Masturbation practices of males and females

In this study, the authors have examined the masturbation practices of both male and female college students, attempting to test some of the premises long held that men and women differ significantly in such practices. The findings indicate that while there are differences in many of the variables examined, there are others which show striking similarities. Thus, they open to question a number of assumptions held regarding differences in sexual needs and responses of males and females.     

Reliability and Validity of the Global Assessment of Relational Functioning (GARF) in a Psychiatric Family Therapy Clinic

The reliability and validity of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-IV Global Assessment of Relational Functioning (GARF) was evaluated in consenting participants presenting to a family therapy training clinic. The purpose of this study was to (a) assess whether the GARF could be administered quickly in a marriage and family therapy training clinic, (b) assess the inter-rater and internal reliability of GARF ratings of intake sessions, (c) examine the relationship of GARF ratings to established measures of relationship functioning, and (d) compare GARF ratings to a measure of depressive symptoms. Study participants completed the General Functioning Subscale of the Family Assessment Device (GFS/FAD), the Quality of Marriage Index (QMI), and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies–Depression Scale (CES-D). After intake sessions were conducted with study participants, GARF ratings were made by an American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy Approved Supervisor or Supervisor-in-Training, a therapist trainee, and two observing trainees who had observed the session from behind a one-way mirror. Cronbach’s coefficient alphas and the average intraclass correlation coefficients were both .82 when ratings of the supervisor and two observers were compared and .78 and .79, respectively, when ratings of the supervisor, two observers, and therapist were evaluated. There was significant agreement between GARF ratings made by the supervisor and therapist (but not observers) and scores on the GFS/FAD, QMI, and CES-D. Results suggest that GARF ratings can be made quickly and reliably, especially among raters with greater clinical experience, and are related to measures of relational functioning and depression. Implications for research and marriage and family therapy training are discussed.     

Does Opening Adoption Records Have an Adverse Social Impact? Some Lessons from the U.S., Great Britain,and Australia, 1953–2007

This study provides an international history of the adoption reform movement in the United States, Great Britain, and Australia from 1953 to 2007. It empirically tests how safe birth parents and adopted adults are in countries that have opened their adoption records, usually birth registration records, using contact preference forms and contact vetoes. The results of this investigation reveal that a vast gap exists between the fear by birth parents and adopted adults that their privacy will be invaded and their family disrupted and the reality that few or no offenses are committed. It follows that opening adoption records with contact preference forms or contact vetoes provides a balanced adoption disclosure system and is a viable alternative to the sealed adoption policies currently used in the vast majority of American states and Canadian provinces.     

Marx and Malthus in North-East Brazil: A Note on the World's Largest Class Difference in Fertility and its Recent Trends

During the late 1960s and early 1970s the world's largest class difference in fertility was recorded in North-east Brazil. By the late 1970s the difference had narrowed dramatically, although it probably remains larger than in any other society. The immediate economic consequence is an unlimited supply of cheap labour and a path of economic growth that increases both inequality and the relative size of the poorer class. There are ideological disagreements about population policy. Some expect an imminent reversal of the official view that ranges from laissez-faire to pro-natalist. Others see cheap labour as an historical policy of long standing, beginning with slavery, followed by subsidized immigration of poor Europeans, the latter ending only when the natural rate of increase of the labouring class was sufficient to supply the cheap labour. The historical policy of cheap labour may simply have switched from active to passive mode. Independently of government policy, however, the democratization of birth control seems to be occurring in the North-east.     

History Does Its Bit

Numeracy is as essential to becoming an active and thoughtful citizen as literacy. Although the concept of numeracy is complex and robust, there are four areas in which teachers can fairly easily begin to incorporate it into social studies curriculum and instruction. The areas include the students' ability to understand raw numeric data in context, to understand percentages in context, to understand the meaning of average, and to interpret and question graphs and charts. The author shares ways to cultivate numeracy in the social studies education classroom related to each of these four basic aspects of numeracy.     

Using Weight of Evidence Characterization and Modeling to Investigate the Cause of the Changes in Pacific Herring (Clupea pallasi) Population Dynamics in Puget Sound and at Cherry Point,Washington

The decline of the Cherry Point Pacific herring stock (CPPHS) has been a puzzle of the upper Puget Sound. In this study, age‐structured population modeling was used to examine the timing and scale of the dynamics of Pacific herring stocks throughout the Puget Sound region. The intrinsic rate of increase and equilibrium age structure was calculated and forecast models were created for the stocks found in Puget Sound. We demonstrate that the causative agent for the decline of the CPPHS and the collapse in age structure existed in the 1974–1975 timeframe. Similarly, Puget Sound Pacific herring stocks at Squaxin Pass, Discovery Bay, and Port Gamble also demonstrate a collapse in age structure as seen in CPPHS during that same period. The data from the mid 1980s to 2006 demonstrate that all stocks share the collapse in age structure. The conclusion is that the causative agent had to affect these stocks at a scale corresponding to the Puget Sound; the effect has lasted over a 30‐year period, and was essentially simultaneous across the region. Forecast modeling of the stocks indicates that given current conditions none of the stocks are likely to show an increase in population size. The results were used to examine the likelihood that the Eastern Pacific decadal oscillation, disease, and persistent organic pollutants are singularly or in concert the causative agents. A research program is suggested to determine the cause(s).     

Trends in the Qualitative Study of Social Identities

This article reviews recent developments and trends in the qualitative study of social identities. Recent scholarship emphasizes multidimensionality and challenges notions of identity singularity and coherence. These challenges include critiques of the implicit identity monism of approaches that give master status primacy to a single marked identity attribute along race, class, gender, or sexuality axes or that portray static notions of a coherent single unified self-identity. After analyzing the social bases of collective identities and self-identities, this article examines identity strategies, claims to identity authenticity, identity shifts and transitions, and the contextual situatedness and multidimensionality of self-identities. Recent developments in the sociology of identity focus on the multidimensionality and mobility of contemporary identities. These developments can be understood by separating identity research into its analysis of markedness and unmarkedness, authenticity claims, and the role of mobility and flexibility, in contributing to the multidimensional character of social identities