Mixed Picture of Readiness for Adoption of Evidence-Based Prevention Programs in Communities: Exploratory Surveys of State Program Delivery Systems

An emerging literature highlights the potential for broader dissemination of evidence‐based prevention programs in communities through existing state systems, such as the land grant university Extension outreach system and departments of public education and health (DOE–DPH). This exploratory study entailed surveying representatives of the national Extension system and DOE–DPH, to evaluate dissemination readiness factors, as part of a larger project on an evidence‐based program delivery model called PROSPER. In addition to assessing systems’ readiness factors, differences among US regions and comparative levels of readiness between state systems were evaluated. The Extension web‐based survey sample N was 958 and the DOE–DPH telephone survey N was 338, with response rates of 23 and 79 %, respectively. Extension survey results suggested only a moderate level of overall readiness nationally, with relatively higher perceived need for collaborative efforts and relatively lower perceived resource availability. There were significant regional differences on all factors, generally favoring the Northeast. Results from DOE–DPH surveys showed significantly higher levels for all readiness factors, compared with Extension systems. Overall, the findings present a mixed picture. Although there were clear challenges related to measuring readiness in complex systems, addressing currently limited dissemination resources, and devising strategies for optimizing readiness, all systems showed some readiness‐related strengths.     

Old Testament and Church Ministries in Two Ecumenical Dialogues

Abstract: To understand any church institution as founded by Jesus, one must take account of its relationship to his work of bringing the Old Testament revelation and its institutions to their eschatological realization. A sample of the work of recent ecumenical dialogues (BEM and the international Lutheran– Roman Catholic document on church and justification) shows that their discussions of church institutions have failed to do this adequately. This failure has complicated the efforts at unity to which these dialogues intend to contribute. Attention to the Old Testament roots of church institutions can help ecumenical ecclesiology to focus better on some important issues.     

Movement and attention in visual working memory

Three experiments that adopt an interference technique to investigate the involvement of movement in the production of a spatial code are described. Arm movements rather than the more commonly employed eye movements are used to provide initial information about the sorts of movements relevant to the code and to allow an empirical separation of the contributions of movement and attention. The results confirm the interference effects of incompatible movement on the generation of the spatial code and show that movement per se rather than attention to the movement can cause a performance decrement.     

Can Pragmatists be Institutionalists? John Dewey Joins the Non-ideal/Ideal Theory Debate

During the 1960s and 1970s, institutionalists and behavioralists in the discipline of political science argued over the legitimacy of the institutional approach to political inquiry. In the discipline of philosophy, a similar debate concerning institutions has never taken place. Yet, a growing number of philosophers are now working out the institutional implications of political ideas in what has become known as “non-ideal theory.” My thesis is two-fold: (1) pragmatism and institutionalism are compatible and (2) non-ideal theorists, following the example of pragmatists, can avoid a similar debate as took place between institutionalists and behavioralists by divulging their assumptions about institutions.