Social Capital and Somali Families in Australia

This paper focuses on the hopes that Somalis who came to Melbourne as refugees have for their children’s education. It analyses their perceptions of the Somali and Australian education systems and the implications of these for their family’s ability to adapt and cope with Australian life. In doing so, it also shows how they use education to reconstruct their world as part of resettlement in Australia. This paper argues that specific programmes and activities that bring parents and teachers together around their child’s education can build bridging social capital, contributes to optimism about the future and sets the stage for positive agency at a time when Somali families are coping with trauma, loss and disconnection in an unfamiliar society.     

Gender Identity Predicts Autobiographical Memory Phenomenology

Gender differences emerge regularly in autobiographical memory research. We suggest that gender differences in phenomenological self‐report measures of autobiographical memory are rooted in gender identity rather than categorical gender. Reminiscing about the past is perceived as a female‐typical activity, and therefore, gender‐typical individuals will conform to these stereotypes. In this study, 196 participants, age 18–40, each rated the phenomenology of four event memories. Ratings of feminine gender identity, also completed by participants, consistently correlated with MEQ scores, indicating that greater endorsement of feminine gender norms predicted higher memory quality and valence. Masculine gender identity also correlated with MEQ scores, but these correlations were less consistent. Findings suggest that a focus on gender identity can both explain the source of some gender differences in autobiographical memory and potentially explain some inconsistencies in the current literature.Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Engaging university casual tutors in collaborative reflection for improving student learning outcomes

There is a growing trend in universities to rely on casual tutors to fill the shortfall in permanent teaching staff. However, casual tutors often feel marginalised and excluded from having a voice in designing unit improvements. This research analyses five casual tutors’ perspectives on their teaching, learning, and assessing role. Data were gathered through reflective processes and semi-structured interviews. The research project and findings provide a collaborative model for capturing their input and feedback at critical points in the unit delivery and marking process. The results identify tutors’ insights, concerns, and underlying principles informing their roles. This investigation highlights the importance of listening to casual tutors’ voices. Their views can inform new ways of looking at issues, leading to enhanced student learning and progressing quality teaching.     

Enhancing the Behavioral and Mental Health Services Within School-Based Contexts

ABSTRACT

Recent health care reform provides many new opportunities to expand mental health and behavioral support to students in schools and school–community partnerships. Through newly available funding sources, as well as expanded legislative initiatives, school psychologists can advocate for and become leaders in delivering universal programming, tiered mental health supports, and formalized collaborative efforts with community agencies. The authors highlight the application of tiered levels of services, with current practice samples, designed to address students' mental and behavioral health. Implications for practice are discussed.     

The recollective qualities of adolescents’ and adults’ narratives about a long-ago tornado

The recollective qualities of autobiographical memory are thought to develop over the course of the first two decades of life. We used a 9-year follow-up test of recall of a devastating tornado and of non-tornado-related events from before and after the storm, to compare the recollective qualities of adolescents’ (n?=?20, ages 11 years, 11 months to 20 years, 8 months) and adults’ (n?=?14) autobiographical memories. At the time of the tornado, half of the adolescents had been younger than age 6. Nine years after the event, all participants provided evidence that they recall the event of the tornado. Adults also had high levels of recall of the non-tornado-related events. Adolescents recalled proportionally fewer non-tornado-related events; adolescents younger than 6 at the time of the events recalled the fewest non-tornado-related events. Relative to adolescents, adults produced longer narratives. With narrative length controlled, there were few differences in the recollective qualities of adolescents’ and adults’ narrative reports, especially in the case of the tornado; the recollective qualities were stronger among adolescents older at the time of the events. Overall, participants in both age groups provided evidence of the qualities of recollection that are characteristic of autobiographical memory.     

Memories of positive and negative emotional events

Women's memories of emotional events differing by both valence and intensity were examined for differences in narrative content and structure, as well as subjective memory ratings. Emotional valence was related to the content of the women's narratives, and emotional intensity was related to the subjective ratings of the memories. Negative narratives contained more negative emotion, cognitive processing words, and passive sentences than positive narratives, and positive narratives contained more positive emotion words and were more complex than negative narratives. Intensely negative narratives were the longest and the least complex, and intensely positive narratives were the most coherent. Women rated both intensely negative and intensely positive events, in general, as more frequently talked/thought about, significant, unique, emotional, and vivid than moderately emotional events, and negative events were rated as more emotional than positive narratives. There was little relation between the objective content of the narratives and the women's subjective ratings of their memory experiences. Finally, researcher‐defined traumatic events did not differ from other intensely negative events. The results of this study have important implications for narrative research in general, methodological issues such as the validity of text analysis programs and subjective memory ratings, and the quality of traumatic memories. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Great man or great myth? A quantitative review of the relationship between individual differences and leader effectiveness

This study presents a meta‐analysis of 25 individual differences proposed to be related to effective leadership, with an emphasis on comparing trait‐like (e.g. personality and intelligence) to state‐like individual differences (e.g. knowledge and skills). The results indicate that although both trait‐like (achievement motivation, energy, dominance, honesty/integrity, self‐confidence, creativity, and charisma) and state‐like (interpersonal skills, oral communication, written communication, administrative/management skills, problem‐solving skills, and decision making) individual differences were consistent predictors of effective leadership, the impact of trait‐like and state‐like individual differences was modest overall and did not differ substantially (ρ= .27 and .26, respectively). Finally, organizational level of the leader, method of predictor and criterion measurement, and organization type moderated the relationship between individual differences and effective leadership.     

The relationship between basic need satisfaction and emotional eating in obesity

Emotional eating has been identified as a factor that promotes the development and maintenance of obesity and hinders its treatment. This study investigated the relationship between unsatisfied basic needs and emotional eating, including the mediating factors of self‐esteem and coping strategies. The results from a survey of 136 obese individuals indicated support for a significant relationship between basic need satisfaction and emotional eating, with a mediating effect of negative coping strategies. These findings extend previous research and provide guidance on how to help individuals who engage in emotional eating by focusing on developing more adaptive coping strategies.