A Reinvented Community: The Case of Gamcheon Culture Village

This study explores Gamcheon Culture Village in Busan, South Korea, as a special case of inclusive and participatory cultural-spatial transformation by which the village was transformed from an impoverished and decaying hillside slum into a vital and picturesque location and tourist attraction. The study delineates this process in terms of a distinctive engagement of the arts and cultural dynamics relative to general social well-being. Of particular note are the roles of resident activism and civil society, social entrepreneurs, and the arts and artists as key resources, all coming together in an organic redevelopment process. Evidence indicates an increased sense of community and cooperation, overall improvement in the quality of life, and cultural enrichment for the residents. However, transformation continues, and the sustainability of Gamcheon Culture Village as a successful case of redevelopment is dependent on the ongoing cooperation and participation of the resident base and primary artistic support.     

Roles of Vegetable Surface Properties and Sanitizer Type on Annual Disease Burden of Rotavirus Illness by Consumption of Rotavirus-Contaminated Fresh Vegetables: A Quantitative Microbial Risk Assessment

Enteric viruses are often detected in water used for crop irrigation. One concern is foodborne viral disease via the consumption of fresh produce irrigated with virus-contaminated water. Although the food industry routinely uses chemical sanitizers to disinfect post-harvest fresh produce, it remains unknown how sanitizer and fresh produce properties affect the risk of viral illness through fresh produce consumption. A quantitative microbial risk assessment model was conducted to estimate (i) the health risks associated with consumption of rotavirus (RV)-contaminated fresh produce with different surface properties (endive and kale) and (ii) how risks changed when using peracetic acid (PAA) or a surfactant-based sanitizer. The modeling results showed that the annual disease burden depended on the combination of sanitizer and vegetable type when vegetables were irrigated with RV-contaminated water. Global sensitivity analyses revealed that the most influential factors in the disease burden were RV concentration in irrigation water and postharvest disinfection efficacy. A postharvest disinfection efficacy of higher than 99% (2-log₁₀) was needed to decrease the disease burden below the World Health Organization (WHO) threshold, even in scenarios with low RV concentrations in irrigation water (i.e., river water). All scenarios tested here with at least 99.9% (3-log₁₀) disinfection efficacy had a disease burden lower than the WHO threshold, except for the endive treated with PAA. The disinfection efficacy for the endive treated with PAA was only about 80%, leading to a disease burden 100 times higher than the WHO threshold. These findings should be considered and incorporated into future models for estimating foodborne viral illness risks.     

Factors influencing resubstantiation of child neglect in South Korea: A comparison with other maltreatment cases

While a high prevalence of child neglect cases has been reported by Child Protective Services (CPS) in Western countries, child neglect cases reported to South Korea's Child Protection Agency (CPA) present different trends than those in Western countries. Nevertheless, child neglect is an understudied area within child welfare. Thus, a need exists to investigate the unique characteristics of child neglect cases substantiated by the CPA in Korea. This study investigates the unique characteristics of child neglect cases and examines how factors associated with the resubstantiation of these cases differ from those of other maltreatment cases. Using CPA administrative data, we employed a multilevel discrete‐time hazard analysis to analyze the risk and protective factors associated with the resubstantiation of child neglect cases and compared the results with other maltreatment cases. In both cases, younger children, perpetrators with alcohol problems, families receiving welfare, and months of agency operation were associated with resubstantiation. For child neglect cases, the provision of child and parent services, and CPAs located in metropolitan area were protective factors that reduced the risk of resubstantiation. The finding in this study highlights the need to expand the provision of services to child neglect cases to prevent resubstantiation.     

Nonlinear regression models for heterogeneous data with massive outliers

The income or expenditure-related data sets are often nonlinear, heteroscedastic, skewed even after the transformation, and contain numerous outliers. We propose a class of robust nonlinear models that treat outlying observations effectively without removing them. For this purpose, case-specific parameters and a related penalty are employed to detect and modify the outliers systematically. We show how the existing nonlinear models such as smoothing splines and generalized additive models can be robustified by the case-specific parameters. Next, we extend the proposed methods to the heterogeneous models by incorporating unequal weights. The details of estimating the weights are provided. Two real data sets and simulated data sets show the potential of the proposed methods when the nature of the data is nonlinear with outlying observations.     

