Adoption outcomes for children with handicaps.

About 800 families who had adopted children with special needs responded to a mailed survey. Most reported good adoption outcomes. The presence of a handicap--vision, hearing, or physical impairment, mental retardation, or serious medical condition--was not an important factor influencing outcome.     

Analysis of the Gibbs sampler for a model related to James-Stein estimators

We analyse a hierarchical Bayes model which is related to the usual empirical Bayes formulation of James-Stein estimators. We consider running a Gibbs sampler on this model. Using previous results about convergence rates of Markov chains, we provide rigorous, numerical, reasonable bounds on the running time of the Gibbs sampler, for a suitable range of prior distributions. We apply these results to baseball data from Efron and Morris (1975). For a different range of prior distributions, we prove that the Gibbs sampler will fail to converge, and use this information to prove that in this case the associated posterior distribution is non-normalizable.     

Experimental avoidance as a mediator of the effects of adolescent sexual victimization on negative adult outcomes

The study examined experiential avoidance as a mediator between sexual victimization and negative adult outcomes. Baron and Kenny's (1986) regression analyses were performed on a sample of 304 undergraduate women to assess direct and indirect effects of sexual victimization on depressive, psychological distress, and alcohol abuse symptoms. Experiential avoidance accounted for statistically significant, but modest effects of victimization on depressive and distress symptoms. Child sexual abuse was not directly associated with experiential avoidance or negative outcomes, but increased vulnerability for adolescent sexual victimization. Adolescent sexual victimization contributed to increased experiential avoidance, which was associated with greater negative outcomes. These results uniquely contribute to the existing literature linking experiential avoidance to psychological problems.     

Achieving limiting distributions for Markov chains using back buttons

As a simple model for browsing the World Wide Web, we consider Markov chains with the option of moving back to the previous state. We develop an algorithm which uses back buttons to achieve essentially any limiting distribution on the state space. This corresponds to spending the desired total fraction of time at each web page. On finite state spaces, our algorithm always succeeds. On infinite state spaces the situation is more complicated, and is related to both the tail behaviour of the distributions, and the properties of convolution equations.     

The relationship between exposure to community violence and psychological distress among adolescents: a meta-analysis

This article is concerned with the "size of the relationship" between exposure to chronic community violence and psychological symptoms among adolescents. It analyzes all relevant empirical studies in the published literature during the last 20 years; uses quantitative methods to summarize findings; and estimates the effect size using meta-analysis. The 37 independent samples (n = 17,322) were coded on 19 categories, including size and characteristics of sample, and characteristics of the independent and dependent variables. Findings indicate that there is a positive correlation between exposure to community violence and psychological distress; and that the effect size (r = .25) of this relationship is low-medium. The estimated effect size of the relationship points to new issues such as the characteristics of the psychosocial dynamics of resilience in the face of exposure to community violence and how exposure to community violence interacts with other potentially traumatic experiences in the producing of psychological distress.     

Self-touching behavior in the job interview: Antecedents and consequences

This study examined self-touching behavior in a simulated employment interview. Four male and four female interviewers each met with four applicants (four male and four female) under two different conditions of formality (informal and formal). Results showed that sex composition of the dyad, status within the dyad, and situational formality could dramatically affect the frequency and location of self-touching. In examining self-touching as a predictor of interpersonal outcomes and hiring decisions, it was found that male interviewers rated applicants more favorably than did female interviewers, and both male and female interviewers engaged in more foot touching while conducting interviews leading to a favorable hiring decision. The striking number of results with large effect sizes suggests that self-touching may be an important but neglected variable in social interaction.This research was supported in part by the National Science Foundation. Part of this research was presented at a meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association held April, 1984, in Baltimore, Maryland. We would like to thank Roger Brown for his insightful comments, Tanna Lee for her tireless efforts in collecting and organizing the data, and Stephen Thayer for his helpful suggestions on earlier drafts.     

FAMILY GOAL RECORDING: AN ADAPTATION OF GOAL ATTAINMENT SCALING FOR ENHANCING FAMILY THERAPY AND ASSESSMENT*

Family Goal Recording is proposed as a systemic approach for measuring change in the presenting concerns of couples and families. This paper describes the procedures for using Family Goal Recording as an outcome measure for family therapy and a device to enhance goal attainment. In addition, the results of an initial study on the reliability and validity of this method are presented.     

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Work satisfaction, self‐esteem, and alienation measures were obtained from white males in three service occupations (bartenders, barbers, and mailmen) at different levels of the occupational prestige hierarchy. While we found an overall positive relationship between work satisfaction and occupational prestige, this only held for variables where societal reference groups were forced upon the respondents. Such findings suggest that the relationship between work satisfaction and occupational prestige is less absolute than usually suggested by the literature. Hypotheses from the literature arguing for a direct relationship between occupational prestige and alienation were not supported by our data. We conclude that sociologists probably overestimate the salience of work and occupational prestige for the working class.