Single Parent Adoptions: A Review

Single parent adoption is a new phenomenon in North America. Social workers will have to deal with this adoption issue at an increasing rate. This paper reviews the findings of existing studies relating to one-parent adoptions.     

WHY HOLD-UPS OCCUR: THE SELF-ENFORCING RANGE OF CONTRACTUAL RELATIONSHIPS

Court enforcement and private enforcement are not alternative contract enforcement mechanisms, but are used jointly by transactors to define the self-enforcing range of a contractual relationship. Within this framework contract terms economize on the limited amounts of private enforcement capital possessed by transactors, either by directly controlling transactor behavior or by shifting private enforcement capital between transactors to coincide with likely future market conditions. Hold-ups occur when market conditions change sufficiently to place the relationship outside the self-enforcing range. This probabilistic view of hold-ups is contrasted with opportunism more generally and with moral hazard behavior.     

Scrambled randomized response methods for obtaining sensitive quantitative data

We study a multiplicative randomized response method for obtaining responses to sensitive questions when the answers are quantitative. The method involves the respondent multiplying his sensitive answer by a random number from a known distribution, and giving the product to the interviewer, who does not know the value of the random number and thus receives a scrambled response. Some particular distributions for the random scrambling number are proposed and studied, and ways of generating the scrambling numbers are discussed. Some modifications for increasing the efficiency of the method are proposed, and numerical results are given that show the scrambled response method is generally superior to the previously used method of randomizing questions.     

Postnatal Effects of Prenatal Insult

Exogenous agents may perturb development during the embryonic period and adversely affect the formation of organs. However, adverse effects on development are not limited to the embryonic period nor are the manifestations restricted solely to outright gross structural malformation, but may instead be expressed as a decrement or abberration of postnatal function. Susceptibility to altered development may extend well into the postnatal period. Studies of functional parameters in several organ systems have demonstrated the broad-based susceptibility, subtlety of expression and potential of long-lasting effects of altered development assessed by physiologic assays. Adverse effects on functional development, whether in the CNS, reproductive, gastrointestinal, genitourinary, respiratory, or immune systems, etc., merit continuing investigation. From the viewpoint of risk estimation and hazard detection, evaluations of postnatal functional parameters may be relevant for several reasons. First, such parameters may serve as low-dose triggers. Second, they may be useful as a focal point for epidemiological studies. Finally, a more thorough understanding of the degree and magnitude of such postnatal functional deficits is needed since an adverse maternal effect may be transient, considered acceptable, or unperceived, but the effect on the conceptus may be permanent and severe. The immune and respiratory systems are discussed as two examples of how subtle and protean adverse effects on functional development may be.     

The Single-Parent Family in Australia: An Overview

Studies of single-parent families in Australia are reviewed and statistical trends related to this type of family pattern are discussed. It is quite evident that family sociology has paid little attention to this growing population in Australia. The categories reviewed include single parents, unmarried mothers, widows, deserted wives and the families of prisoners.     

"毛主义"战略的基本特征

"毛主义"的基本内涵是在一个以农民为主体的社会结构中,按照列宁主义组织原则,建立一个由于信仰马克思列宁主义的若干基本准则而充满活力的政党。因而,这一思想体系就有异干以工人阶级为主体的苏联布尔什维克主义。毛泽东思想也因其鲜明的思想创造性,成为东方马列主义的独立流派。