Does it get better? LGBTQ social work students and experiences with harmful discourse

Although the field of social work is grounded in social justice, the social work educational experience, including classrooms, may not live up to this value, especially for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) students. Using a qualitative phenomenological approach, this study examined the experiences of harmful discourse in social work classrooms for LGBTQ students. Findings indicate that students experienced being misgendered, tokenized, and erased through cis-/heteronormative language and classroom teachings. Although social work is guided by frameworks of social justice, microaggressions and discrimination may be vaguely glossed over, if addressed at all. This study highlights the gap between the values social work teaches and how social work education is delivered.     

Data Dependent Cells Chi‐Square Test With Recurrent Events

We consider a recurrent event wherein the inter‐event times are independent and identically distributed with a common absolutely continuous distribution function F. In this article, interest is in the problem of testing the null hypothesis that F belongs to some parametric family where the q‐dimensional parameter is unknown. We propose a general Chi‐squared test in which cell boundaries are data dependent. An estimator of the parameter obtained by minimizing a quadratic form resulting from a properly scaled vector of differences between Observed and Expected frequencies is used to construct the test. This estimator is known as the minimum chi‐square estimator. Large sample properties of the proposed test statistic are established using empirical processes tools. A simulation study is conducted to assess the performance of the test under parameter misspecification, and our procedures are applied to a fleet of Boeing 720 jet planes' air conditioning system failures.     

Depressive symptoms of caregiving women in midlife: the role of physical health

This research examined the relationships between providing assistance to aging family members, caregivers' age, caregivers' perceptions of their physical health, and caregivers' depressive symptoms. Several alternative hypotheses were examined. Longitudinal data from 1,898 women from the 1992 and 2000 waves of the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) were used. Results indicate a reciprocal relationship between depression and physical health. These processes were examined using a path analysis. Although the evidence only supported one of the hypotheses, this study clearly demonstrated the importance of physical health for the psychological well-being of women in midlife.     

The Online Poker Sub-Culture: Dialogues, Interactions and Networks

This paper examines the distinct world of online poker. It outlines the online poker eco-system, and the players which inhabit it, their distinctive attitudes and behaviors towards the game and gambling. These unique patterns of behavior have been created and sustained by the interaction of players within online poker forums. Therefore online poker forums were identified as primary mechanism within which a poker sub-culture may exist. The study conducted an extensive netnography of online poker forums. The study found that within the online poker eco-system there are forums which are elevated to sacred status amongst this online poker sub-culture. The members of these forums enact sub-cultural characteristics such as ethos of collaboration/cooperation, and a competitive hierarchy of status. In particular this paper identifies the importance of identity generation, and communities within the online poker eco-system.     

Braving Human Suffering: Death Education and its Relationship to Empathy and Mindfulness

Social workers are likely to encounter clients dealing with traumatic grief and death in their practice. Though death education has gained in popularity and acceptance, few social work students receive coursework in this area and many are unprepared to deal with their clients' and their own emotions regarding death and grief. Though death-related content may evoke provider avoidance, mindfulness and empathy may help regulate provider emotions and responses. This United States-based study evaluates the effectiveness of experiential death education on mindfulness and empathy. Measures in three separate cohorts were given at the beginning and end of the course. Results show statistically significant increases on the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire and the Questionnaire of Cognitive and Affective Empathy, indicating that such a course may be effective in increasing both mindfulness and empathy in social work students and those in related fields.     

Patterns of practice: An exploratory factor analysis of child and family social worker skills

There is relatively little research on the communication skills that social workers use in direct practice with families. This study explores patterns of practice skill found in child and family social work home visits. The study analysed 127 practice interactions in family homes, coding for seven dimensions of worker skill using a coding framework drawn from motivational interviewing. Exploratory factor analysis was employed to establish patterns of skill within the data and to group key dimensions of skill. The findings make two contributions. First, three fundamental dimensions of good practice emerged, which we characterize as care and engagement, good authority, and support for behaviour change. Second, in exploring the relationship between “care” and “control” elements of social work, skilled social workers were able to combine good authority and empathic engagement, whereas those who were less skilled in use of authority were also less good at engagement. This contributes to debates about care and control in social work. The usefulness of these dimensions for conceptualizing practice in child and family social work is discussed and directions for further research are suggested.     

Reconstituting racial histories and identities: the narratives of interracial couples

This study explores the process by which interracial spouses construct narratives about their racial histories, identities, and experiences in their relationship together. Ten black-white couples were interviewed individually and conjointly. The results reflected interracial spouses' experience of their life together, their perception of others' perceptions of them, and their unique processes of negotiating racial, gender, and class differences. Black spouses, compared with white spouses, demonstrated a greater awareness of and sensitivity to social resistance to interracial couples, and black spouses' familial and personal histories were sometimes relegated to silence in the couple relationship. I discuss recommendations for marriage and family therapists working with interracial spouses.