Fathers-The Secondary Partners: Professional Perceptions and Fathers' Reflections

SUMMARY. The following is an account of a research project exploring the recollections of seven fathers at the time of the birth of their children with Down's Syndrome. It discusses the disclosure of diagnosis and subsequent contacts the fathers made both professionally and socially during the period following both in the hospital and at home. This is combined with the personal recollections of one father, not part of the original study, whose child was born with special needs. The implications for both professional practice and fathers are highlighted. Whilst there is an acknowledgement that the project was small scale, the conclusions will raise challenging issues for further discussion both among professionals and individual members of families.     

Sexual orientation and body weight: Evidence from multiple surveys

Previous research on sexual orientation and body weight has relied primarily on small convenience samples. I use data from two large representative public health surveys to examine the relationships between sexual orientation and body weight. First, I present new estimates of obesity rates by sexual orientation from the 2001 California Health Interview Survey (which contains information on self-reported sexual orientation) and the 1996–2002 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (which contains information on intra-household same-sex unmarried partnerships). I find evidence in both surveys that gay men are much less likely to be obese relative to their heterosexual counterparts, while lesbians are much more likely to be obese. These differences cannot be easily explained by other demographic characteristics, and there is no evidence that the differences are related to differences in physical activity or muscle strengthening activities. Moreover, I find that obese gay men are less likely to be in a partnership relative to their obese heterosexual male counterparts, even after controlling for the overall lower likelihood of partnership among gay men. This suggests that minority sexual orientation may exacerbate the barriers associated with obesity. Christopher Carpenter ia an assistant professor of Economics/Public Policy at the Graduate School of Management at the University of California at Irvine. His research focuses on health policy evaluation and the relationships between sexual orientation and economic well-being. He has recently published a methodological paper on the measurement of sexual orientation (Contemporary Economic Policy, 2004).     

Mixture of Bivariate Exponential Distributions

The exponential distribution is one of the most used type of distribution because of its importance in many lifetime applications and its properties. So is its bivariate form. Simply used, there can be limitations specially for the heterogeneous type population. Its mixture form adds a lot of characters and desirable properties. We propose a mixture of bivariate exponential distribution, study properties of the associated parameters and predict the elements of the mixture. We include the presence of covariate information through a linear relationship, capturing the now famous idea by Marshall and Olkin.     

Twitter,incivility, and presidential communication: A theoretical incursion into spectacle and power

ABSTRACT

By approaching civility as an operational logic for democracy, we ask how incivility is a strategy related to power and domination, particularly from the president of the United States. We propose that Twitter is part of an infrastructure of incivility, through which structures and discursive mechanisms contribute to a devaluation of normative democratic discourses. Spectacle provides a theoretical framework to contextualize the forces at play in mediating our relations. Using President Trump’s Twitter use as a case study, we offer four propositions that together formulate a framework for theorizing the strategic use and deployment of incivility as an increasingly legitimate, yet problematic tool for democratic governance.     

The Social Work Role in Reducing 30-Day Readmissions: The Effectiveness of the Bridge Model of Transitional Care

The hospital experience is taxing and confusing for patients and their families, particularly those with limited economic and social resources. This complexity often leads to disengagement, poor adherence to the plan of care, and high readmission rates. Novel approaches to addressing the complexities of transitional care are emerging as possible solutions. The Bridge Model is a person-centered, social work-led, interdisciplinary transitional care intervention that helps older adults safely transition from the hospital back to their homes and communities. The Bridge Model combines 3 key components—care coordination, case management, and patient engagement—which provide a seamless transition during this stressful time and improve the overall quality of transitional care for older adults, including reducing hospital readmissions. The post Affordable Care Act (ACA) and managed care environment’s emphasis on value and quality support further development and expansion of transitional care strategies, such as the Bridge Model, which offer promising avenues to fulfil the triple aim by improving the quality of individual patient care while also impacting population health and controlling per capita costs.     

The surprisingly weak evidence base for supervision: Findings from a systematic review of research in child welfare practice (2000–2012)

Objective

The objective of this study is to ascertain what is known about the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of supervision in child welfare in relation to outcomes for consumers/service users, staff and organizations.

