Consistency: a pre-requisite for inspecting old people's homes?

Correspondence to Dr Ian Gibbs, Centre for Housing Policy, University of York, Heslington, York YO1 5DD. Summary Inspection of old people's homes, in both local authority andindependent sectors, forms a major component in the work ofthe new ‘arm's length‘ inspection units. The successof these units will depend in part on inspectors' ability tomake consistent judgements based on agreed standards. This articlereports on a study which examined the extent to which inspectorswere able to reach reliable conclusions about the quality ofcare in old people's homes and the possible contribution ofchecklists in this task.     

EFFECTS OF QUESTIONNAIRE LENGTH, RESPONDENT-FRIENDLY DESIGN, AND A DIFFICULT QUESTION ON RESPONSE RATES FOR OCCUPANT-ADDRESSED CENSUS MAIL SURVEYS

An experimental study of alternatives to the current U.S. decennialcensus questionnaire shows that shortening the questionnaireand respondent-friendly questionnaire design improve response,whereas asking a potentially difficult and/or objectionablequestion, that is, social security number, lowers response.This national study of 17,000 household addresses also demonstratesthat relatively high mail survey response can be achieved withoutaddressing correspondence to individual names of residents.     

Which Children are Registered at Case Conferences?

Correspondence to Terry Fisher, Department of Social Policy and Social Work, University of York, Heslington, York YO1 5DD. Summary A postal questionnaire to social workers was used to describethe characteristics of situations where children were the subjectsof child protection case conferences, to identify factors distinguishingthose registered from those not registered and to describe theaccounts given by social workers of the reasons for registration.The paper reports and analyses this information and raises somebasic issues about the relative importance in registration decisionsof evidence of physical or sexual abuse, characteristics ofthe adults involved, and a child's feelings and emotional state.     

Factors Predicting Admission of Elderly People to Local Authority Residential Care

Correspondence to Dr Ian Sinclair, Director of Research, National Institute for Social Work. Mary Ward House, 5–7 Tavistock Place, London WCIH 955 Summary Successful community care may partly depend on identifying thoseat risk of entering residential homes and targeting servicesto them. This article is concerned with how this identificationcan be achieved. It considers a sample of old people livingalone. in touch with home helps or social workers and followedup for between two and four years. The research examined thefactors likely to produce admission, and used discriminant analysisto predict it.     

Separate worlds: gender and domestic labour in an isolated fishing region

Dans cette communication, les auteurs présentent les données de leur étude des rapports entre le sexe et la division du travail chez les hommes et les femmes mariés de la péninsule Great Northern, une région isolée de Terre-Neuve où l'on vit de la pêche à la périphérie du capitalisme avancé. L'étude visait à déterminer dans quelle mesure la reproduction des ménages est structurée en fonction du sexe en analysant de manière détaillée les travaux domestiques non rémunérés des hommes et des femmes mariés. Les auteurs démontrent que les hommes et les femmes mariés ne participent pas du tout de la même façon à la construction des maisons et à d'autres activités de subsistence des ménages. La responsibilité qu'assument les hommes pour les travaux domestiques demeure à peu près la même, qu'il y ait ou non des enfants à la maison ou que leur femme ait ou non un emploi à l'extérieur du foyer. Contrairement à certaines autres analyses effectuées en milieu rural à Terre-Neuve, cette étude semble indiquer que les changements culturels et économiques plus globaux qui s'opèrent dans la péninsule n'ont pas fondamentalement modifié la division sexuelle du travail typique de l'organisation traditionnelle des ménages. This paper reports our findings on the interconnection of gender and work among married men and women on the Great Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland, an isolated, fishing region dependent on primary production on the periphery of advanced capitalism. We explore the extent to which household reproduction is structured by gender through detailed analysis of the unpaid domestic labour activities of married men and women. We demonstrate that married men and women participate in dramatically different ways in house construction and other household subsistence tasks. We also show that neither the presence of children in the home nor the employment of wives outside the home leads to significant changes in men's responsibility for domestic tasks. In contrast with some other analyses of rural Newfoundland, our research suggests that more macro cultural and economic changes underway in the region have not fundamentally altered the sexual division of labour associated with traditional household organization.     

Political powerlessness and sociodemographic status in Canada*

Fondé sur une analyse secondaire de l'enquête sur l'election nationale (1974), cet article démontre l'association limitée entre l'expérience de l'impuissance et la position socio-démographique. Il offre une explication qui ne désavoue pas l'importance de la situation sociale, mais qui souligne comment le système social fonctionne de façon à produire des aliénations différentes en conformité avec l'expérience sociale de l'individu. Enfin, il discute l'importance, pour le système politique canadien, de la grande proportion des citoyens aliénés, et particulièrement la direction idéologique qu'un tel groupe prendrait s'il était mobilisé. Based on a secondary analysis of the national election survey (1974), this paper shows the limited association between the experience of powerlessness and sociodemographic position. An explanation is offered which does not deny the importance of social position, but stresses how the social system functions to produce different kinds of alienation according to the individual's social experience. Finally, the significance for the Canadian political system of its large proportion of alienated citizens is discussed with particular concern for the ideological direction of such a group if it were mobilized