Pre‐teenage Children's Experiences with Alcohol

This article reports on the drinking experiences and motivations of 77 pre‐teenage children. The main reason which the children gave for occasional or regular drinking was the pleasure which they derived both from the effects of the alcohol and from the social interaction which accompanied the activity. Several of the children claimed that they were partly motivated by boredom. Peer influence appeared to play a minor role as far as the recurrent consumption of alcohol was concerned. A number of causes for concern are identified in the article. These include the frequency of the children's drinking and the volume of alcohol consumed by some of them; their tendency to combine different types of alcoholic drink in the same session; the unreliability of measures undertaken by the children to reduce risk and ensure their safety and the ease with which alcohol could be obtained. These findings emphasise the need for drug education programmes to alert children to the dangers of alcohol consumption and equip them with the skills to deal effectively with peer pressure. There is also a pressing need to improve the leisure facilities available for young people as alternatives to drinking and other problem behaviour. © 2007 The Author(s). Journal compilation © 2007 National Children's Bureau.     

Reactions to issues concerning sexual orientations, identities, preferences, and choices

Most etiological theories of homosexuality suffer from unomania, the preoccupation with single causes. Unomania, in MacDonald's terms, reflects a singularistic, as compared with a pluralistic cognitive set. It also reflects the rigid dichotomization of feminine roles for females and masculine roles for males. It is hoped that current research on bisexuality will be spared the unomania that has afflicted research on homosexuality.     

Offenders as victims of crime?: an investigation into the relationship between criminal behaviour and victimization

Summary.  We consider the association between victimization and offending behaviour by using data from the Youth Lifestyles Survey. We consider the effect of violent and non-violent offending on the probability of being a victim of violent and non-violent crime and find a positive association between these by using univariate probit estimates. However, taking into account the endog- enous nature of offending and victimization via a bivariate probit model, we find that univariate estimates understate the association. We suggest that policy recommendations should only be informed by the bivariate analysis of the association between offending and victimization.     

Locational Decisions of Charter Schools: Probing the Market Metaphor

Objective . Debate about market–oriented school–choice proposals often centers on questions of whether they will help or hurt minorities and the poor. We examine the locational decisions of different types of charter schools in the District of Columbia (D.C.) to assess their distributional consequences. Methods . We employ ordered probit regression to estimate models of the degree to which census tracts are served by charters. Results . Charters are more likely to locate in areas with high proportions of African–American and Hispanic residents than in the predominantly white neighborhoods, and more likely to locate in neighborhoods with middle incomes and high home ownership than in either poor or wealthy areas of the city. This is especially true of those operated by for–profits and those chartered by the elected rather than appointed chartering body. Additionally, we observe charters taking political and practical considerations into account when deciding where to locate. Conclusions . Proponents claim that charter schools will locate where need is greatest, while critics fear they will shy away from neighborhoods housing disadvantaged and minority students. We find that both camps are oversimplifying. Locational patterns are more complex and appear to be sensitive to variations in the type of charter school as well as the institutional characteristics of the chartering agency. Although market incentives are important, so too are pragmatic factors and institutional context.     

A little bit of lavender goes a long way: A critique of research on sexual orientation 1

Despite the suspected large numbers of bisexually oriented people, there has been almost no research on bisexuality. More important, the research on homosexuality is thoroughly confounded by the inclusion of large numbers of bisexuals as homosexuals, making that research difficult to interpret. The few studies of bisexuals that have been done are reviewed in this paper. Comparisons show that bisexuals often significantly differ from homosexuals and heterosexuals. Therefore, the practice of combining bisexuals with homosexuals in studies of homosexuals should be discontinued. Comparison studies of bisexuals, heterosexuals, and homosexuals are recommended.     

Improving homeless persons' utilisation of primary care: lessons to be learned from an outreach programme in The Netherlands

Elissen AMJ, Van Raak AJA, Derckx EWCC, Vrijhoef HJM. Improving homeless persons' utilisation of primary care: lessons to be learned from an outreach programme in The Netherlands Faced with rising homelessness, countries around the world are in need of innovative approaches to caring for those without shelter, who, more often than not, suffer from severe health problems. We conducted a case study of an innovative Dutch Primary Care for the Homeless (PCH) programme to gain insight into clients' demographic characteristics, health problems and service use, and to develop an explanation for its success in increasing the latter. Our analyses are based on a combination of quantitative and qualitative data. The results of the study suggest that the success of the PCH programme can be explained by the providers' pragmatism and will to adapt their mode of care provision to the behavioural patterns and needs of their homeless clients.     

Immigration Policy in Australia,Canada, New Zealand,and the United States: An Overview of Recent Trends

Immigration policies in most host nations of the west have undergone significant changes in recent years. Based on the four country‐specific papers that appear in this section of the journal, and also on our own research, we present an overview of these changes and their context. In all countries, economic considerations play a central role in shaping immigration policy and greater importance is given to scientific research. Several common policy changes are noted in Australia, Canada and New Zealand which include: a shift away from a human capital focus toward more targeted selection based on labor market demand for specific skills, increased emphasis on temporary foreign worker programs, attraction of international students, an overhauling of the refugee system, and regionalization of immigration. In the U.S., while adoption of some of these changes has often surfaced in public policy and academic discussions, legalization of unauthorized migrants remains an important policy debate, with recent arguments focusing on the economic benefits of legalization.