Method

This is a systematic review of the English language literature (2000–2012). Scoping study is followed by database searches of indexes and abstracts including Campbell Collaboration, CINAHL, the Cochrane Library, Medline, PsycInfo and Social Work Abstracts, journal hosts (EBSCO and IngentaConnect) plus specialist journals. Inclusion criteria: studies that reported on the associations between the provision of supervision and outcomes for service users/consumers, workers and organizations as well as intervention studies. Potentially relevant studies were independently screened by two reviewers (Stage 1) and if meeting the eligibility criteria proceed to full text review and data extraction (Stage 2). Studies were subject to critical appraisal by three reviewers using the Weight of Evidence approach (Stage 3). An analysis of included study characteristics is followed by a narrative synthesis of findings structured to answer the research objective.

Results

690 unique studies were identified at Stage 1, 35 proceeded to Stage 2 and, following quality appraisal, 21 were included in the review. Almost all of the studies were cross-sectional, providing evidence of associations between the provision of supervision and a variety of outcomes for workers, including job satisfaction, self-efficacy and stress and for organizations, including workload management, case analysis and retention. There was only one, poorly reported, intervention study and no studies of outcomes for consumers. No economic evaluations were found.

Conclusions

The evidence base for the effectiveness of supervision in child welfare is surprisingly weak. An agenda for research based on a framework for the development and evaluation of complex interventions is proposed.     

Using alcohol to sell cigarettes to young adults: a content analysis of cigarette advertisements

OBJECTIVE: Advertising influences the health-related behaviors of college-aged individuals. Cigarette manufacturers aggressively market to young adults and may exploit their affinity for alcohol when creating advertisements designed to increase cigarettes' appeal. Internal tobacco industry documents reveal that cigarette manufacturers understood the popularity of alcohol among young adults and sought to produce pertinent marketing strategies. METHODS: The authors conducted a content analysis of cigarette and alcohol advertisements in young adult-oriented magazines to investigate portrayed associations between cigarettes and alcohol. RESULTS: The content analysis revealed that 32 of 114 cigarette advertisements referenced alcohol and that those advertisements were more likely than others to portray active smoking. Conversely, 0 of 317 alcohol advertisements referenced cigarettes, and alcohol advertisements were only slightly more likely than cigarette advertisements to feature alcohol-related settings. CONCLUSIONS: Such advertising may detrimentally affect smoking patterns of college students. An understanding of these strategies can benefit on-campus tobacco control efforts.     

Gay and lesbian partnership: Evidence from California

Much recent research on sexual minorities has used couples-based samples, which--by construction--provide no information on nonpartnered individuals. We present the first systematic empirical analysis of partnership and cohabitation among self-identified gay men and lesbians using two independent, large, population-wwbased data sources from California. These data indicate that 37%-46% of gay men and 51%-62% of lesbians aged 18-59 are in cohabiting partnerships (compared with 62% of heterosexual individuals in coresidential unions at comparable ages). Unlike previous research, we find that white and highly educated gay men and lesbians are more likely to be partnered, and we confirm that same-sex cohabiting partners in our data have demographic characteristics that are similar to California same-sex couples from Census 2000. We also present the first detailed analysis of officially registered domestic partnerships in California. We find that almost half of partnered lesbians are officially registered with the local or state government, while less than a quarter of partnered gay men are officially registered. We conclude with implications of our findings for couples-based research on gay men and lesbians, as well as recommendations for survey data collection.     

Welcome to the Real World of Clinical Research

Perhaps we should take a deep breath! We have successfully gained approval from three Area Health regions for a multi‐centre study, which assesses the effectiveness of a group program for parents of children with challenging behaviour. Each Ethics Committee had to have its say, and change a few things, but we were able to jump their hurdles without (we thought) over‐complicating a relatively no‐frills project. We were also extremely lucky that the project had received funding from the Centre for Mental Health. Without funding, it would have been difficult to afford essential research goodies, such as questionnaires at $2.50 per form, or even paper, adding up to several thousand dollars.