Predictors of Living in Precarious Housing Among Immigrants Accessing Housing Support Services

The purpose of this study was to identify factors that explain immigrant housing vulnerability, thereby contributing to the growth of a more substantial knowledge base on the intersection between immigration, housing and homelessness. Administrative data on housing support service recipients (n?=?4168) in Alberta, Canada, were analysed to determine the varied demographic, socio-economic and health-related factors that contribute to living in a precarious housing situation (such as homelessness, couch surfing, staying with friends or family etc.). Logistic regression analysis shows that being an immigrant is a protective factor from living in a precarious housing situation. For the immigrant subsample (n?=?525), logistic regression analysis demonstrates that living in a larger city, having a mental illness and being married were protective factors from living in a precarious housing situation. However, having an addiction and being precariously employed (such as only working part-time, having temporary employment or being unemployed) were risk factors for living in a precarious housing situation. Shared and distinctive vulnerabilities among the immigrant subsample and the full study sample are discussed, along with implications for specific policy and programmes that aim to address the housing needs of immigrants.     

Visual Signal Detection Measured by Event-Related Potentials

Signal Detection tasks typically involve within-subject signal changes. Such a procedure does not lend itself to event-related potential (ERP) experiments where the need for averaging necessitates the maintenance of consistent stimulus parameters. In the present ERP study we adopt a novel approach to thresholding that allows within-subject signal manipulation. The Signal Detection task required the identification of letter targets, formed from dots, in a random dot field. ERP waveforms were segmented into three windows corresponding to N1, N2, and P300 components. Analysis shows that ERP variations are dependent on both task demands and response characteristics for N1, N2, and P300 components.     

Evaluation apprehension,hypothesis awareness,and the weapons effect

The present study was designed to extend Turner and Simons' (1974) investigation of possible experimental artifacts in aggression research. Employing a 2 × 2 × 2 factorial design, 60 male subjects were given either a low or high evaluation apprehension treatment, and then were either exposed or not exposed to weapons in an otherwise close replication of the seven shock-unassociated weapons condition of Berkowitz and LePage (1967). Based on an objectively worded postexperimental questionnaire, subjects were classified as being aware or not aware that the procedures were designed to make them give more shock to their partners. The findings, which were consistent with the analysis of Berkowitz (1974) and Turner and Simons (1974), indicated that the weapons-no weapons comparison was significant only for non-apprehensive, nonaware subjects. The results were interpreted as suggesting that evaluation apprehension, hypothesis awareness, and sophistication in aggression experiments may produce inhibitions which can modify the effects of experimental manipulations.     

When are we better than them and they worse than us? A closer look at social discrimination in positive and negative domains

This article argues that in-group favoritism occurs on positive and negative dimensions only when the dimensions of comparison provide an appropriate and meaningful basis for self-other definition, that is, when traits comparatively and normatively fit in-group-out-group categorizations. Three studies are reported in which groups were evaluated on positive or negative traits that varied in their degree of normative fit to in-group and out-group identity. In line with predictions, fit rather than stimulus valence was the crucial determinant of (a) in-group favoritism and (b) absolute level of differentiation between groups. Implications of the findings for explanations of positive-negative asymmetry and broader understandings of intergroup discrimination are discussed.     

Distinctiveness and the salience of social category memberships: Is there an automatic perceptual bias towards novelty?

It was hypothesized that the effects of novelty on social category membership salience may be mediated by perceivers' current tasks, rather than by an automatic perceptual bias (Taylor and Fiske, 1978). Subjects viewed tape-slide portrayals of mixed-sex groups (1 male—5 females, 2M—4F, 3M—3F, 4M—2F, 5M—1F) under ‘individual’ (focus on one target person) or ‘collective’ (focus on entire stimulus group) task conditions. Results on measures of sex stereotyping strongly supported the hypothesis, indicating that ‘individual’ task subjects tended to maximize stereotyping in the 1M—5F and 5M—1F conditions whilst ‘collective’ subjects did so in the 3M-3F condition. It is concluded that novel category memberships are not automatically prepotent in social perception, and the results are discussed in the context of a functional approach to the salience problem.     

ENCOUNTER WITH NEUROBIOLOGY: THE RESPONSE OF RITUAL STUDIES

Abstract. Knowledge of the working of the brain is of prime importance to anthropologists studying ritual and symbol. The play between the neocortical hemispheres can be inferred from the varying styles at different stages of ritual: one can begin to hypothesize archetypes for general processes such as self-healing social dramas that are at the roots of ritual: the concept of preparedness as a genetic endowment residing in the brain appears to confirm the fundamental importance of image making; while the shamanic skills of inhibition and disinhibition, releasing latent religious powers, can be grasped for what they are.