The availability of personal and external coping resources: Thier impact on job stress and employee attitudes during organizational restructuring

This study examines the relationships among personal coping resources, social support, external coping resources, job stressors and job strains in a sample of 110 American Telephone and Telegraph employees undergoing a major organizational restructuring. The study expanded on a model suggested by Ashford (1988) by defining another category of coping resources that employees may draw upon to deal with the stressors and strains which occur during major organizational changes. External coping resources were defined as those which provided employees with a sense of 'vicarious control' in stressful situations. Results indicated that personal coping resources, social support and external coping resources had a direct effect upon job stressor and strain levels. No 'buffering' effect of these coplng resources was found. Hierarchical regression analyses indicated that external coping resources added to the prediction of job stressors and strains even when pertonal coping resources and social support were entered first into the prediction questions.     

A pilot study of the contribution of empathy to burnout in Salvation Army Officers

Although empathy has been found to distinguish effective counsellors from less effective counsellors, human services professionals who continually experience negative emotional reactions to the feelings that clients express in counselling may be at risk of developing burnout. This study examined the hypothesis that emotional empathy rather than cognitive empathy is associated with burnout. The sample of human services professionals consisted of 71 Salvation Army Officers. Multiple regression was used to investigate whether the dimensions of empathy could predict three aspects of burnout: personal accomplishment, emotional exhaustion and depersonalization. The first regression analysis indicated that personal distress and empathic concern were significant predictor of personal accomplishment. The second analysis indicated that personal distress was a significant predictor of emotional exhaustion. The third indicated that empathic concern was a significant predictor of depersonalization. Although these results support the hypothesis, personal distress was negatively associated with personal accomplishment, whereas empathic concern was positively associated with personal accomplishment. The small size of the sample may have influenced the reliability of the findings. A multidimensional approach to the role of empathy in counselling may help human services professionals to manage their emotional reactions when they engage in counselling with distressed clients.     

高校大学生社会实践活动功能初探

高校大学生社会实践活动作为一种生动有效的培养人才的重要途径,已经显示出它在大学生的思想教育、专业学习和能力培养等方面的综合效益。其基本功能主要表现在五个方面,即思想教育功能、深化教学功能、实践检验功能、社会服务功能、劳动助学功能。     

Work/Care Regimes: Institutions,Culture and Behaviour and the Australian Case

Increasingly around the industrialized world, labour markets rely upon the paid work of women, many of whom have dependents. Such changing patterns of paid work by women — and by men — are located within work/care regimes that are more or less hostile to the needs of paid workers who care for others. This article sets out a model of work/care regimes and locates the Australian case within international and historical contexts. In Australia, the unchanging normative male worker archetype dominates institutions of work and care, while the cultures of motherhood and fatherhood remain stoically resistant to renovation. In the meantime, the behaviour of working women runs ahead of these unchanging cultures and institutions, creating a policy interest in ‘reconciling’ work and care, but a failure to provide it. The reasons for this failure are outlined.     

Who Gets What From Government? Distributional Consequences of Child‐Care Assistance Policies

Given the fragmented structure of child‐care assistance in the United States, it has been difficult to obtain accurate estimates of which families are assisted, through which mechanisms, and at what level. Making use of survey data from New York City, we analyze the distribution of several forms of public child‐care assistance. Results suggest that about 40% of all families with young children receive some form of child‐care assistance. Considering all forms of assistance, the distribution of child‐care help is targeted in both expected and some unexpected ways. Implications of these results are discussed in the context of U.S. child‐care policies governing access and benefit levels.     

Informal Caregiving at Working Age: Effects of Job Characteristics and Family Configuration

This article addresses the relationship between employment and providing informal care for sick, disabled, or elderly people in Great Britain. Hazard rate models for taking up caring and leaving work when caring are estimated using retrospective family, employment, and caring data from the British Family and Working Lives Survey 1994 – 1995 for 9,139 British men and women. Family roles but not employment characteristics were relevant for men and women taking up caring. Being in a lower social class was, however, an important predictor of female carers leaving the labor market. Starting caring and quitting the labor market were not affected by women working part time, nor by most aspects of job flexibility that were considered.     

论刑罚个别化原则的根基和属性——一种多视角的分析与考察

近年我国刑法学界,刑罚个别化原则正日益引起学者的广泛关注和深入研究.刑罚个别化原则有其内在的合理根基它在方法论基础上得益于近代犯罪学对刑法学的推动;在伦理内涵方面体现了人性关怀;在价值追求中实现了公正圆满.刑罚个别化原则不仅仅是一个量刑原则或刑法原则,而且是一个重要的刑事政策原则.     

Professional Perspectives on Decision Making about the Long-term Care of Older People

With the increasing pressure on social and health care resources,professionals have to be more explicit in their decision makingregarding the long-term care of older people. This groundedtheory study used 19 focus groups and nine semi-structured interviews(99 staff in total) to explore professional perspectives onthis decision making. Focus group participants and intervieweescomprised care managers, social workers, consultant geriatricians,general medical practitioners, community nurses, home care managers,occupational therapists and hospital discharge support staff.The emerging themes spanned context, clients, families and services.Decisions were often prompted by a crisis, hindering professionalsseeking to make a measured assessment. Fear of burglary andassault, and the willingness and availability of family to helpwere major factors in decisions about living at home. Serviceavailability in terms of public funding for community care,the availability of home care workers and workload pressureson primary care services influenced decision ‘thresholds’regarding admission to institutional care. Assessment toolsdesigned to assist decision making about the long-term careof older people need to take into account the critical aspectsof individual fears and motivation, family support and the availabilityof publicly funded services as well as functional and medicalneeds.     

关于有效促进社会公正的几个问题

本文认为:(1)为了顺利地推进改革,为了中国社会经济持续、有效和健康的发展,就必须适应新的历史条件,顺应民意、顺应现代社会的基本趋势,把社会公正放到一个突出的位置。(2)在中国现阶段应当开始建立一个初级的社会公平保障体系。初级社会公平保障体系的基本特征是低水准、广覆盖、有实效。对于国家来说,近期需要做的事情可以分为两大块,一是国家的直接投入,二是国家的立法、监督、执行和引导。(3)有一些根深蒂固的观念在妨碍着我们重视社会公正问题。这些观念主要包括:“原始积累不可避免”,“国家财力不足”,“重视公正便会妨碍效率”,因此我们必须对这些观念进行一番必要的反思。(4)要想构建一个公正而和谐的社会,就必须培育一个庞大的中等收入者人群,形成一个“两头小,中间大”的橄榄型的社会结构,那么社会就会变得越来越稳定了。     

On the difficulty of making social choices

The difficulty of making social choices seems to take on two forms: one that is related to both preferences and the method used in aggregating them and one which is related to the preferences only. In the former type the difficulty has to do with the discrepancies of outcomes resulting from various preference aggregation methods and the computation of winners in elections. Some approaches and results which take their motivation from the computability theory are discussed. The latter institution-free type of difficulty pertains to solution theory of the voting games. We discuss the relationships between various solution concepts, e.g. uncovered set, Banks set, Copeland winners. Finally rough sets are utilized in an effort to measure the difficulty of making social choices.