Bidirectional Relations Between Authoritative Parenting and Adolescents’ Prosocial Behaviors

This study examined the bidirectional relations between authoritative parenting and adolescents’ prosocial behavior over a 1‐year time period. Data were taken from Time 2 and 3 of the Flourishing Families Project, and included reports from 319 two‐parent families with an adolescent child (M age of child at Time 2 = 12.34, SD = 1.06, 52% girls). Cross‐lag analyses supported bidirectional relations between parenting and prosocial behavior with particular emphasis on the role of the adolescents’ prosocial behavior on subsequent parenting. Results also varied as a function of the reporter. Discussion focuses on the implications for understanding the multifaceted nature of prosocial development in adolescence.     

External Constraint and the Labour Oriented Supply-side Policies in Italy

ABSTRACT: This paper attempts to estimate the relative importance of various factors that, under an increasing external constraint, have contributed to the competitiveness and output growth in the Italian industry during the last eighteen years. In particular, it tries to evaluate the effectiveness of the few relevant supply-side policies adopted in Italy, which were based essentially on labour oriented policy instruments. It is found that technological change was far more important than policy factors for restructuring and reconverting industrial activities and increasing the level of production.     

Ethical uneasiness and the need for open-ended reflexivity: the case of research into older people with a wish to die

This article focuses on research ethics in highly intimate research with possible impact on life and death. In order to stimulate an open-ended dialogue about research ethics, we reflect on four ethical challenges that came up during our research into older people with a wish to die. Drawing on our experiences, we discuss (1) the possibly confirming influence of our research on the death wish (moral experience of whether or not to disregard responsibility); (2) the suggested duty to intervene (moral experience of whether or not to compromise the person’s autonomy); (3) the researcher’s authority and power over the data (moral experience of threatening a person’s self-narrative) and (4) the dilemma of intimacy (moral experience of encountering the tragic). For guidance in addressing these challenges, we draw upon work on research ethics from phenomenological and care ethics scholars, as well as from those writing about relational ethics in health research. We suggest that being open about ethical uneasiness is important, because in most cases of a grey area, there are only open-ended answers needing an enquiring mind, rather than clear and fixed guidelines. Acknowledgement of ethical uneasiness and open-ended reflexivity are indispensable to constitute a morally good research practice.     

Call to action: Better care,better health,and greater value in college health

ABSTRACT

It is time for action by leaders across higher education to strengthen quality improvement (QI) in college health, in pursuit of better care, better health, and increased value – goals closely linked to students' learning and success. The size and importance of the college student population; the connections between wellbeing, and therefore QI, and student success; the need for improved standards and greater accountability; and the positive contributions of QI to employee satisfaction and professionalism all warrant a widespread commitment to building greater capacity and capability for QI in college health. This report aims to inspire, motivate, and challenge college health professionals and their colleagues, campus leaders, and national entities to take both immediate and sustainable steps to bring QI to the forefront of college health practice – and, by doing so, to elevate care, health, and value of college health as a key pathway to advancing student success.     

The Prosecution of Political Corruption: France,Italy and the USA - A Comparative View

The 1948 Italian Constitution provides for the independence of judges and magistrates. As a result of the tragic outcome of the war, of efforts to prevent dictatorships, war and the violation of human rights, the Italian framers have created an institutional system which can resist political interference in the cases in which elected officials and cabinet ministers are involved. A comparative analysis of France and the USA highlights that in those countries magistrates do not enjoy the same constitutional protection. The state, therefore, and the community, is not adequately protected by a system where power-holders can stop and divert investigations on political corruption.     

Familism Values,Perspective Taking,and Prosocial Moral Reasoning: Predicting Prosocial Tendencies Among Mexican American Adolescents

Mexican American youth often engage in relatively high levels of prosocial behaviors. We theorize that this may be due to a cultural value system that encourages familism values, which, in turn, may foster the development of sociocognitive processes that promote prosocial behaviors. Two hundred and five Mexican American early adolescent youth (M_age = 10.9 years, SD = 0.84; 51% girls) reported their familism values, perspective taking, prosocial moral reasoning, and six types of prosocial behaviors. The results indicated that perspective taking partially mediated the relation between familism values and the specific prosocial tendencies theoretically linked to the Mexican American culture. The study demonstrated the utility of integrating cultural and traditional developmental mechanisms in attempting to explain prosocial behaviors.     

“Good” corporate governance and the quality of internal auditing departments in Italian listed firms. An exploratory investigation in Italian listed firms

One of the most important issue relating to corporate governance reports refers to their ability to provide users with a complete set of information regarding the effective ability of an entity to achieve oversight objectives by the compliance to corporate governance practices required by a specific law or industry code. In addition, other features, such as the quality of the internal auditing function or the sensitivity of top management to issues relating to corporate internal controls and risk management, can also be taken into account when formulating a judgment on the quality of corporate governance practices. Is there an association between the compliance to codes and internal controls effectiveness? We propose to assess the quality of corporate governance through a proxy that considers several characteristics of internal audit departments and combines them to determine an Internal Audit Departments global quality index—IAD Index. To define IAD global quality we consider the effectiveness of an internal audit function analysing its operational aspects. The IAD Index is based on several signalling elements that previous literature assumed as proxies for quality of IADs which are grouped into four pillars: a formal quality index; a static quality index; an activity-related quality index; and a performance-linked quality index. We then test the IAD index on a sample of Italian listed firms and conclude that there are significant associations (positive and negative) between the degree of compliance to some corporate governance regulations for listed firms and the IAD Index for the sample being considered.     

Children's Perceptions of Family Relationships as Assessed in a Doll Story Completion Task: Links to Parenting, Social Competence, and Externalizing Behavior

This study was designed to examine the links between parenting, children's perceptions of family relationships, and children's social behavior. Seventy‐four children (M age=6.01 years; 39 boys; 35 girls) and their parents took part in the study. Children completed relationship‐oriented doll stories that were coded for coherence, prosocial themes, and aggressive themes. Parents completed a report of their child's social behavior, a parenting scale, and a number of demographic items. Teachers also completed measures of children's social competence and externalizing behavior. Warm parenting predicted both a child's representation of prosocial themes in the doll stories and social competence, whereas harsh parenting predicted both a child's use of aggressive themes in the doll stories and a child's externalizing behavior. These findings support the idea that children are constructing models of relationships out of the early interactions with caregivers, and that they use these representations to guide their social behavior.     

Testing the lucas critique: A review

Claims that the parameters of an econometric model are invariant under changes in either policy rules or expectations processes entail super exogeneity and encompassing implications. Super exogeneity is always potentially refutable, and when both implications are involved, the Lucas critique is also refutable. We review the methodological background; the applicability of the Lucas critique; super exogeneity tests; the encompassing implications of feedback and feedforward models; and the role of incomplete information. The approach is applied to money demand in the u.S.A. to examine constancy, exogeneity, and encompassing, and reveals the Lucas critique to be inapplicable to the model under analysis.