The impact of marriage on fertility intentions and related values

Entry into and occupancy of major adult roles are of longstanding theoretical interest, but few studies have designs adequate to examine the consequences of associated changes in orientation. This study is based on a longitudinal project in which changes in fertility intentions and the importance of marriage and the family are examined among four subgroups--females who remained single, females who married, males who remained single, and males who married over a five-year period. Females, regardless of marital status, became less inclined to have children, males remaining single became more inclined and males who married over the interval changed little. When a control for value of marriage and the family was introduced, gender-based differences in fertility desires disappeared. There were substantial changes in the value domain according to sex and marital status--those who married over the five-year period displayed significant increases in the importance of the value of marriage and family. The implications of these findings are discussed.     

Girls being Rey: ethical cultural consumption,families and popular feminism

ABSTRACT

This paper argues that consumers of popular culture engage in practices of ‘ethical cultural consumption’, whereby the consumption of cultural texts is imagined as having the potential to ‘do good’ both individually and socio-politically. The paper explores data from an online questionnaire and drawing activity with girls aged 5–10 and their parents on the experience of costume playing as Rey from the contemporary Star Wars trilogy. Imagined as a ‘girl who can do anything’, Rey represents a new kind of popular feminist hero and role model for girls, enabling a degree of critique of normative gendered role models for children. ‘Being Rey’ also represents a deterministic project through which parents aim to cultivate the ‘right’ kind of girls, seeking to instil the resilience to ‘cope’ with unknown futures. More than a purely individual project, we argue that parents invest in an individualized idea of doing ‘good’ through consumption, drawing on a notion of the consumer as a political actor with the power to affect social change. Investigating the project of participating in and consuming culture ‘ethically’ allows for an exploration of what it means to ‘be political’ and ‘do good’ as a consumer in neoliberalism.     

An Outcome Study of Career Decision Self‐Efficacy and Indecision in an Undergraduate Constructivist Career Course

This study explored outcomes in a constructivist career course. Using a pretest‐ posttest design, the authors assessed the empowerment (operationalized as career decision self‐efficacy) and career indecision of 82 culturally diverse college students at a large, midwestern university. Data were analyzed using a multivariate analysis of variance. Results indicated that students reported significant increases in empowerment with no commensurate decreases in career indecision. In addition to shedding light on the nuanced relationship between empowerment or career decision self‐efficacy and indecision, results indicate the potential constructivist career development has to empower culturally diverse college students.     

Autonomy,Identity, and ‘Illegal’ Logging in the Borderland of West Kalimantan,Indonesia

Borderland identity and traditional community autonomy affect the practice of ‘illegal’ logging and the impact of regional autonomy among the Iban along the upper Kapuas borderland in West Kalimantan, Indonesia. We examine these issues with attention to the historical development of the Kalimantan Iban as a border people, their struggle to maintain control over their traditional forest resources under the fluctuating power of the Indonesian state and their approaches in dealing with regional and cross-border interests in the harvesting of their forests.     

A Review of: “Information and Communication Technologies for Active Ageing: Opportunities and Challenges for the European Union”

This article discusses conceptual, methodological, and ethical challenges of using e-mail to study families and offers strategies to address them. Specifically, the unique nature of issues related to sampling and data collection are addressed. Suggested adjustments and strategies include the use of insiders' consultation, securing opportunities for all family members to voice their views, creating paths for expressing content typically conveyed nonverbally, letting respondents control the pace and shape of the dialogue, creating a virtual shared reality and informing participants about measures to protect their privacy. Directions for future research are offered.     

A Parametric Analysis of Rehearsal Opportunities on Procedural Integrity

Behavioral skills training (BST) involves instruction, modeling, rehearsal, and feedback. Despite its empirical support, the literature provides little to no guidance regarding the best way to implement rehearsal to ensure accurate implementation of behavioral procedures. Thus, the purpose of this study was to conduct a parametric analysis of rehearsal opportunities within a BST package. We evaluated the effects of 1, 3, and 10 rehearsals with feedback on correct implementation of functional analysis (FA). Regardless of the number of rehearsals, 18 undergraduate participants effectively learned to implement FA conditions. The most efficient training involved the use of single rehearsals with feedback until meeting mastery criterion. Participants maintained integrity during a follow-up session and rated the use of rehearsal as highly acceptable.     

Assessing and Increasing Staff Preference for Job Tasks Using Concurrent-Chains Schedules and Probabilistic Outcomes

The assessment and improvement of staff members' subjective valuation of nonpreferred work tasks may be one way to increase the quality of staff members' work life. The Task Enjoyment Motivation Protocol (Green, Reid, Passante, &; Canipe, 2008 Green, C. W., Reid, D. H., Passante, S. and Canipe, V. 2008. Changing less-preferred duties to more-preferred: A potential strategy for improving supervisor work enjoyment. Journal of Organizational Behavior Management, 28: 90–109. [Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) provides a process for supervisors to identify the aversive qualities of nonpreferred job tasks. Through participative management, the process reduces these aversive qualities while increasing the appetitive properties via the pairing of these tasks with enjoyable consequences. The present study provides an extension of Green et al.'s work through utilization of a concurrent-chains schedule arrangement via the pairing of reinforcing consequences with a target job task using probabilistic outcomes to directly assess job task preferences for eight direct support staff in a human service organization.     

An Evaluation of Training Procedures for Animal Shelter Volunteers

This study evaluated the effects of 3 training procedures on the correct implementation of a dog walking and enrichment protocol (DWEP). During the shelter’s typical training, volunteers correctly implemented just over half of all DWEP steps (M = 55.2%). Correct implementation of the DWEP procedure improved when participants completed a video-based self-training package (M = 75.3%) but did not reach the preestablished mastery criterion of 85% fidelity with 0 safety errors. Correct implementation improved during coaching (M = 90.6%), which consisted of modeling and positive and corrective feedback, and was maintained during 1-week and 1-month follow-up probes. Criterion performance was demonstrated by 2 of 3 participants at the conclusion of the study.