What’s a Parent to Do? How Parents Respond to Notification of a Child’s Police Detention

The current qualitative study involved in-depth semistructured interviews with parents whose children had been taken into custody. Their initial emotional reactions, cognitive processing, and behavioral responses to their child’s detention were examined. Five themes emerged from the data: (1) Parents try to defer immediate interactions with the child rather than react out of emotion; (2) Parents feel anger toward their child, but disappointment and shock are more strongly expressed emotional responses; (3) Parents do not accept the behavior but do not reject their child; (4) Police behaviors communicate the seriousness of the act; and (5) The entire family suffers consequences from the child’s act. Findings highlight the experiences of the parents as they interacted with the juvenile justice system.     

Coping,Emotion Regulation,and Self-Blame as Mediators of Sexual Abuse and Psychological Symptoms in Adult Sexual Assault

This study examined whether coping, emotion regulation, and self-blame mediate relationships of trauma histories with post-traumatic stress disorder and depression in adult sexual assault victims (N = 1863). A path analysis showed that theorized mediators partially mediated associations between trauma history variables and psychological symptoms. Specifically, child sexual abuse severity was related to greater post-traumatic stress disorder and depression indirectly through maladaptive coping and decreased emotion regulation but not self-blame. Other traumas had direct relationships with symptoms and partially mediated effects through maladaptive coping and emotion regulation. Child sexual abuse was unrelated to self-blame, but other traumas were related to greater self-blame. Results differed according to whether women had counseling post-assault. Implications are drawn for future research and clinical treatment of adult sexual assault victims.     

A Single-Case Study of Resiliency After Extreme Incest in an Old Order Amish Family

This exploratory research brief presents a single case study of the resiliency of “Mary B.” She grew up in an Old Order Amish family where isolation, secrecy, and patriarchy masked repeated sexual assaults by her older brothers that began at age 7. By the age of 20, Mary alleged she had been raped on more than 200 separate occasions by members of her Amish family. After years of pleading with her mother and church officials to intervene, she sought therapy outside the Amish community. This led to three of her brothers being incarcerated. Her family disowned her and she was banned from the Amish community, leaving with an 8th grade education and little more than the clothes she was wearing. In less than 2 years, Mary had moved to a new town, completed her GED, obtained a car and driving license, maintained a small home, and worked as a certified nursing assistant. She consented to tape recorded interviews and completed several quantitative diagnostic measures. Scores on the diagnostic measures placed her within the normal range on self-esteem, competency, depression, stress, social support, and life skills. Analysis of interviews revealed Mary rebounded from her past by reframing her experiences. Themes identified within the interviews supported 6 of the 7 types of resiliencies (insight, independence, initiative, relationships, humor, and morality) outlined in the therapeutic Challenge Model.     

Caregiver–Youth Communication about Sex in South Africa: The Role of Maternal Child Sexual Abuse History

Much of the research on child sexual abuse focuses on negative outcomes. This brief report explores a potentially protective parenting behavior among black South African female caregivers with and without a child sexual abuse history. Using cross-sectional baseline data, we hypothesized that caregiver child sexual abuse history would be positively associated with caregiver–youth sex communication and this relationship would be strongest for girls. Youth whose caregiver experienced child sexual abuse were more likely to report communicating with their caregiver about sex than youth whose caregivers did not experience child sexual abuse; however, this relation did not hold for caregiver reported communication. Child sexual abuse survivors’ ability and decision to discuss sex with their youth has the potential to protect youth from sexual risk and demonstrates resilience among a group rarely acknowledged for positive parenting practices.     

Citizenship for Some: Heteronormativity as Cloaked Bullying

SUMMARY

The average student of diverse sexuality hears eight homophobic insults per day with one third from faculty and staff. Through a lens of citizenship education, we elucidate heteronormative undercurrents obstructing the acceptance of sexual diversity; in-depth analysis of two such barriers, the public man and the ethics of marriage, are provided and suggest that heteronormativity, with roots in the Enlightenment discourse, is overpowering instrumental curricula promoting the acceptance of sexual diversity. Further, the perpetuation of such heteronormative undercurrents can and should be seen as a form of violence: cloaked bullying. The article challenges the use of “It's Ok to be Gay” kits and other modes of essentializing sexual diversity, and petitions educators to remain cognizant of heteronormative undercurrents in their teaching practice. By laboring to dislodge heteronormative underpinnings educators are enabled to model genuine open-minded and accepting citizenship and effect meaningful progress in the acceptance of sexual diversity.     

