The value of administrative data for longitudinal social research: a case study investigating income support receipt and relationship separation in Australia

ABSTRACT

In recent years, the Australian government has encouraged open access to administrative data, providing new opportunities for examining life course pathways and evaluating social policies. This paper demonstrates the importance of establishing partnerships in the use of administrative data for social research. In collaboration with the data custodian, we used administrative welfare data to investigate a policy-relevant topic: the association between income support receipt and relationship separation. Our results provided greater statistical power for detecting associations for minority groups than is possible with panel survey data, highlighting the benefits of administrative data for understanding the outcomes of population groups that are not well represented in surveys. The collaboration between university researchers and data custodians was critical to enable appropriate sharing of data for research and for accurate interpretation of the data and outcomes for relevance to policy.     

Intensive interaction and autism: some theoretical concerns

The authors consider the possible application of intensive interaction to children with autism. Intensive interaction is briefly described, and the question asked whether children with autism (and developmental delay) can gain from this exemplar of naturalistic, interactive approaches to facilitating sociability and communication. A theoretical approach is taken to unravel the difficulties faced by children with autism in developing sociability and communication, and the way in which intensive interaction functions. Five areas of possible mismatch between the particular difficulties/needs of these children and the method are identified and interrogated. The authors conclude that children with autism can be enabled to learn about interaction and communication through this naturalistic and supportive process. The need for empirical evidence to substantiate this position is highlighted. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

"Work for those that can, security for those that cannot":The United Kingdom's new social security reform agenda

Following its election victory, the Labour government embarked on a programme to reform fundamentally the United Kingdom's post-war welfare state. The reforms are outlined in a number of government policy consultation papers and are intended to address neo-liberal concerns about the welfare state, although neo-liberal panaceas have been rejected in favour of a "third way". Strongly influenced by Mead, Layard, Giddens and Field, the government's welfare reform package is premised on a conception of citizenship that emphasizes equally the importance of "entitlements" and "obligations", especially the obligation to work. We argue that this reform approach is inherently flawed: it presumes that the poor are without work because they lack appropriate incentives, not because they lack jobs that will lift and keep them out of poverty. We argue that the government's welfare reform strategy is contradictory: while it aims to ameliorate poverty, the emphasis on obligations and compulsion may have the effect of reinforcing existing economic and social divisions. In approaching the second millennium, there is a clear need for a robust interventionist approach to welfare which emphasizes the right to a satisfactory standard of living.     

Tagungsberichte

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Navigating Ambivalence: How Heterosexual Young Adults Make Sense of Desire Differences

The miscommunication hypothesis is the assumption that many incidents of acquaintance rape and coercive sex follow from miscommunication between men and women. This hypothesis is entrenched in popular, academic, and judicial understandings of sexual relationships. Recently some evidence has suggested that there is little miscommunication between sexual partners and that the hypothesis does not explain acquaintance rape or other forms of sexual violence. The present study used qualitative methodology in which men and women were asked to imagine themselves in a particular heterosexual dating situation and write what they think happened between the beginning (when sex was refused by one partner) and the end (when sex happened). Thematic analysis of the data found no evidence for miscommunication between partners under conditions of differences in desire. Instead, ambivalence about sexual activity was commonly described by women and men and was most often resolved to both parties’ satisfaction. Coercion by men was present in a minority of narratives under conditions of clear understanding of women's refusals. The study thus provides a rich, experience-based representation of heterosexual sexual activity, with considerable potential for the development of effective education campaigns.     

Social Media Newsrooms in public relations: A conceptual framework and corporate practices in three countries

The rise of social media in organizational settings has opened up new horizons for strategic communication. However, there are also drawbacks. Arguably the most important one is increased complexity. Many communication departments use a multitude of platforms ranging from corporate websites, campaign microsites and blogs to services like Facebook and Twitter to communicate with stakeholders. Social Media Newsrooms (SMNRs) have been introduced as instruments to reduce this complexity. The basic idea is straightforward: SMNRs aggregate social media content provided by the organization and/or thematic content about the organization and its key issues from several platforms in one place. Although SMNRs have been used in public relations practice around the world since the concept was first introduced in 2007, empirical evidence is still missing. This paper closes the research gap by (a) introducing SMNRs from a conceptual perspective based on a literature review, (b) exploring opportunities and challenges for strategic communication, (c) researching empirical manifestations and modes of usage by corporations in three major international markets (United States, United Kingdom, and Germany) based on a comprehensive content analysis of the 600 largest companies and 2045 affiliated brands and subsidiaries, and (d) explaining implications for the practice of public relations.     

Early Word Segmentation in Naturalistic Environments: Limited Effects of Speech Register

We examined 7.5‐month‐old infants' ability to segment words from infant‐ and adult‐directed speech (IDS and ADS). In particular, we extended the standard design of most segmentation studies by including a phase where infants were repeatedly exposed to target word recordings at their own home (extended exposure) in addition to a laboratory‐based familiarization. This enabled us to examine infants' segmentation of words from speech input in their naturalistic environment, extending current findings to learning outside the laboratory. Results of a modified preferential‐listening task show that infants listened longer to isolated tokens of familiarized words from home relative to novel control words regardless of register. However, infants showed no recognition of words exposed to during purely laboratory‐based familiarization. This indicates that infants succeed in retaining words in long‐term memory following extended exposure and recognizing them later on with considerable flexibility. In addition, infants segmented words from both IDS and ADS, suggesting limited effects of speech register on learning from extended exposure in naturalistic environments. Moreover, there was a significant correlation between segmentation success and infants' attention to ADS, but not to IDS, during the extended exposure phase. This finding speaks to current language acquisition models assuming that infants' individual attention to language stimuli drives successful learning.     

The Role of Friends and Peers in Adolescent Body Dissatisfaction: A Review and Critique of 15 Years of Research

We review the research conducted in the past 15 years concerned with the role of friends and peers in adolescent body dissatisfaction. A number of friend and peer group characteristics have been associated with heightened body dissatisfaction both concurrently and longitudinally. Most widely studied and more consistently linked to body dissatisfaction are appearance teasing and perceived pressure from friends to be thin. Other interactions between friends and peers that communicate and strengthen appearance ideals and direct attention to appearance also have been associated with body dissatisfaction, including appearance‐related conversations, friends' modeling of dieting behavior, and perceptions of friends' appearance‐related attitudes. Finally, the research is critiqued, new directions considered, and strategies are proposed that could be implemented to reduce body dissatisfaction.