Social Stratification and the Division of Household Labor in Japan: The Effect of Wives' Work on the Division of Labor among Dual-earner Families

Abstract:  This article explores the relationship between social stratification and the division of household labor by examining how the contribution to housework by husbands in dual-earner families varies across the Japanese social stratification structure. First, I review previous studies concerning the determinants of husbands' participation in housework and construct four hypotheses regarding the relative resources explanation, the time constraints explanation, the ideology/sex role explanation, and the alternative manpower explanation. Second, I examine the empirical support for these hypotheses in dual-earner couples and the effect of social stratification on husband's participation in housework, which has not been studied thus far. Third, I investigate the effect of social stratification in more detail. According to the results of TOBIT regressions and other supplementary analyses, the principal findings are as follows:

• 1) 

  the relative resources explanation is not supported;

       

Fifteen Years of Family Group Conferencing: Coordinators Talk About Their Experiences in Aotearoa New Zealand

Family Group Conferencing (FGC) as a solution-focused strategyin child welfare has now been a mandated practice in AotearoaNew Zealand since 1989. This qualitative study examines theexperiences of Care and Protection Coordinators who have beenconvening FGC since the early years of the legislation. Thestudy explores early perceptions of the legislation, what firstattracted them to the role and what keeps them in the job. Inparticular, the study explores the practice tensions that restwithin family-centred child protection models, and the waysin which FGC practice has developed in response to modern imperatives.     

Can we remember differently? A case study of the new culture of memory in voluntary organisations

This article analyses the positive contribution that Slovenian voluntary, non–governmental organisations, users' organisations and community–based services in the field of mental health have made to the 'new culture of memory' of helpers and users. The conceptual differences between Slovenian psychiatric (institutional) treatment and voluntary community care are presented through the case study of Clare, a young woman who was diagnosed as a chronic schizophrenic. This example shows the importance of community care in voluntary organisations for the reduction of disability associated with mental disorders. The development of the new culture of memory in voluntary organisations and community–based services is not only the 'narrative turn' within social welfare, but also symbolises the 'implicit turn' in the relationship between the helper and the user. The real challenge of the new culture of memory in the process of help to disabled people (in respect of individuals working through traumatic memories) is that the helper can bear and support the user on a daily basis. During the process of their relationship, the deep implicit relational memories of both become activated and influence the change within the user as well as the helper.     

Empathy and professional attitude in social workers and non-trained aides

The purpose of this study was to investigate empathic communication and professional attitude in vocational groups representing different levels of professional training. A further aim was to elucidate some aspects of the impact of the clients. Four groups of professionals participated, three with degrees as social workers and one with only short professional training. Three groups worked with committed drug addicts, one group with somatically ill patients. The 110 subjects were tested with a video-test of professional attitude and empathic communication. Different response patterns were found in the different groups. The group with short training had the highest proportion of unprofessional responses. The group of social workers working with somatically ill patients showed the highest amount of empathic communication. Furthermore, there was a distinction among the kind of unprofessional responses used by the different groups. Hypotheses on the causes of these differences and implications for future research are discussed.     

Medicine on the line? Computer‐mediated social support and advice for people with diabetes

The advent of thousands of Usenet groups on the Internet, covering a vast range of medical and welfare issues and ostensibly devoted to the mutual social support of participating members, has raised the potential for the development of new forms of 'virtual' health care. This article critically analyses the use by people with diabetes of one such Usenet group. It seeks to establish, first, the extent to which such a site provides some demonstrable measure of social support to its participants. This is approached by undertaking a structural analysis of the site to identify the extent of usage, and the nature of supporting interventions using a fivefold classification (instrumental, informational, esteem and social companionship and other). Second, the article attempts to identify any disparity between the lay health-knowledge in evidence and biomedical opinions proffered by the use of a panel of consultant diabetiologists. The results of the analysis suggest that the diabetes newsgroup provides an example of an active forum for largely well-informed participants who routinely use the media as an aid to the reflexive management of their medical condition. It also raises the prospect of a renegotiated relationship between medical knowledge and lay experience based upon shared learning     

社会边缘群体对社会稳定的影响及对策--以哈尔滨建筑业农民工为例

社会稳定和社会边缘群体的生存状况紧密相连.建筑业农民工群体是中国社会边缘群体的重要组成部分,必须通过实证研究分析他们的生存状态及其与社会稳定之间的关系.通过抽样方法和问卷调查,从经济状况、社会分配、社会心理和社会控制等四个方面透视哈尔滨市建筑业农民工群体的生活状况,目前还不是影响社会稳定的因素.但从长期来看,若不注重研究并改善其境遇,则可能成为社会稳定的隐患.鉴于此,必须综合利用农民工社会保障制度、工会组织、技能培训、改善食宿和安全条件以及多样化的休闲途径,来保证这一群体的生活质量和合法权益,以维护社会稳定.     

Art in Social Movements: Shantytown Women's Protest in Pinochet's Chile

How social movements use art is an understudied question in the social movements literature. Ethnographic research on the use of art by the prodemocracy movement in Pinochet's Chile suggests that art plays a very important role in social movements, which use it for framing, to attract resources, to communicate information about themselves, to foster useful emotions, and as a symbol (for communicating a coherent identity, marking membership, and cementing commitment to the movement).     

Value,attitude, and belief determinants of willingness to accept a facility for the homeless

Basic values, attitudes toward the homeless, and specific beliefs about a proposed facility were examined, along with the NIMBY (Not In My BackYard) phenomenon, to explore if, and to what degree, these factors affect community acceptance or rejection of a facility for the homeless. Previously designed Protestant ethic (PE) and Humanitarian-Egalitarian (HE) scales were used to measure two basic values (Katz & Hass, 1988). Scales to measure attitudes toward the homeless and beliefs about a planned facility were developed. As predicted, values, attitudes, and beliefs correlated with each other and were related to plan acceptance, so that HE, pro-homeless attitudes, and positive beliefs about the plan were positively related to acceptance, and PE, anti-homeless attitudes, and negative beliefs about the plan were positively related to rejection. Also as predicted, four proximity measures were all related to acceptance of the plan.     

L'Intervention Sociologique After Twenty-Five Years: Can It Translate into English?

The sociological intervention is a research method developed in France by Alain Touraine in 1976 to explore social movement action. Since then it has undergone significant development, both in terms of the type of social experience explored and the broader research program framing it. Despite its importance, the intervention remains little known and virtually untested within English-language sociology. This article examines key dimensions of this research method through discussing several examples, and argues that the intervention has much to offer English-language sociologists concerned with questions of agency and reflexivity, relationship, narrative and experience.