Networks beyond nationalities? Relationships amongst Eastern European women workers in Italy facing the economic crisis

ABSTRACT

This article explores the intricate relationship between Georgian, Ukrainian and Polish women working as live-in elderly caregivers in the province of Reggio Emilia, Italy. Their case shows how both elements of competition and of support can articulate the relationship between national groups that, on the one side, have in common some cultural, linguistic and historical legacies, but, on the other, have a different legal status in the European Union and positions in the Italian labour market for elderly care. In so doing, this article contributes to the debate on migrants’ social networks by pointing to the necessity of further exploring the boundaries that define people’s participation to the same circle of contacts and relationships that constitute their network of reference. From the analysis of 36 in-depth interviews with women of these nationalities, the article shows how the three groups have overlapped through time in the same Italian areas and how they have emulated each other in their migratory trajectories as well as in their employment strategies in the elderly care sector, but it will also underline how in some cases they have competed and been divided, especially beginning in 2008 as a consequence of the economic crisis.     

Hope and adjustment to college in the context of collective trauma

Objectives: To understand predictors of first-year college adjustment in the context of collective trauma, including a school shooting. Participants: Two consecutive years of entering freshman (Year 1 (Y1) N = 169, Year 2 (Y2) N = 94) were surveyed over time: Y1 in October 2012 and March 2013, and Y2 in October 2013 and August 2014. During Y2, several collective traumas occurred, impacting the campus community and providing a stark comparison. Methods: Online surveys measuring predictors at the start of each year and adjustment at the end of each year. Results: Hope was the only significant predictor of adjustment when included in a regression model with depression symptoms in Y1, and with depression symptoms, baseline posttraumatic stress symptoms, and traumatic exposure in Y2. Conclusions: Fostering hope may promote college adjustment, regardless of collective traumas that might occur on campus.     

Teenagers’ risky health behaviors and time use during the great recession

This paper uses individual-level data from both the 2003–2011 American Time Use Survey and Youth Risk Behavior Survey along with state-level unemployment rates to examine the effects of a weakening economy during the Great Recession on U.S. teenagers’ activities. Black male teenagers had less sex and spent more time with their parents. Hispanic male teenagers spent less time playing sports and more time watching time TV, and were more likely to be obese. Female teenagers, on the other hand, spent less time working, but made greater investments in their education. However, there were signs that female teenagers were stressed by the weak economic conditions, because they slept less and were more likely to smoke daily. Black females also consumed more alcohol.     

Bayesian generalizations of the integer-valued autoregressive model

We develop two Bayesian generalizations of the Poisson integer-valued autoregressive model. The AdINAR(1) model accounts for overdispersed data by means of an innovation process whose marginal distributions are finite mixtures, while the DP-INAR(1) model is a hierarchical extension involving a Dirichlet process, which is capable of modeling a latent pattern of heterogeneity in the distribution of the innovations rates. The probabilistic forecasting capabilities of both models are put to test in the analysis of crime data in Pittsburgh, with favorable results.     

Mixing and moments properties of a non-stationary copula-based Markov process

Abstract

We provide conditions under which a non-stationary copula-based Markov process is geometric β-mixing and geometric ρ-mixing. Our results generalize some results of Beare who considers the stationary case. As a particular case we introduce a stochastic process, that we call convolution-based Markov process, whose construction is obtained by using the C-convolution operator which allows the increments to be dependent. Within this subclass of processes we characterize a modified version of the standard random walk where copulas and marginal distributions involved are in the same elliptical family. We study mixing and moments properties to identify the differences compared to the standard case.     

Quantitative Assessment of the Health Risk for Livestock When Animal Viruses Are Applied in Human Oncolytic Therapy: A Case Study for Seneca Valley Virus

Some viruses cause tumor regression and can be used to treat cancer patients; these viruses are called oncolytic viruses. To assess whether oncolytic viruses from animal origin excreted by patients pose a health risk for livestock, a quantitative risk assessment (QRA) was performed to estimate the risk for the Dutch pig industry after environmental release of Seneca Valley virus (SVV). The QRA assumed SVV excretion in stool by one cancer patient on Day 1 in the Netherlands, discharge of SVV with treated wastewater into the river Meuse, downstream intake of river water for drinking water production, and consumption of this drinking water by pigs. Dose–response curves for SVV infection and clinical disease in pigs were constructed from experimental data. In the worst scenario (four log₁₀ virus reduction by drinking water treatment and a farm with 10,000 pigs), the infection risk is less than 1% with 95% certainty. The risk of clinical disease is almost seven orders of magnitude lower. Risks may increase proportionally with the numbers of treated patients and days of virus excretion. These data indicate that application of wild‐type oncolytic animal viruses may infect susceptible livestock. A QRA regarding the use of oncolytic animal virus is, therefore, highly recommended. For this, data on excretion by patients, and dose–response parameters for infection and clinical disease in livestock, should be studied.     

Efficiency comparison of unrelated question models based on same privacy protection degree

In this study, the problem of estimating the proportion π _A of people bearing a sensitive attribute A is considered. Three dichotomous unrelated question mechanisms which are alternative to the well-known Simmons’ model are discussed and their performance is evaluated taking into account both efficiency and respondent privacy protection. The variance of the estimators of π _A is compared under equal levels of confidentiality measures introduced by Lanke (1976) and Leysieffer and Warner (1976).     

The inclusion of the other in ourselves: reception and comprehension of refugees in Portugal

Abstract

The intensification of different types of migration movements during the last decades is an expression of growing interconnections at the global level. The so called ‘refugee crisis’ is the most visible sign of this intensification. It currently challenges societies to rethink the processes of integrating those fleeing from humanitarian crises and wars. Portuguese civil society has pioneered the creation of a Refugee Support Platform, aimed to address the challenges associated with the arrival of refugee families. Within this platform, an e-learning course was created to help institutions and host families prepare for this task. In the article we first describe this course, focusing our analysis on the relevance of this initiative for institutions, families, and private citizens that wish to welcome refugees in Portugal. We then briefly reflect on the literature pertaining to intercultural dialogue and social tensions. In the final section we analyse the voices of those who attended the course. We conclude with an analysis of the contents of the course modules and the participation of the trainees as a contribution to their self-transformation.