Making the Connections: Community Capacity for Tobacco Control in an Urban African American Community

Developing community capacity to improve health is a cornerstone of community-based public health. The concept of community capacity reflects numerous facets and dimensions of community life and can have different meanings in different contexts. This paper explores how members of one community identify and interpret key aspects of their community’s capacity to limit the availability and use of tobacco products. Particular attention is given to examining the interrelationship between various dimensions of community capacity in order to better understand the processes by which communities are able to mobilize for social change. The study is based on qualitative analysis of 19 in-depth interviews with key informants representing a variety of community sectors in Harlem, New York City. Findings indicate that the community is viewed as rich in human and social resources. A strong sense of community identity and connectedness underlies this reserve and serves as a catalyst for action. At the time this study was conducted, all authors were at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.     

Maternal distress and women's reentry into family and community life

This paper advances conceptualization of maternal distress following incarceration. We utilized a multiple case study methodology based on interviews with 10 mothers who demonstrated various permutations of "the triple threat" (depression, domestic violence, and substance abuse; Arditti & Few, 2006). Findings suggest that depressive symptomology persisted and worsened for mothers in our study and that maternal distress was indicative not only of women's psychological state, but also a relational and situational construct that embodied women's core experience. Maternal distress was largely characterized by health challenges, dysfunctional intimate relationships, loss related trauma, guilt and worry over children, and economic inadequacy. Further, maternal distress seemed to be intensified by the punitive traumatic context of prison and lessened by rehabilitation opportunities as well as support by kin and probation officers after reentry. Recommendations for clinicians and professionals who work with reentry mothers center around the need to alleviate maternal distress and better address women's emotional and physical health needs during incarceration and reentry.     

The effectiveness of distance learning initiatives in organizations

Today, organizations are increasingly adopting distance learning methods to train and develop their employees. Despite the widespread use of these methods, little research has been done regarding their effectiveness. The present paper reviews current literature on the effectiveness of distance learning methods in terms of employees’ reactions, learning, behavior, and organizational results. Suggestions for future research and practice are also offered.     

Gender,Splitting and Non-Recognition in <Emphasis Type="Italic">Mad Men</Emphasis>

The world of Mad Men is one in which life lived on the surface and repression dominates the scene. A superficial reading seems to suggest that the classically gendered subject-object split characterizes Mad Men: women in the series appear devoid of desire, while men possess power, sexuality and agency. But despite its blatant sexism, Mad Men's rendering has turned traditional 1960s American culture on its head. There is no subject-object split in Mad Men because men do not have access to the subject position; they, as much as women, remain objects to themselves and their partners. In the absence of mutual recognition, serotics ultimately fails.     

Parenting and Anxiety: Bi-directional Relations in Young Children

Developmental psychopathologists have long posited a reciprocal relation between parenting behaviors and the development of child anxiety symptoms. Yet, little empirical research has utilized a longitudinal design that would allow exploration of this bi-directional influence. The present study examined the reciprocal relations between parental respect for autonomy, parental hostility, and parental support, and the development of childhood anxiety during a critical developmental period-the transition from preschool to kindergarten and then first grade. Study participants included a community sample of 391 male and 405 female socioeconomically, racially and ethnically diverse 4 to 6–7 year olds. 54 % of the sample was White, non-Hispanic, 16.8 % was African American, 20.4 % was Hispanic, 2.4 % were Asian and 4.4 % self-identified as Other or mixed race. Parent report and observational methodology were used. Parenting and anxiety were found to interact reciprocally over time. Higher levels of age 4 anxiety led to reduced respect for child autonomy at age 5. At age 4 higher levels of parental hostility led to small increases in age 5 anxiety, and increased age 5 anxiety led to increased levels of age 6 parent hostility. Parental support at age 5 resulted in decreased anxiety symptoms at age 6–7 while higher age 5 anxiety levels were associated with reductions in age 6–7 parental support. No relations were found between these variables at the younger ages. Although the magnitude of these findings was small, they suggest that early treatment for childhood anxiety should include both parent intervention and direct treatment of the child’s anxiety symptoms.     

