The five "S" levels of enterprise health.

Whether pride, necessity, or inattention is at the root, some "slowly boiling" physicians find themselves working harder for fewer compensations of all sorts, and may not be fully cognizant of their circumstances. This article helps to diagnose and manage the health of physicians' practices and/or related enterprises. There are five levels of enterprise health, ranging from success (S-1) to shutdown (S-5), that serve as weather vanes about how the enterprise is adapting to changes in its environment. How should physicians respond to chaos and the threats of deteriorating enterprise health? A five-step approach is offered: (1) Discern what is important; (2) place and keep your program in alignment with those patient interests that will enhance your enterprise viability; (3) keep score with an internal balanced scorecard; (4) manage and shepherd your resources in a manner that demonstrably adds value to patient care; and (5) know the score and use it.     

Civil war, social integration and mental health in Croatia

Research has shown that social relationships are generally beneficial for mental health (Thoits 1995). However, few scholars have examined this association after the occurrence of a significant shock to the social system as a whole. The purpose of this article is to examine the relationship between social integration and war-related distress in Croatia immediately following the recent civil war. Does social integration decrease war-related distress? Does social integration buffer the effect of traumatic events on war-related distress? We analyze these questions using nationally representative survey data collected in Croatia in 1996. Results suggest that social integration has both positive and negative direct effects on distress. Being a member of informal organizations, such as sports clubs, and participating in social activities are beneficial for mental health. On the other hand, being a member of some formal organizations, such as church organizations and unions, is detrimental to mental health. There is little support for the idea that social integration buffers the effect of traumatic events on distress. Only one of thirty-six possible interactions is significant and supports the buffer hypothesis. Frequent participation in social activities buffers the effect of experiencing violence on war-related distress. Also, some forms of social integration appear to aggravate the effect of traumatic events on war-related distress. In sum, social integration does affect war-related distress after a system shock, but in complex and sometimes unexpected ways.     

Gender, social status, and emotional reliance

Past research has suggested the potential importance of considering emotional reliance, a dimension of interpersonal dependence, when addressing social and developmental risk factors for depression. Based on a probability sample of 1,393 adults aged 18-55 residing in Toronto, Canada, this paper addresses gender differences in emotional reliance and the relevance of emotional reliance in explaining the gender-depression association. We also explore link-ages between emotional reliance and status factors. Findings indicate that emotional reliance is significantly related to depression and that women report greater reliance than men, independent of social status factors like marital and parental status, education, income, and occupational prestige. Moreover, the positive association between emotional reliance and depression is greater for women. Several social status factors modify the relationship between gender and emotional reliance. Both education and occupational prestige reduce reliance, and are particularly beneficial in this regard for women. Marriage, on the other hand, increases emotional reliance, especially for men. We offer interpretations of this pattern of findings.     

Effectiveness of refusal skills software

This research explores the potential of making social skills training more accessible to schools by the use of computer-aided instruction. An easy-to-use software program called Refusal Challenges, which targets important social skills with effective training methods, was tested. The dependent measure was demonstration of refusal skills strategies. One-hundred-eighty-eight male and female eighth-grade students were stratified according to pre-treatment refusal skill level, gender, and teacher. They were then randomly assigned from the stratified blocks to either the computer-based refusal skills training group or a control group. Repeated measures analyses of variance indicated a significant and meaningful time by treatment interaction for refusal skills scores. The difference between treatment and control groups remained significant and meaningful at both the post-test and follow-up testing.     

What's Playing in the Organizational Theater? Collusive Relationships in Management

This article takes as its point of departureconcepts derived from couple therapy to betterunderstand collusive relationships in organizations. Aswe examine these dysfunctional workplace relationships— these interpersonal gridlocks —four main types of collusive superior subordinateinteraction patterns are identified — thenarcissistic, the controlling, the paranoid, and thesadomasochistic — and the consequences of each such dyad in organizationsare explored. In conclusion, the paper presents a numberof recommendations on how to recognize the presence ofsuch collusive arrangements (taking leadership behavior as a point of departure) and suggestspreventive steps that can be taken.     

Do male dropouts benefit from obtaining a GED, postsecondary education, and training?

The authors use longitudinal data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to investigate whether the wage trajectories of male high school dropouts are affected by the acquisition of the General Educational Development (GED) credential, by postsecondary education, and by training. The authors show that acquisition of the GED results in wage increases for dropouts who left school with weak skills, but not for dropouts who left high school with stronger skills. College and training provided by employers are associated with higher wages for male dropouts.     

Marriages and fertility among Turkish and Moroccan women in Belgium: results from census data

The patterns of family formation and fertility behavior of Turkish and Moroccan women in Belgium are changing rapidly. The census data (1991) indicate a fertility decline. The reasons are changes in the nuptiality patterns, contraceptive behavior, and migratory flows. The changes are not identical in both communities. Young cohorts postpone their marriage, but this is most prominent among Moroccan women. On the other hand, young Turkish women have a clear preference for smaller families. The changes also differentiate according to migrant "generation" and level of education. The changes are not restricted to Belgium but are also observed in the countries of origin.     

A comparative assessment of public opinion toward immigrants and immigration policies

"This article is part of a larger study of public attitudes toward immigration in seven countries that historically and currently have had different policies and practices vis-a-vis immigration. The countries involved are Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Japan and the United States. The time frame for which most of the public opinion data will be reported is from 1970 through 1995. The data have been collected from national surveys that were conducted in each of the countries."     

Death at the border

"Debates about United States border control policies have generally ignored the human costs of undocumented migration. We focus attention on these costs by estimating the number, causes and location of migrant deaths at the southwest border of the United States between 1993 and 1997.... Deaths from hyperthermia, hypothermia and dehydration increased sharply from 1993 to 1997 as intensified border enforcement redirected undocumented migration flows from urban crossing points to more remote crossing areas where the migrants are exposed to a greater risk of death."