Demographic transformation in Poland

The author presents a general review of the demographic transition in Poland from 1750 to the present day. Official data are used to describe the fluctuations in birth and death rates over this period.     

Social and Emotional Functioning of Older Asian American Adolescents

This study identified a constellation of psychosocial problems reported by older Asian American adolescents that was different from their Caucasian peers. When compared to 386 Caucasian American adolescents from the same community, Asian American students performed better academically and reported fewer delinquent behaviors. However, these Asian American youth reported higher levels of depressive symptomatology, withdrawn behavior, and social problems. They also perceived themselves more poorly and were more dissatisfied with their social support. These differences highlight the unique mental health needs of older Asian American youth. Practice recommendations are made that consider traditional Asian values and the role that family members can play in the development of effective treatment plans.     

Financial development, investment, and economic growth

In this article, I use a multivariate vector-autoregressive (VAR) approach to examine the effects of permanent financial development on domestic investment and output in 41 countries between 1960 and 1993. The VAR approach permits the identification of the long-term cumulative effects of financial development on the domestic variables by allowing for dynamic interactions among these variables. The results reject the hypothesis that financial development simply follows economic growth and has very little effect on it. Instead, there is strong evidence that financial development is important to growth and that investment is an important channel through which financial development affects growth.     

Work rehabilitation for migrant workers with work injury--the magic of Chinese paper cutting

As China has gradually transformed from agricultural economy into industrial economy since 1978, occupational injuries and diseases become a serious social problem in China. For occupational rehabilitation professionals, helping workers with occupational injuries and diseases, return to work and re-integrate to community are the ultimate goals of occupational rehabilitation. This article reports a new indigenous initiative with cultural notions in occupational rehabilitation piloted by Guangdong Provincial Rehabilitation Center. Case studies reflected that by learning and practicing traditional Chinese paper cutting, workers with occupational injury and disease could regain their self confidence, identity their strengths, learn more vocational skills as well as to re-integrate into community.     

The implementation of motor learning principles in designing prevention programs at work

Occupational therapy practitioners offer services to workers in the workplace to prevent musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), to help the injured worker restore function, and to recover capacities needed to return to the job. Despite the existence of some evidence about the efficacy of prevention programs, there is uncertainty and even disagreement among health professionals, about the outcome of prevention programs for people with MSDs. It is proposed that principles of motor learning can assist the therapist in structuring prevention programs to facilitate the workers learning of correct movement patterns. This paper discusses basic concepts of motor learning emphasizing characteristics of the learner, the type of task, the structure of practice and application to prevention programs at work settings. We present a four-stage model for prevention programs based on principles of both motor learning and ergonomics. This model coincides with the broad perspective suggested in current occupational therapy models which focuses on the person, the environment, the occupation and their effects on occupational performance.     

Procreative attitudes of newly married couples

Results are presented from a 1985 survey conducted among newly married couples in Poland concerning ideal and planned number of children. Both husbands and wives participated in the survey. Comparisons are made with results from a previous survey undertaken in 1975.     

Fertility prospects in Poland

The three phases of the demographic transition in Poland are described with emphasis on changes in fertility. The author notes that the country had entered the third phase of low fertility by 1965. Despite a slight temporary increase due to pronatalist incentives, fertility has since remained low and will probably continue at this level or decline further.