Decision-Making of Mothers in Hong Kong Regarding the Occasional Use of Alternative Child-Care Arrangements

This study examines the use of alternative child-care arrangements as an everyday life decision in a family context. Interviews with twenty-four mothers from a working class neighborhood in a new town in Hong Kong were transcribed and analyzed using a grounded theory approach. Results of the analysis outlined: (a) the structural components of making a decision regarding alternative care, which consisted of demands, resource options, definitions of the situation, types of decision situations, and the respective decision-making strategies; and (b) the nature of decision-making processes, varying from ad hoc to standing. Together, these aspects illuminate how mothers make decisions regarding the use of alternative child-care arrangements and, in turn, the characteristics of family decision-making in everyday life.     

Butterfly diversity,habitat and vegetation usage in Hong Kong urban parks

The conservation value of urban parks for butterfly communities remains poorly understood, particularly for tropical butterflies in Asia. We conducted point count and route transect butterfly surveys, and used them to sample four habitats located within 13 urban parks across Hong Kong. We found 1054 individuals and 58 species of butterflies recorded in 60 survey hours over 6 months. This represents approximately one quarter of the entire known Hong Kong butterfly species list. Over 30 % of the individuals counted were Catospilia sp. but six of the species identified are classified locally as rare or very rare. Tree-covered habitats and grasslands showed higher butterfly diversity than open areas. The most common butterfly behavior was “directed flight,” which we also found to be habitat-dependent and most common in ponds and open areas. We additionally observed the use of vegetation in urban parks, which included 40 species of nectar plant and four records of butterfly oviposition. The high butterfly diversity, presence of rare species and usage of vegetation (especially as a nectar resource) we documented in this study suggests that urban parks have some conservation value for Hong Kong. However, the use of pesticides and heavy vegetation clearing may limit significant butterfly reproduction and population growth. Altogether these results emphasize the diversity of uses of urban parks for butterflies in Hong Kong while also providing possible directions for improvement in habitat and vegetation management that could increase urban park value for biodiversity.     

Mobile Phone Usage Preferences: The Contributing Factors of Personality,Social Anxiety and Loneliness

Psychological factors and social relationships are important components that influence an individual’s communication style. This paper aims to examine the association of personality factors, social anxiety (SA) and loneliness with mobile phone (MP) usage preferences on the basis of voice calling and text messaging. Malaysian MP users (N = 187) completed four questionnaires (Mobile Phone Usage Questionnaire, Big Five Inventory, Interaction Anxiousness Scale and UCLA Loneliness Scale) on paper or online via a web-link. Multiple regression analyses revealed that personality, SA and loneliness broadly predicted preferences for voice calling or text messaging. Further analyses examining the predictability of time spent on voice calls/text messaging and number of people called/exchanged text messages also revealed some significant findings in regards to the openness-to-experience personality dimension, loneliness and SA. The findings of this research have important implications to tailoring the delivery of psychological services to individuals diagnosed with chronic loneliness and SA.     

Equity in sustainable development: Community responses to environmental gentrification

Sustainable development aims to address economic, social, and environmental imperatives; yet, in practice, it often embodies a neoliberal market logic that reinforces inequalities. Thus, as the social work profession grapples with its role in advancing environmental sustainability, practice models must explicitly attend to social and economic justice. For example, environmental gentrification refers to situations in which the cleanup of contaminated land or the installation of environmental amenities intentionally or unintentionally catalyzes increased housing costs, thereby contributing to the displacement of vulnerable residents. With the goal of contributing to practice knowledge, we conducted a systematic review of peer‐reviewed articles (1997?2017) to learn how community groups have responded to the threat of environmental gentrification. We found that community organizations employ a range of strategies, including blocking development, negotiating for protections, planning alternatives, and allying with gentrifiers. We conclude by exploring ethical implications and practice principles to help social workers engage in truly sustainable development. Key Practitioner Message: ? The term environmental gentrification describes situations where improvements to environmental quality increase real estate prices, contributing to the displacement of vulnerable residents; ? An environmental justice framework attending to procedural, distributional, and recognition‐based claims provides a model for social work practice; ? Opportunities exist for social workers to take an intersectional rather than siloed approach to integrate economic, social, and environmental concerns.     

Giving Back and Staying Put: Volunteering as a Stabilizing Force in Relocation

Relocation in older adulthood has been shown to have health-related and environmental triggering factors. This study explores the relationship between volunteering in a community and relocation. Using data from the 2008 and 2010 Health and Retirement Study, which included 9,220 community-dwelling older individuals who were aged 65 years and older, our findings show that volunteering significantly reduces the likelihood of relocating out of the area, and such a relationship is partially mediated by having friends nearby. This study is innovative because it identifies a stabilizing mechanism important for understanding protective factors, such as volunteering, as a way communities can retain older adults.     

What culture for the post-national subject? Understanding the nation through translation

The central question guiding this project asks: what are the possibilities of conceptualizing a political subject beyond the national cultural boundaries? In order to answer this question, I undertake, from the perspective of conceptual history, a historical reconstruction of the meaning of cultural translation, as a process that frames the integration of designed cultural minorities into the national, majoritarian community. This paper evaluates the possibility of political theory to oppose cultural racism, from neither a normative nor absolute point of view, but from the movement beyond cultural assimilation suggested by a redefinition of cultural translation.     

Parenting Discrepancy and Child Development in Chinese Context

Although parent–child discrepant perception of the family has been increasingly noted in the west, pertinent research is limited in Chinese societies. In addition, prior pertinent studies predominantly treated parent–child discrepant effects as independent of the general and aggregate family context, which are in fact inseparable. Furthermore, these studies tended to either look at the positive side of child outcomes or those negative ones. The present study, based on a community sample of 223 Chinese parent–child dyads, attempted to examine effects of parent–child discrepancy in effective parenting practices on both children’s positive, i.e. self-control and other perspective taking behavior, and negative outcomes, i.e. internalizing and externalizing problems, directly or indirectly through the mediator of children’s self-concept at the aggregate effective parenting context. Results largely support harmful effects of parent–child discrepancy in effective parenting on the child outcomes directly or indirectly through children’s self-concept. Besides, aggregate effective parenting practices are found to robustly contribute to the child outcomes directly and indirectly through children’s self-concept, even taking parent–child discrepant effects into account. What’s more important, the former is significantly moderated by the latter for its effects on the child outcomes, explicating the conditional nature of parent–child discrepant effects on child development. Contributions and implications of the current study applied in Chinese culture as well as future study directions are also discussed.     

Challenges of Appraising Intangible Outcomes with Unclear Objectives: Performance Management Issues in Local Government in Ontario

This article discusses the challenges of performance management on social assistance program. These challenges include measuring intangible outcome against unclear organizational objectives, de-coupling of performance management and performance enhancement, stressing on administrative accountability over out-come oriented culture. Then, strategies are suggested to handle these challenges in order to shift the performance management system from merely an auditing mechanism to an engine of change.