Mental Health Treatment Barriers Among Racial/Ethnic Minority Versus White Young Adults 6 Months After Intake at a College Counseling Center

Abstract

Objective: This study examined mental health treatment barriers following intake at a counseling center among racially/ethnically diverse college students. Methods: College students (N = 122) seen for intake at a college counseling center in 2012–2013 completed self-reports of depressive symptoms, suicidal ideation, and mental health treatment barriers 6 months later. Results: Racial/ethnic minority students less often reported previous mental health treatment and treatment after being seen at the counseling center, compared with white students. They also endorsed more treatment barriers—most commonly, financial concerns and lack of time—and more often endorsed stigma-related concerns. Treatment barriers were associated with not following through with counseling center recommendations and with greater depressive symptom severity but not with suicidal ideation during follow-up. Conclusions: Improving mental health treatment seeking among racial/ethnic minority college students should involve decreasing treatment barriers, improving access to affordable options, providing flexible scheduling or time-limited options, and decreasing stigma.,     

Attack of the Butterfly Spirits: The Impact of Movement Framing by Community Garden Preservation Activists

This study of the community garden preservation movement on the Lower East Side of New York examines the role of movement framing by activists in their struggle to save hundreds of gardens from destruction. In repeated confrontations with the Giuliani administration, gardeners successfully de-routinized the process of urban redevelopment by portraying the loss of a garden as an unimaginable violation against themselves, and the city. This process of re-framing urban development helped activists to compensate for their disempowered political status, and was instrumental in forcing the Giuliani administration to negotiate to save the gardens. Focusing on framing by movement activists demonstrates the purposive and strategic character of neighborhood identity. Emphasizing the strategy of neighborhood identities is a useful corrective to the many studies of community movements that emphasize their emergence from a relational, presumably non-strategic, local reality.     

Sexual assault and alcohol use: exploring the self-medication hypothesis

Though a link between sexual victimization and alcohol use has been well documented, the mechanisms underlying this relationship remain unclear. The current study used path analysis to examine the role of self-reported levels of psychological distress and the function of alcohol use as indirect pathways between adult sexual assault and alcohol use. Participants were 318 undergraduate female victims and nonvictims of adult sexual assault. Results showed that a history of sexual assault was associated with increased psychological distress, which in turn contributed to alcohol use via negative reinforcement. Taken together, these findings provided support for the hypothesis that women who have been sexually assaulted consume alcohol, in part, to self-medicate. The implications for future research are discussed.     

Process of precocious functional aging in workers of laundries

The World Health Organization (WHO), as well as researchers of the whole world, it has been demonstrating concern with the subject of the aging related to the work and it recognizes that modifications in the several systems of the human body take to the gradual decrease in the effectiveness of each one of them, because the aging caused by the work advances apprenticeships of the cycle of the man's life, not respecting the natural state of that process. In this sense, it was aimed at with this research to investigate the relative aspects to the capacity for the work and to the workers' with responsibility to realize the work in the laundries service, verifying if they present signs of precocious functional aging.     

Ergonomics analyses of five joineries located in Florianópolis-SC, using the LEST Method

Considering the goal of Ergonomic Work Analysis to establish, from the point of view of workers, safe, healthy, comfortable and efficient environments, this study propose to analyze the work situation of machine operators at five joineries from Florianópolis-SC. For this, it was applied the LEST Method to evaluate the task made by the operators, considering the physical, cognitive and organizational work environment. As results, it was identified the main ergonomics problems of these workstations, presenting an ergonomic diagnosis and their implications on health and safety of workers. As result, it was concluded that the main ergonomics problems at joineries are related with noise, with constant load of weight and with the postures taken. Besides these problems, others were diagnosed, for example, the pressure for workers to comply strictly the task stipulated and also the poor training and capacity of workers.     

Are young cohorts of women delaying first birth in Mexico?

In the last decades, female permanent sterilisation became the most used method of contraception in Mexico. During this time, the demand for pills, condoms and other short-term contraceptives fell consistently. The shift in the demand for contraceptives raises concerns among demographers that the timing of children may remain unchanged regardless of observed reductions in period fertility rates. This paper assesses such ideas in the context of the timing of a first child using duration models as the main analysis tool. Findings suggest that young cohorts of women are effectively delaying first birth relative to the experience of older generations.

Navigating Housing Instability and Substance Use: Hidden Tensions Facing Youth in Small Town America

Abstract

Recent scholarship indicates that youth homelessness is a significant problem outside urban areas. However, previous studies have not examined how local contexts shape the experiences of youth who are homeless in rural areas and small towns with high rates of poverty and epidemic drug use. To address this gap, this analysis draws from two components of a large national study of homelessness among youth, using data collected in a small non-urban setting in the Northwest including (1) a subset of 41 (out of 215 nationally) in-depth interviews with youth and (2) a subset of 16 surveys (out of 523 nationally) with service providers. We explored availability of services and how youth navigate housing instability and the service landscape in small communities. We discovered that current or prior addictions sometimes posed risks to the safety of youth and compromised their ability to rely on family supports – a support proving critical in the absence of a formal service infrastructure. Our results suggest that youth experiencing housing instability in the context of high rates of drug use and limited formal services must often choose between meeting competing needs: a place to stay versus sobriety. We discuss the implications for policy, practice, and research.     

The Peru Urban Management Education Programme (PEGUP) — linking capacity building with local realities

The development of initiatives for Local Agenda 21 for the cities of Peru, their documentation for the “best practices” programme of HABITAT II, and the demand for a formalized programme of support, capacity building and technical assistance has stimulated the establishment of the Peru Urban Management Education Programme (PEGUP). The PEGUP represents an innovative approach to capacity building, working through different mechanisms of education and training, technical assistance to municipal development of Local Agenda 21 and the promotion of networking and experience exchange. The experiences to date indicate that the set of support mechanisms is in line with the requirements of local governments which need a variety of support on the long road to develop urban management capacities that allow the solution of their urban and environmental problems. PEGUP offers a variety of services which are part of the development strategy of “Forum of Cities for Life” network.     

Planned fertility and family background: a quantile regression for counts analysis

This paper examines how education and family background affect the fertility plans of young individuals in Mexico. Quantile regression for count data is used for the analysis. Results indicate that education and family structure affect planned fertility only at the tails of the conditional distribution. Education reduces planned fertility only among women with relatively strong preferences towards children. An absent father reduces planned fertility mostly at the bottom of the conditional distribution.