Community Interests and Indicator System Success

Testing the validity of indicator systems is a task almost always left to the scientific community, in standard practice and in keeping with the quest for objectivity prevalent in politics and in society as a whole. This paper calls for a reinvigorated agenda within indicators research to question this practice and develop alternative methodologies to test the validity, legitimacy and impacts of indicator systems. The assumptions of objectivity are not realistic in contemporary policy contexts. As a result, the scientific community is not the only community with a stake in assessing an indicator system; it is perhaps not even the most important one. Four other community types with distinct interests in the design, use and impacts of indicator systems are identified. First is the community of elected officials, whose positions of power make their perspective important and unique; second is the community of engaged publics, whose stake is made clear by the principles of participatory and deliberative democracy; third are communities of cultural difference; and fourth are professional communities. The unique relationship each of these communities has with indicator systems, and thus the tests and challenges offered by each to the practice of indicators, is discussed through a case study of a public participation process for the development of a new set of regional sustainability indicators in Vancouver, Canada. The evidence suggests new research questions for scholars in policy and indicators studies who seek to better understand paths and barriers to implementation and impact in indicators practice, as well as lessons for other local indicators practices.

Electroencephalographic Evidence of Abnormal Anticipatory Uncertainty Processing in Gambling Disorder Patients

Putting money at stake produces anticipatory uncertainty, a process that has been linked to key features of gambling. Here we examined how learning and individual differences modulate the stimulus preceding negativity (SPN, an electroencephalographic signature of perceived uncertainty of valued outcomes) in gambling disorder patients (GDPs) and healthy controls (HCs), during a non-gambling contingency learning task. Twenty-four GDPs and 26 HCs performed a causal learning task under conditions of high and medium uncertainty (HU, MU; null and positive cue-outcome contingency, respectively). Participants were asked to predict the outcome trial-by-trial, and to regularly judge the strength of the cue-outcome contingency. A pre-outcome SPN was extracted from simultaneous electroencephalographic recordings for each participant, uncertainty level, and task block. The two groups similarly learnt to predict the occurrence of the outcome in the presence/absence of the cue. In HCs, SPN amplitude decreased as the outcome became predictable in the MU condition, a decrement that was absent in the HU condition, where the outcome remained unpredictable during the task. Most importantly, GDPs’ SPN remained high and insensitive to task type and block. In GDPs, the SPN amplitude was linked to gambling preferences. When both groups were considered together, SPN amplitude was also related to impulsivity. GDPs thus showed an abnormal electrophysiological response to outcome uncertainty, not attributable to faulty contingency learning. Differences with controls were larger in frequent players of passive games, and smaller in players of more active games. Potential psychological mechanisms underlying this set of effects are discussed.     

Spanish version of the Objectified Body Consciousness Scale (OBCS): results from two samples of female university students / Versión española de la Objectified Body Consciousness Scale (OBCS): resultados correspondientes a dos muestras de estudiantes universitarias

Self-objectification happens when people internalize a view of themselves as an object or collection of body parts. Two studies were conducted to validate the Spanish version of the Objectified Body Consciousness Scale (OBCS). This scale assesses self-objectification through three components: body surveillance, body shame and appearance control beliefs in women. In Study 1 and Study 2, 218 and 201 female undergraduate students, respectively, responded to the Spanish version of this scale and other related measures. In Study 2, they also reported on their emotions after being exposed to an objectifying scenario. The three subscales of the Spanish version of the OBCS showed acceptable indices of internal consistency (ranging between α = .68 to .84), and the confirmatory factor analysis showed a three-factor solution to be the most appropriate. Adequate convergent validity was found with respect to the Self-Objectification Questionnaire (SOQ) and other variables such as self-esteem, other-directedness, hostile sexism and enjoyment of sexualization. These findings suggest that the Spanish version of the OBCS is a satisfactory measure of college women’s self-objectification.     

Promoting Twenty-first-century Student Competencies: A Wellbeing Approach

In Australia and internationally, universities are preparing students for the twenty-first century through building the competencies fundamental for both social sustainability and wellbeing. However, there is little evidence on how these competencies can be fostered in curricula. This article presents the findings of a mixed-methods pilot of an Aboriginal wellbeing intervention that seeks to build such attributes when integrated into an undergraduate social work curriculum. A questionnaire incorporating the validated Growth and Empowerment Measure, the Australian Unity Personal Wellbeing Index, and open-ended qualitative questions was administrated to 64 first-year social work students before and after the intervention. Significant changes on both measures suggest that the intervention is highly relevant for student wellbeing, particularly for those who rated themselves as below the median at baseline. The qualitative findings highlight the relevance of the program for promoting social competencies that enable people to problem-solve and adapt in a complex world.     

(Un)settled states: Indian Ocean passages,performative belonging and restless mobility in post‐apartheid South African fiction

A number of post‐apartheid literary works revisit nineteenth‐ to early twentieth‐century Indian Ocean passages. Bringing into visibility South Africa’s other ocean – until recently largely occluded by the conceptual bedazzlement of the black Atlantic – they unsettle some of the paradigms through which it has been imagined. This article explores five such novels, which articulate or critique various citizenship claims through a poetics of (un)settlement. One strand from this cluster employs rhetorical strategies such as an ‘Atlantic register’ to translate oceanic routes into territorial roots, mobility into autochthony; the other registers a more unsettled state as it scrutinises the gendered politics of home‐making and national belonging, and issues a retort to the multicultural imagination.     

Protective Effects of Parent–College Student Communication During the First Semester of College

Abstract

Objective: Recent studies suggest that parents maintain influence as their adolescents transition into college. Advances in communication technology make frequent communication between parents and college students easy and affordable. This study examines the protective effect of parent–college student communication on student drinking behaviors, estimated peak blood alcohol concentration (eBAC), and serious negative consequences of drinking. Participants: Participants were 746 first-year, first-time, full-time students at a large university in the United States Methods: Participants completed a baseline and 14 daily Web-based surveys. Results: The amount of time spent communicating with parents on weekend days predicted the number of drinks consumed, heavy drinking, and peak eBAC, consistent with a protective within-person effect. No association between communication and serious negative consequences was observed. Conclusions: Encouraging parents to communicate with their college students, particularly on weekend days, could be a relatively simple, easily implemented protective process to reduce dangerous drinking behaviors.