Suicide and mental health problems among Swedish youth in the wake of the 1990s recession

The purpose of this explorative study is to bring together a variety of Swedish data sources with indicators of youth mental health and living conditions in order to illuminate trends during the last decades, elucidate possible determinants of mental ill health and develop hypotheses to explain the observed trend patterns. The analyses in the study reveal some surprising inconsistencies with respect to the mental health trends among young people during the 1990s. Most striking is the pattern of increasing youth unemployment coinciding with almost inverse trends in the rates of suicide. The secular trends in fatal suicides during this period do not show any increase but some actual decrease in sub‐populations despite high sustained levels of unemployment. In contrast, survey data indicate that the general mental health of youth during this period appears to have deteriorated.     

Testing for No Effect by Cosine Series Methods

The properties of three lack-of-fit tests that are related to non-parametric cosine regression analysis are examined in the context of testing for a constant mean function. Analytic power comparisons of these tests vs a most powerful test are made using intermediate asymptotic relative efficiency. In particular, a data-driven test is produced which is asymptotically as efficient as the most powerful test over a class of alternatives. A small scale simulation experiment is conducted to ascertain the extent that the large sample comparisons are applicable to finite samples.     

Analysis of Competing Risks by Using Bayesian Smoothing

We consider the competing risks set-up. In many practical situations, the conditional probability of the cause of failure given the failure time is of direct interest. We propose to model the competing risks by the overall hazard rate and the conditional probabilities rather than the cause-specific hazards. We adopt a Bayesian smoothing approach for both quantities of interest. Illustrations are given at the end.     

The success of protest groups: Multivariate analyses

This paper reviews earlier research and presents new analytical findings regarding the outcomes of social movements. Using the resource mobilization/management approach, empirical propositions that seek to explain protest group success or failure are tested. Based upon data gathered from a sample of 53 US protest groups, the causal models explained the majority of the variance in degree of success between these groups. Our findings indicate that protest groups which threaten to replace or destroy established groups are usually unsuccessful, and those having many strong alliances tend to be more successful than groups fighting alone. The use of violence does not greatly aid the prediction of group outcome because of the unpredictable, ambivalent reaction to violence by established groups.     

Social Contacts Amongst Suburban Housewives

Popular or media portrayals have suggested that many suburban housewives are dissatisfied with a number of aspects of their lives. This claim was investigated by surveying two groups of Brisbane women. Data obtained firstly from a sample at a shopping town and secondly from the members of a women's social club suggests that the dissatisfaction with the role of housewife expressed in the media may be overstated. Women find a lack of social contacts with others to be acute but report satisfaction with other aspects of their lives. Tentative solutions to facilitate social contacts between women are suggested.     

Care of the Elderly—A Project,a Protest,a Survey and a Plan

Rehousing of elderly people in Australia has generally not been preceded by research into the kind of assistance that is necessary. An example is given of how an attempt was made to discover the needs of the elderly disabled in a small country community. Assessment by observation of people at home revealed the need for assistance for them to stay where they were. Home Care organized from the district hospital is often a more appropriate answer to this problem than the building of expensive and unnecessary institutions.     

Bereavement: the Contribution of Phenomenological and Existential Analysis to a Greater Understanding of the Problem

Summary Theoretical approaches to grief and mourning have emphasizedthe instinctual and biological elements of a person's responseto bereavement. The behaviour of bereaved individuals has thereforebeen interpreted on the basis of these theoretical models. Thispaper argues that an appreciation of the social context in whichbereavement occurs leads to a fuller understanding of observedresponses in such a situation. It thus emphasizes the socialnature of individuals rather than their biological make-up andprovides a theoretical frame of reference in terms of whichthis may be understood. Such an analysis also has implicationsfor the kind of help which is seen to be appropriate to theneeds of bereaved people. It is suggested that social workersshould develop a greater understanding of this approach andthat, on the basis of this, they would then have a particularrole to play in relation to this area of need