Researching the Social Impact of Arts and Disability: Applying a New Empirical Tool and Method

This paper has a twofold focus: to establish a method of assessing the potential social impact of arts and disability projects and to apply this method to ten such projects. It does so by using a newly developed ‘ripple’ model that conceptualises social impact in terms of the development of active citizenship on the part of all participants over time. The model identifies ten factors (programme activity, welcoming, belonging, programme social values, individual social values, programme networks, individual networks, skills and creativity, programme wider social impact, and individual wider social impact) which evolve through four progressive stages. The original model is empirically adapted for application to arts and disability projects. Qualitative data were collected in the form of interviews, surveys and media reports across ten case studies, each representing a major arts and disability project offering a professional outcome for an external audience. The qualitative data were coded to provide a simple scoring tool for each case. The results support the application of the model in this context. Furthermore, findings indicate three critical conditions which enable projects to generate considerable positive social impact beyond the individual; ensemble in nature; project embeddedness; and networks and partnerships.     

Newborns' Cries are Unique to Individuals (But Not to Language Environment)

Human neonates exhibit individually distinctive patterns of variation—sometimes called cry “signatures”—in the acoustics of their cries. For tests of group differences (e.g., age, health status, or ambient language differences), the uniqueness of cry sounds to individuals means that multiple cries from same infant cannot appropriately be treated as independent events for analysis. This approach violates the assumption of independence that underlies many statistical techniques and runs the risk of uncovering “significant” group effects that do not actually exist. Nonetheless, publications continue to appear in which multiple cries from the same infant have been treated as independent events for analysis. To demonstrate the perils, we have compared the cries of infants born into a Mandarin Chinese language environment with cries of infants born into an American English language environment. We show (1) that treating each cry sound as an independent event yields numerous “significant” group effects and (2) that these effects all but disappear when cries are treated appropriately, as “nested” within individual infants. The latter outcome is in keeping with prevailing models of neonatal cry production and casts doubt on the claim that neonates alter their cries to match features of the language spoken in their environment.     

Vegetation structure along urban ephemeral streams in southeastern Arizona

Riparian areas in Arizona are being encroached upon by urban developments. This study investigated the impacts of different urban housing densities on riparian vegetation structure along ephemeral streams. Nine sites representing three levels of housing density were selected within the town of Marana, located in southeast Arizona. The housing densities were categorized as high (7–8 houses ha^?1), moderate (2.5–4.5 houses ha^?1), and low (< 1.5 houses ha^?1). Each treatment had three replications. The urban developments were relatively young (less than 15 years). No significant differences were found among the treatments for the tree variables (density, height, mean canopy volume and total canopy volume) or the herbaceous vegetation variables (species richness, percentage of introduced species and percentage of ground cover). However, the shrub variables (mean density, mean height, mean canopy volume, total canopy volume and species richness) showed some significant differences. Shrub density and species richness was significantly greater adjacent to ephemeral channels than just three meters upland. In addition, whitethorn acacia shrubs were significantly taller and larger adjacent to the stream channels in the high and moderate housing density sites than in the low housing density sites. Creosote shrubs showed the opposite trend. Increased runoff in the more heavily urbanized streams may have promoted the growth of the facultative riparian species (whitethorn acacia) but not the non-riparian species (creosote). Overall, in these young developments, vegetation was resilient across the levels of urbanization explored in the study.     

Resisting Smoking When a Best Friend Smokes: Do Intrapersonal and Contextual Factors Matter?

This longitudinal study examines individual differences in the tendency to initiate (N = 4,612) and escalate (N = 2,837) smoking when adolescents gain a best friend who smokes. Potential moderating factors include self-esteem, depression, problem behavior, school and family bonds, and household access to cigarettes. In addition to acquiring a smoking best friend, initiation was predicted by trouble at school, household access, poorer grades and delinquency, whereas escalation was predicted by depressive symptoms. There was little evidence that the examined individual difference factors moderate the association between gaining a smoking best friend and increased adolescent smoking. Results point to the challenges of identifying factors that may lead adolescents to be more or less susceptible to the influence of pro-smoking friends.     

