Therapeutic Responses to Domestic Violence in Australia: A History of Controversies

This paper reviews controversies about domestic violence occurring in heterosexual relationships discussed in the Australian context by practitioners and academics and published in the Australian & New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy over the past three decades. Controversies arose in relation to the provision of therapeutic interventions for domestic violence, primarily in individual and couple counselling and group programs. After a literature review, the following controversial issues are identified: (1) the role of patriarchy: Is a patriarchal culture the main cause of domestic violence? (2) Systemic family therapy and gendered violence: Does systemic family therapy hide men's responsibility for domestic violence? (3) Therapeutic and educational interventions for domestic violence: Does therapy turn a ‘crime’ into a ‘psychological problem’? (4) Men as victims: Do both men and women perpetrate domestic violence in equal measure? (5) It takes two to tango: What part do women play in eliciting men's violence?     

Life Satisfaction in Australia: Evidence from Ten Years of the HILDA Survey

Employing data from the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey, this paper examines the level, determinants and distribution of self-reported life satisfaction, as well as the prevalence and severity of dissatisfaction in Australia over the period 2001–2010. Against most objective measures Australia’s economic performance during this period was exemplary. Yet our results indicate a steady decline in life satisfaction from 2003 onwards, as well as a diminishing gap between the life satisfaction of males and females. Results also suggest that inequality in life satisfaction has generally declined. Geographic heterogeneity in the distribution of life satisfaction is apparent, and a number of socio-economic and demographic factors are found to serve an important role in determining an individual’s level of life satisfaction. Measures of the extent of dissatisfaction reveal an encouraging downward trend and provide policy makers with an alternative perspective from which to assess societal welfare.     

Who Gets Custody Now? Dramatic Changes in Children’s Living Arrangements After Divorce

This article reexamines the living arrangements of children following their parents’ divorce, using Wisconsin Court Records, updating an analysis that showed relatively small but significant increases in shared custody in the late 1980s and early 1990s. These changes have accelerated markedly in the intervening years: between 1988 and 2008, the proportion of mothers granted sole physical custody fell substantially, the proportion of parents sharing custody increased dramatically, and father–sole custody remained relatively stable. We explore changes in the correlates of alternative custody outcomes, showing that some results from the earlier analysis still hold (for example, cases with higher total family income are more likely to have shared custody), but other differences have lessened (shared-custody cases have become less distinctive as they have become more common). Despite the considerable changes in marriage and divorce patterns over this period, we do not find strong evidence that the changes in custody are related to changes in the characteristics of families experiencing a divorce; rather, changes in custody may be the result of changes in social norms and the process by which custody is determined.     

The prospectus of activism: discerning and delimiting imagined possibility

This article aims to articulate a new agenda in the scholarship of social movements. Specifically, it seeks to turn attention to the assumptions that undergird activism. Rather than studying movements themselves, we can study them as the embodiment of collective expectation in a particular public. We can learn more about the broader society in which movements are embedded by asking how activists and the public they seek to engage determine what is within the realm of possibility. I refer to the imagined horizon of possibility as the activist prospectus. To illustrate the importance of prospectus, I draw upon a case study of environmental activism in Samara, Russia. Ethnographic observation and analysis yield insights into subjective perceptions that help explain the weakness of civil society within Russia.     

The Value of Information in Decision‐Analytic Modeling for Malaria Vector Control in East Africa

Decision analysis tools and mathematical modeling are increasingly emphasized in malaria control programs worldwide to improve resource allocation and address ongoing challenges with sustainability. However, such tools require substantial scientific evidence, which is costly to acquire. The value of information (VOI) has been proposed as a metric for gauging the value of reduced model uncertainty. We apply this concept to an evidenced‐based Malaria Decision Analysis Support Tool (MDAST) designed for application in East Africa. In developing MDAST, substantial gaps in the scientific evidence base were identified regarding insecticide resistance in malaria vector control and the effectiveness of alternative mosquito control approaches, including larviciding. We identify four entomological parameters in the model (two for insecticide resistance and two for larviciding) that involve high levels of uncertainty and to which outputs in MDAST are sensitive. We estimate and compare a VOI for combinations of these parameters in evaluating three policy alternatives relative to a status quo policy. We find having perfect information on the uncertain parameters could improve program net benefits by up to 5–21%, with the highest VOI associated with jointly eliminating uncertainty about reproductive speed of malaria‐transmitting mosquitoes and initial efficacy of larviciding at reducing the emergence of new adult mosquitoes. Future research on parameter uncertainty in decision analysis of malaria control policy should investigate the VOI with respect to other aspects of malaria transmission (such as antimalarial resistance), the costs of reducing uncertainty in these parameters, and the extent to which imperfect information about these parameters can improve payoffs.     

Control Balance Theory and Violence: An Examination of Contingencies

Abstract

Control balance theory has been previously tested using measures of contingencies. This article builds upon these studies by using data collected from 460 undergraduate students to examine the role of constraints and sensation-seeking in the control balancing process. The findings provide partial support for control balance theory (i.e., that the control deficit and the control surplus both have significant links to predation). Examining the contingency effects showed that the influence of the control deficits and surpluses on deviance was conditioned by contingencies (i.e., high levels of sensation-seeking and low levels of constraint). The findings from this study suggest the need for further exploration of control balance theory, with the focus to shift to Tittle's 2004 revision of the theory.     

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