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.

     

The Influence of Career Planning on Career Thoughts in STEM‐Interested Undergraduates

Undergraduate career planning courses have shown efficacy in decreasing students’ negative career thoughts; however, universities have minimally applied these courses to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) populations. This study compared the influence of a STEM‐focused career planning course for undecided STEM students with a seminar course for decided STEM majors. An analysis of covariance with covariate adjustment revealed that undecided career planning students had lower adjusted mean scores on a measure of negative career thinking than the decided STEM majors after the first semester of college. The results provide support for the efficacy of STEM‐focused career planning courses and measuring negative career thoughts with STEM undergraduates.     

Automating and evaluating reversible jump MCMC proposal distributions

The reversible jump Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) sampler (Green in Biometrika 82:711–732, 1995) has become an invaluable device for Bayesian practitioners. However, the primary difficulty with the sampler lies with the efficient construction of transitions between competing models of possibly differing dimensionality and interpretation. We propose the use of a marginal density estimator to construct between-model proposal distributions. This provides both a step towards black-box simulation for reversible jump samplers, and a tool to examine the utility of common between-model mapping strategies. We compare the performance of our approach to well established alternatives in both time series and mixture model examples.     

Ecosystem resilience, specialized adaptation and population decline: A modern Malthusian theory

The purpose of this article is to construct a theoretical framework characterizing the interactions among economic development, ecosystem equilibrium and possible population decline, and to discuss the population dynamics in the very long run. In our framework, economic activities bridge population and environment. On the one hand, human beings reform the environment through economic activities; on the other hand, economic activities decrease environmental resilience and increase the possibility of an environmental change in a discontinuous and irreversible pattern, as described in Arrow et al. (1995). Furthermore, a highly developed economy also causes over-specialization of human adaptation, which tends to exaggerate the impact of an environmental change on human population size. Received: 19 January 1999/Accepted: 3 July 1999     

Ethnic segregation in context: Social discrimination among native Dutch pupils and their ethnic minority classmates

Social discrimination, defined as the relative preference for intra-ethnic over inter-ethnic relationships, was studied in pupils’ networks in Dutch secondary school classes. While native Dutch pupils (ethnic majority members) mainly named fellow majority members, ethnic minority members reported ties with as many majority as minority members. Considering the ethnic composition of the classroom, however, majority members discriminated less than minorities. No strong effect of classroom ethnic composition on social discrimination was found, whereas neighborhood composition was shown to clearly influence social discrimination: ethnic minority members were more, and majority members less inclined to discriminate in neighborhoods with more ethnic presence.     

A framework for the comparison of maximum pseudo-likelihood and maximum likelihood estimation of exponential family random graph models

The statistical modeling of social network data is difficult due to the complex dependence structure of the tie variables. Statistical exponential families of distributions provide a flexible way to model such dependence. They enable the statistical characteristics of the network to be encapsulated within an exponential family random graph (ERG) model. For a long time, however, likelihood-based estimation was only feasible for ERG models assuming dyad independence. For more realistic and complex models inference has been based on the pseudo-likelihood. Recent advances in computational methods have made likelihood-based inference practical, and comparison of the different estimators possible.     

DISCRIMINATION, WOMEN, AND WORK: Processes and Variations by Race and Class

Research on gender and workplace stratification has made clear that persistent employment, wage, and mobility gaps exist, and that discrimination at organizational and interactional levels is playing a role. Few studies, however, have been able to directly capture processes involved. In this article, we draw on unique qualitative and quantitative data pertaining to verified cases of workplace sex and race discrimination (1988 to 2003), and analyze the discriminatory experiences of African-American and white women across various occupational statuses. Notable are high levels of discriminatory firing for both groups, but higher instances of race-based promotional discrimination for black women—a pattern partially linked to their disparate concentration in sex-segregated workplaces and in positions of lower occupational prestige. Our qualitative immersion into case materials reveals influential mechanisms and employer justifications, unique manifestations of differential treatment on the job, and the use of "soft skill" criteria in gatekeeper decision making. We conclude by discussing important dimensions of workplace discrimination for women, variations by social class and race status, and how complexities of status matter for what women experience and gatekeeper behavior.     

The effects of direct experience on consumer product evaluation

The effects of different sales strategies on consumer product evaluation were investigated. It was expected that direct product experience could decrease economic product valuation. Experiments 1 and 2 studied the effects of product trials and money-back guarantees on consumer willingness to pay (WTP). It appeared that WTP was significantly lower after a product trial than with a money-back guarantee or normal sale. In Experiment 3 a structural equation model showed that product trials had a positive effect on attitude toward the product. Also, a negative effect on WTP was found when the effect was measured directly, but a positive effect when the effect was measured indirectly (through attitude).     

Urbanization-related distribution patterns and habitat-use by the marine mesopredator,giant Pacific octopus (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Enteroctopus dofleini</Emphasis>)

Urbanization is a process that heavily alters marine and terrestrial environments, though terrestrial urban ecosystems have been studied far more intensively. Terrestrial studies suggest that urbanization can facilitate mesopredators by enhancing food and shelter resources and reducing predation pressure from apex consumers. This in turn has considerable consequences for ecological communities. We evaluated spatial distribution patterns and habitat-use of the marine mesopredator, giant Pacific octopus (Enteroctopus dofleini), relative to terrestrial urbanization intensity in Puget Sound, Washington, USA. Using field surveys and citizen-contributed data for E. dofleini, we examined whether: (1) Distribution was related to urbanization, (2) Abundance was related to the extent of benthic anthropogenic debris, and (3) Diet differed as a function of urbanization and den cover. Our results suggest that urbanization impacts may differ with depth. Mixed-effects logistic regression model estimates for the probability of occurrence increased with urbanization in deep-water (> 24 m), and decreased with urbanization in shallow water (< 18 m). Accompanying field surveys indicated that E. dofleini abundance was correlated with the number of benthic anthropogenic debris items, and that E. dofleini diets were not affected by urbanization intensity or den cover. Though E. dofleini may be synanthropic within certain urban environments, the mechanisms driving this pattern likely differ from those affecting common urban mesopredators on land, with den provisioning from man-made structures being more important than altered food resources.