Naturalistic Experimental Analysis of Driver Compliance With Posted Speed Limits

The current study assesses the effects of three interventions commonly used by law enforcement officials to increase driver compliance with posted speed limits and thereby reduce speeding. In two multiple-treatment single-case research designs, motorist speeds on two rural roads in a midwestern state were observed and measured during baseline (no intervention) and during exposure to three interventions: a stationary speed trailer, an unmanned police vehicle, and traditional police enforcement. Interventions were counterbalanced across locations and data aggregated according to intervention type. Results suggests that although two of the three commonly adopted methods had no consistent impact on driver speeds, the unmanned police vehicle intervention yielded increases in compliance compared to baseline for both sites. Implications for small-scale traffic research are discussed.     

Empirical Applications of Skinner’s Analysis of Verbal Behavior with Humans

In Verbal Behavior, Skinner (1957) provided a conceptual framework and taxonomy for the controlling variables of language that defined independent verbal operants by their functional relations to antecedents and consequences (rather than by topography or meaning). Although professional interest in this area has recently increased within the behavior analytic community, Skinner''s conceptual framework may not yet have fully impacted the experimental literature. This quantitative review of the literature examined the studies on verbal behavior that were empirical in nature, concerned with human verbal behavior, and addressed at least one verbal operant (e.g., mand, tact, echoic, autoclitic, and/or intraverbal behavior) within the experiment. The results of this review suggest that a growing body of research exists to support many of the tenets of Skinner''s conceptualization and taxonomy but many areas of verbal behavior research have yet to be addressed. Continued research in this area is crucial for the development and implementation of effective verbal behavior interventions for people with disabilities.     

Violent children and structural violence: Re-signaling ‘RAD Kids’ to inform the social work professions

This article critically examines representations of children diagnosed with Reactive Attachment Disorder, or “RAD Kids”, and their construction as dangerous subjects. Based on ethnographic research within attachment therapy clinics, and among adoptive families, social workers, and medical professionals in the U.S. and Russia, the author suggests that notions of danger associated with “RAD Kids” actually reflect a social anxiety about the contexts of structural violence in which we are attempting to build families and raise children at the turn of the 21st century. The author culturally and historically contextualizes the signaling of “RAD Kids” as violent within literature on moral panics over children and youth. She explores how these representations function as an attempt to “resignal” public anxieties about the difficulties associated with building families through adoption, and especially, the adoption of formerly institutionalized children. The article provides a model for thinking about complex relationships between children, pathology, and power to inform the social work professions, and particularly practice with children diagnosed with RAD.     

Parents' experiences of child welfare interventions: an Anglo-French comparison

This paper reports on an Anglo-French project comparing parental experiences of child welfare interventions in both countries; it does not aim to discuss policy implications but to raise questions about the basis on which policies are decided. We explored differences and similarities in the two countries' systems and practices by asking what it is like to be on the receiving end of professional decisions and actions in order to highlight those aspects of our own system that might otherwise be taken for granted. Considerable overlap was found in English and French parental concerns and in the type of professional assistance offered. However, differences in access to this assistance suggest that parents in England are often thrown into relations with social services that may be counterproductive to child and family welfare.     

Digital Storytelling: A Narrative Method for Positive Identity Development in Minority Youth

This article explores the use of digital storytelling as a group narrative method for positive identity development in the case of African American youth residing in economically disadvantaged, urban areas. Factors such as ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and/or violence exposure may heighten normal youth challenges and affect identity development. Narrative tools that help minority adolescents produce agentic, coherent, affective, and adaptive self-concepts contribute to a proactive identity system and, therefore, an enhanced capacity for them to intervene in their own lives. The purpose of the afterschool digital storytelling group was for youth to gain opportunities in media production and in personal story construction. As a result, youth gained a valuable narrative medium for constructing their stories, and thus their identities, into ones of possibility, promise, and potential. Implications for helping professionals include how to use digital storytelling with youth to gain insight and understanding into a personally difficult life event.     

Estimation of the linear mixed integrated Ornstein–Uhlenbeck model

The linear mixed model with an added integrated Ornstein–Uhlenbeck (IOU) process (linear mixed IOU model) allows for serial correlation and estimation of the degree of derivative tracking. It is rarely used, partly due to the lack of available software. We implemented the linear mixed IOU model in Stata and using simulations we assessed the feasibility of fitting the model by restricted maximum likelihood when applied to balanced and unbalanced data. We compared different (1) optimization algorithms, (2) parameterizations of the IOU process, (3) data structures and (4) random-effects structures. Fitting the model was practical and feasible when applied to large and moderately sized balanced datasets (20,000 and 500 observations), and large unbalanced datasets with (non-informative) dropout and intermittent missingness. Analysis of a real dataset showed that the linear mixed IOU model was a better fit to the data than the standard linear mixed model (i.e. independent within-subject errors with constant variance).     

Working with the whole family: What case files tell us about social work practices

Practice theories to support child protection social work in the United Kingdom, as in the United States and Australia, are being squeezed out by a focus on performance targets and procedural timescales. This study examines an innovative programme designed to reverse this trend initiated by an English local government authority. The programme aimed to embed systemic family practice in situations where children are deemed to be at risk of harm. The findings, derived from an analysis of a case file sample, indicate that the social worker interaction with family members is predicated on who is living with the child in conjunction with the risk status of the case file. Conversely, practitioner interactions with family members are divorced from family structure and the lived experiences of kin relationships. This study concludes by examining why, despite training in systemic family practice, it was problematic for social workers to integrate it into their encounters with families.     

Addressing the midwifery workforce crisis: evaluating an employment model for undergraduate midwifery students at a tertiary maternity hospital in Melbourne, Australia

Background and aims

In Victoria, maternity services are under significant strain due to increased numbers of women giving birth and critical workforce shortages. Hospitals have experienced challenges in adequately staffing maternity units, particularly on postnatal wards. In 2008, a tertiary maternity hospital in Melbourne introduced a model where undergraduate midwifery students were employed as Division 2 nurses (SMW_Div2) (enrolled nurses), to work in the postnatal area only. This study explored the pilot employment model from the perspective of the SMW_Div2 and hospital midwives.

Methods

A web-based survey was administered to hospital midwives and the SMW_Div2s in the employment model in January 2010. The survey explored the views of midwives and SMW_Div2s regarding the perceived impact of the model on workforce readiness, recruitment and retention, and clinical competence and confidence.

Findings

Forty-seven of 158 midwives (30%) and five of nine SMW_Div2s employed in the model responded to the survey. Both groups considered the model to have benefits for the organisation, including increased: student workforce readiness; clinical confidence and competence; and organisational loyalty. Both groups also considered that the model would facilitate: workforce recruitment; a teaching and learning culture within the organisation; and enhanced partnerships between students, hospitals and universities. Caution was expressed regarding workload and the need for ongoing support for SMW_Div2s working in the model.

Discussion and conclusion

SMW_Div2s and midwives were positive about the introduction of the paid employment model at the Women's. The findings are consistent with evaluations of similar programs in the nursing setting. The employment model has potential short and long term individual and organisational advantages, which is important in the context of increasing births and workforce shortages. Progression of such models will be contingent on the collaboration and cooperation of the various stakeholders involved in maternity workforce and education.