CONTRACTING, CONTINGENCIES AND SINGLE-FAMILY HOUSE PRICES

This paper investigates the relationship between single-family house prices and contingent terms in contracts. Since contingencies create uncertainty, the market should exact a price premium. The results indicate that the contracting for property rights affects house prices in the predicted ways.     

Self-assessment in the early educational attainment process*

Ce travail réexamine la nature psycho-sociologique du modèle d'acquisition de situation dans le Wisconsin dont une analyse récente de Wilson et Portes tend à prouver qu'elle est en grande partie erronnée. Elle met particulièrement en question l'hypothèse formulée, et non prouvée, de Sewell et Compagnie que l'auto-évaluation intervient dans les effets des résultats scolaires concernant les aspirations à une situation et les variables de l'acquisition. Basé sur un large échantillonnage d'élèves de 12e année de l'Ontario tiré d'une récente étude en profondeur, nos résultats vont à l'encontre de ceux de Wilson et Portes, réaffirmant dans leur ensemble la nature psycho-sociologique du processus d'aqcuisition de situation et en particulier le rôle critique joué par des processus réflexifs tels que l'auto-évaluation dans ce cadre. This paper reexamines the social-psychological nature of the Wisconsin status attainment model which a recent analysis by Wilson and Portes purports to have largely disconfirmed. In particular, it puts to test the hypothesis formulated, but not tested, by Sewell and associates that self assessment mediates the effects of academic performance on status aspirations and attainment variables. Based on a large sample of Ontario grade 12 students drawn from a recent longitudinal study, our results contradict those of Wilson and Portes, reaffirming in general the social-psychological nature of the status attainment process and in particular the critical role played by such reflexive processes as self-assessment in it.     

PLANNED AND UNPLANNED BEQUESTS

We distinguish between bequests that are planned as part of a lifetime optimization process and those that are the unplanned result of errors in forecasting the date of death. Given the initial endowment we expect a positive relation between the bequest and the planning horizon, and a negative relation between unexpectedly long life and the bequest. A unique data set on wealthy decedents and their parents provides measures of expected horizons based on parents' longevity. Both predictions are confirmed, and there is an especially large and significant positive relation between the bequest and the length of the planning horizon.     

All-brother crews in the North Atlantic

Le recrutement familial (père et fils, groupe de frères) des équipages de pêche côtière dans l'Atlantique nord constitue une caractéristique constante. Même si ce type de recrutement peut être considéré comme une suite de stages successifs dans un cycle de développement, on a porté peu d'attention à l'évolution des équipages familiaux. A partir de données démographiques recueillies en Bretagne méridionale, l'article cherche à mettre en lumière le développement de ces équipages à travers le temps. L'analyse montre, plus précisément, que les raisons 'psychologiques' déjà avancées pour rendre compte de la nécessité et de la fragilité des équipages de frères sont purement illusoires: les tensions peuvent être expliquées, de façpn complète et constante, par la simple réalité de la pression économique.
A constant feature of the North Atlantic inshore fisheries is the familial recruitment of the crews: father and sons or all-brother crews. Although this type of recruitment represents successive stages of a developmental cycle, little attention has been devoted to the evolutive pattern of the family-based crew. Drawing on demographic data collected during fieldwork in southern Brittany, the article seeks to enlighten the developmental reality of the family crew. The analysis reveals in particular that the 'psychological' reasons put forward to account for both the necessity and fragility of all-brother crews pertain to self-deception: the cruder reality of economic pressure explains tensions thoroughly and consistently.     

Social Work and the Medical Profession--Arguments Against Unconditional Collaboration

Summary The history and major texts of medical social work emphasizethe need for collaboration with the medical profession. Howeverthere is a less visible history of conflict between medicineand social work. It is proposed that a critique of medicine’scontribution to health provides the foundation for a statementof principles for a social model of health for social work practice.Collaboration with medicine should be negotiated on the basisof such principles, rather than unconditional.