Grief in the initial adjustment process to the continuing care retirement community

This paper examined the transition to continuing care retirement communities (CCRCs) within the framework of anticipatory and disenfranchised grief. Qualitative interviews with 29 residents and 19 adult children were conducted. Three major thematic categories emerged from the data. The first theme reflected ambivalence, dialectics or uncertainty about the CCRC as manifested by the various names assigned to it by respondents. The second theme reflected the acknowledgement of present and anticipatory losses and grief in response to the move. The final theme reflected respondents' disenfranchisement of their grief and loss and their view of the transition in a positive light. In their early adjustment period, residents and adult children are ambivalent about the transition, but often refrain from acknowledging their losses openly because of the image of the CCRC as a status symbol. Open acknowledgement of losses associated with the transition might be beneficial.     

Beliefs About Cues to Deception: Mindless Stereotypes or Untapped Wisdom?

In this longitudinal study, senders told truths and lies to same-sex friends (judges) at both one month and six months into the relationship. Judges guessed whether the stories were truths or lies, and described the cues they used to make their decisions. These cues were coded into categories according to the nature of the cue (verbal, visual, or paralinguistic). Judges mentioned more verbal cues when the story was truthful than when it was fabricated, and mentioned more visual nonverbal cues when it was fabricated than when it was truthful. Therefore, perceivers' stated beliefs about cues discriminated the truths from the lies, although their explicit judgments of deceptiveness did not. Perceivers who mentioned visual or verbal cues more often were not more accurate at detecting deception (explicitly), but those who mentioned paralinguistic cues more often were more accurate.     

Investigating the Readiness of Hospital Social Workers to Respond to Domestic and Family Violence

ABSTRACT

Domestic and family violence (DFV) is recognised as a health care priority. Women experiencing DFV use health services at a higher rate than the general population. Hospital social workers are an important component of a public hospital response to domestic and family violence but how prepared are they for this role? This research study explored the readiness of social workers in a Melbourne metropolitan hospital setting to respond to DFV. Results indicated that although the social workers had a knowledge base highly relevant for responding to DFV, many lacked specific knowledge of risk assessment, safety planning, legislative responsibilities, and referral pathways for support, including legal support. As a result, it was likely that they were not adequately responding, either by not recognising when they needed to, or with knowledge and confidence when they did. They also identified a range of organisational enablers, including policy, time, and safe conversation spaces.

IMPLICATIONS

• Hospital social workers have a central role to play in responding to domestic and family violence.

• Hospital social workers need to be better prepared for domestic and family violence responses.

• Social workers require ongoing training and organisational support including practice protocols and guidelines, and the provision of time and private, safe spaces for sensitive conversations to occur.

• Universities should ensure that the role of hospital social workers is considered within curriculum addressing the area of domestic and family violence (DFV).

     

Disruptions of self,place and mobility: digital nomads in Chiang Mai,Thailand

ABSTRACT

This article considers the growing lifestyle trend of digital nomadism, whereby individuals leverage digital technology to combine work, leisure and hypermobile travel interests. Based primarily on ethnographic fieldwork in Chiang Mai, Thailand, I examine the lifestyle and mobility pathways of digital nomads through two distinct yet coexisting notions of disruption. On one level disruption is viewed as a radical expression of flexibility, fluidity and newness, that evokes a sense of breaking free from a traditional past. At the same time, I consider disruption on more subtle terms, addressing ways in which historical formations pertaining to work and tourism feed into and unsettle understandings of self, place and mobility. In this article, I examine the role of a work-leisure distinction, colonial imaginaries of place and emerging norms of hypermobility in complicating attempts by digital nomads to establish a coherent sense of self, work and productivity in and across tourism destinations. These seemingly fluid lifestyle practices, I suggest, promote a continual preoccupation with boundaries, as digital nomads try to make sense of work, identity and newness amid an in/visible and intersecting constellation of mobility pathways involving Western backpackers, Chinese tourists, resident foreigners, visiting family and friends, and other nomads.