“I Had to Go to the Streets to Get Love”: Pathways From Parental Rejection to HIV Risk Among Young Gay and Bisexual Men

Young, gay, and bisexual men (YGBM) are at increased risk of family rejection, which is related to HIV infection. What remains unknown is how family rejection leads to HIV risk. In this exploratory study, qualitative interviews were conducted with 21 HIV-positive YGBM aged 18 to 24. Most participants reported family rejection, which decreased instrumental and emotional support and resulted in participants using riskier ways to support themselves, such as engaging in survival sex. Conceptualizing the findings using a family systems framework, we present a tentative conceptual model to describe the potential relationships between family rejection and HIV risk for YGBM.     

Maternal Household Decision-Making Autonomy and Adolescent Education in Honduras

Maternal decision-making autonomy has been linked to positive outcomes for children’s health and well-being early in life in low- and middle-income countries throughout the world. However, there is a dearth of research examining if and how maternal autonomy continues to influence children’s outcomes into adolescence and whether it impacts other domains of children’s lives beyond health, such as their education. The goal of this study was to determine whether high maternal decision-making was associated with school enrollment for secondary school-aged youth in Honduras. Further, we aimed to assess whether the relationships between maternal autonomy and school enrollment varied by adolescents’ environmental contexts and individual characteristics such as gender. Our analytical sample included 6579 adolescents ages 12–16 living with their mothers from the Honduran Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) 2011–2012. We used stepwise logistic regression models to investigate the association between maternal household decision-making autonomy and adolescents’ school enrollment. Our findings suggest that adolescents, especially girls, benefit from their mothers’ high decision-making autonomy. Findings suggest that maternal decision-making autonomy promotes adolescents’ school enrollment above and beyond other maternal, household, and regional influences.     

Life Course Changes in Smoking by Gender and Education: A Cohort Comparison Across France and the United States

Widening of educational disparities and a narrowing female advantage in mortality stem in good part from disparities in smoking. The changes in smoking and mortality disparities across cohorts and countries have been explained by an epidemic model of cigarette use but are also related to life course changes. To better describe and understand changing disparities over the life course, we compare age patterns of smoking in three cohorts and two nations (France and the US) using smoking history measures from the 2010 French health barometer (N = 20,940) and the 2010 US National Health Interview Survey Sample Adult File (N = 20,444). The results demonstrate statistically significant widening of gender and educational differences from adolescence to early and middle adulthood, thus accentuating the disparities already emerging during adolescence. In addition, the widening disparities over the life course have been changing across cohorts: age differences in educational disparities have grown in recent cohorts (especially in France), while age differences in gender disparities have narrowed. The findings highlight the multiple sources of inequality in smoking and health in high-income nations.     

The Comparative Inclusive Human Development of Globalisation in Africa

This study examines the impact of globalisation on inclusive human development in 51 African countries for the period 1996–2011 with particular emphasis on income levels (low income vs. middle income), legal origins (English common law vs. French civil law), resource wealth (oil-rich vs. oil-poor), landlockedness (landlocked vs. unlandlocked), religious domination (Christianity vs. Islam) and political stability (stable vs. unstable). The empirical evidence is based on instrumental variable panel Fixed effects and Tobit regressions in order to control for the unobserved heterogeneity and limited range in the dependent variable. Political, economic, social and general globalisation variables are used. Six main hypotheses are investigated. The findings broadly show that middle income, English common law, oil-poor, unlandlocked, Christian-oriented and politically-stable countries are associated with comparatively higher levels of globalisation-driven inclusive human development. Puzzling findings are elucidated and policy implications discussed.     

Body image,aging, and identity in women over 50: The Gender and Body Image (GABI) study

We conducted a qualitative study of 1,849 women over age 50 to capture the thoughts, feelings, and attitudes that women at middle age have about their bodies and the experience of aging. Via an open-ended question online survey, four primary themes emerged: (a) the physical and psychological experience of aging; (b) the injustices, inequities, and challenges of aging; (c) the importance of self-care; and (d) a plea for recognition of the need to maintain a contributory role in society. Results highlight the complexities of women’s psychological and physical aspects of aging and point toward important topics worthy of further study in this growing population.     

“I Am Becoming More and More Like My Eldest Brother!”: The Relationship Between Older Siblings,Adolescent Gambling Severity,and the Attenuating Role of Parents in a Large-Scale Nationally Representative Survey Study

The present study examined the association between having older siblings who gamble and adolescent at-risk/problem gambling and how parents (i.e., parental knowledge of their whereabouts) and peers might moderate such effects. Data were drawn from the ESPAD^®Italia2012 survey (European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs) comprising a nationally representative Italian sample of adolescents. The analysis was carried out on a subsample of 10,063 Italian students aged 15–19 years (average age = 17.10; 55 % girls) who had at least one older sibling and who had gambled at some point in their lives. Respondents’ problem gambling severity, older gambler sibling, gambler peers, parental knowledge, and socio-demographic characteristics were individually assessed. Multinomial logistic regression analyses including two- and three-way interactions were conducted. The odds of being an at-risk/problem gambler were higher among high school students with older siblings that gambled and those with peers who gambled. Higher parental knowledge (of who the adolescent was with and where they were in their leisure time) was associated with lower rates of at-risk/problem gambling. There was also an interaction between gamblers with older siblings and parental knowledge. The combination of having siblings who gambled and a greater level of parental knowledge was associated with lower levels of problem gambling. The present study confirmed the occurrence of social risk processes (older siblings and peers who gambled) and demonstrated that gambling among older siblings and peers represents an important contextual factor for increased at-risk/problem gambling. However, parental knowledge appears to be sufficient to counterbalance the influence of older siblings.     

Self-Reported Losses Versus Actual Losses in Online Gambling: An Empirical Study

Many research findings in the gambling studies field rely on self-report data. A very small body of empirical research also suggests that when using self-report, players report their gambling losses inaccurately. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the differences between objective and subjective gambling spent data by comparing gambler’s actual behavioral tracking data with their self-report data over a 1-month period. A total of 17,742 Norwegian online gamblers were asked to participate in an online survey. Of those surveyed, 1335 gamblers answered questions relating to gambling expenditure that could be compared with their actual gambling behavior. The study found that the estimated loss self-reported by gamblers was correlated with the actual objective loss and that players with higher losses tended to have more difficulty estimating their gambling expenditure (i.e., players who spent more money gambling also appeared to have more trouble estimating their expenses accurately). Overall, the findings demonstrate that caution is warranted when using self-report data relating to amount of money spent gambling in any studies that are totally reliant on self-report data.     

Suicide ideation,anxiety, and depression: Are children a protective factor for male Veterans?

ABSTRACT

Numerous mental health disorders plague our veterans when they return from deployment including anxiety and depressive disorders, which have been linked to elevated suicide risk when left untreated. Family factors, such as parenthood status, may serve as a protective factor against these mental health issues. This study examined the role of parenthood status of male veterans (N = 234) based on age of the child in order to determine whether a child’s age (minor children v. adult children) affects the likelihood of meeting diagnosis criteria for anxiety, depression, and suicide ideation after controlling for marital status. Three hierarchical binary logistic regression models were constructed to assess the predictive influence of children 18 years old and younger, children older than 18, and no children with the results indicating that parenthood status did meaningfully enhance the prediction of suicide ideation. Complete findings, clinical implications, and future considerations are discussed.