Using Automated Emergency Notification Systems to Inform the Public: A Field Experiment

Research and experience have shown that it can be difficult to get citizens to pay attention to risk messages and preparedness information in the absence of an actual emergency. As the use computerized systems that alert the public to hazards by automatically ringing their home phones increases, we thought it important to ask if tests of these "call down" systems can also be used to convey preemergency information. We worked with a local government to add instructions on how to shelter-in-place to the message on a routine test of a call down system. We then surveyed a test group and a control group before and after the test call and a second control group on after the call. The results indicate that the test call raised awareness of the emergency notification system without generating undue concern about the possibility of a chemical accident. Those who received the test call demonstrated significant improvements in their knowledge of how to shelter-in-place while no such improvement was observed in those who did not get the call. While the nature of the sample used in this study limits generalizability, we feel this outcome is positive enough to warrant further exploration of this method of disseminating risk information and preparedness instructions.     

Anger Management Taught to Adolescents with an Experiential Object Relations Approach

The authors propose a method of teaching anger management utilizing an objects relations theory conceptualization. The inner structure of the angry adolescent is described, and methods of addressing anger tailored to the individual differences of each adolescent's internal world are presented Role playing is utilized in the anger management group to illustrate the concepts presented. The authors conclude that when the clinical intervention resonates with the internal world of the client, the intervention will be experienced as meaningful.     

An Introduction to the Multidimensional Students' Life Satisfaction Scale

QOL researchers have primarily focusedtheir attention on adults. The purpose of thispresentation is to describe the rationale,development, and psychometric properties of amultidimensional life satisfaction scaleappropriate for children and youth, theMultidimensional Students' Life SatisfactionScale (MSLSS: Huebner, 1994; Huebner et al.,1998). This multidimensional self-report scalewas designed for use with students from thirdthrough the twelfth grades. The currentversion of the MSLSS includes 40 items intendedto assess satisfaction with five specificdomains (School, Self, Family, Friends, andLiving Environment). The presentation willsummarize a series of recent studies assessingits reliability, factor structure, andconvergent and discriminant validity. Additionally, the potential usefulness ofchildren's life satisfaction scales forresearch and clinical applications werediscussed.     

"Homo Sociologicus" and Personality Theory

L'image que la sociologie peint de l'homme en théorie contemporaine a été l'objet de critiques qui se groupent autour des deux thèmes suivants: 1 les modéles actuels de l'univers social Agent l'homme dans un moule, en en faisant le prisonnier de ses rôles afin d'expliquer ses comportements; 2 une théorie explicite de la personnalité est un indispensable élément de toute théorie sociologique valable, puisque l'action individuelle est un passage obligatoire pour que se manifeste toute disposition commune au niveau de la collectivité. L'auteur est d'opinion que si, afin d'expliquer l'harmonie sociale, on appuie trop sur l'intériorisation des valeurs collectives, on appauvrit la notion de personnalité en plus de rabaisser, parmi les mécanismes qui produisent l'accord, ceux qui sont de caractère social plutôt que psychologique.     

Seroadaptive Strategies of Vancouver Gay and Bisexual Men in a Treatment as Prevention Environment

British Columbia’s treatment as prevention policy has provided free access to highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) to all HIV-positive provincial residents since 1996. One outcome is an increase in HIV-positive gay and bisexual men (GBM) with suppressed viral loads. Previous cross-sectional analyses indicated that some Vancouver GBM now recognize condomless anal sex with men on HAART who report a suppressed viral load as a seroadaptive strategy. To test the hypothesis that this new strategy, termed viral load sorting (VLS), is recognized and used among by GBM in the Momentum Health Study, we analyzed longitudinal data for HIV-negative/unknown (n = 556) and HIV-positive (n = 218) serostatus participants. Analyses indicated that both groups reported VLS, and that serostatus and Treatment Optimism Scale scores were significant determinants in frequency and use. Results exemplify the medicalization of sex and Rogers’ Diffusion Of Preventative Innovations Model, and they have important implications for HIV research and GBM sexual decision-making.     

International conference on Jewish civilization in eastern and central Europe,Minsk, 24–26 January 2000

A Symposium on Soviet Jewry

The Jews in Soviet Russia, Since 1917, Lionel Kochan (ed.). London, Oxford University Press for Institute of Jewish Affairs. 1970. ix + 357 pp. Index. £2.50.

Wanted: a history of Soviet Jewry

The Silent Millions: A History of the Jews in the Soviet Union by Joel Cang. London, Rapp and Whiting. 1969. 246 pp. £2.10.

