Community is not a Place but a Relationship<Superscript>1</Superscript>: Lessons for Organizational Development

The premise of this article is that organizations need to be “organized” differently if we want to re-invigorate the power of community in contemporary life. A central theme within the current reform movement toward restorative justice is the devolution of authority from formal governmental systems to community. In order to effectively socialize young people, communities and families must perform certain functions well. As more and more societal activities take place within organizations, we face the dilemma that the weakened communities create a demand for increasing involvement of public organizations in the life of the community. Yet modern organizations do not effectively perform functions unique to families and communities. Drawing on insights from a unique community-system partnership in restorative peacemaking circles, this paper argues we may need to reinvent our organizations so that they learn to behave as members of the community. ¹This apt phrase and fundamental insight about the meaning of community came from the seminal article by Paul McCold and Benjamin Wachtel (1998).     

Facilitation and Dialogue as Methods of Reflective Practice in Professional Education

Students may fear sharing their learning in public because classrooms are not traditional places where we teach skills needed for mutual understanding, such as facilitation and dialogue. This is a pedagogical challenge for planning, policy, and design fields because contemporary teaching requires collaboration among participants. We propose that learning to work collaboratively in the classroom has broader relevance for practice because it mirrors the learning that happens in organizations. To address this opportunity, we trained students in facilitation and dialogue. In this article, we discuss the design, implementation, and outcomes of this intervention.     

The last mile of the way: understanding caregiving in African American families at the end-of-life

This research is based on in-depth ethnographic interviews and focus groups with 88 African American family caregivers from various regions of the United States during a stressful time in their family development--caregiving at the end-of-life--and the grieving during the aftermath. The study employed a stratified purposeful sampling strategy. Subjects were African Americans from the Northern, Southern, and Midwestern United States. Formal care is complicated by the distrust that many African Americans hold toward the health care system, which has resulted from years of exclusion, racism and discrimination. The findings highlight the importance of hearing from African American families to gain an understanding of what services, including family therapy and other psychotherapy, they will need during this process.     

Nurses and the dying: Symbolic interaction as a precipitator of dying “stages”

The impact of nurses' attitudes upon their communication with dying patients is examined from the symbolic interaction perspective. Data were obtained from participant observation in the intensive care and postintensive care units of a hospital and from in-depth interviewes with additional nurses. Characteristics of the situation, nurses, and patients were examined in terms of an Interpersonal Reactions Model. The strength of this model is its emphasis upon the effect unintended judgments may have on a patient's self-image. A stage in the dying process may simply be a response to the nonverbally communicated expectations of interactors with dying persons. This research focuses on the first stage of this model—the differential reaction of nurses to the varying characteristics of patients within the constraints of extra-care situations.This is a revision of a paper presented at the annual meeting of the Mid-South Sociological Association in Little Rock, Arkansas, in November, 1980.     

Changing Less-Preferred Duties to More-Preferred: A Potential Strategy for Improving Supervisor Work Enjoyment

We evaluated a strategy for making highly nonpreferred work duties more preferred as a potential means of enhancing work enjoyment among supervisors in a human service setting. Repeated preference ratings and rankings were completed by 4 supervisors during baseline to identify their most disliked work tasks. These tasks were then altered by soliciting each supervisor's opinion regarding why the respective task was so disliked and what could be done to make the task more preferable, removing disliked stimuli associated with the tasks, and adding liked stimuli during completion of the tasks. Following the task alterations, ratings of task likeability increased for all 4 supervisors. Preference rankings of target tasks also increased, including from rankings as among the least preferred tasks to among the most preferred tasks. All supervisors rated the task-alteration process as making their quality of work life better, and all chose to continue the intervention. These results occurred without any observed decrease in work quality. Results are discussed regarding the potential contribution of behavioral interventions with subjective concepts, such as enjoyment, that are viewed as important by the general populace. However, qualifications with relying on verbal reports also are noted.     

Work–family conflict: The importance of differentiating between different facets of job characteristics

This review study clarifies the relationships between job characteristics and work–family conflict (WFC) by differentiating among three facets of job characteristics: latent, perceived, and enacted. To date, research linking job characteristics to WFC has not distinguished the facets of job demands and job resources in this way. Such distinctions are important as a means of understanding the affective, behavioural, and cognitive processes involved in determining how and when job characteristics relate to WFC. Our review of 115 studies showed that perceived job characteristics have been most commonly explored in relation to WFC, whereas latent and enacted job characteristics have been hardly examined. While these findings may not be surprising, our contribution lies in reviewing the literature through the lens of these categories. Based on the findings, and through highlighting examples in the extant literature, we argue that understanding job characteristics in terms of both how they are perceived and enacted by workers will provide a deeper insight into the mechanisms underlying the relationship between job characteristics and WFC. In order to inform evidence-based interventions, future research must uncover the dynamic mechanisms underpinning the connection between job characteristics and WFC through a focus on enacted job facets and the cognitive, affective, and behavioural processes involved.     

What does the pursuit of a high quality of life entail?: Grounding a theoretical model in lived experience

In response to calls for a better understanding of quality of life, we draw upon working professionals’ perspectives and experiences to introduce a theoretical model that emerged from an inductive analysis of respondents’ language. A key element of this model includes a collective picture of factors representing quality of life. Further, this model suggests interrelatedness among these factors with pursuit of a high quality of life emerging as a dynamic process with a tensional nature. Our proposed model extends existing research by more fully capturing the complex ways in which people from the United States describe quality of life and its pursuit.     

Exploring the Moderating Influence of Delinquent Peers on the Link Between Trauma, Anger, and Violence Among Male Youth: Implications for Social Work Practice

This study’s objective was to explore the influence of delinquent peer exposure, on the relationship between male youths’ histories of trauma, anger, and violent behavior. Using a nationally representative sample of male adolescents aged 12–17 and self report interviews, information was gathered on their levels of exposure to violence, stressful life events (SLE), anger, depression, delinquent peer exposure, and violent behavior. Results of a moderation analyses revealed that youth who reported higher levels of exposure to trauma, anger, and delinquent peers were at an increased risk for anger and for violent offending. Delinquent peer exposure exerted a significant interaction effect on the relationship between anger and violent offending. The implications for prevention and intervention efforts are delineated.