The social adaptation of multiple sclerosis patients 1

According to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (Puzzachera, 2013), there were approximately 1.47 million arrests of juveniles in the United States reported in 2011, including 68,150 serious violent crimes and 190,000 simple assaults. These data demonstrate that violent crimes are a significant national issue. Past studies have indicated that court-involved and delinquent adolescents frequently report a history of trauma symptoms and exposure to violence. The goal of this article is to present a framework for practice with court-involved youth that reflects the intersection of literature on adolescent development, trauma, and court-involved youth. Improving our understanding of the influence that trauma has on court-involved adolescents will support our ability to better understand the needs of this population in terms of treatment and crime prevention. This article presents a trauma-specific context for addressing the needs of court-involved youth from developmental, neurobiological, and trauma informed perspectives. One of the central components of this article is the inclusion of the TARGET model, a research-informed exemplar for the treatment of adjudicated adolescents who have histories of trauma. A review of the literature is followed by the presentation of a case composite vignette that exemplifies the need for a trauma-informed approach to working with court-involved adolescents.     

Parenting Assessment in a Psychiatric Mother and Baby Unit

Correspondence to Dr Gertrude Seneviratne, Section of Perinatal Psychiatry, Division of Psychological Medicine, Institute of Psychiatry, De Crespigny Park, London SE5 8AF, UK. E-mail: G.Seneviratne{at}iop.kcl.ac.uk Summary Courts and social services often seek the advice of mental healthprofessionals in deciding whether a mentally ill mother shouldremain the primary carer of her infant. This paper describesthe referral pathways, outcomes at discharge and subsequently,of a sample of mothers referred for parenting assessments toa psychiatric Mother and Baby Unit. A further aim was to examinefactors predicting outcome. A casenote study of sixty-one consecutivereferrals for in-patient parenting assessment over a six-yearperiod is described. Social Services were contacted to establishdevelopments at least nine months after discharge. Fewer thanhalf of the mothers were discharged together with their babiesat the end of the assessment period, and at follow-up, lessthan a third were still caring for their children. Diagnosisof the mother's illness was the main factor determining whethershe continued to care for her child both at discharge and atfollow-up; mothers with depression were more likely to remainprimary carers. Variations in the timing and process of referralsrelated to a lack of antenatal planning were associated withincreased rates of separation of mother and infant before theassessment. The findings illustrate the need for more integratedco-ordination between professionals in mental health and children'sservices to ensure early planning for mothers and infants atrisk.     

Fear of Criminal Victimization: The Effect of Neighborhood Racial Composition

This analysis extends previous research on fear of crime by focusing on neighborhood racial composition as a salient predictor of fear of criminal victimization. Although its main effect was not strongly associated with fear, a multiplicative interaction term for neighborhood racial composition by race (WRAC) suggests that whites living in mostly black neighborhoods are the most fearful. Only sex and size of community were stronger predictors of fear. A parsimonious model including the variables sex, age, community size, and the interaction term WRAC is found to explain twenty-six percent of the variance in fear for personal safety on neighborhood streets at night.     

Bridging,bonding and linking global entrepreneurs: the case of Sri Lanka

The purpose of this study is to understand the dynamics and the nature of successful international business relationships between Sri Lankan small business (SB) entrepreneurs and Sri Lankan emigrants in other countries. Using social capital and social network theory framework, this phenomenological study found the nature and underlying values of business relationships that glue Sri Lankan SB entrepreneurs and their emigrant counterparts. ‘Family-like relationships’ and embedded values lead to developing trusting partnerships that became the sources of augmenting knowledge, resources and internationalization of Sri Lankan SBs. The findings will be useful for international human resource development (IHRD) practitioners to develop training interventions to promote SB internationalization. The implications for IHRD practice and research are discussed. It is important for IHRD scholars to conduct in-depth qualitative research to gain a deeper understanding of hidden values and practices of various SB communities whereas practitioners can initiate actions to develop global SBs.     

Ranking policy options for sustainable development

Sustainable development calls for choices among alternative policy options. It is a common view that such choices can be justified by appealing to an evaluative ranking of the options with respect to how their consequences affect a broad range of prudential and moral values. Three philosophically motivated proposals for analysing evaluative rankings are discussed: the measured merits model (e.g. Chang), the ordered values model (e.g. Griffin), and the permissible preference orderings model (Rabinowicz). The analysis focuses on the models’ potential for making transparent how an evaluative ranking can contribute to a justified choice among options, particularly in situations that involve diverse values as typically found in debates on sustainable development. Such transparency plays a crucial role when policy rankings are going to be used as arguments in political decision processes. The measured merits model is found to have questionable consequences for the concept of sustainability, while the ordered values model calls for an axiological framework that cannot plausibly be spelled out for sustainability. The permissible preference orderings model is more promising. Its formal structure and its ability to deal with value-pluralism provide an interesting re-structuring of the problem of justifying choices in sustainability issues.     

"Take Me Along"-A Marital Syndrome

The work-identity-marriage relationship for females and males is examined. Physicians and their wives illustrate some of the patterns of a "take me along" marital syndrome involving contingent identity for the females. Implications are discussed.