Newspapers, Television and Political Reasoning

Adults' use of newspapers is found to correlate positively withhaving reasons for preferring one U.S. senatorial candidateover another. Television exposure is negatively related to politicalreasoning to a nearly significant degree. Data were providedby a 1974 nationwide, postelection survey. Analysis was conductedat the aggregate level, examining media behavior and politicalknowledge in 67 news markets. News markets with competitionamong daily newspapers show greater levels of information thanmonopoly areas, controlling for education and interest in politics.Results suggest that a decline in newspaper penetration, lessenedcompetition, or shift toward use of television for news wouldweaken peoples' understanding about partisan candidates.     

Social Service Teams and their Managers

Summary A study is reported of the perceived effectiveness of teamsof social workers and their managers. Prior studies are reviewedand shown to give disproportionate emphasis to the supervisionelement in the manager's task. It is shown that in the sampleof teams studied the correlates of perceived team effectivenesswere quite different in area teams from those found in socialwork teams. Social work teams required a manager who was primarilysupportive, whereas in area teams the manager's role was foundto be less important than were group process variables.     

Dynamic Choice and NonExpected Utility

This paper explores how some widely studied classes of nonexpected utility models could be used in dynamic choice situations. A new "sequential consistency" condition is introduced for single-stage and multi-stage decision problems. Sequential consistency requires that if a decision maker has committed to a family of models (e.g., the multiple priors family, the rank-dependent family, or the betweenness family) then he use the same family throughout. Conditions are presented under which dynamic consistency, consequentialism, and sequential consistency can be simultaneously preserved for a nonexpected utility maximizer. An important class of applications concerns cases where the exact sequence of decisions and events, and thus the dynamic structure of the decision problem, is relevant to the decision maker. It is shown that for the multiple priors model, dynamic consistency, consequentialism, and sequential consistency can all be preserved. The result removes the argument that nonexpected utility models cannot be consistently used in dynamic choice situations. Rank-dependent and betweenness models can only be used in a restrictive manner, where deviation from expected utility is allowed in at most one stage.     

The Probable Extent of Minor Mental Illness in the Adult Clients of Social Workers: A Research Note

Summary A small scale pilot study was conducted in two area teams andfour part-time GP attachment schemes to test the use of a psychiatricscreening instrument (GHQ28) and social assessments. The instrumentswere administered at case allocation and again at three months.Few clinical and social changes were observed in the short term.It was found that 27 out of 40 cases (68%) were identified bythe psychiatric screening instruments as probable cases of minordisorder, on both occasions, and that a further seven clientscould have had a transient disturbance. On the basis of theseresults it was felt that a larger two-stage enquiry was warranted,and necessary, before definite conclusions could be drawn.     

FDI AND INCOME INEQUALITY: EVIDENCE FROM A PANEL OF U.S. STATES

This study employs state‐level panel data to explore the relationship between inward foreign direct investment (FDI) and income inequality in the United States. Using panel cointegration techniques that allow for cross‐sectional heterogeneity and cross‐sectional dependence, we find that, in the long run, FDI exerts a significant and robust negative effect on income inequality in the United States. This result for the United States as a whole does not imply that FDI narrows income gaps in each individual state. There is considerable heterogeneity in the long‐run effects of FDI on income inequality across states, with some states (21 out of 48 cases) exhibiting a positive relationship between FDI in income inequality.(JEL F21, D31, C23)     

Explanation and Education in Social Work

Summary Social work education has to confront the problem of workingwith students in developing an understanding of the range ofexplanations that exist in the social sciences and the differentbases of these explanations. One pedagogic approach is to explorea map of categories of explanation based upon different conceptionsof the nature of social science knowledge itself. Such a map,outlined in the paper, would distinguish between physical scienceparadigms and human science paradigms and identify the differentimplications for social work of the various viewpoints. Theteacher cannot remain neutral with regard to explanation inthe social sciences; the author therefore indicates that hisown account is based on a marxist perspective     

PARTIAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT: AN ESSAY

A serious gap is emerging between what is espoused as total quality management and what is actually being implemented. Examples of actual implementation failures are given. In addition to affecting the offending firms, these gaps threaten the viability of the quality management movement in the United States. Their causes and appropriate counter measures are worthy topics for research.