Gender-Sensitive Social Work Practice: A Model for Education

Many social work educators are in search of ways to integrate course content on women while preserving time-tested models of assessment and intervention. Although women comprise the majority of social work clients, most psychological models of assessment and intervention are based on male psychological development. In contrast, feminist theories and therapies have turned attention to female psychological development and how this differs from male progression. This article describes and discusses a psychotherapeutic model for practice and education that allows for balanced gender sensitivity and that can be readily superimposed on existing models for more effective assessment and intervention.     

Another Cautionary Note about R 2: Its Use in Weighted Least-Squares Regression Analysis

A recent article in this journal presented a variety of expressions for the coefficient of determination (R ²) and demonstrated that these expressions were generally not equivalent. The article discussed potential pitfalls in interpreting the R ² statistic in ordinary least-squares regression analysis. The current article extends this discussion to the case in which regression models are fit by weighted least squares and points out an additional pitfall that awaits the unwary data analyst. We show that unthinking reliance on the R ² statistic can lead to an overly optimistic interpretation of the proportion of variance accounted for in the regression. We propose a modification of the estimator and demonstrate its utility by example.     

Teachers as risk and resource factors in minority students’ school adjustment: an integrative review of qualitative research on acculturation

ABSTRACT

The present study is embedded in the contextual approach of acculturation research. It examines teachers’ attitudes and behaviors, teachers’ expectations as well as their teaching practices as risk and resource factors in minority students’ school adjustment. The study applies the method of content analysis and uses a deductively developed and inductively enriched system of categories. The results of the study provide an integrative review of qualitative research on the role teachers play in the acculturation process of minority youth and their adjustment outcomes in the school context.     

Responses to Economic Pressure by Low-Income Families: Financial Distress and Hopefulness

Based on Boss’ family stress model, the study examined whether financial adaptations and locus of control mediated levels of financial distress and hopefulness for low-income consumers experiencing economic pressure. Data were collected online from 221 low-income, Midwestern consumers. Structural equation modeling explored relationships. Those reporting more economic pressure reported higher financial distress, less hopefulness. When locus of control was more internal, however, participants reported less financial distress and more hopefulness. Those making more financial adjustments had more financial distress, but also more hopefulness, indicating that while the current situation was grim, adaptive responses fostered hopefulness that things would improve. Educators can emphasize financial behaviors that improve financial outcomes, facilitating greater perceived control over finances, more hopefulness, and reduced financial distress.     

Assisting A Concerned Person to Motivate Someone Experiencing Cybersex Into Treatment

Cybersex and Internet pornography addiction are new problem areas confronting couples and families. A most significant experience inducing family members to reach out to a therapist or an Interventionist for help with their addicted member is the realization that the individual they are living with has become a stranger. This article focuses on the changes in the attitude, emotions, and behaviors of the addicted individual from compulsive Internet pornography use and cybersex. Identifying these changes for the family members validates their experience of now living with a stranger. This article then presents the three‐level empirically based, manual‐driven method of Invitational Intervention, A Relational Intervention Sequence for Engagement (ARISE) as an effective tool for helping families to get their loved ones into treatment.     

Orderly Departure from Vietnam: Cold War Anomaly or Humanitarian Innovation?

In May 1979, UNHCR and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam signeda Memorandum of Understanding establishing a program for legalemigration from Vietnam, known as the Orderly Departure Program,or ODP. The ODP was intended to make it possible for personswishing to leave Vietnam to do so in a safe and orderly manner,rather than having to join the ranks of the Vietnamese boatpeople. It is the only time UNHCR has extended its assistanceon a large scale to help persons to leave their country of origin.Well over half a million people emigrated from Vietnam underthe auspices of the program. The existence of the ODP made itpossible for the international community to reach consensuson how to tackle problems relating to Vietnamese refugees andasylum-seekers at two major conferences, once in 1979 and anotherin 1987. This article explores the origins of the program inthe context of the Cold War and the aftermath of the Americanwithdrawal from Vietnam, attitudes within UNHCR to the program,and the contribution the ODP made to resolving the Vietnameserefugee crisis.     

Regulatory Models and the Environment: Practice, Pitfalls, and Prospects

Computational models support environmental regulatory activities by providing the regulator an ability to evaluate available knowledge, assess alternative regulations, and provide a framework to assess compliance. But all models face inherent uncertainties because human and natural systems are always more complex and heterogeneous than can be captured in a model. Here, we provide a summary discussion of the activities, findings, and recommendations of the National Research Council's Committee on Regulatory Environmental Models, a committee funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to provide guidance on the use of computational models in the regulatory process. Modeling is a difficult enterprise even outside the potentially adversarial regulatory environment. The demands grow when the regulatory requirements for accountability, transparency, public accessibility, and technical rigor are added to the challenges. Moreover, models cannot be validated (declared true) but instead should be evaluated with regard to their suitability as tools to address a specific question. The committee concluded that these characteristics make evaluation of a regulatory model more complex than simply comparing measurement data with model results. The evaluation also must balance the need for a model to be accurate with the need for a model to be reproducible, transparent, and useful for the regulatory decision at hand. Meeting these needs requires model evaluation to be applied over the "life cycle" of a regulatory model with an approach that includes different forms of peer review, uncertainty analysis, and extrapolation methods than those for nonregulatory models.     

Book reviews

ABSTRACT

Why do some towns become focal points for anti-minority activism at particular moments in time, when other towns with similar socio-economic conditions do not? While policy practitioners charged with responding to such activity frequently ask this question, it has received less academic attention. Consequently, an adequate response falls between different strands of the academic literature on anti-minority politics.

We explore this question through a comparative analysis of how and why Luton, a Bedfordshire town, became a focal point for the latest wave of organised anti-minority activism in the UK, centred around the English Defence League (EDL), while Blackburn with Darwen, a local authority in Lancashire with a history of extreme right political ‘successes’, did not.

We develop the concept of situated credibility contests to help us articulate the contingent relationships between potential explanatory variables and political outcomes, and describe how ‘demand-side’ and ‘supply-side’ variables interact through the strategic actions of anti-minority activists and their opponents.     

Data audit as a management tool

Management faces the three basic challenges of achieving cost efficiency, successfully applying new technology, and minimizing risk. This paper examines the ways in which data audits can help managers come to terms with each of these challenges. It emphasizes the role of data audits in providing reliable information on which to base decisions and stresses the importance of auditing data in process rather than retrospectively. The paper examines frequently encountered sources of error and discusses the ways audits benefit management by assuring the integrity of experimental design, by preventing misassignment of observations, and by preventing the loss of data.     

Values,Perceived Risks and Benefits,and Acceptability of Nuclear Energy

We examined how personal values and perceptions of risks and benefits are associated with the acceptability of nuclear energy (NE). A theoretical model is tested in which beliefs about the risks and benefits of NE mediate the relationship between values and acceptability. The results showed that egoistic values are positively related to the perceived benefits and acceptability of NE. In contrast, altruistic and biospheric values were positively related to the perceived risks of NE. Although it has been argued that NE may help to combat climate change through lower CO₂ emissions, these environmental benefits were not acknowledged by people with strong biospheric values. Furthermore, results confirmed that the more risks respondents perceived, the less they were inclined to accept NE. In contrast, the more a person believed that NE has beneficial consequences, the more acceptable NE was. Finally, as expected, perceived risks and benefits were found to partly mediate the relationship between personal values and acceptability. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.