‘A future not of riches but of comfort’: The emigration of pauper children from Bristol to Canada, 1870–1915

This article examines the emigration of orphan and deserted children from Bristol to Canada in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This emigration was organised and financed by the local Boards of Guardians and, as such, raises important questions about the way in which state agencies cared for dependent children. The emigration of Poor Law children is explored in relation to debates about childcare, poverty, racial degeneration and imperialism. Of particular interest is the role played by women in promoting child emigration and the article considers the women's contribution to discourse and practice, both locally and nationally. The dynamics of emigration are analysed by using both British and Canadian sources and the tensions associated with pauper emigration are examined in some detail.     

Is ‘Candidacy’ a Useful Concept for Understanding Journeys through Public Services? A Critical Interpretive Literature Synthesis

Across the public sector there is concern that service uptake is inequitably distributed by socio‐economic circumstances and that public provision exacerbates the existence of inequalities either because services are not allocated by need or because of differential patterns of uptake between the most and least affluent groups. A concept that offers potential to understand access and utilization is ‘candidacy’ which has been used to explain access to, and utilization of, healthcare. The concept suggests that an individual's identification of his or her ‘candidacy’ for health services is structurally, culturally, organizationally and professionally constructed, and helps to explain why those in deprived circumstances make less use of services than the more affluent. In this article we assess the fit of candidacy to other public services using a Critical Interpretive Synthesis of three case studies literatures relating to: domestic abuse, higher education and environmental services. We find high levels of congruence between ‘candidacy’ and the sampled literatures on access/utilization of services. We find, however, that the concept needs to be refined. In particular, we distinguish between micro, meso and macro factors that play into the identification, sustaining and resolution of candidacy, and demonstrate the plural nature of candidacies. We argue that this refined model of candidacy should be tested empirically beyond and within health. More specifically, in the current economic context, we suggest that it becomes imperative to better understand how access to public services is influenced by multiple factors including changing discourses of deservedness and fairness, and by stringent reductions in the public purse.     

The impact of oral probiotics on vaginal Group B Streptococcal colonisation rates in pregnant women: A pilot randomised control study

Objective

To perform a pilot project to determine if this research design was appropriate to explore potential causal relationships between oral probiotic use and vaginal Group B Streptococcal (GBS) colonisation rates in pregnant women.

Falling short of dietary guidelines – What do Australian pregnant women really know? A cross sectional study

Background

Maternal diets are not consistent with dietary guidance and this may affect the health of mothers and their infants. Nutrition knowledge and motivation may be important factors.

Roles of Response Inhibition and Gene–Environment Interplay in Pathways to Adolescents' Externalizing Problems

This study used two waves of data to investigate pathways through which adolescents' response inhibition related to later externalizing problems. A polygenic risk score indexed genetic risk for poor response inhibition. Adolescents' performance on a response inhibition task mediated the relation between adolescents' polygenic risk scores and mother's inconsistent parenting (i.e., evocative rGE), even after controlling for mothers' genetic risk (i.e., passive rGE). Mothers' inconsistent parenting subsequently prospectively predicted adolescents' externalizing problems. Adolescents' response inhibition also prospectively predicted later externalizing behaviors. These findings were subgroup‐specific, with greater risk for non‐Hispanic Caucasian boys with substance‐disordered parents. Results suggest that poor response inhibition may increase risk for adolescents' externalizing problems both directly and by evoking certain environmental conditions.     

Infants’ sensitivity to shape changes in 2D visual forms

Research in developmental cognitive science reveals that human infants perceive shape changes in 2D visual forms that are repeatedly presented over long durations. Nevertheless, infants’ sensitivity to shape under the brief conditions of natural viewing has been little studied. Three experiments tested for this sensitivity by presenting 128 seven‐month‐old infants with shapes for the briefer durations under which they might see them in dynamic scenes. The experiments probed infants’ sensitivity to two fundamental geometric properties of scale‐ and orientation‐invariant shape: relative length and angle. Infants detected shape changes in closed figures, which presented changes in both geometric properties. Infants also detected shape changes in open figures differing in angle when figures were presented at limited orientations. In contrast, when open figures were presented at unlimited orientations, infants detected changes in relative length but not in angle. The present research therefore suggests that, as infants look around at the cluttered and changing visual world, relative length is the primary geometric property by which they perceive scale‐ and orientation‐invariant shape.     

Prevalence of childhood abuse in mothers taking part in a study of parenting their own children

This paper describes the incidence of maltreatment histories in a community sample of mothers of one‐year‐old infants in Northern Ireland. The occurrence of five subsets of childhood maltreatment is examined: emotional abuse, emotional neglect, physical abuse, physical neglect and sexual abuse. Of the 201 women who completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, 70 mothers (35%) reported that they had experienced one or more types of maltreatment during childhood. Forty‐eight mothers (24%) gave a history of being emotionally abused, 43 (21%) of emotional neglect, 27 (13%) of physical abuse, 20 (10%) of sexual abuse and 19 (10%) of physical neglect. Physical abuse was the only type of maltreatment which showed an association with maternal socio‐economic status, with a higher incidence reported amongst Occupational Classes 4 and 5 (lower supervisory and technical occupations and semi‐routine and routine groups). More than half of those with a history of abuse experienced more than one type of maltreatment (42 mothers or 60% of those reporting maltreatment). Differences in rates of incidence to more recent studies on younger adults are discussed, as well as implications for prevention and intervention. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Housing strategies in an uncertain market

The slump in house prices in the early 1990s created a degree of uncertainty in the housing market which contrasts markedly with the optimism of the 1980s. In particular, the market downturn made it sharply apparent that there could be losers as well as winners in the unstable housing market. This study looks at a sample of owner occupiers drawn from Glasgow and Bristol in 1995. While still endorsing home ownership as the major housing option and as potentially enabling in housing and neighbourhood terms, a note of caution is recognisable. Aspirations to climb the housing ‘ladder’ are tempered by fear of overextending financially and by the broader uncertainties that people perceive to be endemic in the labour market and the housing market. Strategies reflect both diverse personal histories and the adoption of defensive or risk reduction options. For many respondents maintaining current housing standards is more important than market advancement.     

Post‐Authoritarian State Formation in Argentina: Transitional Justice as the Accumulation of Symbolic Power

Looking at the transitions to democracy in Latin America during the late 20^th century, a number of scholars observed that human rights and transitional justice had become the central legitimizing axis of the new, post‐authoritarian order. But the question of how human rights and transitional justice measures became such powerful sources of legitimacy in the first place was left unexplored. In this article I use Bourdieu's concept of symbolic capital along with Mara Loveman's explanation of the accumulation of this capital to explain how transitional justice came to function as a form of post‐authoritarian state formation in Argentina.