Cultural Attunement in Therapy With Mexican‐Heritage Couples: A Grounded Theory Analysis of Client and Therapist Experience

There is a need for culturally attuned approaches for couple therapy with Mexican/Mexican‐Americans. This qualitative grounded theory study utilized interviews with 11 client couples of Mexican heritage and 14 marital and family therapists to shed light on how Latino and non‐Latino therapists co‐construct positive experiences of cultural attunement with Mexican and Mexican‐American couple clients. Analysis identified a model of cultural connection through personal engagement with four interrelated phases: (a) mutual invitation, (b) shared engagement, (c) expanding personal connection, and (d) creating cultural connections. Clients in this study valued professionalism and expertise of the therapist, but felt attuned to and respected when therapists demonstrated humility, shared personal stories and emotion, and engaged in a collaborative process.     

The Dyadic Effects of Supportive Coparenting and Parental Stress on Relationship Quality Across the Transition to Parenthood

The transition to first‐time parenthood can be challenging for couples. Using a sample of 848 ethnically diverse couples from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study across the first 3 years of parenthood, we investigated the longitudinal and dyadic associations of each parents’ parental stress, supportive coparenting, and relationship quality. Results from an actor–partner interdependence model indicated that supportive coparenting significantly predicted higher relationship quality for both mothers and fathers. Fathers’ supportive coparenting significantly buffered the effects of mothers’ parental stress on relationship quality. Also, the unique dyadic contexts of each parents’ supportive coparenting, and also both partners’ parental stress were significantly associated with relationship quality. Clinical implications from these findings are discussed through commonly used clinical theories.     

Predicting Follow‐up Outcomes in Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy: The Role of Change in Trust,Relationship‐Specific Attachment,and Emotional Engagement

Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy (EFT), an evidence‐based couple therapy (Johnson, Hunsley, Greenberg, & Schindler, 1999), strives to foster lasting change through the creation of secure attachment bonds in distressed couples. Although studies have demonstrated lasting change in follow‐up (Wiebe et al., in press), research is needed to investigate predictors of long‐term outcomes. Our goal was to investigate predictors of long‐term outcomes in relationship satisfaction. Relationship satisfaction was assessed across 24 months in a sample of 32 couples who received an average of 21 EFT sessions. Decreases in attachment avoidance were most predictive of higher relationship satisfaction across follow‐up. These findings support the theoretical assumption that EFT helps couples foster lasting change in relationship satisfaction through the facilitation of secure attachment bonds.     

It's About Time! Examining Received Dosage and Program Duration as Predictors of Change Among Non‐Distressed and Distressed Married Couple and Relationship Education Participants

Although Couple and Relationship Education (CRE) programs were intended to be preventive in nature, an emerging reality is that relationally distressed couples are attending programs. This has raised questions about both its general usefulness and what is known regarding predictors of change in CRE for distressed couples particularly. Previous work has identified dosage and duration as important moderators of changes, and there are myriad program contexts offered, highlighting the need to examine these among distressed couples. This study utilized a sample of community CRE participants and examined received dosage and program duration as predictors of change. Comparing results for distressed and non‐distressed participants, we found several group differences. Findings suggest that it is important to consider distress level and time spent in programs when placing participants. In addition, research should continue to examine these groups separately (or comparatively) to find out what works for whom.     

How Does Occupational Access for Older Workers Differ by Education?

To assess the employment opportunities of older job-changers in the years prior to retirement, this study examines the how the breadth of occupations in which they find employment narrows as they age past their prime working years and how this differs by gender and educational attainment. The results indicate that workers who change jobs in their early 50s find employment in a reasonably similar set of occupations as prime-age workers, with opportunities narrowing at older ages. They also indicate that job opportunities broadened significantly for better-educated older workers since the late 1990s. While job opportunities now narrow significantly for less-educated men in their late 50s, this narrowing primarily occurs in the early 60s for women and better-educated men. In contrast to previous research, the study finds that employer policies that emphasize hiring from within are less important barriers to the hiring of older job-seekers. The study also finds that the narrowing of job opportunities is associated with a general decline in job quality as measured by median occupational earnings, a decline associated with differences in occupational skill requirements and the underlying economic environment. These results suggest that older hiring is not as limited to a select few occupations as it had been in previous decades, and that policy reforms aimed at increasing opportunities and improving labor market fluidity might best be served if they focused on less-educated men.     

Blood ties and strong ties: a two-way linkage? Some non-trivial implications of the care workers market in a Mediterranean region

Taking their cue from a seeming dissonance between the theory of commodification and exploitation of migrant care workers and the case study of the outsourced self proposed by Hochschild, the author speculates whether or not the family–caregiver relationship may be equal and inclusive. The argument is unraveled by posing another question en route: what specific ‘catalysts’ can trigger ‘high-intensity affective relationships’? Elster defines 'essentially byproduct' the result of a process lacking any direct and conscious link between outcome and intention, and requiring the relaxation of the control of reason in order to be fulfilled. The author mixes significant theoretical results coming both from the relational Palo Alto School and from history of families studies, concluding that an equal and inclusive relationship may be like an Elster’s ‘essentially byproduct’ of a market relationship , when a high-intensity affective relation acts as a ‘catalyst’. The frame suggested in this article seems consistent with recent constructionist reinterpretations of the idea of kinship, which take shape and evolve through ‘everyday experiences’. Kinship thus shifts towards a more complex undefined category, that of Karsten’s relatedness. Speaking of which, the author argues some logical reasons suggesting a generalized adoption of the term only with great care and caution.     

Thinking politics and fashion in 1960s Cuba: How not to judge a book by its cover

Theory and Society - This article presents fashion as a mechanism of domination and political legitimacy, focusing on Soviet-type state socialist regimes. In particular, it documents some dynamics...     

Cigarette Smoking and All-Cause and Cause-Specific Adult Mortality in the United States

This study illuminates the association between cigarette smoking and adult mortality in the contemporary United States. Recent studies have estimated smoking-attributable mortality using indirect approaches or with sample data that are not nationally representative and that lack key confounders. We use the 1990–2011 National Health Interview Survey Linked Mortality Files to estimate relative risks of all-cause and cause-specific mortality for current and former smokers compared with never smokers. We examine causes of death established as attributable to smoking as well as additional causes that appear to be linked to smoking but have not yet been declared by the U.S. Surgeon General to be caused by smoking. Mortality risk is substantially elevated among smokers for established causes and moderately elevated for additional causes. We also decompose the mortality disadvantage among smokers by cause of death and estimate the number of smoking-attributable deaths for the U.S. adult population ages 35+, net of sociodemographic and behavioral confounders. The elevated risks translate to 481,887 excess deaths per year among current and former smokers compared with never smokers, 14 % to 15 % of which are due to the additional causes. The additional causes of death contribute to the health burden of smoking and should be considered in future studies of smoking-attributable mortality. This study demonstrates that smoking-attributable mortality must remain a top population health priority in the United States and makes several contributions to further underscore the human costs of this tragedy that has ravaged American society for more than a century.