The Legacy of Parsons: Career Counselors and Vocational Psychologists as Agents of Social Change

The commitment to social change demonstrated by the founder of vocational psychology, Frank Parsons, continues in several areas of vocational psychology today, including individual career counseling, guidance work in the schools, career interventions with special populations, and vocational research. This article highlights ways in which career counselors and vocational psychologists have focused and can continue to focus their practice and research to improve the condition of society and to provide interventions that enhance the ability of all individuals to love and to work in a meaningful way.     

Families in the Middle and Later Years: A Review and Critique of Research in the 1990s

Research on families in the middle and later years came into its own during the 1990s, documenting the complexity, malleability, and variety of older family connections. We examined 908 articles on family gerontology topics, observing 4 trends: Conceptually, an appreciation for pluralism and resilience as individuals and families age is apparent. Theoretically, life course, feminist, socioemotional selectivity, and family solidarity theories are increasingly applied to intergenerational family relations. Methodologically, new interest in qualitative methods for studying diverse groups has improved the depth with which aging studies can account for variability in old age; new quantitative methodologies have allowed greater sophistication in dealing with longitudinal data. Substantively, there is greater understanding of family caregiving, social support, parent‐child relationships, marital transitions, and grandparenting relationships. The field is poised to take even greater risks in fulfilling the promise of studying linked lives over time.     

Comparison of Standard Radiological Risk Models and Using RESRAD to Derive Generic Risk-Based Area Factors for Final Status Surveys

The RESidual RADioactivity (RESRAD) computer code has been used for years to calculate carcinogenic risk and radiological dose from exposure to radionuclides. The basic ingestion, inhalation, and direct gamma intake equations used by RESRAD, Risk Assessment Guidance for Superfund (RAGS), and the Soil Screening Guidance for Radionuclides (SSG) are similar and can produce similar results, but there are some notable differences. Of particular interest is the fact that RESRAD incorporates sophisticated environmental transport models. Associated environmental parameters allow risk assessors to consider, among other variables, the size (i.e., surface area) of the contaminated zone, a variable not typically addressed quantitatively under the RAGS/SSG paradigm. Considering the similarities between basic RESRAD, RAGS, and SSG intake equations and given the broad acceptance of RESRAD, it stands to reason that RESRAD-derived area factors may be used to supplement RAGS/SSG human health risk calculations. This would allow risk assessors to retrofit existing results or otherwise modify standard RAGS/SSG equations for use in site closeout planning under the Multi-Agency Radiation Survey and Site Investigation Manual (MARSSIM), given a key component of the MARSSIM method is the consideration of small areas of elevated activity or "hot spots" through the use of area factors.     

Children's Use and Knowledge of Display Rules for Anger Following Hypothetical Vignettes versus Following Live Peer Interaction

Our primary goal was to examine the correspondence between children's self-reported use and knowledge of display rules for anger following hypothetical vignettes versus following live peer interactions. Our secondary goal was to investigate whether children's self-reported experience and self-reported expression of anger were related their observed anger expression, considered an observational measure of use of display rules for anger. Participants were 274 second-grade children. Children were first interviewed about their use and knowledge of display rules for anger in game-playing situations depicted through hypothetical vignettes. Several months later, children interacted with a confederate in standardized games designed to simulate the vignettes and answered the same questions about display rules. Children's responses were moderately related across the two contexts. However, following the live interactions, compared to the hypothetical vignettes, children reported feeling less anger, expressing less anger, intending to hide their anger more, and dissembling their anger more. In addition, there were differences in the quality and quantity of strategies for hiding anger that children generated across the two contexts. Observations of anger expression were not related to self-reports of either the experience or expression of anger.     

Exploring Heideggerian hermeneutic phenomenology: A perfect fit for midwifery research

BackgroundHeideggerian hermeneutic phenomenology has been used widely to understand the meaning of lived experiences in health research. For midwifery scholars this approach enables deep understanding of women's and midwives’ lived experiences of specific phenomena. However, for beginning researchers this is not a methodology for the faint hearted. It requires a period of deep immersion to come to terms with at times impenetrable language and perplexing concepts.ObjectivesThis paper aims to assist midwives to untangle and examine some of the choices they face when they first come to terms with an understanding of this methodology and highlights the methodology's capacity to reveal midwifery authenticity and holistic practice.DiscussionThe illumination of a selection of various concepts underpinning hermeneutic phenomenology will inform midwives considering this methodology as suitable framework for exploring contemporary midwifery phenomena.     

Roadmap to recovery: Reporting on a research taskforce supporting Indigenous responses to COVID‐19 in Australia

In April 2020 a Group of Eight Taskforce was convened, consisting of over 100 researchers, to provide independent, research‐based recommendations to the Commonwealth Government on a “Roadmap to Recovery” from COVID‐19. The report covered issues ranging from pandemic control and relaxation of social distancing measures, to well‐being and special considerations for vulnerable populations. Our work focused on the critical needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities; this paper presents an overview of our recommendations to the Roadmap report. In addressing the global challenges posed by pandemics for citizens around the world, Indigenous people are recognised as highly vulnerable. At the time of writing Australia's First Nations Peoples have been largely spared from COVID‐19 in comparison to other Indigenous populations globally. Our recommendations emphasise self‐determination and equitable needs‐based funding to support Indigenous communities to recover from COVID‐19, addressing persistent overcrowded housing, and a focus on workforce, especially for regional and remote communities. These latter two issues have been highlighted as major issues of risk for Indigenous communities in Australia It remains to be seen how governments across Australia take up these recommendations to support Indigenous peoples' health and healing journey through yet another, potentially catastrophic, health crisis.     

A Research Note on the Stability of Coresidential Unions Formed Postconception

There is a large literature examining the stability of mid‐pregnancy unions, and parallel work on unions formed after a nonmarital birth, but research has yet to compare pre‐ and postbirth unions and simultaneously consider whether the union is with the father or a new partner. Using the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1997 Cohort, the author compares the stability of coresidential unions (cohabitations and marriages) among three groups of mothers with nonunion first conceptions: those with a mid‐pregnancy union with the father (n = 203), those with a postbirth union with the father (n = 333), and those with a union with a new partner (n = 342). Compared to mid‐pregnancy unions with the father, postbirth father unions are 35% more likely to dissolve. New‐partner unions are more likely to dissolve than both types of father unions. These associations persist when accounting for union type and socioeconomic and demographic characteristics.     

From Sickly Survival to the Realisation of Potential: Child Health as a Social Project in Twentieth Century England

SUMMARY: During the last century the improvement of child health has become an important matter of public concern, reflecting preoccupations with the quality of the future adult population as well as with the current welfare of children. This paper traces some of the changing ideas and practices associated with this social project, from the late nineteenth century to the postwar years of the twentieth. From a period when survival beyond birth and infancy was the critical area of social concern to one when psychological adjustment and behaviour emerged as the essential indices of children's present and future health status.