Critical Reflection on the Ethics of Mindfulness

Mindfulness is a way to achieve mental wellbeing that has been widely adopted as part of counselling and mental health treatment. However, there is a distinct lack of critical reflection about the origins of this technique, how it is used, and the implications it has for the beliefs of clients. The purpose of this paper is to provide a carefully considered response to the use of humanistic mindfulness. Social workers need to explain why they recommend mindfulness, and explore culturally consistent and sensitive practice, so that they are abiding by the Australian Association of Social Workers Code of ethics.

IMPLICATIONS

• The use of mindfulness in social work practice requires careful consideration as to its impact and relevance to clients’ needs.

• Mindfulness originates in philosophical traditions distinct from mental health treatment.

• In choosing to use mindfulness social workers require consistent and sensitive understanding of clients’ needs, world views, and culture.

     

Relationship building and message planning: An exploration of media challenges and strategies used during school crises at the P-12 level

Schools at the P-12 level increasingly face crises related to school shootings, violence, and other tragedies. Understanding the communication challenges schools face is paramount to assisting schools with communication before, during, and after crisis events. The current study focuses on the challenges created by media interest in such crises and the strategies implemented to overcome these challenges and provide responsible information to stakeholders. Interviews conducted with 21 school crisis teams at the P-12 level revealed that sensationalism, seeking alternative routes to information, and framing were key challenges in working with the media. In light of these challenges, administrators focused on creating media plans, building relationships with the media, being accurate but guarded, and communicating reassurance and reunification. Implications are discussed for school districts nationally.     

Adolescent Conflict Appraisals Moderate the Link Between Marital Conflict and Physiological Stress Reactivity

The goal of this study was to advance understanding of how adolescent conflict appraisals contribute uniquely, and in combination with interparental conflict behavior, to individual differences in adolescent physiological reactivity. Saliva samples were collected from 153 adolescents (52% female; ages 10–17 years) before and after the Trier Social Stress Test. Saliva was assayed for cortisol and alpha‐amylase. Results revealed interactive effects between marital conflict and conflict appraisals. For youth who appraised parental conflict negatively (particularly as threatening), negative marital conflict predicted dampened reactivity; for youth who appraised parental conflict less negatively, negative marital conflict predicted heightened reactivity. These findings support the notion that the family context and youth appraisals of family relationships are linked with individual differences in biological sensitivity to context.     

Caregiver perceptions of empowerment and self-efficacy following youths’ discharge from residential care

ABSTRACT

Residential care is one of the most restrictive out-of-home care settings; however, this is a temporary placement and youth eventually reintegrate into the home and community setting. Reintegration presents many challenges, and aftercare becomes critical for maintaining youth gains and promoting family stability. Aftercare programs and supports should align to individual family needs that entail understanding individual and familial characteristics. Previous studies have explored characteristics related to family functioning, mental health, behavior, and perceptions of need during reintegration; yet little is known regarding how affective characteristics (i.e., self-efficacy, empowerment) factor into reintegration, or the implications this may have for providers. The purpose of this study was to address this gap by exploring empowerment and self-efficacy in caregivers (N = 120) who had a child return home within 1 month of departing residential care. Overall, caregivers reported high levels of empowerment and self-efficacy during the initial transition period. Significant differences for empowerment and self-efficacy were present in characteristics such as race, income, number of children in the home, and free/reduced lunch status.     

Empirical issues in lifetime poverty measurement

Recently there has been increased interest in developing methods for measuring poverty in a way that takes into account the lifetime experience of individuals. We analyze some specific proposals that take the so-called spells approach and consider how they differ in the manner in which they address issues of lifetime poverty, most notably the measurement of chronic poverty. Comparing these specific measures by applying them to a US panel data set, we provide important insights for further research in conceptualizing and measuring lifetime poverty.     

Monogamy,the Protective Fallacy: Sexual versus Emotional Exclusivity and the Implication for Sexual Health Risk

The authors examined the hypothesis that many individuals define monogamy based on emotional rather than sexual fidelity. Participants, 373 heterosexual college students and 282 gay men, read three vignettes of decreasing mitigation in which they imagined committing an act of infidelity against a hypothetical partner and where half the participants were cued to their emotional attachment toward the partner. Despite the infidelity, relationships in the emotional attachment–cued vignettes were rated as monogamous to a greater degree than relationships in the vignettes where emotional attachment was not cued. In addition, over one-third of the participants in our study reported infidelity in their current self-defined monogamous relationships yet also reported feeling more protected from sexual health risks and reported less condom use than individuals who defined their relationship as nonmonogamous. The implications for monogamy as a protective fallacy are discussed.     

Children, death and ageism

The position of children in the social order can be seen as an ambiguous one. On the one hand, they are highly valued, at a rhetorical level at least, as the basis of the future generation. On the other hand, however, they can be seen to be marginalized and disenfranchised, protected from more aspects of social life than is strictly necessary. This paper explores some of the important issues relating to children's disenfranchised social position, with specific reference to issues relating to death, dying and bereavement.