Mental health service users' experiences of returning to paid employment

Research into mental health and employment has focused largely on people who are unemployed. This paper reports the experiences of 20 clients of employment support agencies who had succeeded in returning to work. A number of barriers to getting back to work were identified, but receiving employment support could enable people to overcome them. There was consistency with previous studies of factors associated with high and low levels of job satisfaction. Even those participants who were less satisfied with their jobs identified benefits and none described any negative effects. The quality of the employment support provided was important, including advice and counselling during the job search, enabling informed choice about disclosure and support in work. Job retention targets are required for funding programmes in addition to placement targets. Further research into the timing and processes of disclosure and into occupational health screening processes would be helpful.     

Reflections from a Student of Mothering

This reflective article provides a window into one clinical social worker's experience of returning to school after becoming a mother. The convergence of two separate lives, those of mother and student, is explored through a psychodynamically‐informed perspective. Challenges of integrating theories on mothering from an experience‐near position are discussed.     

A Behaviour-Based Peer-Nomination Measure of Social Withdrawal in Children

Research on social withdrawal has been impeded by problems in the definition of the construct and in its measurement. The purpose of this study was to develop a behaviourally-based peer-nomination measure useful in measuring two types of withdrawal: Inhibited/Wary and Self-Conscious/Anxious. In Study 1, we report the development of the measure. We examined whether this two-factor structure would be supported by data obtained from multiple informants. Data were collected from children in grades 3, 5, and 7, and their peers and teachers. Intercorrelations of peer-, teacher-, and self-reports of the Behaviour-Based Peer-Nomination Measures of social withdrawal supported the validity of the Inhibited/Wary dimension; teacher-peer agreement also provided support for the validity of the Self-Conscious/Anxious dimension. In Study2, the Behaviour-Based Peer-Nomination Measure of Social Withdrawal was cross-validated against observed play behaviour with 120 boys and girls. Results revealed some concordances between observational and peer-nomination data.     

A Cross-Cultural Exploration of the Stability of Children's Friendships and the Predictors of their Continuation

The purpose of this study was to explore cultural differences in children's perceptions of friendship quality and in the predictors of the subsequent continuation of their relationships. Participants were third and fourth-grade children in Florence, Italy, and Toronto, Canada. A total of 184 dyads of children who indicated that they were friends near the beginning of the school year completed questionnaires regarding the quality of their relationships. Among the Italian children, especially the girls, a higher proportion of friendships remained intact at the end of the school year than among the Canadians. Positive aspects of relationship quality at the first data collection point were associated with future friendship status, but earlier conflict within the dyad was unrelated to the continuation of friendship. The levels of conflict reported by the children were lower in the Italian sample than in Canada.     

Attitudes Towards Disabled Staff and the Effect of the National Minimum Wage: a Delphi survey of employers and disability employment advisors

This Delphi study drew on the expertise of a national sample of 100 employers of disabled people, and a similar number of Disability Employment Advisors (DEAs). It presents their existing attitudes towards disabled employees before analysing the effect of the NMW on these views. Differences between employers and DEAs were found in relation to the perceived costs and obstacles to employers of taking or retaining disabled staff, the problems presented by specific disabilities and the motivation shown by disabled staff. There was general agreement that the NMW has benefited disabled people by making low paid jobs better paid. A minority of respondents thought it had created additional obstacles to employment for disabled people. Some disabled employees appear to have been adversely affected by the interaction of the NMW with the Supported Placement Scheme (SPS, now Workstep) and the benefits system. Understanding employers' perspectives may facilitate the promotion of work opportunities for disabled people.     

Rhythmic organization of social interaction and observer ratings of positive affect and involvement

Many investigators have speculated that a high degree of rhythmic patterning of social interaction and close coupling between the activity rhythms of partners are associated with positive affect, attachment, and interpersonal attraction. Others suggest that predictable or rhythmic patterning is an indication of inflexibility, and that close linkages between the physiological arousal of partners are associated with negative affect. In the present study, spectral and cross spectral analyses were applied to vocal activity and heart rates recorded during 12 conversations. Indexes of rhythmicity and strength of coupling were derived and used as predictors of observer ratings of pleasantness of affect and degree of involvement. There was a curvilinear relationship between affect and rhythmicity of vocal activity, such that moderately rhythmic social interactions were evaluated most positively. This relationship remained statistically significant even when other variables (such as mean and standard deviation of amount of vocal activity) were statistically controlled. Strength of coupling between partner vocal activity patterns and strength of coupling between the vocal activity and heart rate within speaker were not statistically significant predictors of ratings of pleasantness. Results suggest that there may be an optimum degree of rhythmicity in social interaction, with moderately rhythmic interactions evaluated most positively.We gratefully acknowledge support from the Central University Research Fund and from the Office of the Dean of Liberal Arts at the University of New Hampshire. Thanks to Kim Mooney, Charles Dufour, Mark Henn and Jay Goober for their contribution in developing the coding system.     

Residual analysis for parametric models fit to censored data

The focus of this paper is on residual analysis for the lognormal and extreme value or Weibull models, although the proposed methods can be applied to any parametric model. Residuals developed by Barlow and Prentice (1988) for the Cox proportional hazards model are extended to the parametric model setting. Three different residuals are proposed based on this approach with two residuals measuring the impact of survival time and one measuring the impact of the covariates included in the model. In addition, a residual derived from the deviations equality presented in Efron and Johnstone (1990) and the residual proposed by Joergensen (1984) for censored data models are discussed.