Mainstream and Marginal Newspaper Coverage of the 1995 Quebec Referendum: An Inquiry into the Functioning of the Canadian Public Sphere*

Cet article applique le concept habermassien de la sphère publique à l'examen des relations entre les journaux ethniques et grand public présents à Toronto. En particulier, cette étude analyse les éditoriaux parus au cours de l'année précédant le référendum de 1995 sur la souveraineté du Québec et en explique la couverture médiatique sur la base d'entretiens avec les rédacteurs en chef des journaux concernés. Pendant cette période, tous les journaux, sauf un, étaient antiséparatistes. Cependant, contrairement aux journaux grand public, les journaux ethniques se sont particulièrement attachés à des questions de survivance culturelle. Les approches des éditeurs sur la question de la souveraineté suggèrent qu'on ne peut ni parler de sphère publique unifiée ni de publics multiples et atomisés. Il y a plutôt des sphères publiques multiples - inscrites dans des tempo-ralités socio-économiques spécifiques - qui se recouvrent et se complètent. This article employs Habermas's concept of the public sphere in examining the relationship between ethnic and mainstream Toronto newspapers. In particular, the study analyses editorials in the year leading up to the 1995 Quebec referendum on sovereignty, and draws upon interviews with the newspaper editors in explaining the patterns of coverage. During the specified time period, all but one newspaper was anti-separatist. Unlike the mainstream papers, however, the ethnic presses stressed issues of cultural survival. The editors' approaches to the sovereignty question suggests that there is neither a single unified public sphere nor multiple discrete publics. Instead, there are multiple overlapping public spheres—embedded in particular socio-economic historical moments—that complement one another.     

Where Does Religion Matter Most? Personal Religiosity and the Acceptability of Wife‐beating in Cross‐National Perspective

Does religion justify violent acts against wives, or does it reduce approval of this type of intimate partner violence? We examine whether personal religiosity raises or lowers the acceptability of wife‐beating. In addition, we investigate how the relationship between personal religiosity and attitudes toward wife‐beating differs depending on the overall normative context of the country where a person lives. Using multilevel modeling with data from the fifth wave of the World Values Survey (2005–2008), we find that greater individual‐level religiosity reduces the acceptability of wife‐beating. More importantly, cross‐level interactions show that these reductions are greatest in countries where there is a general lack of normative restraint as measured by the “anomie” scale. These observations suggest that religiosity may influence an individual's norms the most in countries where secular controls are absent or weak.     

Bayesian change-point problem using Bayes factor with hierarchical prior distribution

We consider the hierarchical Bayesian models of change-point problem in a sequence of random variables having either normal population or skew-normal population. Further, we consider the problem of detecting an influential point concerning change point using Bayes factors. Our proposed models are illustrated with the real data example, the annual flow volume data of Nile River at Aswan from 1871 to 1970. The result using our proposed models indicated the largest influential observation in the year 1888 among outliers. We have shown that it is useful to measure the influence of observations on Bayes factors. Here, we consider omitting single observation as well.     

Meta‐analysis of depression among marriage‐based migrant women in South Korea

Using meta‐analysis, this study examines the effect sizes of the variables related to depression and the moderating effects of depression among marriage‐based migrant women in South Korea to determine the implications for human service fields. This study identified 25 peer‐reviewed articles from 2000 to 2014 published in either Korean or in English. Results showed that (i) Korean language proficiency and economic hardship had significant effect sizes relative to depression; (ii) the psychosocial characteristics (i.e., acculturative stress, social support, marital satisfaction, life satisfaction, and self‐esteem) of this population had medium effect sizes relative to depression; and (iii) use of the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression scale, residence in agricultural areas, average age, and average length of stay in Korea had significant moderating effects. Based on these results, the authors discuss social work practices and policies for this population, suggesting the priorization of marriage‐based migrant women in agricultural areas who have lived in Korea for short lengths of time.     

Positive,Negative, and Ambivalent Interactions With Family and Friends: Associations With Well‐being

Although the relationship between social relationships and mental health is well established, debate continues about the relative importance of specific sources (spouses, children, relatives, friends) as well as of positive and negative interactions. The authors examined the associations of positive, negative, and ambivalent interactions with life satisfaction and depressive symptoms for spouses, children, relatives, and friends, using data from the 2008 Health and Retirement Study (N = 6,418). The findings generally showed positive associations between positive interactions and mental health and negative associations between negative or ambivalent interactions and mental health. These associations were most pronounced for relationships with spouses and children. Gender differences were found in life satisfaction but not in depressive symptoms. These results imply that future research on older adults needs to consider both positive and negative relationship features from diverse sources separately and in combination to disentangle their relative effects and their additive or compensatory potential.