SNAP Benefits and Pregnancy-Related Emergency Room Visits

Pregnant women are likely to be sensitive to daily fluctuations in nutritional intake. To see if income constraints at the end of the month limit food consumption and trigger health problems, we examine how the date that benefits are issued for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) changes the probability that a woman will go to the Emergency Room (ER) for pregnancy-related conditions using administrative data from SNAP and Medicaid from Missouri for 2010–2013. SNAP benefits in Missouri are distributed from the 1st through the 22nd day of the month based on the birth month and the first letter of the last name of the head of the household, making timing of SNAP issuance exogenous. We estimate probit models of the calendar month and SNAP benefit month on the probability of a pregnancy-related ER visit for women age 17–45, or the sample at risk of being pregnant. We also examine the relationship between SNAP benefit levels and ER visits. We found that women who received SNAP benefits in the second or third week of the calendar month were less likely to receive pregnancy-related care through the ER in the week following benefit receipt. Results suggest that SNAP benefits might be related to patterns of pregnancy-related medical care accessed through the ER. Since SNAP issuance date is within state control in the United States, states may want to consider the health effects of their choice.     

Family Instability and Material Hardship: Results from the 2008 Survey of Income and Program Participation

This study used longitudinal, nationally representative data from the 2008 Survey of Income and Program Participation to explore how each of six sources of instability (employment shocks, household formation shocks, residential changes, income changes, household size changes, and disability shocks) impacted the key domains of material hardship (food insecurity and medical, housing and essential expense hardship). The study found that income shocks and having a person with a disability join the household were the only consistent triggers for all types of material hardship, and that overall, sources of instability had an asymmetrical impact on material hardship; that is, sources of instability did not help households when they were removed as much as they harmed households when introduced. These results provided a nuanced understanding of the household dynamics that result in economic and family instability in the US and provided new evidence regarding why some households were unable to cover basic needs.     

Home and school influences on the behavioral and academic outcomes of low-income children of color

Framed within contextual systems model, this study examines how home and school operate together to shape behavioral and academic outcomes for 544 low-income African American (56%) and Latino/a (44%) elementary school-aged children (mean age?=?7.88 years, SD?=?1.46, 50% male). Using data from Welfare, Children, & Families Study: A Three City Study and multiple group path analysis, we found that for children in kindergarten through third grade, the adequacy of the home resources was positively related to applied problem scores (e.g. math literacy) and negatively associated with externalizing behavior. For fourth- to sixth-graders, the adequacy of classroom resources was negatively associated with applied problem scores. For both age groups positive teacher–child relational quality was also a positive predictor of externalizing behavior. Results revealed that barriers to parental involvement in school were a negative predictor of applied problem scores for low-income children in early and later elementary school. Implications for policy and practice aimed at strengthening opportunities for children and families from marginalized communities are discussed.     

"Show me your impact": evaluating transitional justice in contested spaces

This paper discusses some of the most significant challenges and opportunities for evaluating the effects of programs in support of transitional justice - the field that addresses how post-conflict or post authoritarian societies deal with legacies of wide spread human rights violations. The discussion is empirically grounded in a case study that assesses the efforts of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and one of its Guatemalan partners to evaluate the effects of a museum exposition that is attempting to recast historic memory and challenge racist attitudes in post-conflict Guatemala. The paper argues that despite the increasing trend to fund transitional justice programs, many international aid donors are stuck in traditional and arguably orthodox paradigms of program evaluation. This is having a negative effect not only upon the administration of aid but also upon how transitional justice research is perceived and valued by local populations. The case study experience indicates that there is no perfect evaluation model or approach for evaluating transitional justice programming - only choices to be made by commissioners of evaluation, evaluators, and those being evaluated. These are profoundly influenced by the extreme politics and moral values that define transitional justice settings as contested spaces in which calls to remember the tragic past must be balanced with aspirations to re-build a hopeful future.     

Violence,murder, and fallen women: prostitution in the works of Vsevolod Garshin

This article investigates the theme of prostitution in two stories by the Russian writer Vsevolod Garshin (1855–88). Like many authors of the nineteenth century, Garshin utilizes the symbolic figure of the prostitute to question social and medical beliefs about commercial sex. Focusing on Garshin’s “Proisshestvie” (“An Occurrence”, 1878) and “Nadezhda Nikolaevna” (1885), the article traces the use of melodrama and violence in the depiction of prostitution. Particular attention is paid to Garshin’s use of St. Petersburg to add heightened meaning to the fallen woman’s plight. Connected through the Petersburg myth and the character of Nadezhda Nikolaevna, the stories complicate the traditional redemption plot associated with prostitutes by focusing on the inner life of the fallen woman and her impact on the male characters that she encounters.     

On-line bin packing with restricted repacking

Semi-on-line algorithms for the bin-packing problem allow, in contrast to pure on-line algorithms, the use of certain types of additional operations for each step. Examples include repacking, reordering or lookahead before packing the items. Here we define and analyze a semi-on-line algorithm where for each step at most k items can be repacked, for some positive integer k. We prove that the upper bound for the asymptotic competitive ratio of the algorithm is a decreasing function of k, which tends to 3/2 as k goes to infinity. We also establish lower bounds for this ratio and show that the gap between upper and lower bounds is relatively small.     

Food insufficiency and physical and mental health in a longitudinal survey of welfare recipients

Food insufficiency is a significant problem in the United States, and poor African American women with children are at especially high risk. An inadequate household food supply can potentially affect the well-being of household members, but it is difficult to distinguish the effects of food insufficiency from risk factors for poor health that are also common among the food insufficient, such as poverty. We examined food insufficiency and physical and mental health among African American and white women (n = 676) who were welfare recipients in 1997. Controlling for common risk factors, women who reported food insufficiency in both 1997 and 1998 were more likely to report fair or poor health at the later date. Food insufficiency in 1998 was significantly associated with meeting the diagnostic screening criteria for recent major depression. Food insufficiency at both times and in 1998 only was related to women's sense of mastery. These findings add to growing evidence that household food insufficiency is associated with poor physical and mental health.     

Cognitive-behavioral treatment for adolescents who sexually offend and their families: individual and family applications in a collaborative outpatient program

This article describes an outpatient treatment program for adolescent sexual abusers that was established by a mental health agency in collaboration with a specialized probation program in the juvenile court. Individualized treatment is based on a comprehensive clinical assessment with the youth and guardian, for which examples are provided. Given the heterogeneity of this population, we describe several treatment strategies directed to various individual or family clinical targets, including psychiatric disorders, sexual deviance and sexuality, normal adolescent development and adaptive skills, and parent and family relationships. Ongoing collaborative and coordination issues are also reviewed. The integration of mental health and probationary services provides a balanced approach to the community management and treatment of the low-risk, primarily first-time, adolescent sexual offender.