Evidence Review on Labour Market and Job Place Retention: Mentoring Pathways Towards Employment

In Europe, there are four main active labour market programs: training, job search assistance, wage subsidies and subsidized public sector employment. Literature indicates that among all four, job search assistance, which includes mentoring, is the active employment policy with the most positive results. This paper, an output of an European funded project work package, is aimed to answer the question ‘What is there that says that mentoring is effective in job place retention?’ In order to answer this question, we conducted a literature review. In terms of content, our literature review’s results could be categorized into 14 main topics: Retention, Employee, Supervisor, Leadership, Education, Health Care, Management &; Marketing, ICT &; IT, Finance, Programme, Benefits, Mentee, Mentor, Less positive about mentoring. In addition to the academic literature review, we conducted a review in four different EU countries: Cyprus, Romania, Hungary and Portugal. Based on these reviews we will discuss the recommendations considering the three types of actors present in an effective mentoring process: mentoring coordinator, mentor and mentee.     

Challenges Faced by Young Mothers with a Care History and Views of Stakeholders About the Potential for Group Family Nurse Partnership to Support Their Needs

Women with experience of being ‘looked after’ are more likely than their peers to become young mothers. There has been limited research investigating support for their needs. This study, embedded in a randomised trial of Group Family Nurse Partnership (gFNP), involved interviews with young mothers with care experience, Family Nurses delivering group gFNP, and health and social care professionals. This first qualitative study to explore the views of these varied stakeholders found consensus regarding young mothers’ social isolation and lack of trusting relationships but diversity in views about the potential of gFNP to meet their needs.     

Service user/survivor-led research in mental health: epistemological possibilities

This paper considers possible epistemologies for user-led and survivor research by drawing on four discourses: the mainstream English tradition, Canadian Mad Studies, critical theory more generally and feminist standpoint epistemology. It discusses general, universalising epistemologies, the extent to which these characterise the discourses at stake and the problems with knowledge claims that rest on such singular conceptualisations. The institutional and political concomitants are considered. The paper has an additional double aim: to engage with survivor scholarship around critical theory and to insert that scholarship into the field of critical theory itself in a novel manner.     

Blurring reality with fiction: Exploring the stories of women,madness, and infanticide

Problem

Often, there is a sense of shock and disbelief when a mother murders her child.

The Perils of Balance Testing in Experimental Design: Messy Analyses of Clean Data

Widespread concern over the credibility of published results has led to scrutiny of statistical practices. We address one aspect of this problem that stems from the use of balance tests in conjunction with experimental data. When random assignment is botched, due either to mistakes in implementation or differential attrition, balance tests can be an important tool in determining whether to treat the data as observational versus experimental. Unfortunately, the use of balance tests has become commonplace in analyses of “clean” data, that is, data for which random assignment can be stipulated. Here, we show that balance tests can destroy the basis on which scientific conclusions are formed, and can lead to erroneous and even fraudulent conclusions. We conclude by advocating that scientists and journal editors resist the use of balance tests in all analyses of clean data. Supplementary materials for this article are available online     

Designing response scales with multi-trait-multi-method experiments

ABSTRACT

Split-ballot multi-trait-multi-method experiments are used to evaluate the quality of measurement of different response scales of survey items gauging “evaluation of government services” and “political trust.” The response scales differ by agree/disagree scales, item-specific scales, total number of categories, and the presence of fixed reference points on their constructing extreme items. The Center for Opinion Studies of the Catalan government in Spain conducted the survey in 2011. The best response scale depends on the complexity of the topic and of the formulation of the question. For simple topics and formulations, the format of the response scale has no effect on the quality of measurement.     

Juvenile offender rehabilitation in Estonia: interprofessional collaboration in written assessments and specialists’ perceptions

Qualitative and quantitative research methods were used to study an interprofessional assessment model in rehabilitation services and its implementation in Estonia based on (1) a sample of rehabilitation plans for 160 juvenile offenders aged 7–18 and (2) expert interviews with 10 members of an interprofessional assessment team. Each specialist’s role was compared with the assessments. While each team member is assigned a discrete role based on discipline, in practice, the disciplines’ work overlapped considerably during the assessment process. The overlap seems to occur because team members conduct their assessments individually, rather than following the collaborative best practice model for interprofessional teams described in the literature. The expert interviews indicate that rehabilitation specialists perceive the individual-level elements of interprofessional teamwork to be consistent with the ideals articulated in the Perception of Interprofessional Collaboration Model, while the substantial overlap in assessments that occurred in practice could be related to lack of interprofessional collaboration at group and organizational levels. Recommendations to improve the functioning of teams serving juvenile offenders include establishing an interprofessional education system, increasing the flexibility of the legal framework for service provision, and improving the interprofessional assessment instrument.     

Coming Out Disabled: A Transsexual Woman Considers Queer Contributions to Living with Disability

The author provides an autobiographical illustration of the similarities in coming out lesbian, transsexual, bisexual, or gay and taking visible steps to address a previously invisible disability. The essay begins with a comparison of personal experiences of transsexuality and invisible disability, and addresses the advantages of applying the coming out model to the author's disability. The author concludes that coming out is a process model that disabled individuals can use to aid a transition to caring for a new or worsening personal disability.     

Voluntary organisations and the social state in the European Community

Accurate comparison of the social welfare systems operating in the twelve countries of the European Community is inhibited by lack of information about the voluntary or non-governmental organisations which form an important element in those systems. This paper summarises available information about the scale and scope of voluntary organisations, and attempts to set them in the context of current policy debates. The changing nature of the family in Europe, the development of mixed economies in the provision of welfare, the functions of NGOs as employers and organisers of volunteering, the future of NGOs after 1992, and in the context of a steadily more open Europe are some of the themes which are preoccupying voluntary organisations in most countries of the Community. The paper refers to the inadequacy of most data on NGOs atnational level and to the consequent impossibility of constructing valid cross-national comparisons.I am grateful to the Department of Social Welfare in Dublin for sponsoring the work on which this paper is based. An earlier version was presented as a background paper at the European ConferencePartners in Progress, jointly organised by the Minister of Social Welfare and the EC Commission in Galway, Ireland, June 1990.     

Overview of the “state of the field”

The editors offer a short overview of the state of the field in the light of contributions to this special issue.