Indigenous identity, ‘authenticity’ and the structural violence of settler colonialism

In many ways, the structural violence of settler colonialism continues to dominate the lived experience of Indigenous populations, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in contemporary Australia. One aspect of this structural violence concerns the regulation of Indigenous identity, today perpetuated through state monitoring of the ‘authenticity’ of Aboriginal people. This article argues that the contest over Indigenous identity perpetuates a form of symbolic political violence against Indigenous people. It considers the ways in which structural violence against Indigenous identity has featured in Australia's settler colonial regime and examines the particular violence faced by urban-dwelling Aboriginal people, who endure much contemporary scrutiny of the ‘authenticity’ of their Indigeneity. As a case study, the article examines the symbolic violence associated with a particular legal case in Australia and, in light of this analysis, concludes that settler colonies could make a decolonising gesture by legislating for the protection of Indigenous identity.     

Attitudes Toward Advanced Licensing for Macro Social Work Practice

ABSTRACT

Trends in clinical licensing and a renewed energy to strengthen macro practice are raising questions about the appropriateness of licensure for macro social work practice. This article presents findings from an online survey of macro social work educators and macro social work practitioners exploring their attitudes toward an advanced-level macro social work license. Faculty and practitioner responders agreed that there is a role for advanced-licensing of macro social work practice; however, the lack of a collectively strong response reflects a current state of ambivalence toward advanced-level licensing for macro practice. Implications from these findings on contemporary social work are discussed.     

Constructing Identities in Multicultural Learning Contexts

In this article we examine two concepts that aid our understanding of processes of identification in multiethnic schools. The first concept focuses on the complementarity of “three processes of identity” (identifying the other, being identified, and self-identification). This is brought together with the concept of sociocultural coupling introduced to examine the co-constructions of changes in practices (across places and times) and changes in identification. The analysis draws on an interview with a pupil, Monifa, a Black African (Nigerian) girl (aged 10 years), and on an interview with a Pakistani teacher, Shazia. Although Shazia and Monifa belonged to different generations (i.e., a pupil/daughter and a teacher/mother) and different cultural groups (British-born Black African and Pakistani Kashmiri), the same identity processes could be applied to the data. They both articulated accounts of “identifying the other,” “being identified,” and “self-identification,” which emphasized their transitions between cultural practices and multiple communities. Furthermore, we propose that sociocultural coupling has enabled us to understand the means by which aspects of cultural practices borrowed from home and school allows them to reproduce aspects of their home cultural identity and at other times to transform these identities.     

Multisensory Emplaced Learning: Resituating Situated Learning in a Moving World

This article outlines the implications of a theory of “sensory-emplaced learning” for understanding the interrelationships between the embodied and environmental in learning processes. Understanding learning as multisensory and contingent within everyday place-events, this framework analytically describes how people establish themselves as “situated learners.” This approach is demonstrated through three examples of how culturally constructed sensory categories offer routes to knowing about the multisensoriality of learning experiences. This approach, we suggest, offers new routes within practice-oriented educational theories for understanding how human bodies become situated and embedded in cultural, social, and material practices within constantly shifting place-events.     

Barriers and Promoters of Mental Health Services Utilization in a Latino Context: A Literature Review and Recommendations from an Ecosystems Perspective

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on the problems of disparities in mental health service utilization in the Latino population in the United States. It begins with an overview of the Latino population within the United States, an exploration of the diversity within this group, and shared cultural values and traits with a particular focus on the problems of Latino poverty. A review of the literature follows, including identified barriers to and promoters of mental health services utilization. These are contextualized in a Latino perspective using an ecosystems framework. Recommendations are made for future practice, research, and policy regarding mental health and mental health services utilization in the Latino community.