Toward professional civility: An analysis of rejection letters front sociology departments

I received 124 rejection letters from 124 sociology departments across the United Slates during my job search in 1996 and 1997. In this article, I analyze those rejection letters with regard lo the messages they send to individuals and organizations. I argue: (a) that rejection letters constitute a unique form of mass media in contemporary life as they are sent and read massively by individuals and organizations; and (b) that they may socialize entering practitioners into a specific discourse of attitudes and behaviors, sustaining a particular tradition of collegiality, morality, and interpersonal relationships for an organization, discipline, and profession. On the basis of this analysis, I offer suggestions lor positive change that will promote professional civility. Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Hawaii-Manoa. He is now assistant professor in sociology at California State University-Northridge. Dr. Shaw is interested in the study of deviance, crime, social problems, social control, and organizational behavior. He has published widely in those areas.     

Early and Middle Adolescents' Reasoning About Moral and Personal Concerns in Opposite‐sex Interactions

This study examined how adolescents coordinate personal and moral concerns in reasoning about opposite‐sex interactions. Sixty‐four early and middle adolescents (Ms = 12.74, 16.05 years) were individually interviewed about two hypothetical situations involving opposite‐sex interactions (commenting on appearance, initiating a date), presented in four conditions that varied the salience of personal vs. moral concerns. Overall, participants viewed opposite‐sex interactions as harmless and acceptable in personal conditions, but as moral concerns became more salient, they were viewed more negatively, as less contingent on the target's response, and as entailing humiliation, coercion, and victimization. Age differences occurred primarily in reasoning about conditions entailing mixed‐personal and moral concerns. Implications for adolescents' understanding of harassment and victimization are discussed.     

Proactive Parenting and Children's Effortful Control: Mediating Role of Language and Indirect Intervention Effects

We examined associations of proactive parenting, child verbal ability, and child effortful control within the context of a randomized prevention trial focused on enhancing parenting practices in low‐income families. Participants (N = 731) were assessed annually from the age of two to five, with half randomly assigned to the Family Check‐Up (FCU). Results indicated that the child's verbal ability at the age of three partially mediated the influence of proactive parenting at the age of two on children's effortful control at the age of five. More importantly, the FCU indirectly facilitated children's effortful control by sequentially improving proactive parenting and children's verbal ability. The findings are discussed with respect to taking a more integrative approach to understanding early predictors and the promotion of self‐regulation in early childhood.     

Interaction between adoptive mothers’ and fathers’ depressive symptoms in risk for children’s emerging problem behavior

The effect of parental depression on children's adjustment has been well documented, with exposure during early childhood particularly detrimental. Most studies that examine links between parental depression and child behavior are confounded methodologically because they focus on parents raising children who are genetically related to them. Another limitation of most prior research is a tendency to focus only on the effects of maternal depression while ignoring the influence of fathers’ depression. The purpose of this study was to examine whether infants’ exposure to both parents’ depressive symptoms, and inherited risk from birth mother internalizing symptoms, was related to school age children's externalizing and internalizing problems. Study data come from a longitudinal adoption study of 561 adoptive parents, biological mothers, and adopted children. Adoptive fathers’ depressive symptoms during infancy contributed independent variance to the prediction of children's internalizing symptoms and also moderated associations between adoptive mothers’ depressive symptoms and child externalizing symptoms.     

Cumulative Risk,Negative Emotionality,and Emotion Regulation as Predictors of Social Competence in Transition to School: A Mediated Moderation Model

The goals of this study were to examine the additive and interactive effects of cumulative risk and child negative emotionality on children's social competence in the transition from preschool to school and to test whether these associations were mediated by child emotion regulation within a sample of 310 low‐income, ethnically diverse boys. Multiple informants and methods were used to measure contextual risk factors and negative emotionality at the ages of 1.5 and two, emotion dysregulation at the age of 3.5, and social competence in the home at the age of five and in school at the age of six. Results indicated that the relation between cumulative risk and emotion dysregulation was amplified for children with higher levels of negative emotionality. In turn, emotion dysregulation predicted lower social competence across both the home and the school contexts. This study represents an early effort to develop an integrative model of social competence by considering joint contributions of contextual risk, negative emotionality, and emotion regulation.     

Sex Differences in Associations Between Parental Behaviors and Characteristics and Adolescent Social Integration

One hundred and eight eighth grade students completed self-report questionnaires about their perceptions of parental warmth, structure, and psychological autonomy granting (used to compute a measure of perceived parental authoritativeness) and three measures of social integration: their own connectedness to their communities and involvement in school- versus community-based extracurricular activities. Parents of these students participated in telephone interviews during which they reported on their own relationships with their children's friends and friends' parents, and their own involvement in community activities. Parental community involvement was associated with stronger feelings of community connectedness and higher levels of community involvement among boys and more involvement in school- and community-based extracurricular activities among girls. Perceived parental authoritativeness was associated with stronger feelings of community connectedness and higher levels of involvement in community activities among girls. Parents' relationships with children's peers and peers' parents were associated with greater involvement in school-based extracurricular activities among girls.     

Commentary regarding parenting coordination in cases of high conflict disputes

There is oftentimes no distinction in disputed divorce or child custody cases between “high conflict” and “abusive” relationships. This commentary addresses the important distinction between high conflict divorce cases and cases of intimate partner violence (IPV) and highlights the differences between the two terms. It further explores the role of parenting coordination efforts in high conflict cases and how those efforts are not always appropriate in cases of abuse. There is also further discussion regarding the importance of appropriate training for parent coordinators and, at minimum, what that training should entail.