Red Rose

Rosa Luxemburg, Ich War — Ich Bin — Ich Werede Sein, by Harry Wilde. Wien‐Muenchen‐Zurich, Verlag Fritz Molden. 1970. 264 pp.

A Book on Georgian Jewry

Yehudey Gruzia: Ma'avak Al Ha'shiva Le‐tsion (The Jews of Eorgia: A Struggle for the Return to Zion), by Mordecai Neishtat. Tel‐Aviv, Am Oved Publishers, Ltd. 1970. 148 pp. (in Hebrew).

Menshevism and the Jewish question

Russian Social Democracy; the Menshevik Movement. A Bibliography, by Anna M. Bourgina. Hoover Institution Bibliographical Series: XXXVI, The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, Stanford University, Stanford, California. 1968. 392 pp. (no price listed), (in Russian; English introduction).

Jewish writers of Byelorussia

Pismienniki Savieckaj Bielarusi: Karotki Bijabiblijahraficny Davednik (Writers of Soviet Byelorussia: a short Biobibliography), A. Harodzicki et al (comp.). Minsk, Vydavectva ‘Bielarus’. 1970. 440 pp. 82 kopeks.     

VIA's visual voices: the awareness of a dedicated audience for voices in patient video narratives

First the authors examine the concept of ‘voice’ in one model of participant media research (PMR) giving special attention to parallel variables of hearing, begging questions about the ‘listening’ component of any communication process. Second, they describe the use of a research programme entitled Video Intervention/Prevention Assessment (VIA) and a series of ongoing video narrative projects with chronically ill young people at Children's Hospital Boston. Young people were asked to show how they see their own illness-centred lives by using videocam technology. Third, ‘visual voices’ as found on the videotape results are examined through Thompson's five kinds of voice used by participants living with spina bifida, cystic fibrosis and, in one case, obesity. We conclude that knowledge and anticipation of what we have termed ‘a dedicated audience’ is one of the primary variables in the elicitation of voice and the overall value of participant media research.

… [one] main characteristic of illness narratives is that they formulate and express a central aspect of being ill in modern society, namely the difficulty of giving voice to both suffering and to the lifeworld context of illness. (Hyden 1997 Hyden, L. 1997. Illness and narrative. Sociology of Health & Illness, 19(1): 48–69. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 64)     

Exploring the ethics of treatments for depression: The ethics of care perspective

This article explores the ethics of current treatments for depression through the lenses of social work values and ethics. As a vehicle for analysis, the approach associated with ethics of care will be utilized. Particular attention is paid to ethical dilemmas in the treatment of depression under the auspices of managed care companies. A case example is presented to help social workers understand these dilemmas in the context of practice. Adopting an ethics of care perspective would mandate that social workers become more politically active, and work toward integrating direct and indirect practice approaches in treating people who suffer from depression and similar problems.     

Media, ‘Fat Panic’ and Public Pedagogy: Mapping Contested Terrain

Discourses regarding a ‘global obesity crisis’ and alternative frames (e.g. weight‐inclusive approaches to health) have proliferated through various media of communication. These media range from traditional print and visual formats (e.g. newspapers and television shows) to digital media (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube), which enable different publics to produce, and not just consume, text, images and other data relating to the body. Reflecting a sociological understanding of educational practices as extending beyond formal schooling, mediated obesity discourse and counter‐movements have also been conceptualised as public pedagogies, which instruct people how to relate to their own and other's bodies, health and subjectivities. This article examines what is critically known about various media at a time when governments and agencies are reinvigorating the global war on obesity, with populations being ‘advised’ to become and remain conscientious weight watchers. In conclusion, the article underscores the salience of social studies of the media when seeking to rethink obesity, incorporating critical reference to moral panic theory and the need to better understand what media can ‘do’ as enactments of public pedagogy.     

Quantifying urban forest structure,function, and value: the Chicago Urban Forest Climate Project

This paper is a review of research in Chicago that linked analyses of vegetation structure with forest functions and values. During 1991, the regions trees removed an estimated 5575 metric tons of air pollutants, providing air cleansing worth 9.2 million. Each year they sequester an estimated 315 800 metric tons of carbon. Increasing tree cover 10% or planting about three trees per building lot saves annual heating and cooling costs by an estimated 50 to 90 per dwelling unit because of increased shade, lower summertime air temperatures, and reduced neighborhood wind speeds once the trees mature. The net present value of the services trees provide is estimated as 402 per planted tree. The present value of long-term benefits is more than twice the present value of costs.