Accumulation of Welfare Problems in a Longitudinal Perspective

In this article we study the bias caused by the conventional retrospective measurement of parental high cultural activities in the effects of parental high cultural activities and educational attainment on son’s or daughter’s high cultural activities. Multi-informant data show that there is both random measurement error and correlated error in the respondent’s report of parental high cultural activities. Correlated measurement error is the consequence of the fact that adult children who have higher rates of high cultural activities, report higher levels of parental cultural activities than the parents themselves do. When controls for both types of measurement error are included in structural models, the total intergenerational effect of parental high cultural activities appears to be larger than in a model without controls for measurement error, but the direct intergenerational effect is not biased if educational attainment is controlled for. The effect of educational attainment on high cultural activities is larger in models that correct for measurement error. In addition, the effect of educational attainment is stronger than the effect of parental high cultural activities, both with and without correction for measurement error.

Constituents of healthy workplaces

The aim of the study presented here was to identify and characterize the constituents of a healthy workplace from the viewpoints of employees at four different companies with low rate of absenteeism due to illness. A non-randomized, purposive selection was made of 27 respondents -- four department heads, 16 white-collar workers, and seven blue-collar employees. The respondents were told to describe in writing how they experience factors contributing to good health at their workplace. The data analysis was carried out with a phenomenographic approach. Four main categories of health-related factors emerged: Good Work Environment, Active Keep-Fit Measures, Functional Leadership and Individual Responsibility. The employers fulfil demands for a good physical working environment, but the need for improvements in the psychosocial environment remains. The most promising finding is that the respondents' accept personal responsibility for maintaining their own good health.     

Do They Know What They are Doing? Risk Perceptions and Smoking Behaviour Among Swedish Teenagers

Cross-sectional survey data on Swedish adolescents aged 12–18 was used to analyse perceived risks of smoking-related lung cancer, the determinants of these risk perceptions, and how these perceptions related to smoking behaviour. Three major conclusions were drawn: (1) that both smokers and non-smokers overestimated the risks of lung cancer, (2) that these risk perceptions fell substantially with age, but nevertheless implied risk overestimation, and (3) that individuals with higher perceived risks were less likely to be smokers but that risk beliefs had no effect on the number of cigarettes smoked.     

Synthesizing ENABLE-AGE Research Findings to Suggest Evidence-Based Home and Health Interventions

ABSTRACT

As the quest for knowledge translation from research to practice and policy contexts is growing stronger, researchers need to develop strategies for synthesizing research findings. Since home environments constitute an important context for the delivery of health care and social services to older adults and people aging with disabilities, research in this field can serve as an example for such endeavors. Using 35 original publications and one unpublished doctoral dissertation based on the European ENABLE-AGE Project, we aimed to demonstrate a systematic approach to synthesize research findings generated by large research projects as the basis for evidence-based interventions. The synthesized findings highlighted the complex interactions between objective and perceived aspects of housing and aspects of health in very old age, impacting on, for example, residential decision making. Independence in daily activity is influenced by the sociocultural care and service context. A familiar and safe neighborhood, a social network, and a good supply of services are important to perceptions of participation. Going further, we suggest housing-related interventions that address problems and challenges related to ongoing demographic changes. This article contributes to the development of strategies for knowledge translation, connecting research and practice and policy contexts struggling to meet the societal challenges that accompany population aging.     

Night work and symptoms of anxiety and depression among nurses: A longitudinal study

Over the last few decades, night work has been found to be associated with negative somatic consequences; however, there is less knowledge about its impact on mental health. In a sample of 633 Norwegian nurses, we investigated by means of latent growth curve modelling whether different work schedules predicted differences in baseline values of anxiety and depressive symptoms, and trajectories of these over a two-year span. All participants completed the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale as part of a larger survey conducted during the winters of 2009, 2010 and 2011. The results revealed that night workers and nurses who changed from day work to night work during the study period did not differ from day workers either in terms of baseline symptoms of anxiety or depression, or in terms of trajectories of these symptoms. However, nurses who changed from night work to day work reported a significant decrease in symptoms of both anxiety and depression over time compared to day workers. Furthermore, supporting previous work, languidity was related to higher anxiety and depression and hardiness to lower levels of those symptoms. Possible mechanisms underlying the results are discussed.     

