La formation en cours d'emploi en Europe: déterminants et effets sur les salaires

Partant des données du Panel communautaire de ménages (PCM) pour la période 1995–2001 dans six pays, les auteurs étudient les déterminants des activités de formation et les effets de celle‐ci sur les salaires. A partir de quatre indicateurs caractérisant la formation, ils montrent que, si les estimations par la méthode des moindres carrés ordinaires indiquent que, presque partout, la formation valorise substantiellement les salaires, les estimations avec effets fixes font apparaǐtre une incidence quasi nulle. Les effets sur les salaires seraient donc surestimés faute de prise en compte adéquate de la corrélation entre la formation et d'autres facteurs affectant les salaires.     

Income distribution,economic growth and European integration

In this paper I discuss recent theories on the relationship between growth and inequality, and ask whether the two move together or not. Output growth can be due to increases in physical capital, human capital, employment or the level of technology, and I argue that each of these represents a mechanism that relates our two variables of interest. The European integration process has represented a major policy change that has affected not only the opportunities for growth but also the constraints faced by national governments. We can then ask whether such integration has had an effect on inequality, and to what extent it has resulted in a conflict between productive efficiency and distributive considerations.     

What do social entrepreneurs need to walk their talk? Understanding the attitude–behavior gap in social impact assessment practice

The topic of social impact assessment (SIA) is growing in importance, and this is especially true for social enterprises. The mission of solving social problems is the main feature of these organizations; thus, the need to assess the extent to which this mission is fulfilled becomes essential. The purpose of this paper is to propose a conceptual model that could explain the attitude–behavior gap in SIA practice through the development of a coherence/displacement matrix, to gauge if social entrepreneurs are coherent in “walking their talks.” The study is based on a mixed‐methods approach focused on the Italian context. An empirical quantitative analysis has been performed to identify the misalignment between attitude and behavior. The gaps that emerged are then analyzed through in‐depth interviews with social entrepreneurs, to provide a pilot case study that could test the model and gain further insights into how those gaps could be filled.     

From Drama Text to Stage Text: Transitions of Text Understanding in a Student Theatre Production

Exploring how text understanding evolves through interaction in a drama-text-based student theatre production, the present study takes its theoretical point of departure in sociocultural and dialogical approaches to meaning making and creativity. Video data from a Swedish upper secondary school allowed us to follow transitions of text understanding in the artistic shaping of characters from drama text to stage text. We analyze a special kind of communicative side project: short, recurrent student-initiated role-plays, embedded in teacher-led activities. The joint text understanding that was established in these side projects proved productive in the emergent shaping of the stage text.     

Self-identified strengths among youth offenders charged with assault against a non-intimate family member

Youth involved in the criminal justice system are particularly vulnerable to increased risk for continuing offending behaviors since aggressive and/or violent behavior compromise developmental growth. The present study seeks to build on the current literature related to youth offenders by using an exploratory qualitative approach to analyze strength-based asset interviews completed by youth referred to a diversion program. Results revealed four distinctive themes: 1) hardiness, 2) grit, 3) social competence, and 4) empathy. Broadening the scope of research focusing on youth offenders, the present study offers a number of implications for social work practice.     

Armed and Aging: Dementia and Firearms Do Not Mix !

ABSTRACT

The possibility that persons with dementia possess firearms is cause for concern, but only a limited number of research studies have been conducted on such a topic, usually in the form of case reports. Reducing the occurrence of the firearm-related violence requires effectively identifying dangerous individuals and keeping firearms out of their hands. The health care professionals, i.e. the social workers and the physicians, need to work together and to produce a suitable evaluation of patients with dementia to prevent firearm-related injuries and serious and irreparable damage to persons.     

Learning the two parameters of the Poisson–Dirichlet distribution with a forensic application

In forensic science, the rare type match problem arises when the matching characteristic from the suspect and the crime scene is not in the reference database; hence, it is difficult to evaluate the likelihood ratio that compares the defense and prosecution hypotheses. A recent solution consists of modeling the ordered population probabilities according to the two-parameter Poisson–Dirichlet distribution, which is a well-known Bayesian nonparametric prior, and plugging the maximum likelihood estimates of the parameters into the likelihood ratio. We demonstrate that this approximation produces a systematic bias that fully Bayesian inference avoids. Motivated by this forensic application, we consider the need to learn the posterior distribution of the parameters that governs the two-parameter Poisson–Dirichlet using two sampling methods: Markov Chain Monte Carlo and approximate Bayesian computation. These methods are evaluated in terms of accuracy and efficiency. Finally, we compare the likelihood ratio that is obtained by our proposal with the existing solution using a database of Y-chromosome haplotypes.     

Towards Body–Mind–Spirit Integration: East Meets West in Clinical Social Work Practice

Contemporary trends in clinical practice are moving more toward an integrative approach that views the mind, the body and the spirit as inter-connected entities. There is an increasing interest in approaches that utilize physical, cognitive, emotional and spiritual components in assessment and treatment. This paper presents an integrative body–mind–spirit approach in clinical social work practice which is informed by the Eastern philosophical traditions of Daoism, Buddhism, and Traditional Chinese Medicine. Our work with a bereaved elderly woman is presented to illustrate how the three key intervention principles: (1) promoting a dynamic balance within the individual through multi-modal intervention; (2) fostering strengths; and (3) facilitating meaning-making can be effective in helping people in a clinical setting.