Use of functional capacity evaluations in workplaces and the compensation system: a report on workers' and report users' perceptions

Until recently, little was documented about how functional capacity evaluations (FCEs) are used by employers and workers' compensation organizations. Such information was one focus of a comprehensive research study on FCEs carried out in southern Ontario, Canada, which involved representatives from the full range of groups involved in FCEs: referral sources, assessors, return-to-work specialists, third party payers and injured workers [1]. This paper shares findings from a cohort of injured workers undergoing FCEs, and explored how their FCE results were perceived and utilized by those receiving the reports. Based on study findings, we provide recommendations as to how FCEs should be requested, undertaken, reported and particularly applied to reduce work disability among injured workers.     

The factor structure of generalized workplace harassment

We describe the development and psychometric characteristics of the Generalized Workplace Harassment Questionnaire (GWHQ), a 29-item instrument developed to assess harassing experiences at work in five conceptual domains: verbal aggression, disrespect, isolation/exclusion, threats/bribes, and physical aggression. Over 1700 current and former university employees completed the GWHQ at three time points. Factor analytic results at each wave of data suggested a five-factor solution that did not correspond to the original five conceptual factors. We suggest a revised scoring scheme for the GWHQ utilizing four of the empirically extracted factors: covert hostility, verbal hostility, manipulation, and physical hostility. Covert hostility was the most frequently experienced type of harassment, followed by verbal hostility, manipulation, and physical hostility. Verbal hostility, covert hostility, and manipulation were found to be significant predictors of psychological distress.     

The Impact of Legalization on Illegal Gambling Participation

This paper examines the effects of legalization on illegal gambling participation using a multivariate analysis to adjust for the influence of demographic variables. In addition, the incidence of illegal gambling in a nationwide sample was compared with the incidence reported by Nevada residents. Games with similar structures and psychological characteristics appear to be complementary. That is, people who participate in one tend to participate in the other as well, regardless of their legal status. Dissimilar games operate as substitutes for each other.     

Ambivalence Toward Integration: the Sequence of Response to Six Interracial Situations*

White liberals (N=204) believing in integration and living in Los Angeles County expressed their attitudes toward six interracial situations: (1) busing in the schools for the purpose of ending de facto segregation; (2) the entrance of blacks into the respondents' occupational fields; (3) blacks moving into the respondents' neighborhoods; (4) the quota system as the basis for college admission for minorities; (5) rentals to blacks in white-occupied apartment buildings; and (6) hiring of blacks. A scalogram analysis indicates that the attitudes common to white liberals as a group form a systematic ordering of adherence to or retreat from anti-discriminatory principles, with the underlying dimension being the degree of attitudinal favorableness toward the situations and integration in general. We found a predictable pattern of complexity of attitudes toward the situations, with progression from the most difficult to the least difficult situation as follows: quota, busing, residence, apartment, hiring, and occupation. We reject a situational, direct threat hypothesis in favor of a general attitude hypothesis since retreats from anti-discriminatory beliefs follow a cumulative sequence, irrespective of the respondents' particular life circumstances or the nature of the specific situation. We conclude that the cultural definitions of the situations and the degree of clarity of emergent norms are primary factors determining attitudinal expressions which are consistent or inconsistent with a general belief in integration.     

Adolescent sexuality

The reader is offered a contemporary view of adolescent sexuality, which has evolved into new forms of sexual behavior, in response to current shifts of values and societal realities. The current phenomena of excalating sexually transmitted diseases and teen-age pregnancy and parenthood are examined. The recent developments in clinicians views about homosexuality and heterosexuality are also offered. A case of more optimal adolescent heterosexual activity is presented, depicting the accompanying self questioning, uncertainties, passions and inner musings, regarding a male adolescent's sense of self and self object choices.in private practice     

Strangers to Their Own Class?

The central question addressed is whether constitutional democracy, institutionalized opposition, and radical leadership tend to narrow the vertical social distance between the officers and members of industrial unions. The empirical analysis utilizes data on the Congress of Industrial Organizations unions during the late 1940s. The argument is that both union democracy and radicalism tend to sustain a close identification between workers and their leaders, to enhance their class solidarity, and to minimize the split between them. The analysis shows that officers' salaries and the income differential between their salaries and the workers' wages were far smaller in the democratic unions and in those in the Communist camp than in the oligarchical unions and those in the anti-Communist camp.     

The British Community Development Project: Lessons for today

This paper looks back at the experience of the first Britishpoverty programme, the national Community Development Project(CDP), which operated from 1969 to 1978. The "radical" projectswithin CDP comprehensively rejected the official governmentview of the nature and causes of, and solutions to, povertyand urban deprivation. The roots of the radical CDP perspectiveare to be located within the political character of the periodamong other factors. The paper offers a retrospective accountof the strengths and limitations of CDP.