On the unavoidability of power in child-rearing: Is the language of rights educationally appropriate?

I am indebted to Graham Haydon for his help with the correct English wording of my thoughts.     

Subgroups of autistic children based on social behavior display distinct patterns of brain activity

Two questions were addressed in the present study: (1) Do autistic and normally developing children exhibit regionally specific differences in electroencephalographic (EEG) activity? (2) Do subgroups of autistic children classified according to Wing and Gould's (1979) system which emphasizes degree of social impairment exhibit distinct patterns of EEG activity? Twenty-eight children with autism (5 to 18 years of age) and two groups of normally developing children (one matched on chronological age and the other on receptive language level) participated. EEG was recorded from left and right frontal, temporal, and parietal regions during an alert baseline condition. Compared to normally developing children, autistic children exhibited reduced EEG power in the frontal and temporal regions, but not in the parietal region. Differences were more prominent in the left than the right hemisphere. Furthermore, subgroups of autistic children based on Wing and Gould's system displayed distinct patterns of brain activity. Compared to autistic children classified as “active-but-odd,” “passive” autistic children displayed reduced alpha EEG power in the frontal region.     

Gender and patterns of sexual risk taking in college students

The role that gender plays in influencing the prevalence and patterns of sexual risk taking was examined in 245 college students from two samples (about 60% of whom were White, 20% Asian, 10% Black, and 6% Hispanic). The sexual experiences of these students were analyzed for potential risk associated with type of partners or sexual practices. Consistent with previous findings, males engaged in more risk taking behaviors relevant to partner choice (e.g., more partners and more casual knowledge of partners) and sexual practices (e.g., lower levels of contraceptive use) than females. Gender differences in patterns of risk taking were also found: For females, potentially risky behavior in the partner domain was negatively related to risky behavior in the sexual practice domain, whereas for males, the domains were positively related. The results suggested that males engaged in greater risk taking across many domains, while females compensate for risk in one domain by lower risk in another.     

Counselling in the enterprise culture

The way in which therapeutic models and language have been dravm upon to provide support for concepts of human flexibility and 'human resource development' in the enterprise culture ofthe 1980s and 1990s is described. The use ofhumane managerial rhetoric to mask the practice of increasingly ruthless public and private-sector organisations, and the dilemmas posedfor counsellors operating within these kinds of institutional settings, are examined.     

Assessment of Supervisee Developmental Level and Supervision Environment Across Supervisor Experience

Supervisors representing different levels of experience viewed videotape vignettes of counselors demonstrating the first three developmental levels of Stoltenberg's (1981) Counselor Complexity Model. Supervisors assessed each counselor on his or her developmental level and on the supervision environment he or she would provide for the trainee. Results indicated that supervisor experience did not influence the assessment of developmental level or the ability to make accurate environmental matches. Nevertheless, supervisors had the most difficulty accurately assessing counselors representing Level 2 in Stoltenberg's model and tended to make relative judgments about counselor developmental level. Implications for training and further research are discussed.     

Frame multiplicity and policy fiascoes: Limits to explanation

The dynamics of intractability, frame multiplicity and intense controversy not only characterize policy formation struggles, as described by Schön and Rein, but also affect the evaluation of policies and government action. Policy analysts play an important part in the politics of policy evaluation. This article demonstrates that they tend to produce very different explanations for controversial, failing policies. Such differing explanations imply different causal attributions, different allocations of blame, and different lessons for future policy-making. Such differences are not random occurrences; they are embedded in the analytical frames that evaluators use to reconstruct policy processes and to explain their outcomes. It is shown that at least three deep-rooted frames can be reconstructed: fiascoes as failures of public problem solving, fiascoes as institutional imbalances, and fiascoes as system artefacts. One of the great epistemological challenges is how to deal with multiple analytical frames. The final part of the article discusses various strategies.