Gay,Lesbian, and Heterosexual Couples About to Begin Couples Therapy: An Online Relationship Assessment of 40,681 Couples

We currently have little idea of precisely who goes for couples therapy. This is a report of the results of a validated online assessment of relationship and individual functioning based on 39,251 heterosexual, 1,022 lesbian, and 438 gay couples about to begin couples therapy. Using validated and reliable questionnaires of relationship and individual functioning, this report presents and compares, for each sexual-orientation, the percentage of couples, pre-therapy, who are coping with a variety of relationship problems. To test for the replicability of results, the sample was divided randomly into two subsamples and statistical tests were performed on each sample. Couples initiating therapy suffer from greater distress and many more co-morbidities than has been presumed in previous literature, and same-sex couples present a particular set of both strengths and challenges compared to heterosexual couples. Gay-male and lesbian couples were very different on trust and monogamy, as were heterosexual and lesbian couples. Based on this epidemiologically sized sample, the challenge to our field may be to create interventions with much larger effect sizes than we currently have.     

The understudied half of undergraduates: Risky sexual behaviors among community college students

Abstract

Objective: This study examines the prevalence and risk factors associated with risky sexual behaviors in community college students. Participants: A diverse sample of 18–19-year-old community college students (N?=?264). Methods: Baseline data from an online prevention program administered in 2015. Results: Community college students in this sample disproportionately experienced sexual assault and were unlikely to test for STIs. Higher intentions to engage in risky sexual behaviors were associated with gender and sexual experience, but also with having lower intentions to communicate with a sexual partner about pregnancy and STIs, and having higher gender norm endorsement. Conclusions: Older adolescents attending community colleges may be at high risk for poor sexual health outcomes, and appropriate theory-based education should be tailored to meet the needs of these underserved students.     

GIS‐Based Integration of Social Vulnerability and Level 3 Probabilistic Risk Assessment to Advance Emergency Preparedness,Planning, and Response for Severe Nuclear Power Plant Accidents

In the nuclear power industry, Level 3 probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) is used to estimate damage to public health and the environment if a severe accident leads to large radiological release. Current Level 3 PRA does not have an explicit inclusion of social factors and, therefore, it is not possible to perform importance ranking of social factors for risk‐informing emergency preparedness, planning, and response (EPPR). This article offers a methodology for adapting the concept of social vulnerability, commonly used in natural hazard research, in the context of a severe nuclear power plant accident. The methodology has four steps: (1) calculating a hazard‐independent social vulnerability index for the local population; (2) developing a location‐specific representation of the maximum radiological hazard estimated from current Level 3 PRA, in a geographic information system (GIS) environment; (3) developing a GIS‐based socio‐technical risk map by combining the social vulnerability index and the location‐specific radiological hazard; and (4) conducting a risk importance measure analysis to rank the criticality of social factors based on their contribution to the socio‐technical risk. The methodology is applied using results from the 2012 Surry Power Station state‐of‐the‐art reactor consequence analysis. A radiological hazard model is generated from MELCOR accident consequence code system, translated into a GIS environment, and combined with the Center for Disease Control social vulnerability index (SVI). This research creates an opportunity to explicitly consider and rank the criticality of location‐specific SVI themes based on their influence on risk, providing input for EPPR.     

Out of the ordinary: research participants’ experiences of sharing the ‘insignificant’

How do research participants feel about having their ‘ordinary’ lives researched? This article focuses on how research participants manage the sharing of details emerging out of their ordinary lives in the context of research – an activity which, for most, is outside of the ordinary. Despite two significant research turns – towards reflexivity and towards the ‘everyday’ – these experiences remain curiously neglected. Drawing on a study of small acts of help and support, I seek to push methodological debate about researching the ordinary beyond the technical challenges of surfacing or capturing the apparently mundane or ‘insignificant’. I do so by arguing that background feelings rooted in the living of, and sharing about, the ordinary are analytically important in their own right; that the ‘ordinary’ itself, therefore, has to be managed by research participants and researchers; and that Goffman’s notion of performance is a useful tool for understanding how this is done.     

Parental advice to preadolescent bystanders about how to intervene during bullying differs by form of bullying

The current study examined parental advice given to fourth‐ and fifth‐grade preadolescents who imagined being bystanders to different forms of bullying (physical, verbal, property attack, social manipulation, exclusion). We assessed the frequency with which parents advised youth to follow specific intervention strategies (stop the bully, help/comfort the victim, tell adults), and we tested whether the frequency by which parents provided each kind of advice varied by the form of bullying described. One hundred and six fourth‐ and fifth‐grade preadolescents completed an interaction in which their parent gave them advice about how to respond if they were bystanders to five hypothetical bullying situations. Each situation described a different form of bullying. Across forms of bullying, parents most frequently told bystander children to intervene by telling an adult. However, advice differed based on the form of bullying presented. Parents most frequently advised children to “tell an adult” in response to physical bullying or property attacks, most frequently advised children to “help/comfort victims” in response to social exclusion and physical attacks, and most frequently advised children to “stop the bully” in response to verbal and social manipulation bullying.     

A Political Ecology of Shrimp Aquaculture in Thailand1

ABSTRACT This paper uses themes from political ecology to develop insights into the billion dollar shrimp aquaculture sector in Thailand. We find that corporations can exercise only limited control over shrimp production and that there is no clear trend toward larger operations. We explain the continued viability of small owner-operated farms by looking at how shrimp farming is located in physical and social space, and at the ability of owner-operators to work within the highly unstable socio-ecological processes of shrimp production. We also find that shrimp farming has induced a spatially-uneven increase in state territorial regulation. The spatial distribution of regulation is shaped by differences in how landscapes become politicized, and the degree of jurisdictional clarity. We conclude that industry self-regulation has limited prospects for containing the social and environmental problems of shrimp farming in Thailand, but that expanded state regulation that mobilizes the participation of local people might be effective.     

From Adversaries to Allies: Relief Workers' Attitudes Toward the US Military

Although soldiers and relief workers traditionally have engaged in conflicting missions—killing versus saving lives—recent peacekeeping operations have required the two groups to work together on humanitarian efforts. Interviews with aid workers in Bosnia and in Haiti reveal that this traditionally antimilitary population has come to support military interventions in their regions. They have developed a cooperative relationship with the military despite lingering doubts and persistent cultural differences. This recent shift in attitudes demonstrates that the concept of task cohesion, developed from studies of small-group dynamics, can be applied at the organizational level. Organizations that share a common goal and that depend on one another to reach that goal can develop a cooperative relationship and yet retain distinct organizational memberships and cultures.     

Obfuscating Child Sexual Abuse II: Listening to Survivors

The reality of the extent and experience of child sexual abuse cannot be revealed while children are unable to ‘stand up and be counted’. Limited alternatives, lack of information and dependence on adults prevent the true scale of the problem being appreciated. Similarly, media and legal treatment of abused children also operate to suppress the truth. The expertise and knowledge of those who have suffered abuse need to be acknowledged and utilized in order that child sexual abuse can no longer be obfuscated. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.