Specific Aspects of Minority Stress Associated With Depression Among LDS Affiliated Non-Heterosexual Adults

A nation-wide sample of 634 previous or current members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS), non-heterosexual adults (ages 18–33), were surveyed to examine how specific aspects of minority stress are individually and collectively associated with depression, and how such associations differ across sex, sexual orientation, and level of affiliation with the LDS church. When five stressors were examined simultaneously, need for others’ acceptance (NA) was the strongest predictor of depression, followed by internalized homophobia (IH). All minority stress factors were found to be individually predictive of depression and did not differ across sex or sexual orientation subgroups. Differences were observed, however, when considering current LDS status, such that participants who were no longer affiliated with the LDS church reported stronger relationships between some minority stressors and depression. Implications of religious identity salience as a potential mediator of relationships between specific stressors and depression are discussed.     

A Comparison of Two Data Analysis Training Methods for Paraprofessionals in an Educational Setting

Analyzing and using student educational data to guide instructional programming is a critical staff skill to ensure quality programming based on applied behavior analysis. We compared two training methods to teach staff to use rules to analyze graphed educational data to enact program changes: didactic instruction and behavioral skills training using direct practice. Participants showed improvements in verbally identifying data patterns using simulated data; however, participants in the latter group were also effective using actual student data. The lack of correspondence between rule identification and rule following challenges the assumption that an individual’s ability to identify rules predicts actual performance.     

Measurement of Dating Aggression During Middle School: Structure,Measurement Invariance,and Distinction From General Aggression

Two studies examined the factor structure of a modified version of the Safe Dates dating aggression scale and evaluated whether dating aggression is distinct from general aggression during early adolescence. Analyses were conducted on a derivation sample of 3,894 adolescents from 37 schools (Study 1) and an independent cross‐validation sample of 938 middle school youth (Study 2). Categorical confirmatory factor analyses supported a two‐factor model (perpetration and victimization) over models differentiating psychological and physical forms of aggression. The model was invariant across time, sex, grade, and season. Study 2 also supported dating aggression as distinct from general aggression. Results supported measuring dating aggression perpetration and victimization as latent constructs represented by ordered categorical indicators that capture item severity and frequency.     

Making Sense of Inequalities: How Do Clinical Commissioning Groups in England Understand their New Role?

This research explored how newly forming clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) were beginning to think about their new ‘duty’ to tackle health inequalities (HIs), as outlined in UK health policy. The concept of ‘sensemaking’ (Weick 1995) was used to illustrate the influences on CCGs’ interpretations of the policy. Three CCGs in the North of England were recruited, and qualitative methods, including interviews, observations and document analysis, were used to collect data, over a period from January 2012 to December 2012. The tangibility of central policy objectives is important in providing clear guidance and direction to organizations trying to tackle large scale policy agendas such as HIs. At a local level, both individual and collective organizational histories and wider relationships were influential on the way CCGs understood the problem of HIs and how they decided to try to tackle the issue locally. The research highlights what influences local level relationships and what factors need to be considered when trying to interpret and implement national policy at a local level.     

Language Matching Among Mother‐child Dyads: Associations with Child Attachment and Emotion Reactivity

Links between mother‐infant affective matching and attachment security are well‐documented, but research on other types of behavioral matching and attachment security are lacking, as are studies that examine these constructs later in children's development. We examine language style matching (LSM) between mothers and their school‐aged children (N = 68), using interviews with each dyad member. As predicted, regressions revealed that higher mother‐child relational LSM was associated with greater child attachment security (operationalized as high security, low dismissal), and that higher LSM predicted smaller increases in children's electrodermal response to a relational probe 1.5 years later. Further, mother‐child relational LSM was a mediator in the indirect path between children's attachment security and children's reactivity. We discuss the potential utility of LSM as a measure of relationship quality and future studies that could refine our understanding of parent‐child language matching.     

Beliefs about alcohol and the college experience, locus of self, and college undergraduates’ drinking patterns

The purpose of this study is to assess the extent to which locus of self (institutional versus impulse), measured using the Twenty Statements Test (TST), moderates the relationship between beliefs about alcohol and the college experience (BACE) and alcohol use among college undergraduates. Although the majority of our respondents listed more idiosyncratic personal characteristics and preferences than consensual social roles in response to the TST, the number of students classified as institutionals was notably higher than what has been reported within the literature. In opposition to our hypothesis that BACE would affect levels of alcohol consumption primarily among these individuals, our results indicated that the perception that alcohol use is integral to the college experience had a relatively minimal effect on drinking among respondents who defined themselves in terms of institutional roles. Moreover, multiple social roles themselves appeared to reduce the effects of BACE on levels of alcohol consumption. More impulse-oriented personal characteristics and preferences did not exhibit this moderating influence. Thus, our findings suggest that role occupation may be more important than locus of self in shaping students’ susceptibility to beliefs about drinking and college life.     

State capacity: the missing piece in child welfare privatization

Privatization has been used to address the limited capacity of government to achieve positive results in child welfare systems. Privatized systems have not realized better outcomes than their public counterparts, however, and many states continue to struggle with implementation. In order to demonstrate that privatization is in fact an investment on the part of the state, rather than a solution to limited public resources, this article explores the relationship between state capacity and privatization and makes recommendations for more effective partnerships between the public and private sectors.     

College student perceptions on campus alcohol policies and consumption patterns

Environmental strategies for colleges and universities to reduce alcohol consumption among their students include the development and enforcement of campus alcohol policies. This study examines students' knowledge and attitudes toward campus alcohol policies and how they relate to alcohol consumption and alcohol social norms. A sample of 422 freshman students was surveyed during their first month at a 4-year public college. Findings indicated that the majority of students (89%) were aware of campus policies, yet of those who were aware, less than half (44%) were accepting of these campus rules and regulations. In addition, the majority (79%) of students drank at social events, despite this behavior being in direct violation of campus alcohol policies. However, those who supported campus rules consumed significantly less alcohol at social events than those who opposed or had no opinion of the rules. Also, those who supported the rules perceived that their peers and students in general consumed significantly less alcohol at social events than those who were opposed or had no opinion. This outcome supports the premise established by several theories of behavior change including the theory of planned behavior, which state that behavior is influenced less by knowledge than by attitude and intention.