Informal Caregiving and Quality of Life Among Older Adults: Prospective Analyses from the Swedish Longitudinal Occupational Survey of Health (SLOSH)

Social Indicators Research - Providing unpaid informal care to someone who is ill or disabled is a common experience in later life. While a supportive and potentially rewarding role, informal care...     

An empirical assessment of the Above the Influence advertising campaign

This study evaluated the efficacy of Above the Influence (ATI), a national media-based health persuasion campaign to deter youth drug use. The campaign uses public service anti-drug prevention messages and targets youth between the ages of 14 and 16, a period of heightened susceptibility to peer influences. The evaluation utilized mall intercepts from geographically dispersed regions of the country. Theoretical impetus for the campaign combines elements of the theory of reasoned action (TRA), persuasion theory, and the health belief model. A series of structural equation models were tested with four randomly drawn cross-validation samples (N = 3,000). Findings suggest that awareness of ATI is associated with greater anti-drug beliefs, fewer drug use intentions, and less marijuana use. Congruent with the TRA, changes in beliefs and intentions are intermediate steps linking campaign awareness with behavior. This study provides further evidence of positive campaign effects and may strengthen reliance on mass media health persuasion campaigns as a useful adjunct to other programs targeting youth.     

Neglect of older adults in Michigan nursing homes

Although research on domestic elder abuse and neglect has grown over the past 20 years, there is limited research on elder neglect in nursing homes. The purpose of this study is to estimate the incidence of elder neglect in nursing homes and identify the individual and contextual risks associated with elder neglect. Data came from a 2005 random digit dial survey of individuals in Michigan who had relatives in long term care. Our analytic sample included 414 family members who had a relative aged 65 or older in nursing homes. Results showed that about 21% of nursing home residents were neglected on one or more occasion in the last 12 months. Two nursing home residents' characteristics reported by family members appear to significantly increase the odds of neglect: functional impairments in activities of daily living and previous resident-to-resident victimization. Behavior problems also are associated with higher odds of neglect (p = 0.078). Policy implications of these results are discussed.     

Restrictiveness and guidance in support systems

Restrictiveness and guidance have been proposed as methods for improving the performance of users of support systems. In many companies computerized support systems are used in demand forecasting enabling interventions based on management judgment to be applied to statistical forecasts. However, the resulting forecasts are often ‘sub-optimal’ because many judgmental adjustments are made when they are not required. An experiment was used to investigate whether restrictiveness or guidance in a support system leads to more effective use of judgment. Users received statistical forecasts of the demand for products that were subject to promotions. In the restrictiveness mode small judgmental adjustments to these forecasts were prohibited (research indicates that these waste effort and may damage accuracy). In the guidance mode users were advised to make adjustments in promotion periods, but not to adjust in non-promotion periods. A control group of users were not subject to restrictions and received no guidance. The results showed that neither restrictiveness nor guidance led to improvements in accuracy. While restrictiveness reduced unnecessary adjustments, it deterred desirable adjustments and also encouraged over-large adjustments so that accuracy was damaged. Guidance encouraged more desirable system use, but was often ignored. Surprisingly, users indicated it was less acceptable than restrictiveness.     

Prismatic Metropolis: Race and Residential Segregation in the City of the Angels

Most major urban areas remain segregated by race, especially in terms of black segregation from whites. We replicate and extend the innovative approach developed by Farley and colleagues for understanding processes of racial residential segregation with data collected in Los Angeles. Using a large (N = 4025) multiracial sample of adults, we examine (1) actual and perceived differences in economic status, (2) mutual preference for same race neighbors, and (3) racial prejudice and discrimination as hypotheses for the persistence of residential segregation. With a systematic experimental design we gauge respondent openness to living in areas with varying proportions of black, white, Latino, or Asian neighbors. We find no support for actual or perceived cost of housing as a barrier to integration. Although all groups exhibit some degree of ethnocentric preference for same race neighbors, this tendency is strongest among whites rather than blacks and plays only a small role in perpetuating segregation. Blacks face the greatest hostility in the search for housing and are consensually recognized as most likely to face discrimination in the housing market. Racial minorities are more open to sharing residential space with whites than with other minorities. We find generally higher rates of openness to integration than Farley and colleagues found in their recent Detroit survey.     

Adverse selection and equilibrium in liability insurance markets

Models of asymmetric information in insurance markets typically consider insurance buyers with Bernoulli loss distributions differing in expected loss. This article analyzes markets where buyer loss distributions are characterized by mean-preserving spreads and insurers can classify applicants in terms of expected values but not by risk. Because liability losses are characterized by skewed continuous probability distributions, both discrete and continuous loss distributions are considered. In contrast to the single separating equilibrium in the classic Rothschild-Stiglitz insurance market, multiple separating equilibria are identified in this article: three in the discrete case and four in the continuous case. The possibility of extreme discontinuities in insurer policy offers provides a new explanation for crises in liability insurance markets.The support of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners is gratefully acknowledged.     

The epidemiology of pathological gambling: Critique of existing research and alternative strategies

As legalized gambling opportunities increase, the performance of research on pathological gambling assumes greater importance. In this regard, a useful starting point involves documenting the epidemiological nature of pathological gambling. Unfortunately, the only systematic study of the incidence/prevalence of pathological gambling which has yielded widely publicized and frequently cited results appears to possess several methodological problems. Thus, this paper critiques this study and discusses methodological issues relevant to any epidemiological research effort. In addition to sampling and measurement concerns, issues such as data accessibility, denial and related reactive effects, ethical considerations, and the appropriateness of various data collection methods are discussed to promote the conduct of sound pathological gambling research.     

No trend in the intergenerational transmission of divorce

Previous studies on trends in the intergenerational transmission of divorce have produced mixed findings, with two studies (McLanahan and Bumpass 1988; Teachman 2002) reporting no trend in divorce transmission and one study (Wolfinger 1999) finding that divorce transmission has weakened substantially. Using a stratified Cox proportional hazard model, we analyze data from the National Survey of Families and Households and find no evidence for any trend in divorce transmission. To reconcile apparent differences in results, we note that the General Social Survey data used by Wolfinger lack information on marital duration, permitting analysis only for whether respondents have divorced by interview. As a result, an apparent decline in divorce transmission could be due to inadequate adjustments for the longer exposures to risk by earlier marriage cohorts, yielding a higher probability of divorce by interview for earlier cohorts relative to more recent cohorts even if divorce risks are identical across all marriage cohorts. We confirm this possibility by using a series of discrete-time hazard logistic regressions to investigate the sensitivity of estimates of trends in divorce transmission to different adjustments for exposure to risk. We conclude that there has been no trend in the intergenerational transmission of divorce.     

Discipline and due process in labor unions

This article examines the implications of bureaucratization for discipline and due process within labor organizations. Two perspectives on these relations were developed from the literature on union governance and tested with data from union constitutions and other secondary sources. The extent of due process protections was positively related to both bureaucratization and the number of grounds for discipline. The results support the solidarity perspective, which posits a convergence of union leaders’ and members’ interests.