Trading Sex for Money or Compensation: Prevalence and Associated Characteristics from a Sexually Transmitted Infection (STI) Clinic Sample

The purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence and individual risk factors of people who trade or sell sex among sexually active individuals seeking HIV and sexually transmitted infection (STI) testing. Using electronic agency records, an analysis of the characteristics of 5,029 youth and adults who voluntarily obtained HIV and STI testing was conducted. Multiple imputation procedures for missing data from 3 variables and logistic regression were conducted. A total of 128 individuals reported having traded sex. Nine variables had statistically significant associations with trading sex. Individuals who identified as White and female had lesser odds of trading sex, whereas individuals who were transgender, were living in a shelter, had been sexually assaulted, had a previous STI, had high-risk sex, or used drugs had greater odds of trading sex. Elevated levels of high-risk behavior in addition to sexual trauma should be considered in intervention research and community health practice. Implications for service providers and researchers are discussed.     

Between Opportunity and Constraint: Understanding the Onward Migration of Highly Educated Iranian Refugees from Sweden

In the 1980s and early 1990s, more than 50,000 Iranian refugees moved to Sweden. The Swedish state attended to their immediate needs, providing housing, language training, and other types of support. Moreover, these migrants had almost immediate access to all the benefits of the Swedish welfare state including affordable healthcare, unemployment insurance, and free education up to and including the tertiary level. Despite the opportunities available to them in Sweden, many Iranian refugees have faced challenges, especially when trying to secure meaningful work. One of the strategies they have used to overcome barriers to entering the labor market is to leave Sweden for onward destinations which are seen as having relatively more to offer. This study explores the onward migration of Iranians from Sweden by way of a two-step mixed methods approach: in the first step, population register data is used to determine how onward migrants differ from those Iranians who stay in Sweden. In the second step, information from life history interviews conducted with onward migrants in London and Toronto is used to understand what motivates individuals to leave Sweden. Overall, the study finds that highly educated Iranians who have struggled to find employment in Sweden are the most likely to move on. Their precise motivations for doing so, however, are nuanced and complex and relate to more than just economic factors.     

Profiles of Resilience and Psychosocial Outcomes among Young Black Gay and Bisexual Men

Young Black gay/bisexual men (YBGBM) are affected by contextual stressors—namely syndemic conditions and minority stress—that threaten their health and well‐being. Resilience is a process through which YBGBM achieve positive psychosocial outcomes in the face of adverse conditions. Self‐efficacy, hardiness and adaptive coping, and social support may be important resilience factors for YBGBM. This study explores different profiles of these resilience factors in 228 YBGBM in New York City and compares profiles on psychological distress, mental health, and other psychosocial factors. Four profiles of resilience were identified: (a) Low self‐efficacy and hardiness/adaptive coping (23.5%); (b) Low peer and parental support (21.2%); (c) High peer support, low father support (34.5%); and (d) High father and mother support, self‐efficacy, and hardiness/adaptive coping (20.8%). YBGBM in profile 1 scored markedly higher on distress (d = .74) and lower on mental health functioning (d = .93) compared to men in the other profiles. Results suggest that self‐efficacy and hardiness/adaptive coping may play a more important role in protecting YBGBM from risks compared to social support and should be targeted in interventions. The findings show that resilience is a multidimensional construct and support the notion that there are different patterns of resilience among YBGBM.     

Sensitizing Potential Jurors to Variations in Eyewitness Evidence Quality Using Counterfactual Thinking

Jurors often have difficulty evaluating eyewitness testimony. Counterfactual thinking is a type of mental simulation that informs causal inference. Encouraging jurors to think counterfactually about eyewitness factors may sensitize them to these factors' causal influence on eyewitness identification and testimony accuracy, improving their overall judgments (such as verdicts). One hundred twenty‐one undergraduate participants were randomly assigned to read a scenario containing either high‐quality or low‐quality eyewitness evidence and to evaluate eyewitness factors adopting either their default or a counterfactual mindset via a question‐order manipulation. Logistic regressions and analyses of variance revealed that a counterfactual mindset lowered perceptions of eyewitness accuracy and guilty verdicts (compared with the default mindset) when the evidence was poor; a counterfactual mindset, however, did not increase perceptions of accuracy and guilty verdicts when evidence was strong. We discuss possible mechanisms underlying these effects and identify several potential avenues for future research.Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Biopsychosocial Influences That Promote and Impede Social Brain Maturation

ABSTRACT

Social, emotional, and executive function systems of the brain change greatly during adolescence as the result of biopsychosocial influences. These factors alter the course of adolescent behavior through effects on the component processes of social behavior. Specifically, the influences of chronic stress, social and economic adversity, alcohol and drugs, and brain injury as well as parental buffering and support, increased neural connectivity and mentalizing resources, and enriched environments can impede or promote maturation of the social and executive brain networks that regulate social adjustment and emotional expression. Hence, there are many early “windows of opportunity” to affect the biological and neurocognitive foundations of adolescent social executive functions such as empathy, theory of mind, self-monitoring, and social emotions.     

The female advantage: sex as a possible protective factor against emotion recognition impairment following traumatic brain injury

Although moderate to severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) leads to facial affect recognition impairments in up to 39% of individuals, protective and risk factors for these deficits are unknown. The aim of the current study was to examine the effect of sex on emotion recognition abilities following TBI. We administered two separate emotion recognition tests (one static and one dynamic) to 53 individuals with moderate to severe TBI (females = 28) and 49 demographically matched comparisons (females = 22). We then investigated the presence of a sex-by-group interaction in emotion recognition accuracy. In the comparison group, there were no sex differences. In the TBI group, however, females significantly outperformed males in the dynamic (but not the static) task. Moreover, males (but not females) with TBI performed significantly worse than comparison participants in the dynamic task. Further analysis revealed that sex differences in emotion recognition abilities within the TBI group could not be explained by lesion location, TBI severity, or other neuropsychological variables. These findings suggest that sex may serve as a protective factor for social impairment following TBI and inform clinicians working with TBI as well as research on the neurophysiological correlates of sex differences in social functioning.     

Momentum in Child Compliance and Opposition

Several event-dependent properties of child-mother interactions were studied to investigate momentum in child oppositional and compliant behavior. It was hypothesized that: (a) compared to an episode of child opposition, an episode of child compliance would be related to an increased likelihood of subsequent child compliance, and (b) the association between a target episode of child opposition and the likelihood of subsequent compliance or opposition would be mediated by the history of the dyadic interaction. These hypotheses were supported. In addition, the presence of interactional sequences predictive of child compliance was inversely related to mother dysphoria and unrelated to mother-reported child externalizing behavior disorder symptoms. Discussion focuses on antecedent interactional patterns as determinants of future child behavior.