Building a virtual research and teaching community

The Sloan Work and Family Research Network was created to provide web-based resources to individuals interested in work–family studies. The Network's website includes a database that contains over 5,000 citations/annotations of work–family research, a range of teaching resources for faculty and a newsletter. Experiences with the implementation of this project offer opportunities to consider the importance of devising community-building strategies for virtual networks that function as part of the ‘invisible college’.     

Texas college students' opinions of no-smoking policies, secondhand smoke, and smoking in public places

Abstract. The authors examined college student opinions of no-smoking policies, secondhand smoke, and smoking in public places. A convenience sample of 1,188 (66.4% female; 26.9% White, 64.1% Black, and 9.0% Hispanic) students attending 5 Texas colleges volunteered to complete a 60-item anonymous survey on tobacco attitudes and behaviors. Results of our study showed that women, Black students, and nonsmoking students reported the most favorable attitudes toward no smoking. Male students, white students, and students who smoked in the past 30 days (current smokers) reported the least favorable attitudes. The lowest level of agreement by all subgroups was provided for prohibiting smoking everywhere on campus (inside and outside of buildings). Implications for tobacco control on college campuses are discussed.     

Explaining organizational variation in flexible work arrangements: why the pattern and scale of availability matter

This study examines flexible work arrangement (FWA) availability in 2009 in a sample of 545 American employers. While most employers offer FWAs to some of their workforce, few offer these to the majority of their workers. Those employers that offer flexible work options tend to rely most heavily on flexibility in the scheduling and place of work. Seldom do organizations make options of reducing work and/or pausing work available to majority portions of their labor forces. Industry sector, labor market conditions, and organizational cultural support of flexibility are predictive of wide-scale FWA availability. This study reveals that FWAs remain out of reach for most workers, but that some conditions may foster greater availability.     

Political Violence and Adolescent Out‐group Attitudes and Prosocial Behaviors: Implications for Positive Inter‐group Relations

The negative impact of political violence on adolescent adjustment is well established. Less is known about factors that affect adolescents' positive outcomes in ethnically divided societies, especially influences on prosocial behaviors toward the out‐group, which may promote constructive relations. For example, understanding how inter‐group experiences and attitudes motivate out‐group helping may foster inter‐group co‐operation and help to consolidate peace. The current study investigated adolescents' overall and out‐group prosocial behaviors across two time points in Belfast, Northern Ireland (N = 714 dyads; 49% male; Time 1: M = 14.7, SD = 2.0, years old). Controlling for Time 1 prosocial behaviors, age, and gender, multi‐variate structural equation modeling showed that experience with inter‐group sectarian threat predicted fewer out‐group prosocial behaviors at Time 2 at the trend level. On the other hand, greater experience of intra‐group non‐sectarian threat at Time 1 predicted more overall and out‐group prosocial behaviors at Time 2. Moreover, positive out‐group attitudes strengthened the link between intra‐group threat and out‐group prosocial behaviors one year later. Finally, experience with intra‐group non‐sectarian threat and out‐group prosocial behaviors at Time 1 was related to more positive out‐group attitudes at Time 2. The implications for youth development and inter‐group relations in post‐accord societies are discussed.     

Maternal Religiosity,Family Resources and Stressors,and Parent–Child Attachment Security in Northern Ireland

This study explores the associations between mothers' religiosity, and families' and children's functioning in a stratified random sample of 695 Catholic and Protestant mother–child dyads in socially deprived areas in Belfast, Northern Ireland, a region which has experienced centuries of sectarian conflict between Protestant Unionists and Catholics Nationalists. Findings based on mother and child surveys indicated that even in this context of historical political violence associated with religious affiliation, mothers' religiosity played a consistently positive role, including associations with multiple indicators of better family functioning (i.e., more cohesion and behavioral control and less conflict, psychological distress, and adjustment problems) and greater parent–child attachment security. Mothers' religiosity also moderated the association between parent–child attachment security and family resources and family stressors, enhancing positive effects of cohesion and mother behavioral control on mother–child attachment security, and providing protection against risks associated with mothers' psychological distress. Findings are discussed in terms of implications for understanding the role of religiosity in serving as a protective or risk factor for children and families.     

Marital Conflict, Child Emotional Security about Family Relationships and Child Adjustment

Addressing a gap in process‐oriented understanding of relations between marital conflict and children's adjustment, propositions of the emotional security hypothesis from a family‐wide perspective were tested in a longitudinal research design. Participants were 181 families and their 11–12 year‐old‐child (115 boys, 76 girls) living in Wales, in the United Kingdom. Relations between marital conflict, children's emotional security about marital conflict and parenting, respectively, and children's adjustment were assessed based on reports by mothers, fathers, and children and videotaped analogue procedures completed by children. Structural equation modelling indicated that children's emotional security about interparental conflict (emotional regulation, cognitive representations and behavioural regulation) mediated the relation between marital conflict and children's security about parenting. Processes pertaining to children's security in multiple family systems (i.e., interparental and parent–child) provided an indirect mechanism through which interparental conflict affected children's symptoms of psychological distress (internalising and externalising problems) assessed 12 months later. Future directions for further tests of comprehensive, theoretically based models for the effects of marital conflict on children are discussed.     

The impact of touch‐tone data entry on reports of HIV and STD risk behaviors in telephone interviews

Respondents’ concerns about privacy can decrease reporting of HIV and STD risk behaviors in general population telephone surveys. The purpose of this paper is to describe the results of an experimental study evaluating whether one method for increasing privacy, touch‐tone data entry (TTDE), is effective in increasing estimates of sexual behaviors from a population‐based survey. We conducted a random‐digit‐dial telephone survey of adults in New Jersey (n = 405), with half the respondents using TTDE for answering sexual behavior questions. TTDE led to increased reports of same‐sex sexual behavior, certain HIV and STD risk factors, and concern about one's risk for HIV and STD transmission. TTDE also narrowed the difference between men's and women's reports of the number of different sexual partners over the past 10 years. The feasibility and limitations of TTDE are discussed, along with possible alternative interpretations that consider the impact of TTDE on the dynamics of the interaction between the respondent and the interviewer.