An Existential Approach to Risk Perception

Existential, or existential-phenomenological philosophical approaches to the social psychology of risk perception provide a novel framework for understanding issues that are common to all humanity, such as fear of death, freedom and responsibility, isolation and meaninglessness, as these anxieties are a function of existing, or being-in-the-world. These fundamental anxieties can be related theoretically to the ways people perceive risks within social and cultural milieus, and can also be used practically within case studies, as demonstrated in the three examples presented, which examine perceptions of climate change, food-related risks, and environmental awareness via a mixture of quantitative and qualitative techniques. The discussion focuses on the possible insights that can be gained from taking an existential perspective on risk perception, and relates notions of contemporary technologically-oriented societies to the existential challenges faced by individuals and societies in the contemporary world.     

What to Do at Low Doses: A Bounding Approach for Economic Analysis

To quantify the health benefits of environmental policies, economists generally require estimates of the reduced probability of illness or death. For policies that reduce exposure to carcinogenic substances, these estimates traditionally have been obtained through the linear extrapolation of experimental dose-response data to low-exposure scenarios as described in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Guidelines for Carcinogen Risk Assessment (1986). In response to evolving scientific knowledge, EPA proposed revisions to the guidelines in 1996. Under the proposed revisions, dose-response relationships would not be estimated for carcinogens thought to exhibit nonlinear modes of action. Such a change in cancer-risk assessment methods and outputs will likely have serious consequences for how benefit-cost analyses of policies aimed at reducing cancer risks are conducted. Any tendency for reduced quantification of effects in environmental risk assessments, such as those contemplated in the revisions to EPA's cancer-risk assessment guidelines, impedes the ability of economic analysts to respond to increasing calls for benefit-cost analysis. This article examines the implications for benefit-cost analysis of carcinogenic exposures of the proposed changes to the 1986 Guidelines and proposes an approach for bounding dose-response relationships when no biologically based models are available. In spite of the more limited quantitative information provided in a carcinogen risk assessment under the proposed revisions to the guidelines, we argue that reasonable bounds on dose-response relationships can be estimated for low-level exposures to nonlinear carcinogens. This approach yields estimates of reduced illness for use in a benefit-cost analysis while incorporating evidence of nonlinearities in the dose-response relationship. As an illustration, the bounding approach is applied to the case of chloroform exposure.     

Racial differences in urban neighboring

Despite mixed expectations generated by existing theories and evidence, this analysis documents clear racial differences in urban neighboring behavior. Using data from a survey of Nashville, Tennessee, residents, we show that blacks interact with their neighbors more often than whites do, and in a greater variety of ways. The only noteworthy similarity between the two groups is the positive impact of neighboring on feelings of community affect. Overall, our results support the view that neighbor relations — like other kinds of informal participation — have helped blacks cope with constrained social opportunities and provided them with access to resources unavailable through formal institutional channels.Revised version of a paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, San Francisco, August 1989.     

冗员失业、社会负担与国有企业效率

影响国有企业效率的因素有很多,其中制度因素最为重要。而在传统的国有企业制度下,冗员失业和社会负担又是制约企业效率提高的关键。时至今日,这个问题仍是国有企业进行减员增效改革、实施战略性重组的最大障碍。从理论上研究冗员失业对企业效率的影响,并结合我国实际情况分析社会负担给国有企业造成的压力,以强化社会保障为突破口,提出解决冗员失业和社会负担问题、提高国有企业效率的具体对策。     

乐教与儒者的宗教情怀

乐教是理解儒家精神不可忽视的重要方面。乐教扎根于“亲亲”之情,具体体现为与“忧患意识”有别,而与“安”“乐”相协调一致的“怛”和“哀”“悲”之情。此情实质上是超越的天道内化为人的心性而落实下来的生命意义与价值得以呈现的方式。儒者虽深知人生之哀、悲,但以乐入手,解悟和转化现实的人生与宇宙,是一大特色。如此,宗教情怀转化为现实的人生关怀,成为特有的礼乐文明的核心内涵。     

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;

       

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.     

Developing a typology of the 'duty to work', as experienced by lay persons with musculoskeletal disorders

Musculoskeletal diagnoses account for the majority of cases of reduced work capacity. This article investigates lay persons' strategies in relation to work and musculoskeletal disorders. Twenty interviews were conducted and analysed using grounded theory. A typology of self-presentations was developed. The interviewees' self-presentations revealed a strong sense of a 'duty to work'. This sense of duty took four different forms, leading us to categorise persons expressing particular forms as workaholics, work manics, workhorses or relaxed workers. Relaxed workers seem to have the best prognosis for recovery as they had a confident self-agency and worked to fulfil their own needs rather than those of others. This was in contrast to work manics, with an uncertain self-agency and driven to work by others' needs. In conclusion, awareness of such linguistic forms as self-attributions and idiomatic phrases provides an opportunity to identify and talk about individual's self-agency and driving forces in the recovery process.     

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