Overprotection in the lives of people with intellectual disability in Malta: knowing what is control and what is enabling support

A study of overprotection in the lives of persons with intellectual disability in Malta was carried out on the principles of inclusive research. Focus groups were held with people with intellectual disability, parents of people with intellectual disability, and those working with persons with intellectual disability. Overprotection is a disabling barrier. Its effects were identified in employment, leisure time, intimate relationships, and the use of public transport, money, and mobile phones. People with intellectual disability who experience overprotection live very structured lives. They cannot develop their skills, abilities, and potential. Furthermore, they cannot live their life on their own terms, but on terms determined by others. This creates a sustained dependence on others, especially the family. It is important that a balance is achieved between protection and enabling support. Persons with intellectual disability should be given the support they need to express their wishes and act on them.     

Supervisors in ergonomic change of meat cutting work

Being a supervisor is an important and lonely occupation. The aim of this study was to identify barriers and opportunities in working conditions for supervisors, being facilitators and implementers of change for meat cutters. Nine supervisors of meat cutters in one large company were interviewed. The semi-structured interviews covered their roles as supervisors, performance of the change process and their own working conditions. Notes were taken and structured in themes. Similarities, differences, plus and minus were identified. There was a nuanced view on the change processes and their effects. The change processes and the decisions were anchored in a democratic process with groups of employees and the union. All were clear on what demands the company had on them. They were secure in a functioning network of peers and their immediate superior. On their own education, most were as a whole satisfied, but in need of more training and talked of lifelong learning. They considered their work demanding and lonely, with a need both to be manager and leader. A shared leadership could mean doing a better job. There is a need for education and training as a manager and leader as well as the opportunity to discuss with peers.     

Behavioral and Electrophysiological Indices of Memory in Typically Developing and Hypoxic‐Ischemic Injured Infants

Behavioral and electrophysiological indices of memory were examined in 12‐month‐old typically developing control infants (CON) and infants with history of perinatal hypoxic‐ischemic injury (HII) across 2 days. Using a visual paired comparison (VPC) procedure, novelty preference was tested immediately after a familiarization period and then after delays of 2 min and 24 h. Both groups showed a significant novelty preference only for the no‐delay condition. On day two, event‐related potentials (ERPs) were recorded while infants viewed the VPC familiar face, a more recently familiarized face, and a novel face, and mean amplitude for components thought to reflect memory (positive slow wave, PSW) and attention (negative central, Nc) were computed. In temporal regions, HII showed a diminished Nc and enhanced PSW to the recently familiarized face, while CON showed a similar trend for the PSW only. Overall, infants showed the largest PSW over left scalp regions. Finally, a positive correlation between VPC novelty preference after 24 h and PSW was found in CON, and preliminary results suggest that this association differs as a function of group. Therefore, in comparison with CON, HII showed both similarities and differences on individual tasks of memory as well as potentially disparate relations between the behavioral and neural mechanisms underlying memory performance.     

Estimates for cell counts and common odds ratio in three-way contingency tables by homogeneous log-linear models with missing data

Missing observations often occur in cross-classified data collected during observational, clinical, and public health studies. Inappropriate treatment of missing data can reduce statistical power and give biased results. This work extends the Baker, Rosenberger and Dersimonian modeling approach to compute maximum likelihood estimates for cell counts in three-way tables with missing data, and studies the association between two dichotomous variables while controlling for a third variable in \( 2\times 2 \times K \) tables. This approach is applied to the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System data. Simulation studies are used to investigate the efficiency of estimation of the common odds ratio.     

European Welfare regimes and the transition to adulthood: A comparative and longitudinal perspective

Social Indicators Research -     

Introduction

Social Indicators Research -     

The Changing Character of Regulation: A Comparison of Europe and the United States

European and U.S. regulatory policies have changed considerably over the past 30 years. In Europe, since the mid-1980s, consumer and environmental regulation has become more politically salient and regulations have by and large become stricter. On the other hand, in the United States consumer and environmental issues have become less salient and contentious, and regulations have not become (comparatively) stricter. This apparent "flip-flop" of regulatory systems has not been analyzed in much detail to date. This perspective is an attempt to analyze some examples in which it has occurred and identifies one possible cause--namely, credibility.     

Urban segregation in Sweden housing policy,housing markets,and the spacial distribution of households in metropolitan areas

The postwar Swedish housing standard has been raised considerably. But there were also unforeseen and undesired side effects in the form of increasing segregation. Between 1965–1975 a great number of rental apartments were built in the periphery of the metropolitan areas. They originally received an overrepresentation of the poor, immigrants, social welfare recipients, and members of the working class. Today these areas face long distances, increasing deterioration and the lower socioeconomic level of their population is accentuated. The following wave of rebuilding in the central metropolitan areas also reinforced residential segregation. As the dwellings became larger and totally modern, the rents rose. Ownership forms often changed to tenant-owned dwellings which drove up the prices of tenant-owned dwellings. The older working-class population was replaced by wealthy families with middle-class backgrounds. The rebuilding in the city centers has in all likelihood been the motor in the overall relocations and migrations of the metropolitan populations during the 1980s. The movement of the middle-class towards the centers corresponds to an increased concentration of workers and various resource-weak groups on the peripheries. This analysis uses a new large micro data base integrating Swedish census and level-of-living survey data on individuals, households and neighbourhoods.Housing segregation has not been seen as a very serious problem in Sweden. Attention has primarily been aimed at providing spatial and modern dwellings for everyone. The construction of housing was explosive through the middle of the 1970s, and it has been supported by substantial general subsidies. Today, Sweden, together with Norway, has Europe's highest and most evenly distributed housing standard. Overcrowding and unmodern housing have for all practical purposes been abolished.