and services for carers is fragmented and limited. Our knowledge about the prevalence of caregiving and the socio-demographic characteristics of carers and their service needs, is inadequate. Studies in relation to carer use of and satisfaction with services tend to be small scale and focussed on a specific service or carer group. Carer views on broader mainstream service provision have received little attention. This paper identifies gaps in our knowledge as well as the practical and conceptual difficulties in documenting the range of services available and the relevant social policy. These difficulties are likely to reflect barriers to broad and effective policy and service development.     

Latent variable techniques for categorical data

Two useful statistical methods for generating a latent variable are described and extended to incorporate polytomous data and additional covariates. Item response analysis is not well-known outside its area of application, mainly because the procedures to fit the models are computer intensive and not routinely available within general statistical software packages. The linear score technique is less computer intensive, straightforward to implement and has been proposed as a good approximation to item response analysis. Both methods have been implemented in the standard statistical software package GLIM 4.0, and are compared to determine their effectiveness.     

Australian Policies on Special Education: Towards a Sociological Account

The discussion analyses Australian national and four State policies from a sociological perspective. It examines these written policies (as distinct from stated and enacted policies, cf. Macdonald, 1981) along a number of dimensions, and theorises the various integrationist positions in these policies, using Demaine's (1981) and Culley & Demaine's (1983) framework. In addition, it comments on other aspects of these policies which have social and sociological significance, including their social control implications.     

Independent Living: gender, violence and the threat of violence

In what ways is independent living for young adults with disabilities compromised by violence and its threat? A qualitative study of 42 young adults with severe physical disabilities explored their perceptions and concerns about independent living, access to services and the meeting of needs. Young women especially experienced difficulties about leaving home, because of their own and their parents' fears about vulnerability; some who did leave home experienced highly restricted social lives because of anxiety about neighbourhood violence. Few had established partnerships, but violence and sexual abuse from partners emerged as an issue for which there is little policy. Control and abuse within caring relationships are serious issues for those who need personal care. Violence and lack of protection may undermine independent living, especially for women.     

Adult children of parents with mental illness: navigating stigma

The experiences of children who live with parental mental illness are becoming increasingly recognized. However, there remains a limited body of knowledge in relation to an individual's longer term experiences. This study sought adult children's experiences of childhood parental mental illness. It generated reflections of 13 adult children who had lived with parents with mental illness during their childhood. The narrative design of the study facilitated a voice for participants. The paper presents one main theme of the findings. The findings offer a unique insight into childhood awareness of social stigmas and children's behavioural changes to avoid disclosure of parental mental illness. Participants noted that they were aware of social stigmas associated with mental illness during their childhood. This contributed to their fear of disclosure to others that fuelled a culture of familial secrecy, reinforcing the children's own sense of difference. Further work is required to enhance community understanding about the familial journeys of parental mental illness and the impact of negative‐natured stigmas.     

On the relation between ‘visual research methods’ and contemporary visual culture

One of the most striking developments across the social sciences in the past decade has been the growth of research methods using visual materials. It is often suggested that this growth is somehow related to the increasing importance of visual images in contemporary social and cultural practice. However, the form of the relationship between ‘visual research methods’ and ‘contemporary visual culture’ has not yet been interrogated. This paper conducts such an interrogation, exploring the relation between ‘visual research methods’ – as they are constituted in quite particular ways by a growing number of handbooks, reviews, conference and journals – and contemporary visual culture – as characterized by discussions of ‘convergence culture’. The paper adopts a performative approach to ‘visual research methods’. It suggests that when they are used, ‘visual research methods’ create neither a ‘social’ articulated through culturally mediated images, nor a ‘research participant’ competency in using such images. Instead, the paper argues that the intersection of visual culture and ‘visual research methods’ should be located in their shared way of using images, since in both, images tend to be deployed much more as communicational tools than as representational texts. The paper concludes by placing this argument in the context of recent discussions about the production of sociological knowledge in the wider social field.