Life Experiences and Vulnerabilities of Homeless Women: A Comparison of Women Unaccompanied Versus Accompanied by Minor Children,and Correlates With Children’s Emotional Distress

The histories and service needs of 2 groups of homeless women, those unaccompanied by minor children (n = 46) and those accompanied by minor children (n = 22), were compared, on the basis of their responses to a biennial survey of homeless people in a midsize city in the southeast United States. Mothers of children aged 2-10 also completed a measure of stress symptoms for their children (n = 20). Irrespective offamily status group, problems such as substance abuse, history ofmental illness, health problems, chronicity of homelessness, and crime victimization tended to cluster together. The findings also suggest that declining and/or inadequate levels ofpublic benefits, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, and Medicaid-funded health care in particular, have adversely affected the 2 groups, particularly families with children. The young children in this sample experienced elevated levels ofstress, and significant associations were found between children’s stress levels and certain riskfactors oftheir mothers. Implications for service delivery are discussed.     

Unofficial Hanoians: Migration,Native Place and Urban Citizenship in Vietnam

Independent migration to Hanoi has surged dramatically over two decades of deepening market reforms, blurring the distinctions between urban and rural lives once maintained so carefully by the Communist Party of Vietnam. However many urban migrants face ongoing legal and social obstacles in Hanoi, tied to an outmoded system of household registration (ho khau), and widespread anxieties about the ‘floating population’ threatening to overwhelm the city. This article shows how one group of ‘unofficial Hanoians’—migrant motorbike taxi drivers from Nam Dinh Province—navigate a system of differentiated urban citizenship by forging communities and mutual assistance networks around shared ‘native places’ (que huong) to find employment, housing and social support in the city. It also reveals how Hanoi's marginal urban spaces—home to entrenched migrant communities of ambiguous legality—emerge as key arenas in the negotiation of Vietnamese citizenship, forcing national leaders, city officials, landlords and residents to grapple with questions of free movement and the rights of rural citizens to transgress urban space.     

Gambling-related Irrational Beliefs in the Maintenance and Modification of Gambling Behaviour

Abstract

The present study investigated a primary assumption of the cognitive theory of problem gambling, that gambling-related irrational beliefs lead directly to problematic gambling behaviour. Participants (N =114) received a message designed to increase their illusion of control (IOC) over a computerised roulette game, a message designed to decrease their IOC, or a neutral message. Participants then played the game, during which their gambling behaviour was recorded and irrational beliefs were measured. Based on the cognitive model, it was expected that those receiving the IOC enhancement message would evidence greater levels of irrational beliefs and correspondingly more intense gambling behaviour and that those in the IOC reduction condition would show decreased levels of both irrational beliefs and behaviour. However, although conditions differed as to levels of irrational beliefs, there were no significant differences in gambling behaviour. Results are discussed and implications of the results on the cognitive theory of problematic gambling are explored.     

Towards an Insurrectionary Power/Knowledge: Movement-Relevance,Anti-Oppression,Prefiguration

Despite ongoing efforts to articulate radical methods and theoretical frameworks for social movement research, the field remains embedded in exploitative, oppressive, and hierarchical modes of knowledge production. Following Foucault, I argue that this is because societies like ours, founded through racial and patriarchal violence, are invested in a regime of truth supportive of that violence. In light of this, I argue that social movements scholars need to adopt a radically different form of knowledge practice. Building on anarchist, anti-racist feminist, and anti-colonial scholarship, this paper begins by analysing how liberalism constrains social justice organizing and how academic norms foreclose accountable social movements scholarship. I then introduce three unique ethics emerging in resistance to this situation: movement-relevant, anti-oppressive, and prefigurative. The first confronts the extractive imperatives of enlightenment truth-making; the second resists its neutral and disinterested tendencies; and the third models a rejection of its hierarchical and exclusive mode of authority. I argue that together they provide scholars with a strategy for re-/orienting their research towards what Foucault theorizes as an insurrection of knowledges. These three ethical frameworks combine to facilitate an insurrectionary power/knowledge that fosters collective struggle as it progressively dismantles the regime of truth underlying social movements research.     

Creativity,brands, and the ritual process: Confrontation and resolution in advertising agencies

The intensity of modern business has increased pressure for innovation, which places greater emphasis on creativity. This article explores one of the central sites of creativity in the American corporate world, the advertising agency. We examine how creativity in agencies is managed, controlled, and channeled to produce advertisements. We contend that the brand advertised and the agency’s creative collaborations have properties of ritual symbols and that rituals mediate tension inherent in two forces, stability and change, which define the brand and the advertising collaboration. The article offers an analytical perspective on creativity and a new perspective on rituals and ritual symbols.     

The application of a small group learning approach to social group work teaching - an exploratory study

A new modality – the small group learning approach, was developed for social group work courses for social work students in Hong Kong. A research study, aimed at understanding the students’ level of satisfaction with the new approach and exploring its effectiveness regarding enhancing students’ learning in social group work, was conducted for three cohorts of students in the academic years from 2013-14 to 2015-16. The findings indicated that its effectiveness was influenced by the quality of the tutors and the level of co-operation of the students. Strategies for improving the design and the implementation of the approach will be discussed     

Ambiguity of gender identity fantasies and aspects of normality and pathology in hypopituitary dwarfism and Turner's syndrome: Three cases

Three cases of short stature females are presented, two with, gonadal dysgenesis and one with hypopituitarism, all about the same age, social class, and intelligence. One of the subjects with gonadal dysgenesis was normally functional; the other depressed, but she became functional after psychotherapy. The patient with hypopituitarism was poorly adapted and failed to change on brief effort at psychotherapy, discontinuing treatment. Evidence is drawn from transference and observational material that disturbances in the mother‐child relationship may lead to persistence of unreasonable wishes to grow physically. This leads to a split in the ego which prevents adaptation to small stature because it is not acceptable to the patient. In the case which was successfully treated, it is shown that the acceptance of the defective self led to restoration of ego functions adaptive to small stature.     

Redirecting sexual orientation: Techniques and justifications

This essay reviews efforts to alter sexual orientation using behavioral, psychodynamic, hormonal, pharmaceutical and surgical methods. The essay also examines various justifications offered for such therapy and shows how these have changed as a pathological interpretation of homoeroticism has been abandoned. While such therapy was once justified in language of psychopathology, some current justifications for conversion therapy now treat the matter of therapy as a matter of personal choice and do not invoke the language of pathology at all. That a formal medical rejection of a psychopathological categorization of homoeroticism has not altogether eliminated efforts to redirect sexual orientation suggests that it is ultimately a moral and not medical devaluation of homoeroticism that at bottom drives continuing efforts to control and redirect sexual orientation.     

A pilot study of Latinos with multiple sclerosis: demographic, disease, mental health, and psychosocial characteristics

In this study the authors present results from a survey of 99 Latinos with multiple sclerosis (MS), including demographic, disease, and mental health characteristics. Four in 10 respondents reported depressive symptoms; half thought they had more worries than other people due to their MS; and about 29?% thought they needed mental health care in the past year. Whereas 76?% of respondents were highly satisfied with their access to MS-focused care, only 61% were highly satisfied with their access to mental health care. These findings highlight the role of mental health and social services in the comprehensive care needed by Latinos with MS.     

An intervention analysis of the effects of legalized abortion upon U.S. fertility

Models of time series data on births in the United States are used to assess the impact of the 1973 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court invalidating statutes that seriously restrict access to abortion. The decision of the Court is found to have no discernible impact on births for the nation as a whole. Models of state-level data suggest that the legalization of abortion by states prior to the decision was satisfying the demand for abortion