Gender and health among older people: What is the role of social policies?

The study investigated how social policies moderate the association between gender and health among older people across European countries. The study is the first to take a comprehensive view on the role of social policies in connection with gender inequality in health among older Europeans. The association between gender and poor self‐rated health and limiting long‐standing illness was investigated in a multilevel framework. Cross‐level interaction effects showed that more generous minimum pensions, higher spending on eldercare and a higher degree of eldercare formalisation are associated with relatively better health among women, while more generous standard pensions are associated with relatively better health among men. The conclusion is that policies directed towards older people are not gender neutral; rather they are likely to affect men and women differently. By shaping the distribution of resources as well as of unpaid work, social policies can contribute to either strengthening or weakening the link between gender and health.     

Covariance structure approximation via gLasso in high-dimensional supervised classification

Recent work has shown that the Lasso-based regularization is very useful for estimating the high-dimensional inverse covariance matrix. A particularly useful scheme is based on penalizing the ?₁ norm of the off-diagonal elements to encourage sparsity. We embed this type of regularization into high-dimensional classification. A two-stage estimation procedure is proposed which first recovers structural zeros of the inverse covariance matrix and then enforces block sparsity by moving non-zeros closer to the main diagonal. We show that the block-diagonal approximation of the inverse covariance matrix leads to an additive classifier, and demonstrate that accounting for the structure can yield better performance accuracy. Effect of the block size on classification is explored, and a class of asymptotically equivalent structure approximations in a high-dimensional setting is specified. We suggest a variable selection at the block level and investigate properties of this procedure in growing dimension asymptotics. We present a consistency result on the feature selection procedure, establish asymptotic lower an upper bounds for the fraction of separative blocks and specify constraints under which the reliable classification with block-wise feature selection can be performed. The relevance and benefits of the proposed approach are illustrated on both simulated and real data.     

Stuck in the land of disability? The intersection of learning difficulties,class, gender and religion

This article discusses the discrepancy between formal rights to full social inclusion and the lived experiences of young adults with learning difficulties. It draws on inclusive life history research in Iceland and employs intersectional theory to study the social participation of young adults with learning difficulties. In an attempt to understand the complex political, economic and ideological forces that hinder the actualisation of their formal rights the intersection of disability, class, gender and religion in the production and reproduction of existing social hierarchies is examined. The article demonstrates how the research collaborators resisted their devalued social construction and attempted to create and affirm themselves as competent social actors.     

Theorizing accommodation in supportive home care for older people

This paper examines the issue of what thinking is necessary in order to advance a notion of accommodation in the organization and provision of supportive home care for older people. Accommodation in this context is understood as responsiveness to the singularity of older adults, and we consider how this idea might be used to support opportunities for (independent) living for elders as they age and become frailer. To elaborate the question we draw on examples from our empirical work – ethnographic studies of home care practice undertaken in Canada and Iceland – and consider these examples in light of critical philosophical and social theory, particularly Agamben's (1993) work, The Coming Community. This is a relevant frame through which to consider the potential for the accommodation of the unique needs of older adults in home care because it helps us to problematize the systems through which care is accomplished and the current, dominant terms of relations between individuals and collectives. We argue that giving substance to a notion of accommodation contributes an important dimension to aligned ideas, such as patient-centeredness in care, by working to shift the intentionality of these practices. That is, accommodation, as an orientation to care practices, contests the organizational impulse to carry on in the usual way.     

Nonsuicidal Self‐Injury in a Community Sample of Adolescents: Subgroups,Stability, and Associations With Psychological Difficulties

Patterns of nonsuicidal self‐injury (NSSI) and their association with other psychological difficulties were studied in a community sample of young Swedish adolescents, by a two‐wave longitudinal design with a 1‐year interval. Hierarchical cluster analysis at T1 identified eight NSSI subgroups in each gender, of which five were clearly replicated at T2. Among these were a subgroup with generalized high‐frequency NSSI, which was associated with both internalizing and externalizing problems, and a subgroup of girls who engaged primarily in cutting and showed mainly internalizing problems. In general, NSSI clusters among girls were more stable over time and associated with more psychological problems. The results indicate that different patterns of NSSI have different developmental and clinical implications.