An Interview with Joyce Edward: Exemplary Clinician, Advocate, and Scholar

Over the years, noteworthy social workers have been interviewed for the Clinical Social Work Journal. This article features an interview with Joyce Edward who is recognized for her many extraordinary contributions to clinical social work. Joyce has co-written or co-edited three exceptional books for the social work clinician, she has been an esteemed teacher and a vocal activist for quality mental health care. In this interview Joyce reflects on family influences, her work as a social caseworker, the psychoanalytic luminaries with whom she trained, her concerns about the clinical education of today's social work students, and finally, her perspective on managed mental health care.     

The Relationship of Attachment Variables to Career Decision‐Making Self‐Efficacy and Fear of Commitment

The present study indicated that both attachment bonds and self‐rated attachment style were significantly related to fear of commitment and, to a lesser extent, career decision‐making self‐efficacy. Given previous research showing that fear of commitment is related to career indecisiveness and “floundering,” the possible importance of attention to attachment bonds and styles in career counseling is suggested.     

Cyclic Evaluation of Transitivity of Reciprocal Relations

A general framework for studying the transitivity of reciprocal relations is presented. The key feature is the cyclic evaluation of transitivity: triangles (i.e. any three points) are visited in a cyclic manner. An upper bound function acting upon the ordered weights encountered provides an upper bound for the ‘sum minus 1’ of these weights. Commutative quasi-copulas allow to translate a general definition of fuzzy transitivity (when applied to reciprocal relations) elegantly into the framework of cycle-transitivity. Similarly, a general notion of stochastic transitivity corresponds to a particular class of upper bound functions. Ample attention is given to self-dual upper bound functions.     

Do universal non‐contributory old‐age pensions make sense for rural areas in low‐income countries?

The need for old‐age security coverage in rural areas of many developing countries is rapidly increasing for several reasons, including population ageing and the weakening of family support networks. These trends have generated intense interest in policies that might help respond to the growing problem of rural old‐age destitution. The focus of our analysis is on one of the most promising alternatives under consideration: universal non‐contributory old‐age pensions. This model has some limitations and it is not appropriate for all developing countries, but it would be of potential benefit to far more than the six that have already implemented variants of this approach.     

Biomechanical aspects of dynamic stability

Walking is a fundamental motor skill that significantly affects the level of independence in older adults. The amount of variability present in a walking pattern reflects the quality of neuromuscular control. It is well established that a large proportion of falls in older people occurs when walking. The prevention of falls is vital for minimizing disability, preventing injury, and impeding the development of frailty and subsequent deterioration in quality of life. The present literature review focuses on dynamic stability. In dynamic stability, both the base of support and the center of mass are in motion, and effective balance function is required. In general, older adults are expected to have different movement patterns from younger adults, expressed by differences in limb kinematics and kinetics. A better understanding of the biomechanical variables involved can help anticipate and prevent potential falls.     

Licensing Marriage and Family Counselors: A Model Act

The author presents a model bill for the licensing of marriage and family counselors and describes some of the historical context in which it developed within the Conciliation Court movement. The model bill is similar to the one proposed by the American Association of Marriage and Family Counselors. Editor.     

Developmental differences in baserate estimates of social behaviors and attitudes

This study examined the development of baserate estimation skills for everyday social events and attitudes. Subjects in grades one, three, and six responded to questions concerning their own rates of behavior and attitudes, and their estimates of baserates of behaviors and attitudes for their classmates. The findings indicate a general increase in accuracy for the estimation of baserates throughout the elementary school years. In addition, younger subjects were less likely to make similar estimates for themselves and their classmates than were older respondents. Developmental changes in estimation accuracy are discussed in relation to task content, use of the response scale, correspondence between self-reports and estimates, and sample variability.     

Fast Mapping but Poor Retention by 24‐Month‐Old Infants

Four experiments explored the processes that bridge between referent selection and word learning. Twenty‐four‐month‐old infants were presented with several novel names during a referent selection task that included both familiar and novel objects and tested for retention after a 5‐min delay. The 5‐min delay ensured that word learning was based on retrieval from long‐term memory. Moreover, the relative familiarity of objects used during the retention test was explicitly controlled. Across experiments, infants were excellent at referent selection, but very poor at retention. Although the highly controlled retention test was clearly challenging, infants were able to demonstrate retention of the first 4 novel names presented in the session when referent selection was augmented with ostensive naming. These results suggest that fast mapping is robust for reference selection but might be more transient than previously reported for lexical retention. The relations between reference selection and retention are discussed in terms of competitive processes on 2 timescales: competition among objects on individual referent selection trials and competition among multiple novel name–object mappings made across an experimental session.