Unable to be a Human Being in Front of Other People: A Qualitative Study of Self-Isolation Among People Living with HIV/AIDS in China

In China, acute stigma accompanying an HIV diagnosis can lead to self-isolation. In a cultural setting where family relationships are highly valued and contribute critically to well-being, such self-isolation can thwart HIV self-management and engagement in medical care, and so heighten risk for health disparities. To understand this phenomenon, we conducted individual in-depth interviews with 34 persons living with HIV/AIDS (PLwHA) in Shanghai and Beijing. Inductive content analysis revealed a range of forms of self-isolation motivation, beliefs, and behaviors influenced by: 1) internalized stigma and desire to avoid discrimination; 2) HIV-related factors such as HIV knowledge and disease progression; and 3) familial factors such as a sense of responsibility and family members’ reactions. Based on a proposed framework centering on dialectical family influences (whereby PLwHA are pushed away from, yet pulled toward the family fold), implications for provision of multidisciplinary care in medical settings are considered, including culturally appropriate strategies to decrease health disparities.     

An Examination of Satisfaction With My Supervisor and Organizational Commitment

This paper reports an examination of the relationship between satisfaction with one's supervisor and organizational commitment type based on data collected from nonmanagerial employees. The results show that moral and alienative forms of commitment were related to employees' satisfaction with their supervisors and that calculative commitment was not related. Supervisor behaviors related to moral commitment include consistency of behavior toward subordinates, showing concern for career progress, backing up employees with other managers, and employees' satisfaction with the supervisor's technical competence. Supervisor behaviors related to alienative commitment include the way one's supervisor treats an individual when he or she makes a mistake, the way the supervisor shows concern for one's career progress, and the way one's job responsibilities are defined.     

How does reading direction modulate perceptual asymmetry effects?

Left-side bias effects refer to a bias towards the left side of the stimulus/space in perceptual/visuospatial judgments, and are argued to reflect dominance of right hemisphere processing. It remains unclear whether reading direction can also account for the bias effect. Previous studies comparing readers of languages read from left to right with those read from right to left (e.g., French vs. Hebrew) have obtained inconsistent results. As a language that can be read from left to right or from right to left, Chinese provides a unique opportunity for a within-culture examination of reading direction effects. Chinese participants performed a perceptual judgment task (with both face and Chinese character stimuli; Experiment 1) and two visuospatial attention tasks (the greyscales and line bisection tasks; Experiment 2) once before and once after a reading task, in which they read Chinese passages either from left to right or from right to left for about 20 min. After reading from right to left, participants showed significantly reduced left-side bias in Chinese character perceptual judgments but not in the other three tasks. This effect suggests that the role of reading direction on different forms of left-side bias may differ, and its modulation may be stimulus-specific.     

Examining the impact of gender on the factor structure of the Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Revised

Research on the factor structure of psychopathy has yielded mixed results, supporting anywhere from one to three factors. Additionally, most of this research has used all-male samples, and the possibility of structural invariance across gender has not been examined. Using a mixed-gender sample of 360 undergraduates, the factor structure of the Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Revised was examined using confirmatory factor analysis and multiple group analysis. One-, two-, and three-factor models were tested and compared with each other. When males and females were combined, none of the three models provided adequate fit to the data. Multiple group analyses revealed partial invariance across gender for all three models. Model comparison criteria supported use of both the one- and two-factor models, taking into account variable factor structure across gender. The importance of considering structural differences based on biological sex when assessing psychopathic traits is discussed.     

Comparing standardized coefficients in structural equation modeling: a model reparameterization approach

We propose a two-stage method for comparing standardized coefficients in structural equation modeling (SEM). At stage 1, we transform the original model of interest into the standardized model by model reparameterization, so that the model parameters appearing in the standardized model are equivalent to the standardized parameters of the original model. At stage 2, we impose appropriate linear equality constraints on the standardized model and use a likelihood ratio test to make statistical inferences about the equality of standardized coefficients. Unlike other existing methods for comparing standardized coefficients, the proposed method does not require specific modeling features (e.g., specification of nonlinear constraints), which are available only in certain SEM software programs. Moreover, this method allows researchers to compare two or more standardized coefficients simultaneously in a standard and convenient way. Three real examples are given to illustrate the proposed method, using EQS, a popular SEM software program. Results show that the proposed method performs satisfactorily for testing the equality of standardized coefficients.